France to Limit Off-the-Clock Work Emails

confuzzled dude wrote:Labor unions and corporate representatives in France have agreed on an “obligation to disconnect from remote communications tools” that would apply to 250,000 employees of consulting, computing and polling firms. The accord, signed this month but yet to be approved by the Labor Ministry, would require that employers verify that the 11 hours of daily “rest” time to which all workers are legally entitled be spent uninterrupted.
 
“We really want there to be 11 consecutive hours,” said Marie Buard, a project leader at the Federation of Communication, Consulting and Culture, a branch of the French Democratic Confederation of Labor. Still, Ms. Buard said, “We also wouldn’t like this to squeeze businesses and cause them problems.”
 
Under the agreement, she said, each company would develop a policy and enforcement mechanisms. One might choose to block communications from 11 p.m. to 10 a.m. by shutting down its email servers, while another might simply ask employees not to check email between 9 p.m. and 8 a.m.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/12/world/europe/in-france-a-move-to-limit-off-the-clock-work-emails.html?hpw&rref=business&_r=0

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:i once had an argument with a frenchman about the general laid back attitude to work of the french. he pointed to the fact that if you actually scale the per capita GDP of the us and france by the number of workdays france comes out ahead. his claim therefore was that the french are more efficient than americans. his point? he'll gladly accept less pay for more leisure and socialized medicine.

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:his other point americans work far too much for far too little.

confuzzled dude wrote:

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:i once had an argument with a frenchman about the general laid back attitude to work of the french. he pointed to the fact that if you actually scale the per capita GDP of the us and france by the number of workdays france comes out ahead. his claim therefore was that the french are more efficient than americans. his point? he'll gladly accept less pay for more leisure and socialized medicine.

makes perfect sense to me.

Propagandhi711 wrote:

confuzzled dude wrote:

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:i once had an argument with a frenchman about the general laid back attitude to work of the french. he pointed to the fact that if you actually scale the per capita GDP of the us and france by the number of workdays france comes out ahead. his claim therefore was that the french are more efficient than americans. his point? he'll gladly accept less pay for more leisure and socialized medicine.

makes perfect sense to me.

you should move to france. or move to any of your other favorite places (middle east (excluding israel), venezuela, cuba, russia, pakistan, afghanistan etc) where life and policies are so much better and "consistent" and lacking in "oppressors" and aren't "self interest driven".

Merlot Daruwala wrote:Haha...if Air France's servers in France crash late in the night, its global ops will have to wait five hours till the admin checks his alerts and fixes it. Way to go, France. With 34 hr weeks and extended vacations, you were already the epitome of inefficiency. This now is icing on top. Bravo!

Idéfix wrote:

Merlot Daruwala wrote:Haha...if Air France's servers in France crash late in the night, its global ops will have to wait five hours till the admin checks his alerts and fixes it. Way to go, France. With 34 hr weeks and extended vacations, you were already the epitome of inefficiency. This now is icing on top. Bravo!

French consultants joke that they do all the work that goes into keeping the country running, while the rest of their compatriots enjoy their 35 hour work weeks and six weeks off for les vacances. I guess this rule will fix all that.

Kris wrote:

Idéfix wrote:

Merlot Daruwala wrote:Haha...if Air France's servers in France crash late in the night, its global ops will have to wait five hours till the admin checks his alerts and fixes it. Way to go, France. With 34 hr weeks and extended vacations, you were already the epitome of inefficiency. This now is icing on top. Bravo!

French consultants joke that they do all the work that goes into keeping the country running, while the rest of their compatriots enjoy their 35 hour work weeks and six weeks off for les vacances. I guess this rule will fix all that.

>>>It is one thing to strike a work-life balance personally and another to have this done by governmental diktat. The country stinks when it comes to customer service, with everyone behaving like they are doing you a favor.

Kris wrote:
>>>It is one thing to strike a work-life balance personally and another to have this done by governmental diktat. The country stinks when it comes to customer service, with everyone behaving like they are doing you a favor.

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:let me preface this by saying i don't agree with the french way of achieving work life balance. however this american conservative sacred creed of any govt regulation and interference is evil and accepting that position as if it is some immutable natural law is ridiculous. it is govt regulation driven by unions that brought you the five day week. so if you enjoy your weekend don't forget to thank the evil unions and their handmaiden, government regulation.

Kris wrote:

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:let me preface this by saying i don't agree with the french way of achieving work life balance. however this american conservative sacred creed of any govt regulation and interference is evil and accepting that position as if it is some immutable natural law is ridiculous. it is govt regulation driven by unions that brought you the five day week. so if you enjoy your weekend don't forget to thank the evil unions and their handmaiden, government regulation.

>>> The conservative creed i.e. skepticism of government regulation is not one that comes out of the blue. It is informed by a fear of governmental power-creep. In the abstract, employment is between two parties: the employer and the employee. The government is a third party. Of course, it is not that black and white, since civilized societies cannot stand by and allow blatant labor abuse or slave wages. In that sense, the government as the upholder of laws has more interest than a strict third party. However, how far can government be allowed to take over the process? The French case being discussed here is an example when things get out of hand. The example you have given of the 5 day workweeks and weekends etc. probably did get a head-start because of unions, but I am not sure those would not worked out anyway as the economy matured. We have working-from-home and flexible time schedules now that have been worked out on the basis of mutual convenience, without governmental diktat. I am not  making a case for a complete 'hands off' position by the government, but think it is healthy to question whether the government is a party to turn to every time we hit certain roadblocks.

Merlot Daruwala wrote:

Kris wrote:

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:let me preface this by saying i don't agree with the french way of achieving work life balance. however this american conservative sacred creed of any govt regulation and interference is evil and accepting that position as if it is some immutable natural law is ridiculous. it is govt regulation driven by unions that brought you the five day week. so if you enjoy your weekend don't forget to thank the evil unions and their handmaiden, government regulation.

>>> The conservative creed i.e. skepticism of government regulation is not one that comes out of the blue. It is informed by a fear of governmental power-creep. In the abstract, employment is between two parties: the employer and the employee. The government is a third party. Of course, it is not that black and white, since civilized societies cannot stand by and allow blatant labor abuse or slave wages. In that sense, the government as the upholder of laws has more interest than a strict third party. However, how far can government be allowed to take over the process? The French case being discussed here is an example when things get out of hand. The example you have given of the 5 day workweeks and weekends etc. probably did get a head-start because of unions, but I am not sure those would not worked out anyway as the economy matured. We have working-from-home and flexible time schedules now that have been worked out on the basis of mutual convenience, without governmental diktat. I am not  making a case for a complete 'hands off' position by the government, but think it is healthy to question whether the government is a party to turn to every time we hit certain roadblocks.

Well said. Labor protection in France has been carried to such an extreme by the socialistic regimes there that companies there are losing competitiveness, burdened with entrenched workforces they can't touch. Even something as innocuous as an ERP upgrade requires consultation with the worker councils. Consolidating multiple offices into one facility in the same city is an elaborate multi-month project in negotiations, involving consulting and gaining consensus with multiple councils and regulators.

No wonder French companies are so eager to outsource. That's the only way they can get anything done. Indian companies are gaining share at the expense of the CapGeminis of the world.

Kris wrote:
>>> The conservative creed i.e. skepticism of government regulation is not one that comes out of the blue. It is informed by a fear of governmental power-creep.

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:

Kris wrote:
>>> The conservative creed i.e. skepticism of government regulation is not one that comes out of the blue. It is informed by a fear of governmental power-creep.

so too the liberal fear of laissez-faire. government collusion with one or other interest groups can also go the other way. the robber barons of 19th century america and putin's twenty-first century russia are examples of government supported oligarchies that diminish the citizenry's well being.  i have no problem necessarily with anything you are saying, but only want to point out there is an extreme on the other side too.

and if you are so inclined, like some well known habitually sarcastic female posters here with an interest in mathematics and crossword puzzles who have made themselves scarce recently, you might even think of present day american governmental structures as well camouflaged support structures for wall street oligarchies.

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:let me preface this by saying i don't agree with the french way of achieving work life balance. however this american conservative sacred creed of any govt regulation and interference is evil and accepting that position as if it is some immutable natural law is ridiculous. it is govt regulation driven by unions that brought you the five day week. so if you enjoy your weekend don't forget to thank the evil unions and their handmaiden, government regulation.

MaxEntropy_Man wrote:

Kris wrote:
>>> The conservative creed i.e. skepticism of government regulation is not one that comes out of the blue. It is informed by a fear of governmental power-creep.

so too the liberal fear of laissez-faire. government collusion with one or other interest groups can also go the other way. the robber barons of 19th century america and putin's twenty-first century russia are examples of government supported oligarchies that diminish the citizenry's well being.  i have no problem necessarily with anything you are saying, but only want to point out there is an extreme on the other side too.

and if you are so inclined, like some well known habitually sarcastic female posters here with an interest in mathematics and crossword puzzles who have made themselves scarce recently, you might even think of present day american governmental structures as well camouflaged support structures for wall street oligarchies.