I was always taught to live by the “work smarter not harder” mentality. But apparently, that mantra went flying out the window for one designer whose boss claimed she had been wasting company time. 

Her frustrated husband proceeded to jump onto the Malicious Compliance subreddit to share the full story of how she was scolded at work, so you’ll find all the details below, as well as some of the responses from invested readers. But be careful not to read too quickly! We wouldn’t want you pandas to be found guilty of being efficient…

Apparently, the advice to “work smarter not harder” doesn’t always apply to employees who work quickly

Image credits: Kelly Sikkema (not the actual photo)

After one product designer’s boss realized she was completing projects much faster than her colleague, she was scolded for wasting company time

Image credits: cottonbro studio (not the actual photo)

Image source: Professional-Fee-957

Product designers are in high demand at the moment, so it would be wise for companies to value their skilled designers

Image credits: Sebastien Bonneval (not the actual photo)

It’s ridiculous enough to force an employee who’s producing excellent work to start working slower, but especially when it’s such a challenge to find skilled product designers, this company should be clinging to this woman. When it comes to design jobs, product designers are in extremely high demand; in fact, Dribbble deemed them the most in-demand role companies were hiring for in 2022. “They’re the driving force behind the websites, apps, and other digital products we use on a daily basis,” Renee Fleck at Dribbble explains. 

“Becoming a product designer requires a solid basis in user experience design and user research. In addition, most product designers have experience working as senior designers on a design team, where they’ve implemented user-focused solutions,” Fleck went on to note. “They should also have well-established design thinking skills, as that process will guide much of their work.” When a company has an experienced designer like this woman on their team, they should not be squandering her skills and forcing her to move at a slower pace. If anything, they should be re-evaluating her colleague to see if they are working hard enough.

And it’s natural for employees to work at various speeds, so experts recommend not equating hours worked with productivity

And while it’s natural for various team members to work at different paces, companies have to try to find a way to balance out the workload and fairly compensate their teams. Sometimes, this means accepting that not everyone will need the same number of hours within a week. In fact, Liane Davey, cofounder of 3COze Inc. and author of You First: Inspire Your Team to Grow Up, Get Along, and Get Stuff Done, told Harvard Business Review that it can be much smarter to focus on workload than the amount of time spent sitting in an office.

“It’s important to make sure your employees understand you don’t equate hours with productivity,” Davey says, recommending that bosses praise their staff for strong performance, regardless of the number of hours they’ve worked. “If Jose put up great numbers last week—even if he leaves at 4:30 every day—you need to celebrate him in a public forum,” she goes on to explain. “If people complain [about Jose’s hours] or you pick up on gossip, head it off at the pass,” she says. “Say, ‘I encourage you to pay attention to what people are accomplishing and contributing as opposed to the sheer number of hours they work.’”

More and more people around the world are realizing that forcing workers to commute or log onto their computers five days a week might be an outdated idea anyway. The four-day work week has been gaining traction in Iceland, Germany and the Netherlands, and it’s been discussed or trialed in many other places as well. Richard Godwin wrote a piece for The Guardian discussing how the five-day work week might be on its way out, and he noted that, “The largest-ever UK pilot scheme recently concluded: 70 companies (from a chip shop in Norfolk to a finance firm in Manchester), offered 3,300 workers a 20% reduction in hours with no reduction in pay.” The full results were not yet available, but Godwin wrote that halfway through the study, “95% of companies said they had maintained or improved productivity and 88% reported they would continue after the trial.”

Many people around the globe believe the five-day work week is an outdated concept anyway

Image credits: Israel Andrade (not the actual photo)

“All the evidence shows that you are more productive in four days rather than five,” Joe Ryle, of the 4 Day Week campaign, told the Guardian. “People almost become more naturally efficient overnight. We’ve got so much evidence now – we’re hoping 2023 will be the year we move beyond trials and pilot schemes into actually rolling this out across the country. When things are bleak – as they are now – we need policies that give people hope.”

There is no reason for this boss to require their designers to work at the same pace when there is clearly a difference in how they operate, and perhaps their skill levels as well. If we’re happier and healthier working less hours, why not applaud employees who manage to get their work done in a timely fashion? We would love to hear your thoughts on this topic in the comments below, pandas. Would you have taken a reduction in hours if your boss scolded you for working too quickly? Feel free to share, and then if you’d like to read another Bored Panda article featuring an employee who was “too efficient”, check out this story next.      

Invested readers echoed frustration about the situation in the comments, calling out the boss and sharing some of their own similar stories

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