Some friends and I were discussing a mutual friend who suffered a “possible” heart attack whilst working in his hotel room, discharged himself from hospital and then worked a 15 hour day the next day before checking in with his GP the day after that.  The GP booked him back into to hospital where the heart attack was confirmed & he underwent surgery. The conversation (understandably) moved on to why people work so hard. Most of the people there said they felt they put in too many hours for a good work life balance but, if they knew that, why carry on doing it? Was it just the protestant work ethic?

The main reason seemed to be job satisfaction - there is no satisfaction in doing a job badly so rather than be unsatisfied they chose to over work.  If something is worth doing it’s worth doing right, so the choice is to put in long hours or admit the hours you do spend at work are worth nothing.

Much of stress relates to decisions, we can have too many options or (more often) no satisfactory ones so we continually re-evaluate what choices we do have. In this case ”should I work late” (maybe causing health and relationship issues) or “not” (not doing a “good” job, possibly losing self and colleagues’ respect and maybe even my job)? Neither is good option so the choice is stressful.

The solution? Like I’d know! However, being more fully aware of the options and consequences and asking the right questions is a good place to start. So, if you are overworked, ask the question “Why am I doing this?” “Because I have to” isn’t a valid answer, “Because if I don’t I’ll probably lose my job and then maybe lose my house and I don’t want that” is, but it would help to put a value the “probably” and “maybe”.

For a lot of us ,”I want people (including myself) to think I’m good at what I do” is sufficient incentive for long hours but we need to weigh that against other needs.

Finally, although I already sound like an agony aunt and this will make it more so, if you are in a relationship and work is an issue then try and talk the questions through together.

As you may know I am a teleworker, working for a large company that (amongst other things) manufactures printers and ink cartridges. Interesting then that I have been trying to get some ink for my printer since April.

Having flogged my way through the seemingly deliberately obfusticated order process I still haven’t received any - possibly because it is impossible to reset my delivery default address from the office they closed.

I have had yet another go at ordering ink but have now been told consumables are no longer available to order “… that overall there should be almost no need for users to order consumables” because everyone should be using their local office printer. Hmmm, 4-6 hour round trip to pick up my hardcopy. That wouldn’t be so bad but we all know the first draft has the margins wrong, or the font, or …

Maybe the department that was so keen to save money closing my office should talk to the department that is so keen to save money by getting rid of personal printers. Sadly enough I think it is the same department.

Here’s a use of technology (including the web) that I like

Just as much fun as filling in those surveys in trashy magazines but it actually tells you something useful - which parties most closely match your views.

Actually it told me something scary - the party that most closely matches my views is UKIP. I need therefore to distrust the methodology, change my views or move - I am not voting for Robert Kilroy-Silk.

Methodology? Being a cynic (although I fight against it) I am obviously wary. It would be easy to set up a site that purported to advise you who you agree with but always came back with the same answer whatever you put in - bit like old Sunday school talks, whatever the question you knew the answer would be Jesus.

I’m not even sure that it would be illegal - advertising standards? The web is pretty hard to regulate even if it was deemed illegal. What is a bit worrying is that at first glance some parties seemed way out of my line but looking at the actual results 5 parties were within 4 points (6%) of each other with one (UKIP!?!!) a few ahead and one several behind. As ever, although figures don’t lie the way we present them makes a hell of a difference.

So will I change my views? Now this is where it is interesting, because to do the survey I had to consider various issues and having got the results I am re-evaluating my views - wow, actually thinking about EU issues! I might do the survey a few times, see what I have to compromise on to get a candidate I like and then go with that.