New French Law Prohibits After-Hours Work Emails

Hugh Pickens DOT Com (2995471) writes "Lucy Mangan reports at The Guardian that a new labor agreement in France means that employees must ignore their bosses' work emails once they are out of the office and relaxing at home – even on their smartphones. Under the deal, which affects a million employees in the technology and consultancy sectors (including the French arms of Google, Facebook, and Deloitte), employees will also have to resist the temptation to look at work-related material on their computers or smartphones – or any other kind of malevolent intrusion into the time they have been nationally mandated to spend on whatever the French call la dolce vita. "We must also measure digital working time," says Michel De La Force, chairman of the General Confederation of Managers. "We can admit extra work in exceptional circumstances but we must always come back to what is normal, which is to unplug, to stop being permanently at work." However critics say it will impose further red tape on French businesses, which already face some of the world's tightest labor laws." (Continues) "However according to Simon Kelner French productivity levels outstrip those of Britain and Germany, and French satisfaction with their quality of life is above the OECD average. "No wonder, we may say. We'd all like to take a couple of hours off for lunch, washed down with a nice glass of Côtes du Rhône, and then switch our phones off as soon as we leave work. It's just that our bosses won't let us.""

Comments

Re:get rid of salary pay / make it have a high lev

[royallthefourth]

In the 1980's, IBM (among others) invested lots of money to have legislation passed that makes programmers, engineers, and sysadmins into "salaried professionals" so that they wouldn't have to pay overtime.

The only way that could possibly be reversed is a group larger and more powerful than the owners of tech companies fighting to reverse it; that is to say, the organized tech workers will have fight for our own standard of living. We won't be able to do that until we are actually organized, though. Perhaps the sporadically striking fast food workers who were previously thought to be powerless can set an example for us.

Re:At least someone appreciates work-life balance

[Shakrai]

If I'm off the clock, I should be able to completely ignore work and everything work-related.

In a fair world you would be able to. Of course, in a fair world people also wouldn't check Facebook during business hours, or read personal e-mails, answer texts/calls their personal cell phones, shop on Amazon, or gossip with their coworkers at the coffee pot/water cooler outside of designated break times.

The work-life balance tilts both ways. YMMV, but I come out significantly ahead when I compare the personal things I do on company time against the occasional phone call or e-mail I handle during the evening or on the weekend.