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december 2006 49

financial analyst we’ll call Sudhir emigrated five years ago from

Mumbai, India. He works at a major

commercial bank in New York. Sum-

mertime, when he puts in 90 hours a

week, is his “light” season. The rest of the

year, he works upwards of 120 hours

per week – leaving only 48 hours for

sleeping, eating, entertaining, and (he

smiles) bathing. Sudhir stays late in the

office even when he has nothing par-

ticularly pressing to do. His get-a-life

existence is a hazard of the profession –

but worth it: As a 23-year-old with a

first job, he is in the top 6% of earners in

America.

Higher up the totem pole, Joe (not

his real name) has risen through the

corporate ranks to become a managing

director at a major bank. Joe thought

his workload would become lighter as

he moved up, but the opposite has oc-

curred: He now works six or seven days

a week, from multiple locations. He

keeps an apartment in New York, where

he works two days, and is on the road

another three or four days. Only on

weekends does he see his wife and three

children –who live in Connecticut. Even

then, he gets calls in the middle of the

night on Saturdays and Sundays, and

flies out to see clients on a moment’s

Extreme Jobs The Dangerous Allure of the 70-Hour Workweek

by Sylvia Ann Hewlett and Carolyn Buck Luce

A

P J

L O

U G

H R

A N

B I G P I C T U R E

Certain industries breed

a type of professional for

whom get-a-life dedication

is a badge of honor. The

phenomenon is on the rise,

but is it sustainable?

notice.“The first year we were married,”

Joe’s wife recalls, “we had to rearrange

my grandmother’s funeral so that he

wouldn’t miss a meeting.”

Ming Mei is a managing director

and a member of the executive commit-

tee at ProLogis, a fast-growing real es-

tate investment trust with extensive op-

erations in Asia. Mei is in charge of

expansion in China, where he’s built

ProLogis’s portfolio base from zero to

10 million square feet of properties over

the past three years. The demands of

his job are immense. Negotiating with

Chinese government officials, he rou-

tinely packs five cities into six-day busi-

ness trips. These trips can be grueling –

back-to-back meetings spill over into

late dinners where key relationships

are cultivated and cemented. Despite

the pressure and the pace, Mei de-

scribes his job in glowing terms: “Build-

ing this business in markets where no

one has done anything like this before

is enormously exciting. And impor-

tant. We’ve built distribution centers

that are vital for China’s growth – they

contribute to the overall prospects of

the economy.”

Jonelle Salter is similarly enthusiastic

about her job. An offshore installation

manager (OIM) at BP, Jonelle knows

what it’s like to be in charge of the health

and safety of 80 workers on an oil plat-

form in the North Sea. On top of pres-

sures that would face anyone in this job,

she has some unique management chal-

lenges. As the first black woman to be-

come an OIM at BP, Jonelle has some-

times had to go to extra lengths to

establish her authority in this male-

dominated environment. But she loves

being a pioneer and credits BP for

going out on a limb and finding a fe-

male mentor (Gro Kielland, a manag-

ing director for BP Norway) to help her

through the rough patches. Jonelle

talks eloquently about the thrill that

comes with the challenges of her job.

“You train and train, but you still don’t

know whether you’ll come through when

50 harvard business review | hbr.org

B I G P I C T U R E • T h e D a n g e r o u s A l l u r e o f t h e 7 0 - H o u r W o r k w e e k

Sylvia Ann Hewlett is the president of the Center for Work-Life Policy, a New York–based nonprofit organization. She also heads the

Gender and Policy Program at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, in New York. Carolyn Buck Luce is

the chair of the Hidden Brain Drain Task Force and the global pharmaceutical sector leader at Ernst & Young, in New York.

Researching Extreme Jobs

In 2004 the Center for Work-Life Policy launched a private-sector task

force consisting of 33 global companies devoted to stemming attrition in

their female executive ranks – a problem referred to as the “hidden brain

drain.” Task force discussions and survey data showed that one challenge

facing women was a trend toward more extreme work in corporate mana-

gerial positions. In 2005 and 2006, we focused specifically on that issue.

This research consists of two surveys – one of high earners across various

professions in the U.S. and the other of high-earning managers in large

multinational corporations – as well as 14 focus groups and 35 one-on-one

interviews. The survey of U.S. workers targeted the top 6% of earners in

the country and garnered responses from 1,564 full-time employees (844

men, 720 women) ages 25 to 60. The survey of managers at global compa-

nies included 652 men and 323 women, ages 25 to 60, at the director level

or above; 54% were from the United States or Canada, and 46% were from

Europe, the Middle East, or Africa. Survey statistics cited throughout this

article refer to the U.S. high earners unless specifically attributed to the

multinational management population. The surveys were conducted

online by Harris Interactive from November 1, 2005, through April 6, 2006.

an emergency happens – and whether

you can conjure up the right kind of

leadership,” she says.“It’s a kind of test.

And when you pass, you feel quite

wonderful.”

Sudhir, Joe, Mei, and Jonelle are suc-

ceeding in what we have come to term

“extreme jobs,” and they’re not alone.

Across the economy, there are high-

earning professionals whose work has

become all consuming. The outrageous

hours they put into their careers are

matched only by the over-the-top re-

wards they receive.

Do these professionals constitute a

new breed? Not entirely. Highly de-

manding and important jobs have al-

ways been around – along with the

workaholics who created them where

they didn’t need to exist. Yet there is

a difference. No longer the pitiable

drones and graspers of society, today’s

overachieving professionals are recast

as road warriors and masters of the

universe. They labor longer, take on

more responsibility, and earn more ex-

travagantly than ever before – and their

numbers are growing.

Our research on extreme jobs is a

project of the Hidden Brain Drain Task

Force, which we launched in February

2004 and now head up. In late 2005,

four of the task force’s member compa-

nies – American Express, BP, ProLogis,

and UBS – sponsored two large surveys

with the intent of “mapping” the shape

and scope of high-level, high-impact

jobs these days. We also conducted in-

depth qualitative research–focus groups

and interviews – to get at the attitudes

and motivations that lie behind the

extreme-work model (the sidebar “Re-

searching Extreme Jobs” provides more

detail). We then considered the data in

relation to the large-scale structural

shifts that have made high-stakes em-

ployment a more prominent feature of

the U.S. economy and culture. What

emerges from this inquiry is a complex

picture of the all-consuming career –

rewarding in many ways, but not with-

out danger to individuals and society.

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tual behavior, we must rely on our re-

spondents to gauge the increase. Of the

extreme jobholders, 48% say they are

working an average of 16.6 more hours

per week than they did five years ago.

That finding is consistent with other

studies of the expanding workweek,

including, most recently, one by Peter

Kuhn and Fernando Lozano of the Na-

tional Bureau of Economic Research.

(Among college-educated men working

full-time in the United States, Kuhn and

Lozano report, those putting in 50-hour

weeks rose from 22.2% to 30.5% between

1980 and 2001.)

Vacations, meanwhile, seem to be

shrinking. Among the extreme-jobs

crowd, 42% take ten or fewer vacation

days per year–far less time off than they

are officially entitled to – and 55% claim

they have had to cancel vacation plans

“regularly.” Moreover, they say no one

is forcing them to do this. The long

hours and months without breaks are

discretionary. Jay (not his real name),

a creative executive at a major enter-

tainment company, is a case in point.

He can’t remember the last time he

had a vacation, and he has all but dele-

gated his social life to handlers. He is

driven by a vision of taking his com-

pany into a new creative space – video

games – and his heart and soul are

wrapped up in this mission, which has

become the defining element of his

identity. “If I can get this to work for

the studio,” he told us with unalloyed

enthusiasm,“I’ll be the first guy to figure

it out. Everyone else who has tried has

failed. It’s my Everest.”

Let us back up for a moment and clar-

ify the distinction we are making be-

tween run-of-the-mill long-hours jobs

and extreme jobs. Our definition, which

grew out of extended focus group dis-

cussions, takes into account not just

hours (and, of course, pay) but also the

pressures that make these positions

particularly stressful. We identified ten

common characteristics of extreme jobs

and decided to classify a respondent as

an extreme jobholder if he or she is

confronted by at least five of them, on

top of working 60 hours or more per

week (see the sidebar “The Elements of

Extremity”). By this standard, 21% of

the high earners in the U.S. whom we

surveyed have extreme jobs. (In our

separate survey of professionals work-

ing in global companies, this figure

rises to 45%.)

The fact is, extreme jobs are no longer

a rarity. Our data reveal an enormous in-

crease in work pressure for high-caliber

professionals across ages, genders, sec-

tors, and continents. Extreme jobs, we’ve

found, are distributed across the econ-

omy–in large manufacturing companies

as well as on Wall Street, in entertain-

ment and media, in medicine and law,

in consulting and accounting.

Given this increasingly extreme work

model, one might imagine that our

study has also uncovered a great many

burned out and bitter professionals. In

fact, quite the opposite is true. The over-

whelming majority of extreme jobhold-

ers in our U.S. sample (66%) say they

love their jobs – and in the global com-

panies survey, this figure rises to 76%.

Far from seeing themselves as worka-

holics in need of rescuing, extreme

workers wear their commitments like

december 2006 51

T h e D a n g e r o u s A l l u r e o f t h e 7 0 - H o u r W o r k w e e k • B I G P I C T U R E

The American Dream on Steroids The first thing that becomes clear is

that successful professionals are work-

ing harder than ever. The 40-hour work-

week, it seems, is a thing of the past.

Even the 60-hour workweek, once the

path to the top, is now practically con-

sidered part-time, as a recent Fortune

magazine article put it. Our data reveal

that 62% of high-earning individuals

work more than 50 hours a week, 35%

work more than 60 hours a week, and

10% work more than 80 hours a week.

Add in a typical one-hour commute,

and a 60-hour workweek translates into

leaving the house at 7 am and getting

home at 9 pm five days a week. If we

focus on the subset of those workers who

hold what we consider extreme jobs (a

designation based on responsibilities

and other attributes beyond pay), the

hours are even more punishing. The

majority of them (56%) work 70 hours

or more a week, and 9% work 100 hours

or more.

How dramatic a jump is this from the

past? Without longitudinal data on ac-

The Elements of Extremity

How do we define extreme jobs? For the purposes of data analysis, we’ve

said that survey respondents have such jobs if they work 60 hours or more

per week, are high earners, and hold positions with at least five of these

characteristics:

• Unpredictable flow of work

• Fast-paced work under tight deadlines

• Inordinate scope of responsibility that amounts to more than one job

• Work-related events outside regular work hours

• Availability to clients 24/7

• Responsibility for profit and loss

• Responsibility for mentoring and recruiting

• Large amount of travel

• Large number of direct reports

• Physical presence at workplace at least ten hours a day

Our two surveys of high-earning professionals have revealed the four charac-

teristics thought to create the most intensity and pressure: unpredictability

(cited by 91% of respondents), fast pace with tight deadlines (86%), work-

related events outside business hours (66%), and 24/7 client demands (61%).

badges of honor. To use the words of

the cultural critic Catherine Orenstein,

these jobs constitute “the American

Dream on steroids.” There is very little

sense of victimization. Almost two-

thirds (64%) of extreme workers admit

that the pressure and the pace are self-

inflicted – a function of a type A person-

ality. By and large, extreme professionals

don’t feel exploited; they feel exalted.

Why the Rise in Extreme Work? Every extreme worker has his or her

own reasons for putting in the effort.

Many people love the intellectual chal-

lenge and the thrill of achieving some-

thing big. Others are turned on by the

oversize compensation packages, bril-

liant colleagues, and recognition and

respect that come with the territory.

When we asked our survey respon-

dents what motivated them, most cited

a number of factors. (See the exhibit

“Why Do You Do It?”)

Note how gendered the responses

are. For men, compensation comes in

third on the list of motivators, after

stimulation/challenge and high-quality

colleagues. For women, compensation

comes in fifth, or last. The following

comments by Debra Langford are typi-

cal of what we heard in interviews: “It’s

not that compensation isn’t a top pri-

ority – it clearly is important. As an

African-American single woman with

financial responsibilities, I must be stra-

tegic in my career choices. When I ac-

cepted this position with Time Warner,

in which I am responsible for identify-

ing diverse candidates for high-level

positions at the company, I knew the

benefits would be beyond the purely fi-

nancial. This is an important position

because of the value of what I do – and

the recognition and support I receive

for my efforts are incredibly rewarding.”

Similarly, Susan Sobbott, president

of the OPEN division of American Ex-

press, chose AmEx because she wanted

to be part of a mission she believed

in–and part of a dedicated team.“I used

to be a financial analyst on Wall Street,”

she said. “After my MBA, I weighed

going back into investment banking and

considered consulting. I thought about

the big paycheck that typically comes

with working in these fields. But for

me, the most important thing in choos-

ing a path – more important than zeros

after a dollar sign – was to find an orga-

nization where I could work with tal-

ented people to create leading business

strategies that further a great brand.”

Interesting as these motivations are,

it should be pointed out that individual

decisions about work are not made in a

vacuum. At a macro level, the reasons

behind the rise of the extreme job are

structural; it’s the outcome of sweeping

changes in the global economic envi-

ronment. These changes–which include

increased competitive pressures, vastly

improved communication technology,

and cultural shifts – intersect in power-

ful ways.

Competitive pressures. To begin with, competition has become more in-

tense, both at the level of the individual

professional and at the level of the cor-

poration. Within companies, the com-

bined effect of merger mania and sub-

stantially flattened hierarchies has been

to pit a bigger pool of workers against

one another for any given promotion.

Catalyst reported that in 2005 there

were 368 fewer corporate officer posi-

tions in the Fortune 500 than there had

been ten years earlier (the number de-

clined from 11,241 to 10,873) – which

means the competition for high-level

positions has become that much fiercer.

Add to this the influx of talent that has

come about through women’s large-

scale movement into the workforce and

companies’ ongoing diversity efforts.

Both factors heighten the level of com-

petition. As companies grow leaner and

meaner, we see the declining job secu-

rity that Louis Uchitelle describes in The

Disposable American. Meanwhile, more

responsibility falls on the shoulders of

fewer individuals. Paul, a vice chairman

at one of the big four accounting firms,

told us his job has gotten so huge that

each day more things are left undone.

“The clincher,” he said, “is that the im-

portance of the things I’m not getting

to is greater than it used to be.”

The economists Robert Frank and

Philip Cook have argued that, more

and more, our economy operates by

“winner take all” rules. This is the kind

of dynamic that exists in flatter hier-

archies. Because a slight performance

edge yields outsize rewards (culminat-

ing in the gargantuan salaries awarded

to CEOs these days), there is a powerful

incentive to work incrementally more

52 harvard business review | hbr.org

B I G P I C T U R E • T h e D a n g e r o u s A l l u r e o f t h e 7 0 - H o u r W o r k w e e k

Why Do You Do It? Holders of extreme jobs indicated what motivates them to work long,

stressful hours. They answered the question “What are the main reasons

you love your job?” Multiple responses were allowed.

Stimulating/ challenging/ gives me an

adrenaline rush

High-quality colleagues

High compensation

Receive recognition

for work

Power/ status

90% 82%

52% 43% 43%

28% 37%

42%

23% 30%

Men Women

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than one’s rivals. Hours and effort ratchet

up accordingly. Consider how different

this is from the days of TV shows like

Leave It to Beaver and Ozzie and Harriet,

when a professional man who was rea-

sonably productive between the hours

of 9 and 5 could count on a steady if un-

spectacular ascent through the ranks.

The 1950s professional model was in

many ways kinder and gentler, but for

any young turk willing to work harder

and eager to be rewarded, it was a

source of intense frustration. Today’s

model operates by the young turks’

rules: The American Dream isn’t about

being Ozzie Nelson. It’s about being

Donald Trump.

Increasingly, the young turks are ac-

tually young Indians or young Chinese–

or whatever smart and hardworking

population offers a labor cost advan-

tage. The threat of losing jobs to out-

sourcing arrangements is another driver

in the rise of extreme work. Finally, the

climbing costs of health care insurance

and other benefits – and the fact that

“nonexempt” professionals do not earn

overtime pay in the U.S.– make compa-

nies eager to squeeze as many hours of

work as possible out of their employees

before springing for another fully

loaded salary.

The “extreme” ethos. While compet- itive pressures in corporations are mak-

ing extreme jobs more necessary, other

changes in the broader society are mak-

ing them more attractive. Orenstein

points to signs in the popular culture

of the widespread embrace of the “ex-

treme” ethos. Extreme sports in particu-

lar have become wildly popular – they

have their own version of the Olympics,

known simply as the X Games, created

in 1995 by ESPN. The reality TV show

Fear Factor gives couch potatoes vicari-

ous thrills by putting ordinary people

to the test in extreme stunts. Neighbor-

hood health clubs now offer rock-

climbing walls and kickboxing classes

for those who abhor the dull routine of

exercise.

We first heard the word “extreme” ap-

plied to white-collar work four years ago

in an interview with Marilyn, a senior

banker at a London-based investment

december 2006 53

T h e D a n g e r o u s A l l u r e o f t h e 7 0 - H o u r W o r k w e e k • B I G P I C T U R E

bank. Marilyn was captivated by ex-

treme sports: skydiving, snowboarding,

triathlons, bungee jumping, surfing,

mountaineering – anything that pro-

vided a rush of adrenaline and an ele-

ment of danger. She eagerly recom-

mended Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air (an

account of an ill-fated trip by amateur

mountain climbers) as a window into

why people push themselves to the lim-

its of their physical endurance. Marilyn

saw parallels between extreme sports

and her life as an investment banker.

First, there were the extraordinary time

demands and performance stressors.

Seventy-hour workweeks, grueling travel

requirements, and relentless bottom-line

pressures constantly pushed her to her

limits – both physically and intellectu-

ally. Second, there was the allure of the

job. Much like extreme sports, invest-

ment banking was exhilarating and se-

ductive. Marilyn told us,“It gives me this

rush. Like a drug, it’s addictive.”

In the world of extreme sports, the

more daring, demanding, and – this is

telling – gratuitous the feat, the greater

our awe of the athlete. We appreciate

the extreme athlete’s talent, skill, and

courage, but also the hubris that sets

him or her apart from the crowd. High

stakes and danger define the extreme-

sports challenge, which in the end is less

about the physical than about the exis-

tential – less about mountain peaks or

big waves than about inner strength and

testing one’s limits. In a popular culture

that lionizes such athletes, it is not sur-

prising that the extreme ethos has

worked its way into other endeavors.

And so, our most intense jobs are seen

not as exploitative but, rather, as glam-

orous, desirable, and virtuous. (Witness

The Apprentice.) From ER doctors to tax

lawyers to management consultants to

hedge fund salespeople, many profes-

sionals are wearing their outsize work

commitments on their sleeves; they

consider their over-the-top efforts – and

often voluntary sacrifices and risks –

a reflection of character. They brag about

pulling all-nighters and about flying

300,000 miles in a year. To them, a 70-

hour workweek is about proving their

worth. It’s akin to going up against the

elements.

New levels of connectivity. Extreme work is also the result of the key tech-

nologies that facilitate it. Modern com-

munication devices have prompted a

shift in expectations and behavior. We

see it all around us: people glued to

their cell phones or BlackBerrys, no

matter the day, time, or occasion. Profes-

sionals tap so incessantly at their wire-

less devices that a new medical ailment

has arisen – “BlackBerry thumb” – and

Hyatt hotel spas now offer a “Black-

Berry Balm hand massage.”

Communication technology seems

to have both liberated and shackled

extreme professionals. In our U.S. sur-

vey, 67% of people with extreme jobs

said that being available for clients 24/7

is a critical part of being successful.

According to one young investment

banker, “When you’re an analyst, even

when you’re in a meeting, waiting an

hour to respond to an e-mail is just not

acceptable.” This kind of availability,

not possible before the advent of Black-

Berrys and cell phones, is a curse as well

as a blessing. A Dallas-based accountant

in one of our focus groups described

how her boss had tracked her down at

a five-year-old’s birthday party the pre-

vious weekend and insisted she join a

90-minute conference call because

something had blown up with a client.

Of the U.S. survey respondents, 72% said

that technology helps them do their

jobs well, 59% said that it lengthens

their working day, and 64% noted its

encroachment on family time.

The workplace as social center. Per- haps most profound among the cultural

shifts we’ve been describing is the fact

that the workplace is now the center

and source of many people’s social lives.

When one’s best friends and most stim-

ulating encounters are at the office – as

is increasingly the case – the prospect of

working late into the evening becomes

less onerous. Robert Putnam famously

decried the loss of social capital in

American cities as more people “bowled

alone.” But it can be argued that the

B I G P I C T U R E • T h e D a n g e r o u s A l l u r e o f t h e 7 0 - H o u r W o r k w e e k

Extreme jobs may be deeply allur-

ing, but they are certainly not

cost free. Our data show that the

extreme-work model is wreaking

havoc on private lives and taking

a toll on health and well-being.

Housework and home care seem

to be among the first things to go.

Over three-quarters (77%) of the

women we surveyed and two-thirds

(66%) of the men said they can’t

properly maintain their homes. One

executive in a London-based focus

group told us that although he had

lived in his South Kensington flat for

two years, a mattress and a sleeping

bag were the sum total of his furnish-

ings. His schedule was such that he

hadn’t been able to make a commit-

ment to be home to accept a delivery.

Health is also an issue. More than

two-thirds of professionals we sur-

veyed don’t get enough sleep; half

don’t get enough exercise; and a sig-

nificant number overeat, consume

too much alcohol, or rely on medica-

tions to relieve insomnia or anxiety.

Moms with extreme jobs tend

to do better than dads in terms of

coming through for their children.

Almost two-thirds (65%) of men with

extreme jobs said their work inter-

feres with their ability to have strong

relationships with their children –

compared with one-third (33%) of

women. In a focus group targeting

the teenage children of extreme work-

ers, a fresh-faced 16-year-old we’ll call

Ellen said her dad had promised he’d

work less when he made partner at a

major accounting firm.“But instead,

he works more….My dad’s always

exhausted. He’s gone when I get up,

and not back when I go to sleep.”

But her father’s absentee parenting

seemed normal to her since, in her

world, all the fathers she knew worked

such long hours.

Spouses and partners also suffer

from the extreme-work model. Ex-

treme workers dramatically under-

invest in intimate relationships.

Some of the data are quite startling.

For example, at the end of a 12-hour

or longer workday, 45% of all respon-

dents in our global companies survey

are too tired to say anything at all to

their spouses or partners. Focus

group conversations were sprinkled

with half-joking references to four

in bed these days: oneself, one’s part-

ner, and two BlackBerrys or Treos.

Something’s Gotta Give

Being able to maintain my home

Having a strong relationship

with my children

Having a strong relationship

with my spouse/partner

Having a satisfying

sex life

66% 77%

65%

33% 46% 46% 49%

53%

Repercussions of Extreme Jobs for Family, Home, and Intimate Life

U.S. Survey Extreme Jobholders Saying Job Interferes with the Following

Men Women

54 harvard business review | hbr.org

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CC YY

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kinds of personal connections once

made through civic organizations are

now made in workplaces. In a far less

positive light, this is a theme that Arlie

Russell Hochschild has explored in her

book The Time Bind, which gets inside

the relationships of some dual-career

couples and reveals how home life can

become seriously depleted when both

men and women work long hours. As

households and families are starved of

time, they become progressively less ap-

pealing, and both men and women

begin to avoid going home. Returning to

a house or an apartment with an empty

refrigerator and a neglected teenager

might prove to be a little bleak at the

end of a long working day – so why not

look in on that networking event or put

that presentation through one more

draft? Hochschild shows that for many

professionals, “home” and “work” have

reversed roles. Home is the source of

stress and guilt, while work has become

the “haven in a heartless world” – the

place where successful professionals

get strokes, admiration, and respect.

More knowledge-based work. Part of the reason that workplaces have be-

come more sociable is that the nature

of work has undergone a transforma-

tion. “Knowledge work” is increasingly

important, and corporations are now

full of people employing their brains

more than their brawn. One thing’s for

sure: There’s no need to lay down tools

at the end of a shift; to the extent that

knowledge work requires capital equip-

ment, the equipment is highly portable

communications devices rather than

plant machinery. Knowledge-based en-

terprises also tend to attract employ-

ees who are on a par intellectually. The

exchange of ideas and knowledge that

now characterizes most workplaces is

without doubt a source of stimulation –

again, making it less painful to put in

the hours. It is probably not wrong to

assume that more knowledge work

means that people simply like their

jobs more.

This surely seems true of Alex, a fed-

eral prosecutor who focuses on securi-

ties fraud. He works long hours, typi-

cally arriving home around 11 pm and

routinely skipping meals. Instead of

eating dinner, he will have a PowerBar

at his desk – or a peanut butter and jelly

sandwich when he gets home late at

night. He never makes it home before

his two young children are in bed, al-

though he does make a point of taking

his daughter to preschool in the morn-

ing. He laments that in trying to salvage

as much family time as possible, he is

neglecting his relationship with his

wife. On a rare recent “date,” the couple

went to a jazz club, only to have Alex

doze off after one drink. It’s not hard to

imagine why: His average workweek is

75 hours – and in the midst of a trial, he

can put in 95 hours.

Nevertheless, Alex derives enormous

satisfaction from his work. Last year, for

example, he prosecuted an accounting

fraud case.“Enron writ small,” he calls it.

For him, the case exemplifies what mo-

tivates him to work so hard. He not only

made sure a criminal was punished for

breaking the law; he also helped secure

compensation for those who were

wronged. The problem with this great

job is its size. “In a nutshell, it’s un-

doable,” says Alex. “We’re underfunded

and painfully understaffed….Over the

last five years, I’ve built up some great

relationships with our FBI agents, who

often bring me compelling cases – but

the fact of the matter is, I can only take

a small proportion of them. It’s disap-

pointing and frustrating, but I just can’t

drive myself any harder.”

Global operations. As companies gain global spans of operation, there are

december 2006

Professionals tap so incessantly at their wireless

devices that a new medical ailment has arisen –

“BlackBerry thumb.”

continued on page 58

56 harvard business review | hbr.org

B I G P I C T U R E • T h e D a n g e r o u s A l l u r e o f t h e 7 0 - H o u r W o r k w e e k

Our research shows that extreme jobs

are much more common among men

than among women. The exhibit “Who

Has Extreme Jobs?” tells the tale. Among

high earners in the United States, 21%

hold such jobs, and less than a fifth of

those are women. Among high earners

at global companies, 45% are working

extremely, and women make up a third

of that group.

Why aren’t more extreme workers

women? Part of the answer emerges from

finer cuts of the data. In the global compa-

nies survey, we found that young, talented

women are well represented in jobs that

have reasonable hours (fewer than 60 a

week) but high performance requirements

(fast pace with tight deadlines, 24/7 client

demands, and so on). Of the respondents

holding these jobs, 39% are women. By

contrast, of those meeting high perfor-

mance requirements and putting in longer

hours, only 30% are women. The data sug-

gest that women are not afraid of the

pressure or responsibility of extreme jobs –

they just can’t pony up the hours.

The U.S. survey, too, demonstrates

that the number of hours worked is

where women fall short. Consider the

exhibit “How Many Hours and How Much

Responsibility?”– which divides the high

earners we surveyed into four quadrants,

according to the length of the workweek

and the demands of the job. Positions

that involve long hours but little in the

way of performance pressure are particu-

larly shunned by women: Only 2% of the

women in our sample work long hours in

positions with few extreme-job responsi-

bilities. Men are somewhat more tolerant

of such jobs.

Perhaps women are less tolerant of

high-hours, low-impact work because they

are more aware of the “opportunity costs.”

They seem particularly tuned into – and

pained by – the fallout on their children.

They see a direct link between their long

workweeks and a variety of distressing

behaviors in their children. As the research

literature attests, it’s extremely rare for

parents to admit to having problems with

their children. (There are serious problems

in society, but never in one’s own home.)

Thus, the data in the exhibit “Extreme Jobs

Affect Well-Being of Children” constitute

a veritable portrait of guilt. That women

Extreme jobs demand a high number of responsibilities (five or more out of ten specific challenges, such as tight

deadlines and 24/7 availability to clients) as well as a high number of work hours (60 or more a week). The matrix

below illustrates where the men and women in our U.S. survey fall. Each figure represents 1% of the total popula-

tion of high earners surveyed.

How Many Hours and How Much Responsibility?

High

HighLow

QUADRANT III QUADRANT II

N um

be r o

f E xt

re m

e-

Jo b

Ch ar

ac te

ris tic

s

Number of Hours Worked

Men=15% Women= 4%

Men= 33% Women= 12%

Men=12% Women= 2%

Is There a Gender Issue Here?

U.S. Survey Global Survey

4%

17%

15%

30%

Who Has Extreme Jobs?

Men Women

Men=17% Women= 4%

QUADRANT IV QUADRANT I

YY EE

LL MM

AA GG

CC YY

AA NN

BB LL

AA CC

KK

december 2006 57

T h e D a n g e r o u s A l l u r e o f t h e 7 0 - H o u r W o r k w e e k • B I G P I C T U R E

worry about the implications for their

children is probably not because mothers

are more caring than fathers but because,

as our survey data show, more men in

extreme jobs (25%) than women (12%)

have the support of an at-home spouse or

partner.

These dynamics play out in homes

around the world every day. In a focus

group held at Canary Wharf in London,

a woman lawyer put it succinctly: “When

I walk out the door in the morning, leav-

ing my two-year-old with the nanny,

there’s usually a bit of a scene. Tommy

clings, pouts, and whips up the guilt.

Now, I know it’s not serious – he’s a happy

kid, and he likes his nanny. But it sure

makes me think about why I go to work –

and why I put in a ten-hour day. It’s as

though every day I make this calculation:

Do the satisfactions I derive from my job

(efficacy, recognition, a sense of stretch-

ing my mind) justify leaving Tommy?

Some days it’s a close run.”

Indeed, for many women, the equation

is not balancing out. A clear majority (57%)

of the women in extreme jobs in the

United States told us they don’t want to

continue working at this pace for more

than a year. Less than half the men (48%)

felt the same way. Only 13% of the women

(versus 27% of the men) want to be work-

ing at this pace in five years. The numbers

were far more dramatic in our global com-

panies survey, in which 80% of the women

(versus 58% of the men) said they don’t

want to keep working this many hours for

more than a year, and only 5% of the

women (and 12% of the men) said they

want to do so for the next five years.

The key question, of course, is whether all

this creates a barrier for ambitious women

and for companies that want to achieve

more gender diversity in their upper ranks.

The answer is yes to the extent that extreme

workers constitute the talent pool from

which top leadership will be drawn. If this

group of high-octane workers represents

the “A team”–and we think it does –it’s

very disturbing to see so few women in it.

The silver lining is that employers face a

real opportunity here. We know of several

companies that are beginning to tap into

the talents of women who are willing to

commit to hard work and take on responsi-

bility but cannot do the long hours. For

example, Booz Allen Hamilton and Ameri-

can Express are beginning to “chunk out”

work in different ways. AmEx has created

an internal consulting pool that provides

flexible career paths for high-performing

employees. A working mom, for instance,

might choose to arrange her workday so

that she’s able to pick her children up from

school. “We’re sharpening our approach

to creating flexible work models,” says

L. Kevin Cox, executive vice president of

human resources at American Express. In

a similar vein, Lehman Brothers and Gold-

man Sachs are beginning to create flexibil-

ity over the arc of a career. Lehman’s En-

core program welcomes talented women

who have off-ramped and are looking for

a road back into the financial sector –

reaching out with networks, mentors, and

flexibility. Goldman Sachs’s New Direc-

tions program provides reskilling and a

“new compass” for returning women, show-

ing them a way back into their careers.

Heidi Yang, an investment banker in

Hong Kong, illustrates the edge some global

companies are developing as employers of

choice for young, talented women. Heidi is

definitely a “high-potential manager.”

During her three and a half years in the

investment division of UBS in Hong Kong,

she has been promoted twice; she now

runs a team of 25. When we first met with

her in November 2005, she was pregnant

with her first child and pleased with UBS’s

parent-friendly policies – which she consid-

ered as generous as any “on the street”–

but she worried about whether those poli-

cies were “for real.” If, for instance, she

availed herself of her full maternity leave,

would she be seen as not serious, and sub-

tly derailed from the fast track? Happily,

when we last interviewed her, in July 2006,

her fears had not been realized. “There’s

been a real change at this firm,” she ob-

served. “The culture is shifting. They’re

allowing me to work flexibly. As long as

I come through for my clients, I can work

wherever I want. There’s none of this face-

time stuff. My bosses seem to understand

the importance of keeping women.”

Respondents answered the question “Has your child ever experienced any

of the following because of the number of hours you work?”

Extreme Jobs Affect Well-Being of Children

Global Survey

Watching too much television

Acting out/ discipline

issues due to lack of

attention

Eating too much junk food

Having too little adult supervision

Underachieving in school

49%

18%

38%

12%

34%35%

14% 22%

13%

22%

Men Women

additional reasons for jobs to become

extreme. The need to oversee work in

multiple time zones increases not only

the travel requirements of a job but

also the length of the workday. One oil

company executive we interviewed ran

a global team composed of colleagues

in Angola, the United States, and China.

As he put it, this “did a number” on his

working day. Other professionals in our

focus groups told anecdotes about

pulling all-nighters and defying jet lag

to attend back-to-back meetings in Sin-

gapore and New York. The difficulty

of waking up to participate in global

conference calls in the middle of the

night was a common refrain.

Because many companies are expand-

ing globally, senior managers have a

larger scope of responsibility. Take Gwen

(not her real name), who manages a

supply chain for a large DIY retailer. The

pressures of her job are enormous –

involving quick decisions on inventory

levels that can have huge consequences

for her company’s bottom line. Just

three years ago, most of her suppliers

were in South Carolina and Georgia;

now her supply chain reaches to East-

ern Europe and China. Gwen operates

in three different time zones and seven

different countries. She says,“The chal-

lenges are intense – and I like that. But

being away from home half the time –

and I mean away away – is really hard

on my ten-year-old.” Compounding the

overload problem is the fact that man-

agers these days are less able to dele-

gate low-value but necessary tasks (like

compiling the expense reports for all

that travel Gwen does). Secretaries seem

to have been replaced by do-it-yourself

technology – 71% of extreme workers

have no dedicated administrative assis-

tant, and more than a third (37%) don’t

even have a shared assistant.

We believe that these are the key

trends underlying the rise in extreme

work. There may be others. The point,

however, is that they represent a mix of

positive and negative pressures. Long

workweeks cannot simply be chalked

up to the crushing effects of a heartless

and unchecked capitalist system, as

some commentators have argued. The

extreme professionals who find their

work enormously alluring are not de-

luded. Recognizing trends like the rise

in knowledge work and society’s general

embrace of the extreme ethos makes it

easier to understand the attitudes of

people like Madeleine (not her real

name), the chief operating officer of a

major global bank. As she detailed the

demands of her job for us, we found

her to be downright exuberant. She had

recently transferred from the bank’s

New York headquarters to London,

where her responsibilities were ex-

panded tenfold: She now travels be-

tween three time zones. The pressure is

undeniable, but we heard no complaint.

Instead, Madeleine described the thrill

of managing a large international busi-

ness and being “a global player on top of

my game.”

Life on the Edge If people in extreme jobs are uncom-

plaining and their employers are happy

to have their services, is it reasonable to

claim there is a problem? Arguably, the

trend toward more extreme work is a

boon to national competitiveness.

Yet there are, even in the responses to

our survey, hints of the dangers afoot.

Asked about the effects of their extreme

jobs on their health and relationships,

most respondents readily noted the

downsides. More than 69% believe they

would be healthier if they worked less

extremely; 58% think their work gets in

the way of strong relationships with

their children; 46% think it gets in the

way of good relationships with their

spouses; and 50% say their jobs make it

impossible to have a satisfying sex life.

(For more data on the personal costs of

extreme work, see the sidebar “Some-

thing’s Gotta Give.”)

These statistics are underscored by the

stories shared by focus group partici-

pants. In one session, which took place

at a financial services company, an exec-

utive described how he had lost all cred-

ibility with his elderly wheelchair-

bound father by canceling so many

promised weekend visits. Another exec-

utive, striking a more positive note, de-

scribed the transformative recent ex-

perience of taking, for the first time in

his 14-year career, two consecutive

weeks of vacation: “It was a revelation.

I had no idea I even had it in me to

enter into this other zone, where I was

able to focus on my nine-year-old son,

and I mean really focus. By the second

week, I was listening to meandering sto-

ries of a tiff he’d had with a best friend

and his description of what had hap-

pened in the last episode of his favorite

TV show without urging him to get to

the point, or wrap it up. And we spent

hours playing Ping-Pong – a game he

loves but I generally have no patience

for.” The other participants listened in-

tently, clearly trying to wrap their minds

around what a two-week vacation

would be like.

These are poignant examples of the

costs of extreme work to individuals,

but there can be costs at the company

level, as well – for instance, when burn-

out occurs. Half of our extreme jobhold-

ers don’t want to continue working

under this kind of pressure for more

than a year. Moreover, the next genera-

tions of management–the so-called Gen

X and Gen Y cohorts – seem less enam-

ored of their jobs than baby boomers.

In the 45-to-60 age group, only 19% of

extreme jobholders say they are likely

to leave their jobs within two years;

this figure rises to 30% in the 35-to-44

age group and to 36% in the 25-to-34 age

group. The ultimate price may be paid

in succession planning if maxed-out

58 harvard business review | hbr.org

B I G P I C T U R E • T h e D a n g e r o u s A l l u r e o f t h e 7 0 - H o u r W o r k w e e k

Long workweeks cannot simply be chalked up to

the crushing effects of a heartless and unchecked

capitalist system.

professionals stop striving for top jobs.

In our survey, 65% said they would de-

cline a promotion if it were even more

demanding of their energy.

Beyond the level of any single com-

pany, the costs of the extreme-job phe-

nomenon become far more troubling.

The common observation about a job

category that is demanding to the

point of exhaustion is that it is “a young

man’s game.” But more jobs are falling

into this category – and more than

young men need to be in the game. The

societal costs of income disparity and

winner-take-all economics are huge, as

many before us have argued.

Women in particular stand to lose

from the extreme-work model. Our re-

search finds that while women don’t

shirk the pressure or responsibility of

extreme work, they are not matching

the hours logged by their male col-

leagues. This is especially true of moth-

ers, who are also dealing with an in-

creasingly extreme parenting model;

they simply can’t – or don’t choose

to – work exceedingly long hours. Of all

the high earners we classified as ex-

treme jobholders, only 20% are women.

The women who do hold extreme jobs,

meanwhile, are somewhat less likely

than the men to love their work. (The

sidebar “Is There a Gender Issue

Here?” offers an extensive analysis of

the implications for women executives

and the companies that strive to re-

tain them.)

Cultures of Midnight Oil Of all the high earners we surveyed (not

just the extreme-job subset), 44% feel

that the pace of their work is extreme.

Professionals these days are putting in

longer hours, taking on more responsi-

bility, and facing more pressure than

ever before. Their intensity and invest-

ment may serve companies well in the

short run but will pose risks in the long

run. The extreme-work model threat-

ens to cull real talent, particularly fe-

male talent, that otherwise could have

reached the top.

It’s hard to offer solutions. Many com-

panies are encouraging more work/life

balance; a few go to some lengths to YY EE

LL MM

AA GG

CC YY

AA NN

BB LL

AA CC

KK

december 2006

ensure that the policies they’ve put on

paper are reflected in reality. For every

company that does so, however, there

are others afraid of creating a work at-

mosphere that is unattractive to “A play-

ers.” If an effort to establish a more

measured work style means that ex-

treme achievement will no longer be

rewarded, they reason, then some ex-

treme workers will seek opportunities

with firms more likely to appreciate

their outsize contributions. Colleagues

may be happy to see extreme workers

go; workaholics can be highly de-

manding and critical of their less dedi-

cated coworkers. But some manage-

ment teams think there are worse

things than having an ultraperformer

around–like having that person join the

competition.

Indeed, some organizations – certain

management-consulting and invest-

ment-banking firms come to mind –

attract talent in the first place with

their famously tough environments.

The importance of company culture in

setting the pace of work was strongly

affirmed by our survey, in which 74% of

respondents agreed that extreme jobs

emerge from companies’ particular value

sets. Shane, a young man who partici-

pated in a focus group, put his finger on

it. Having spent his weekend jumping

through hoops for a demanding boss,

only to discover that he’d wasted his

time, he pinned the problem on the

“tone at the top.”

Senior leadership of organizations

should take note: The attributes that

give a workplace an advantage in re-

cruiting and retention can change dra-

matically over time. The culture that

celebrates the extreme ethos today may

tire of it – quite literally – tomorrow. At

a minimum, senior executives should

think carefully about the work behav-

iors they are rewarding, encouraging,

or requiring. More than anything, the

signals they send will determine whether

jobs become extreme–and if so, whether

those jobs remain exhilarating or simply

become exhausting.

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“This masterful study is destined

to be a landmark.”

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