Power off your desktop. Hang up the landline. Tidy your workspace. Rinse, repeat.
Leaving the office used to mean the workday was over. And if it wasn’t? You ordered takeout and burned the midnight oil until you could call it quits.
Then came 2020. Commutes shifted to kitchen tables and spare bedrooms. Work-from-home setups lived on even after many returned to the office. And for a lot of us, working hours now stretch beyond the confines of the legacy 9-5.
Enter the infinite workday.
Where professionals used to hit two productivity peaks, before lunch and after lunch, there is now a third peak, around 6 to 8 pm.
According to Microsoft:
- 29% of employees are back in their inboxes by 10 pm
- Evening meetings logged are up 16% year over year
- And ~20% of employees do some form of work over the weekend
At first glance, these numbers might scream burnout. In some cases, that’s a fair assessment. But we don’t think that’s the full story.
With this shift comes something else: flexibility.
- Plug in after dinner when the house is quiet
- Run that errand during the day with the ability to catch up later
- Put in some time on a project on a Sunday morning when inspiration strikes
We’re not glorifying sleepless nights or always having to be “on”. The key is being intentional. Know when to lean into that flexibility… and when to log off.
Because just as the 9 to 5 is fading, so is the one-size-fits-all workday.
And we’re here for it.
Until next time,
Your Spherion South Central WI & Northern IL team