In my previous 16 years in academia,
it had been up to me to judge whether
I was working hard enough. Usually,
I felt I needed to work harder.
During my Ph.D., I always be-
lieved I could make my dissertation
better with extra effort. My research
never felt finished, and I had no idea
how many hours I was supposed to
work. That made it easy to go down
rabbit holes and work more hours
than necessary.
After graduating, I continued to
work long hours, even though my
employment contracts spelled out
shorter workweeks. During my post-
doc years, I was supposed to work
precisely 39.5 hours per week, ac-
cording to the labor agreement for
public servants in Germany. But
nobody asked how long I actually
spent in the office, and I probably
exceeded that on a regular basis.
When I started my first faculty position, my contract
stated that I work anywhere from 36 to 48 hours per week.
At first, I appreciated the flexibility, hoping for the occa-
sional guilt-free 36-hour workweek. But my teaching and
administrative workloads were so high that I regularly
reached the 48-hour mark.
I was conscious of my work hours. I kept track mentally
and made a point of taking some time off when I felt as
though I’d worked too hard. But there were stretches of
time during my first faculty job when my children didn’t
see me enough, or when—between work and parental
duties—I had no time to spend with my husband.
In my second faculty position, I expected that my work
hours would again be my business. So when I was told to
track them, I was surprised. My contract stated that I work
40 hours per week, and couldn’t I be trusted to do so?
Grudgingly, I opened a spreadsheet and started to re-
cord my hours. It would have been easy to add standard
start and end times for each day—for instance, 9 a.m. to5 p.m.—and be done with it. But my
scientific tendencies kicked in, and I
decided to keep careful track of my
hours, even noting breaks.
I’m glad I did, because the data
have completely altered my view
of work-life balance. Recording my
hours showed that I was racking up
much longer workweeks than I real-
ized. During the first month I started
to track, for instance, I worked
15 hours more than was required
of me—nearly two full workdays.
That’s far less than the insane hours
that some academics work. But it
was eye-opening for me.
With my tracking, I’ve found that
I generally accumulate 1 week of
overtime every 2 to 3 months. So
now, every time I reach that mile-
stone, I take a few days or even a
whole week off. I spend that time at
home with my family. Or I use the
days to take a longer vacation, or to spend more time with
relatives who visit. The breaks have improved my overall
happiness and job satisfaction.
The data also help alleviate any guilt that I may have
otherwise felt taking time off. I still have deadlines, tenure
requirements, and the pressure to publish papers. And I
still work a lot, sometimes even on weekends. But I now
know how much I work—and that I deserve the time off.
When I am tenured, I won’t have to submit my hours to
my university any longer. But I’m going to continue to track
them to help keep my work in bounds. To some academ-
ics, it may seem like a waste of time. But for me, it’s been
anything but.
I’d recommend opening a spreadsheet and tracking the
hours that you spend at work. Even if you only do it for
1 or 2 weeks, you might be surprised what you’ll discover. jAnouschka Foltz is an assistant professor at the University of Graz
in Austria. Send your career story to [email protected].“The data have
completely altered my view
of work-life balance.”
Clocking your work
F
our months into my second faculty job, I was shocked to discover that I had to record the hours
I’d worked. I’d heard that others at the university were required to do that—but surely not
faculty members, I thought. I was wrong. At the end of each month, I was expected to sign and
submit a sheet that listed my start and end times each day. At first, I was annoyed that I had to
waste my time on such a mundane task. But the practice of writing down my work hours was
surprisingly illuminating, ultimately sending me down a path to better work-life balance.By Anouschka Foltz
ILLUSTRATION: ROBERT NEUBECKER542 1 MAY 2020 • VOL 368 ISSUE 6490 sciencemag.org SCIENCE
WORKING LIFE