A new standard or the bare minimum? How S’poreans are embracing a healthier work-life balance.

Singaporeans are finally embracing a healthier work-life balance by starting with the basics—leaving work on time. 

This finding is based on a recent Reddit thread that sparked discussions on whether employees in Singapore stay back past working hours. 

“I’m working [from] 9AM to 6PM but at 6PM, [the] majority [of] people still stay and don’t leave till like 6:15PM to 6:30PM. Is it wrong to leave at 6PM? Is there any unspoken rule not to leave on time?” Such was the query that garnered over 300 responses from other Reddit users within five days. 

Most of them shared that they’ve made it a point to clock out and leave work once their working hours are up. 

This is a rather jarring deviation from previous decades. If you remember (or have heard), people used to stay back just to “show face to the bosses that they’re still hard at work”, as one Redditor put it.

But it seems that those days are slowly disappearing as more young people join the workforce and have a different idea of work-life balance.

A decent number of Reddit users even shared that they actually leave earlier than the supposed clocking out time. So long as they get their daily tasks done, it’s not an issue with their management.

“If you consistently need extra time to complete your work tasks, it might be a sign of inefficiency,” another commenter pointed out. 

“My tip, set three important goals you need to accomplish for the day. Complete them and leave. If ad hoc tasks come in, prioritise to do them tomorrow or look at the urgency of it. Of course, if you have the spare time to do more than just three, just do it and get it out of the way,” someone else advised.

This should go hand-in-hand with setting boundaries and managing people’s expectations. 

All that said, you could argue that inefficiency is up for debate depending on the workload given out and the industry they’re in. 

For example, media personnels like those in the news cycle tend to have last-minute assignments that are time-sensitive. In such cases, speed is of the essence and occasionally staying back to get the news out isn’t unusual.

The company culture at your place of employment plays a large role in this as well. Speaking from experience, one Reddit user explained that the Japanese MNC they worked at praised workers for still being in the office at 9PM. In contrast, their next job with a UK MNC encouraged them to leave by 5:30PM.

“[It] all depends on company culture. I’m sure Singaporean SME bosses have their own ideas too.” 

Overall, though, it’s obvious from this Reddit discussion that employees in Singapore are prioritising work-life balance and doing what they can to embrace it. 

Whether that’s by assessing priorities or ending work at a certain time, it tallies with what other surveys in recent years have found on the topic. And considering that many Zillennials are joining the labour force, perhaps companies should also start creating a workplace culture that can meet this need.

Featured Image Credit: Taken from the Reddit thread