Why You Shouldn't Be Proud Of A 60-Hour Workweek

By Jeff Archibald

Your 60-hour work week is not a badge of honor. It's a problem.

There's a sense of pride over being able to state that we worked an exorbitant amount of hours this week, last week or last month. I know because I've done it in the past, and probably still do it. (Sigh.) After all, saying you worked a 60-hour week is indirectly telling the listener how busy your design firm is, how successful your product is, how important you are to your employer.

It's essentially a humblebrag.

But as you dig into the 60-hour work week, you realize it's a problem – and not just for the obvious reasons like work-life balance, burnout, how unhealthy it is, the errors that come with being tired and so forth.