8 HOURS OR NOT 8 HOURS, IS THAT A QUESTION?

Obviously, Shakespeare didn’t live in the era when the office has a tradition to set 8 working hours. Should there be like that, I’m sure Shakespeare would have replaced his famous tag on Hamlet (“To be or not to be, that is the question..”) with the title as above.. ;P

The statement really trigs me, when my dearest friend told me that some member of my team doesn’t like me. One of them (let’s just say, ‘the angel’ ;P), stabbed me at my behind. She gossiped me not to be efficient in working. She told my dearest friend that I almost did nothing during my work. I couldn’t give ‘the best finding’ with her statement, “He is nothing! His finding in audit result was not SATISFIED!” And, the worst was, “During his working time, he almost browsed the internet all the time!” Not mention she added, “By his quality like that, our manager still give him good grades on his personal annually appraisal!”

How 'angelic' she was! ;P

I almost said to her, “Well, why didn’t you accuse me to sleep with our manager (she is a woman) to have that high grades? Please be my guess!” But let us just store it in here (and I don’t think that she will read this notes.. he..he..)

But, later I thought nothing about ‘the finding’. I don’t care with that, as long as I could guarantee that my work has been completed well. One thing that worried me was her accusation to me for not using the working time efficiently. I have to admit that during my working time, of course I spare a time to browse the internet (not all the time, but poor alas that ‘the angel’ always seen my screen posed on the internet while she stood up and saw my laptop). It means that I didn’t use 8 hours working time efficiently. And I’ve ever heard that one of my boards (she is really so muslimah) said, “I’ve been messaged by my uzstad since the 1st time I started working here, ‘Allah has given you a chance to have a working for 8 hours in the office. So, if you are working less than 8 hours, it means you commit a sin..’”..

Hmmm.. 8 hours.. Let’s see. Besides browsing on the net during my working time, I also spared my time to ‘visit the toilet (long or short.. hey.. it depends! ;P)’, to talk with my friend through the phone or lively conversation (of course, not a business purposes ;P).. and do my praying. Well, to tell you the truth, everyday I just spent maybe only 6 hours net to work in the office!

Wow, that 'angel' really knew how to make me introspect myself.. ;P

When I compared with my other friends who still works in a foreign company (as I said, I’m working in a governmental institution), they really have a flexible time to enter and leave the office, doesn’t have any proper presence machine. So, they usually start to work at 9.00, although it was ‘instructed’ you should come on 8.00. But, they always leave after 18.00 or 19.00. But they say, the important thing is not about the presence matter, but it is about your work. The management just care about the completed assignment. They don’t care about your entering and leaving time, while in the governmental institution, the image of your entering and leaving time is still important to be considered.

After a while, I think, I really don’t care about that 'angel’s statement. Okay, I really used a time to browse a web in the office, okay I don’t come on time (they usually come at 7.00, while I come at 7.30), but my mind always employ the working matters whenever I could. In Jakarta, where a traffic jam is always be a routine menu for us, you really could use that event to.. at least think about working matters, sketch the memo, sketch the note, designing a program, think about the report concept, and so many other working matters as well. And you can also do those when you were in Bathroom (take a batch or etc.), or in a hotel (while we are on our business trip), or in a lousy date (to distract your mind from possessive girlfriend perhaps? He..he..)

And obviously it will be more than 8 hours a day..

Whether you give 8 hours or not, it’s not a big matter I guess. But, you should give your heart to the working matters. And it’s not about 8 hours or not 8 hours anymore, but it’s all about exactly like Shakespeare said in Hamlet, “To be or not to be, that is the question..”

Or If I could complete that, “To be or not to be professional employee, that is the question..”