Relationship between Productivity and working hours

Productivity and Working Hours

The time factor plays a very important role for any person and organization, however the way in which that time is used is even of greater importance and implication in the social, work and general day-to-day. When the organization and the workers agree with this, an environment can be fostered and the implementation of working days according to the needs of both parties, without any being affected.

Governments worldwide have begun to consider reducing working hours in order to motivate and increase productivity and improve the worker’s social quality of life. But what is the relationship between productivity and working hours? Does productivity mean more or less hours of work?

Much has been said about this issue and there are several positions on this issue, several studies have been carried out by different countries to cut the working day and have yielded conflicting results.

The truth vs. what is thought

Some countries have been able to improve productivity by reducing working hours, such as Paris, Lyon and Moscow, and have been able to improve their wages due to high productivity, on the other side of the coin we have countries like Venezuela, Nicaragua, Sweden, South Korea that have reduced working hours and their non-seasonal productivity or countries such as Chile, Mexico and Costa Rica that have the longest working days and their productivity does not correspond.

There are those who think that the more work is done, some people think that with the reduction of the day, people will produce more, but they forget about the cultural, social and economic factors that lead to the relationship between work and productivity.

The data can be interpreted in different ways, it can mean that personal well-being is not related to the number of hours worked, the short workdays can mean an intensification of the work that leads to an increase in stress levels, fatigue, affecting the Quality of work or otherwise the person works more motivated and relaxed, but will depend on the context of labor relations where a more collaborative and less confrontational system should be applied.

It is not just a matter of reducing or increasing the working day, but changing the perspective of having a schedule, adapting a model that meets the needs of workers without neglecting the requirements of business. Due to the physical exhaustion, people cannot be productive with very long hours, labor flexibility works both for the employee and for the organization, since it allows the efficient use of available resources.

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Productivity and Working Hours

Productivity and Working hours are not the only important indicator of workers, there are factors such as satisfaction and motivation, which influence the productivity of workers.

This puts into consideration the implementation of a new structure of work, which seeks to generate a higher quality of life and not just wealth.

It is vital to change the paradigm of the employee and employer relationship, promoting work in pursuit of common goals, which requires the will and cooperation of both to achieve a win-win that allows progress towards development.

Organizations must provide working conditions that allow the worker to develop and live in dignity to achieve better jobs that are summarized in greater collaboration and productivity.

Establishing clear goals, led and supervised by trained personnel provides the necessary conditions so that each employee can carry out his task efficiently and efficiently sets a guideline to begin to leave the productivity measured by hours of work and enter the world truly Productive of work by meeting goals, where each worker can self-manage and manage their time in function of the objectives.