Latest news with #WorkTrendIndex
The Hill
2 days ago
- Business
- The Hill
The traditional 9-to-5 is being replaced by the ‘infinite workday'
While most of the conversation around the post-pandemic workplace has focused on remote working and RTO (return to office) mandates, new research is pointing to an emerging trend. Microsoft's latest Work Trend Index has found that the traditional nine-to-five workday is becoming obsolete, and is being replaced by the 'infinite workday' instead. The Work Trend Index found that the average American employee receives 50 work-related messages outside of standard business hours, 40 percent who are online at 6am are reviewing emails, nearly 30 percent check emails after 10pm, and one in five review work correspondence on weekends. Want to take your career in a new direction? Discover 5 jobs hiring across the U.S. Research Intern, J.L. Partners, New York Policy Analyst, First Nations Education Steering Committee, Greater Vancouver Engineer Policy Advisor (GOVEX), New Mexico Public Regulation Commission, Santa Fe Police Crime Analyst, City of Danville, VA, Danville Government Partnerships Broker, CivicReach, Raleigh This shift represents a fundamental transformation in how Americans work, with potential ramifications for everything from overtime regulations to employee wellbeing initiatives. The pandemic's lasting impact While the pandemic didn't directly create an out-of-hours work culture, it made it more normal, particularly in jobs that would have never been done remotely before. The shift to a more flexible attitude to working hours was necessary as adults juggled childcare or caregiving responsibilities during the traditional workday. However, this trade-off has now become embedded in workplace culture, several years after restrictions have become a distant memory, and mandatory RTO policies are paradoxically exacerbating the problem rather than solving it. This is because workers now feel pressure to demonstrate their productivity and commitment by working additional hours, particularly those who are desperately trying to cling onto whatever remote working privileges they have left. After all, how can any boss argue with an employee looking for workplace flexibility when they are visibly online well into the night? Another pandemic hangup that is affecting how we work is the amount of meetings we've become accustomed to. While camera-on video calls became a necessary evil during the pandemic, the default option to 'jump on a call' when an email chain would suffice means workers are spending much of their in-office hours on calls or in meetings that leave little time for focused work. In fact, 57 percent of meetings are arranged on the fly without a calendar invitation. Most meetings take place between 9am and 11am and 1pm and 3pm, and Tuesdays are the day when most meetings take place (23 percent). However, being trigger-happy when it comes to sending emails en masse isn't the solution either. Microsoft's research uncovered that the average worker receives 117 emails daily and mass email threads with 20-plus participants are up 7 percent in the past year. One-on-one emails are on the decline (down 5 percent in the last year). This means evenings and weekend hours are increasingly becoming the only times real tasks can be accomplished. Microsoft's research found that 29 percent of workers are diving back into their inbox at 10pm and 50-plus messages are sent and received outside of core working hours. Additionally, 20 percent of workers are actively working over the weekends and check their emails before noon on Saturdays and Sundays. Around 5 percent will also check their email after 6pm on a Sunday in anticipation of the working week. Hanging in the balance This transformation raises important questions about existing labor protections and overtime regulations. And while some off-hours work represents legitimate flexibility which allows employees to attend to personal responsibilities during traditional business hours, Microsoft's research also suggests that many workers are experiencing genuine work expansion rather than redistribution. One solution could lie in HR departments implementing screen time monitoring to get a better overview of working patterns, but this kind of intervention could also create a toxic work culture where anyone not working overtime could be viewed less favourably by management and lead to even more burnout. As such, when off-hours work becomes the norm, it creates what the report refers to as an 'infinite workday' where employees never truly disconnect. The death of the nine-to-five workday may be inevitable, but how America manages this transition will determine whether it leads to greater work-life integration or simply longer working hours disguised as flexibility in the long run. Looking for a new role? Browse thousands of jobs on The Hill Job Board
Time of India
2 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
Explained: The rise of fake productivity at work; how employees are ‘task-masking' to look busy
If your calendar looks like a Mumbai local at rush hour and Teams pings like a Diwali bazaar, you're not alone; that bustle may not be real productivity. But it may not be real productivity. A new workplace habit is spreading: Fake productivity, the theatre of looking busy while sidestepping high-impact work. One recent clue: A Workhuman poll found more than a third of UK employees (36%) admit to 'pretend productivity', driven by pressure to appear constantly active and to protect work–life balance. In parallel, leaders are wrestling with 'productivity paranoia': Microsoft's Work Trend Index reports 85% of managers say hybrid work makes it hard to trust productivity, even as employees themselves report feeling productive—an optics paradox tailor-made for performative busyness. The conditions are ideal for what social and workplace commentators now call task-masking—performative micro-tasks (reply-all, calendar clutter, meeting hopscotch) that signal effort without moving outcomes. Media analyses link the behaviour to return-to-office pressures and the surveillance vibe of 'bossware,' which nudge people to show activity over achievement. Meanwhile, collaboration load has ballooned: Microsoft shows people attend roughly three times more Teams meetings than in February 2020, while investigative summaries of Atlassian's State of Teams suggest tens of billions of work hours are lost yearly to pings, low-value meetings and duplicated effort. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Secure Your Child's Future with Strong English Fluency Planet Spark Learn More Undo Add the cognitive drain of video calls—Stanford's validated Zoom Exhaustion & Fatigue scale has tied specific design factors (mirror anxiety, close-up eye contact) to depleted energy—and you get a recipe for surface-level work that 'looks' productive but isn't. This is not simply a moral failing; it is a systems problem. Always-on messaging fuels telepressure—the compulsive urge to respond—which research in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychology connects to poorer sleep, higher burnout and worse work–life balance. People learn to survive the signal-choked day by doing visible tasks that keep the Slack dot green. The result: energy burns on the appearance of work, outcomes lag, and trust erodes. Understanding why task-masking thrives—and how to replace it with outcome-first habits—is now a core career skill. What exactly is 'task-masking' (and how is it different from simple busyness)? Task-masking is performative busyness: Behaviours that signal industriousness (typing loudly, darting between meetings, carrying a laptop everywhere) while avoiding deep, outcome-bearing work. The label has spread through Gen-Z-heavy social feeds and newsrooms. Analysts describe it as a productivity theatre tuned for the open-plan and the activity dashboard. The underlying prevalence is plausible given Workhuman's finding that 36% of UK workers confess to 'pretend productivity,' often to escape burnout or unrealistic expectations. The psychology and systems that fuel fake productivity Fake productivity doesn't emerge in a vacuum—it's shaped by systems that reward responsiveness, visibility and performative hustle. At the centre is telepressure: the compulsive need to answer messages instantly, regardless of urgency. Multiple studies in occupational psychology link this behaviour to poor sleep, elevated burnout and fractured work–life boundaries. But the pressure isn't confined to pings and emails. According to Microsoft's 2023 Work Trend Index, employees now attend nearly three times as many Teams meetings as they did before the pandemic. That explosion in meeting load may aim to increase coordination, but it comes at the cost of cognitive fragmentation and depleted focus time. The problem is compounded by the medium itself. Stanford's research on Zoom fatigue finds that constant video calls introduce non-verbal stressors—close-up eye contact, mirror anxiety, and reduced mobility—that accelerate exhaustion across the day. Layered on top is the rise of digital presenteeism—the compulsion to appear online and 'active' even when unwell or mentally drained. According to the CIPD & Simplyhealth Health and Wellbeing at Work survey (2022), 81% of UK organisations reported presenteeism among remote workers, compared to 65% in physical workplaces. The numbers expose a system where visibility trumps well-being—and where looking busy matters more than being effective. Together, these factors fuel task-masking: a survival strategy in a workplace architecture built for appearances. Why Gen Z is over-indexed on task-masking Gen Z did not invent pretend work, but they are operating in a post-pandemic labour market where visibility is often misread as value. Return-to-office rules, legacy KPIs and leader distrust make 'being seen' a protective strategy. Coverage of task-masking consistently spotlights younger workers navigating visibility politics while fearing job loss or AI displacement. At the same time, values have shifted: Deloitte's 2025 global survey finds Gen Z prioritises well-being, balance and learning ; they will comply with optics if outcomes and boundaries are unclear, but they are quick to disengage from rituals that feel meaningless. Several surveys show that many Gen Z workers resist full-time office returns, increasing the temptation to 'signal' productivity when present rather than to refactor the work itself. Task-masking and quiet quitting: Cousins, not twins Quiet quitting is disengagement to the contractual minimum; task-masking is disengagement disguised as hustle. According to Gallup's State of the Global Workplace 2024 report, only 21% of employees worldwide were actively engaged at work. The majority were either disengaged or quietly quitting, creating ideal conditions for fake productivity to flourish. In such environments, workers are more likely to adopt surface-level behaviours that signal busyness, such as excessive meetings or constant online presence, rather than contributing to meaningful outcomes. When trust is low and objectives are fuzzy, people hedge: They keep the lights blinking, attend everything, and avoid risk. In that sense, task-masking can be the performative arm of quiet quitting—a way to stay safe while mentally stepping back. How managers create (or crush) faux productivity Leaders can unintentionally train teams to optimise for optics: Obsessing over green dots, input metrics and time online. Microsoft's 2022–2025 data calls this 'productivity paranoia,' visible when managers track activity rather than outcomes and calendars swell to compensate. A related body of research, Atlassian's State of Teams report, highlights the enormous time sink caused by pings, meetings, and duplicated effort. It estimates that billions of work hours are lost annually to ineffective collaboration. The fix is not more dashboards; it is clarity (what is the outcome, who owns it), cadence (fewer, sharper meetings) and evidence (show progress with artefacts, not attendance). Bottom line Fake productivity isn't laziness—it's a symptom of misaligned systems. In today's workplace, visibility has become a proxy for value. When calendars are packed and Slack is never silent, activity becomes the performance, not the means to an end. Employees aren't defying work; they're adapting to cultures where being seen outweighs producing results. Task-masking emerges as the rational response to environments that reward optics over output. Quiet quitting and fake productivity aren't opposites—they're parallel forms of disengagement. One retreats quietly, the other performs loudly. Both thrive when trust is low, goals are vague, and measurement skews toward motion instead of meaning. In this landscape, the green dot—the little status indicator once meant to show availability—has evolved into a badge of allegiance, a digital placeholder for presence. Ready to navigate global policies? Secure your overseas future. Get expert guidance now!
The Hill
3 days ago
- Business
- The Hill
The traditional 9-to-5 is being replaced by the 'infinite workday'
While most of the conversation around the post-pandemic workplace has focused on remote working and RTO (return to office) mandates, new research is pointing to an emerging trend. Microsoft's latest Work Trend Index has found that the traditional nine-to-five workday is becoming obsolete, and is being replaced by the 'infinite workday' instead. The Work Trend Index found that the average American employee receives 50 work-related messages outside of standard business hours, 40 percent who are online at 6am are reviewing emails, nearly 30 percent check emails after 10pm, and one in five review work correspondence on weekends. Want to take your career in a new direction? Discover 5 jobs hiring across the U.S. This shift represents a fundamental transformation in how Americans work, with potential ramifications for everything from overtime regulations to employee wellbeing initiatives. The pandemic's lasting impact While the pandemic didn't directly create an out-of-hours work culture, it made it more normal, particularly in jobs that would have never been done remotely before. The shift to a more flexible attitude to working hours was necessary as adults juggled childcare or caregiving responsibilities during the traditional workday. However, this trade-off has now become embedded in workplace culture, several years after restrictions have become a distant memory, and mandatory RTO policies are paradoxically exacerbating the problem rather than solving it. This is because workers now feel pressure to demonstrate their productivity and commitment by working additional hours, particularly those who are desperately trying to cling onto whatever remote working privileges they have left. After all, how can any boss argue with an employee looking for workplace flexibility when they are visibly online well into the night? Another pandemic hangup that is affecting how we work is the amount of meetings we've become accustomed to. While camera-on video calls became a necessary evil during the pandemic, the default option to 'jump on a call' when an email chain would suffice means workers are spending much of their in-office hours on calls or in meetings that leave little time for focused work. In fact, 57 percent of meetings are arranged on the fly without a calendar invitation. Most meetings take place between 9am and 11am and 1pm and 3pm, and Tuesdays are the day when most meetings take place (23 percent). However, being trigger-happy when it comes to sending emails en masse isn't the solution either. Microsoft's research uncovered that the average worker receives 117 emails daily and mass email threads with 20-plus participants are up 7 percent in the past year. One-on-one emails are on the decline (down 5 percent in the last year). This means evenings and weekend hours are increasingly becoming the only times real tasks can be accomplished. Microsoft's research found that 29 percent of workers are diving back into their inbox at 10pm and 50-plus messages are sent and received outside of core working hours. Additionally, 20 percent of workers are actively working over the weekends and check their emails before noon on Saturdays and Sundays. Around 5 percent will also check their email after 6pm on a Sunday in anticipation of the working week. Hanging in the balance This transformation raises important questions about existing labor protections and overtime regulations. And while some off-hours work represents legitimate flexibility which allows employees to attend to personal responsibilities during traditional business hours, Microsoft's research also suggests that many workers are experiencing genuine work expansion rather than redistribution. One solution could lie in HR departments implementing screen time monitoring to get a better overview of working patterns, but this kind of intervention could also create a toxic work culture where anyone not working overtime could be viewed less favourably by management and lead to even more burnout. As such, when off-hours work becomes the norm, it creates what the report refers to as an 'infinite workday' where employees never truly disconnect. The death of the nine-to-five workday may be inevitable, but how America manages this transition will determine whether it leads to greater work-life integration or simply longer working hours disguised as flexibility in the long run.
Fast Company
4 days ago
- Business
- Fast Company
The future of work is being written
We are in a once-in-a-generation moment. AI isn't just changing how people work—it's pushing companies to rethink how they're structured, how decisions get made, and who gets to lead. Our annual Work Trend Index report reveals the stakes: While 81% of women leaders say their company must adopt AI to stay competitive, fewer than half feel they have the resources to drive real impact. Additionally, our research found that men are more likely to use AI at work, trust it with high-stakes tasks, and worry less about being replaced by it. Knowing this matters, because as AI reshapes jobs and workflows, those who engage early will shape what comes next. Become an agent boss I've seen too many brilliant women opt out because they don't feel 'technical enough' or 'ready.' We saw this pattern during the rise of STEM—when closing the gap took decades of education and investment. But readiness isn't innate, it's built. Say yes to the uncharted projects. Say yes to leading the pilot. Say yes to rethinking how your team works. The most meaningful roles in the AI era won't be assigned—they'll be claimed by those bold enough to step forward. That also means investing in a new kind of skill set. At Microsoft, we talk about becoming agent bosses—people who build, direct, and collaborate with AI agents to amplify their impact. This shift is already underway. In fact, 51% of managers say upskilling for AI will be a core responsibility within five years. Just as we once learned to manage teams, we now need to learn to manage agents. But AI fluency alone isn't enough. If we want to truly change how work feels—not just how it's done—we need to rethink the systems around us. Break the cycle of burnout The pace of work has outgrown the workday. What once fit inside the bounds of a 9-to-5 now spills across time zones, platforms, and personal hours. Our research found that despite 84% of women leaders saying hybrid work improved their experience, 74% still feel they don't have enough time each day to get their work done. This comes as no surprise given that the average employee is interrupted roughly every two minutes— 275 times a day. Even with gains in flexibility, many are still stuck in cycles of time poverty and busywork. AI offers a way forward—but only if it's paired with structural change. Start with the 80/20 rule: Reclaim time from low-value tasks and reinvest it in what truly moves the business forward. Replace rigid org charts with agile work charts—flexible, outcome-based teams powered by AI to close skill gaps. And empower every employee—not just the technical ones—to lead with AI. The magic is in the handoff. For example, AI helps me draft a memo, and an agent tracks the responses and prompts the follow-ups. This frees me to focus on bigger challenges instead of managing my inbox. Because progress doesn't come from the tools alone—it comes from who gets to use them, and how they're used. Design the future of work The organizations pulling ahead today aren't just using AI—they're building with it. We call them Frontier Firms: AI-native companies with digital labor embedded from the start. They're leaner, faster, and more adaptive. But what truly sets them apart is how they prioritize people. According to our research, Frontier Firms employees are more likely to report being happier, fulfilled, and able to take on meaningful work. Because real transformation isn't just about technology—it's about trust, autonomy, and opportunity. On my own team, we've started making intentional changes: asking whether every meeting is necessary, muting notifications during heads-down time, integrating AI into our workflows, and protecting time for recovery, not just delivery. These small shifts help reset the rhythm of the day and create room for people to thrive. The future of work won't write itself. If we want it to be more equitable, more human, and more inclusive, we have to build it that way. And that starts with more women raising their hands, using their voices, and picking up the pen.
USA Today
22-07-2025
- Business
- USA Today
Mastering AI is career insurance. Upskill now or fall behind
Can't we all just get along? How do we encourage AI and human synergies in the workplace? As we've seen with other disruptive technologies over the decades, generative AI's rapid adoption has sparked a very human concern among many in the white-collar workforce: job displacement. The Pew Research Center published findings from an October 2024 survey that found more than half (52%) of U.S. workers are 'worried' about the future impact of generative AI on their careers. Similarly, a recently published PYMNTS Intelligence Report based on survey results collected a month later revealed as many as 54% of U.S. workers believed genAI posed a 'significant risk' of widespread layoffs. But are these fears justified? PYMTS, which publishes news and insights on the financial sector, found 82% of those who use genAI at least weekly reported that it increases their productivity. From buzzword to must-have: Why AI is now an imperative for business leaders Other surveys have found similar results. Conducted by researchers from Stanford, George Mason and Clemson Universities, a report published in April found workers using AI claim a three-fold productivity gain, estimating tasks that would normally (i.e., manually) take about 90 minutes to complete can be finished in 30 minutes with the help of genAI. In other words, perhaps AI tools will augment rather than replace staff to provide the most efficient outcomes for employees — and perhaps yield more profitable results for employers. Collaboration, not condemnation Billed as 'your AI companion,' Microsoft's Copilot is one of the biggest players in this space, and the benefits of embracing AI in the workplace are highlighted in the company's latest Work Trend Index. A recent study showed "that an individual with AI now outperforms a team without it,' affirms Colette Stallbaumer, WorkLab Cofounder and General Manager of Copilot, at Microsoft. 'But a team using AI outperforms them all.' 'It's all about this combination of sort of AI fluency and human skills, and I really believe the future belongs to people who can partner with AI,' adds Stallbaumer. In case you missed it: How AI and cloud technology are reengineering Formula One racing On why Copilot, Stallbaumer says it's integrated with 'all the tools that millions of people already use every day at work,' such as the Microsoft 365 suite of productivity apps. 'Copilot goes with you where you work, it understands your organizational data, it's secure, and while you're in control of it all, it's easy for employees to create and build 'agents' and set them to work on their behalf,' she adds. Leveraging artificial intelligence, AI agents are programs that can perform tasks and achieve goals for you, such as a smart personal assistant that can interact with your customers, like a chatbot that can learn and adapt its behavior over time. Stallbaumer says the new phrase 'agent boss' refers to a human manager who uses or oversees the work of AI agents. One example could be a sales professional who might leverage one agent to draft a request for proposal (RFP) and another agent to pull high-potential leads from their CRM data, and then bring the two together. 'Interestingly, our data showed that employees at companies with human-agent teams are actually more satisfied with their work, and so there's something really interesting happening when everyone is empowered with AI.' Upskilling and new AI-related jobs While some workers may be losing sleep over the threat of genAI coming after their jobs — and it didn't help that Amazon's CEO Andy Jassy recently conceded that AI will likely reshape its 1.5 million workforce in coming years — employees could in fact learn to master genAI as a kind of insurance policy. 'Our data showed that 47% of business leaders say that their top workforce priority is upskilling existing employees over the next 12 to 18 months,' says Stallbaumer. Carolina Milanesi, president and principal analyst at Creative Strategies, a Silicon Valley–based technology research firm, agrees. 'It's true that AI is going to impact every single job, one way or another — it will take some jobs, but also create a lot of jobs that were not possible before — and existing workers should be learning AI skills, too.' Milanesi quotes Cisco's President Jeetu Patel. 'Don't be afraid of AI taking your job. Be afraid of someone who knows how to use AI well from taking your job.' 'People can also take advantage of AI to do menial tasks that they don't want to do to free up their time and energy for more interesting parts of the jobs,' adds Milanesi. Microsoft is calling 2025 'the year the 'frontier firm' is born,' defined by the Work Trend Index as 'a company powered by intelligence on tap, human-agent teams, and a new role for everyone: agent boss.' And 'remember it's early innings right now,' says Stallbaumer. 'Only 1% of global leaders say their AI strategy is fully implemented, and so as we start to see the emergence of the 'frontier firm' we will see some exciting things ahead.' 'We will have to learn how to leverage and interact with AI, especially in the era of agentic AI,' adds Milanesi, 'and take advantage of this powerful technology for our benefit.'
