Bobby. wrote on Jan 9^th, 2012 at 9:29am:


Company cars are less common that they were. Unless it's a sales or service type of job, you usually find that the company offers a subsidised Novated lease type of arrangement, where part of your salary is tax free. I used to do that, but decided that it was too much of an encumbrance if I wanted to change jobs at any time.

As far as working weekends is concerned, again it depends on the nature of the work. A sales or marketing person may often reply to emails and even work on tenders on the weekend, and it's a fine line between social events and work.  The same applies for some service type roles.

I remember one past job where that was the case. Now I get much higher remuneration than I did in that position, but my weekends are usually sacrosanct. If I do some work on the weekend it's because I want to.

Updated November 10, 2010


The amount of unpaid overtime Australians work is again in the spotlight, with a new survey revealing four in five overtime workers want to work fewer hours.   

The research, commissioned by the Australia Institute, found half of all workers surveyed would like a shorter working week.

In fact, they said they would like to cut, on average, two-and-a-half hours from their weekly grind.

The executive director of the Australia Institute, Richard Dennis, argues cutting back on overtime could create about 400,000 extra jobs in Australia and improve the health of workers.

"If you could convert all of the unpaid overtime into new jobs you could create more than 1 million new jobs," he said.

"But we've estimated that if the number of hours reduced were apportioned in the same way that occurred when France reduced their hours you could create 390,000 new jobs."

Dr Dennis says people working 50 hours or more each week would happily slash 13-and-a-half hours from their workload.

"Australian workers are donating more than $70 billion a year to their employers in terms of unpaid overtime and that's a very generous gift, and our employers have taken, got into the habit of accepting it," Dr Dennis said.   

"But the reality is, if you don't know how many hours you work, you can't really figure out what your hourly rate of pay is.

"Full-time workers want to work a lot less and part-time and casual workers want to work a lot more, so the labour market really isn't matching the preferences of employers and the preferences of employees," he said.   

Dr Dennis says Australia's overwork culture is counter-productive.

"We're saying to people we want them to tackle lifestyle illness like diet through fixing their diet, fixing their exercise and seeing their doctor before they get sick," he said.

"But what our survey respondents are telling us is that they're too busy to cook home-cooked meals, they don't have time to exercise and, in fact, when they're sick they're more likely to soldier on and go to work than they are to go to the doctor and find out what's wrong."

Dr Dennis says tackling the problem will require action on a number of fronts.

He wants governments to introduce caps on working hours, employers to cut their reliance on unpaid overtime and workers to pay more attention to how much of their time they are giving away.   

A smart and considerate employer would have provided his hard working employees with a continence pad, so they would not have to leave their desk to go to the toilet rather than totally embarrass the employee by having them seek permission to take a toilet break.
That way the employee could demonstrate their understanding of multi tasking by toileting and answering the phone simultaneously.
Who says the Unions can't demonstrate productivity increases to justify their previously unreasonable wage demands.
It's a win/win situation for all parties.

Verge wrote on Jan 9^th, 2012 at 1:39pm:


Yes but I feel under pressure to meet deadlines that are imposed upon me
without first gaining my approval.
We are slaves to our companies.

Andrei.Hicks wrote on Jan 9^th, 2012 at 9:25am:


Yeah but you're on salary, not wage...

Andrei.Hicks wrote on Jan 9^th, 2012 at 9:25am:


I hear what you are saying Andrei, but really you need to realise that you are what most of use know as an obsessive. Sooner or later you will begin to become crabby and annoy your work mates because your life has become so small and meaningless. No problem with having a commitment to your job, hell i love going in the morning and would give an extra hour every day just because i loose track of time but you have to learn to turn the phone off and ignore the email at certain times and boxing day is one of them. Don't kid yourself the world won't end. Get a life outside of work.

Imcrook, mate most of this is tactical sales technique and really if the staff are to dopey to get it you don't really want them working for you. Don't you show up before your shift starts, we call you a dead weight. The toilet business is a bit stiff though, i get why but really somethings are private.