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Comment by gms | Hacker News Reader

I think one of the major causes of this, although not mentioned in the article, is the institutionalised culture of having to arrive at the office at a certain time early in the morning, then having to spend the next 8-9 hour block trapped in it.

With such an inflexible regime, all it takes is one night of going to bed late (real life can disrupt even the most disciplined schedules) and you're doomed to exhaustion for the rest of the week. Let alone the fact that people aren't clones of one another; not everyone has the same sleep patterns.

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On the other hand, my experience has taught me that going to bed late and not having to get up at a certain time in the morning, leads to going to bed even later. I've found that this does not make me less tired, but more.

I don't disagree, but it's nice to have the option once in a while for when real life throws a spanner in the works.

With such an inflexible regime

As much as everyone trash talks big corporations, I work for one now and have this beautiful thing called flex hours. Unless there's a meeting in the morning (rarely) I'm usually up at 915 and into work before 10am (no rush hour traffic). Some people arrive as late as 11-1130am, but as long as you're doing the work that needs to be done it doesn't matter.

It's a nice balance because it allows me to go to bed ~1am and then any shift in sleep during the week (usually the weekend) isn't so drastic to cause massive exhaustion for the next few days while trying to rotate back.

As much as everyone trash talks big corporations, I work for one now and have this beautiful thing called flex hours.

Those that have flex time are lucky, and I find that programmers are more likely to have this perk. When I was an employee, I didn't explicitly have flex time, but I pretty much lived on the 10-to-6 schedule, coming in at 11 if I needed the extra hour.

I have a few friends (who are also programmers) who explicitly get flex-time.

But my wife, who is a fashion designer for a major department store, does not have that option. She has the classic "corporate" job. Be there at 8:30, attend useless meetings all day, and after 4 or 5pm the real work can finally start. But she has to be there at 8:30, otherwise she's likely to miss a meeting in the morning. The whole process from concept to delivery is one of the most convoluted processes I've ever heard, involving meeting after meeting. Nothing is approved until an army of committees have agreed to it.

In my book being forced to be in the office for the 8 or 9 hour stretch is equally as bad as having to show up early every single day.

How are you "forced" to do anything? If you've made the choice to work a corporate day job, you've also made the choice to be "forced" to be in the office for 8-9 hours a day. This sounds like making a decision and then not accepting responsibility.

Secondly, I also have the option of working from home and can easily just VPN in, except personally I work much better when I'm in a setting that is designated for work only, so I choose to head into the office M-F.

As a programmer there's a lot of flex in big companies that let them come pretty close to the flex of working on a startup. In fact, I would argue that working 80-90 hour weeks (including weekends) on a startup is hardly flexible. The only real difference is whether or not you're working on something that is intrinsically motivating, but I find it's always possible to find meaning in even the most dull of tasks.

For now though, I balance the need for food and rent with pursuing my own ideas.

Well yes at a high level of course I am not forced as it was my choice. I'm talking at the local level of company policy. It's nice that you have the option of working from home; I'd like that as an option once in a while.

The thing is, if I left the office in the middle of the day for a walk/gym session, everyone would get noticeably uncomfortable. Mind, I'm not sure how much walking one can get done in a suburban office park.

I can easily work long hours on something I care about, but the pressure to chain myself to the desk and avoid noticeable breaks gets to be quite a drag. In summary I don't think we are disagreeing on anything.

Sure, it sucks, but I wouldn't say it's as bad. Being required to work X hours per day with the option to start when you want is still an improvement over a completely regimented schedule.

"having to spend the next 8-9 hour block trapped in it"

That's what hacker news is for.

Forgive me if I'm missing something, I'm not trying to catch you out but I'm curious why you believe that one late night will affect the rest of your week.

Surely a correspondingly early night the next evening will redress things?

It's quite difficult to fall asleep an hour earlier than normal for most people.

Ah right. I must be an outlier then.

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