It often feels like there are only 3 productive hours in typical American white collar work day.
What if we just cut out the rest?
Edit: Some great responses. So responses must have also been said about the 5 day and 40 hour work weeks.
For many jobs, it won’t change much. My advisor comes to the university 3 days a week, and stays for 4 ish hours. But he’s a very good researcher with high research output. (I do math, this might not be possible for lab based researchers.)
Usually these jobs can’t be measured in hours you spend in your workplace. You’re kind of always working since you can’t really turn your brain off while working on an interesting problem, but what others see is that you’re sipping coffee with your laptop open.
I thoroughly believe that 4 hours is the limit for most people (on most days) on how long they can focus deeply on a problem. That was at least my experience as a mathematics grad student. In math this is more evident because most of high level math requires this deep level of understanding.
Of course one thinks about these problems while doing other things (obsession is a common consequence of prolonged deep thinking), which is why visits to the restroom, walks outside and so on are famous to prove very productive.
Either way, math is also social (most problem solving benefits from discussion) and it is in my opinion much more productive to set some time off for talking about / working on stuff with others than grinding through longer. This is still work and incidentally also good time and resource management.
Of course. My friends who are doing research on Physics or Biology tell me that I always seem to be free. The truth is, I’m always kind of working. It’s very hard to shut off your brain when you’re tackling with some intriguing problem. I’ve found myself thinking about work while out with the boys for drinks lol.
