60 Hours a week is the sweet spot of productivity?

3 points by ikt 1 year ago | 5 comments

On Wednesday, Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google, said the company could lead the industry in artificial general intelligence — when machines match or become smarter than humans — if employees worked harder.

“I recommend being in the office at least every weekday,” he wrote in a memo posted internally on Wednesday evening that was viewed by The New York Times. He added that “60 hours a week is the sweet spot of productivity” in the message to employees who work on Gemini, Google’s lineup of A.I. models and apps.

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Does anyone know where he got this number from? I've asked a few people and no one seems to know.

I assume he's talking about 12 hour work days as well not like 8 hours for 7 days essentially having no time off at all

hamdouni 1 year ago |

I've never read anything about a "sweet spot of productivity" involving working 60h/w. And it is kind of funny that his motto is not "work smarter" but "work harder" in the context of AI :-)

simne 1 year ago |

It remembers me "The Mythical Man-Month" by Brooks. And in book you will find some sources of this myth.

Also I suggest to search for more recent discussions about this book, where you could see modern cases.

rzzzwilson 1 year ago |

Maybe 60 hours a week if you aren't doing demanding work. Even with undemanding work 60 hours a week isn't all that sustainable.

> Does anyone know where he got this number from?

He may have just made it up.

gibbitz 1 year ago |

Entrepreneurs forget that they worked this hard because it was their company. Most companies act like their employees should work this hard because of their culture. They forget that we wouldn't be there if they didn't pay us.

Rotundo 1 year ago |

So I'll be working 60 hours a week at making myself superfluous and making a billionaire even richer than he already is. Yeah, but no thanks.