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China's Tech Work Culture Is So Intense People Sleep and Bathe In Their Offices (techinsider.io)

Posted by msmash on from the different-culture,-different-lifestyle dept.

An anonymous reader writes: China's technology sector is booming at an intensely fast pace. Many startups are seeing their business grow faster than they can hire, placing a heavy burden on those already working within the industry. "The pace of Chinese internet company growth is extremely fast," Cui Meng, general manager and cofounder of data startup Goopal, told Reuters. "I've been to the US and the competitive environment there isn't as intense as in China." This has led many workers to put in overtime, sleeping at their desks, on cots, or even in provided bunk beds. Many employees are encouraged to live at the office during the workweek. Lunchtime naps are generally allowed, and those who end up staying past midnight usually pass out in the office.Reuters has amazing photographs of such offices and employees.

17 of 184 comments (clear)

  1. When I think of China by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    When I think of China the first thing that comes to mind is technical innovation.

    1. Re: When I think of China by zenlessyank · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The worlds' addiction to laziness and greed will ensure that doesn't happen. You have been warned. China is but an embryo slowly morphing into the mighty dragon it will become. It is already too late. Just sit back and enjoy the show.

    2. Re: When I think of China by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I agree 100%. I have been to China and I have seen how rapidly they are accelerating. Anyone who dismisses the rise of China by making racist remarks or talking about their lack of innovation is in for a surprise. I work with many chinese engineers and i see no shortage of innovative ideas. Some of them might lack in their leadership abilities but unlike Japan and Korea, China is very open to adopting western ways of doing things and you already see the changing of their culture. American engineers should enjoy their 8-9 hour/day jobs while Chinese engineers and entrepreneurs are working 15 hours a day. Soon Silicon Valley will be like the North East, hordes of angry unemployed people shaking their fists at the "damn farreigners".

    3. Re: When I think of China by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 3, Insightful

      And right about the time they hit their stride, we'll hit a shortage of almost every industrial metal.

      Should be interesting.

      I can understand their motivation. It's like it used to be for programmers in the U.S. in the 80s. You could literally work 6 months and earn 2 years worth of pay.

      Today, you work 72 hours a week and the company offers you base salary plus a "potential" bonus that never hits 100% while the executives take home millions in pay, have a 2nd better funded pension system, and gold plated health care.

      U.S. workers do work hard when they have a realistic potential to earn $200k in less than a year. I've seen them walking around with black eyes from lack of sleep. I've been at companies where they worked themselves til they were taken away unconcious from their desk to an ambulance.

      But executives have gotten greedy and taken away... comp time, genuine achievable bonuses, and decent pay (with heavy offshoring).

      As china moves from a GDP of $15,000 to a GDP of $45,000 the ability to become 'rich' thru working long hours will fade and with it so will their enthusiasm to work these hours. Their children who enter the work force in 10 to 15 years will not be nearly so enthusiastic ( same pattern as the u.s., then japan, etc.).

      There will be a time when the chinese also ask, "Do I live to work or do I work to live?"

      Former programmer then manager... retired for 4 years and loving it.

      --
      She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
    4. Re: When I think of China by bmo · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The British said this about the Americans at the start of the Industrial Revolution, when we stole their technology.

      We Americans said the same about the Japanese and Koreans.

      The British were wrong. We were wrong. Everyone who says that "they just steal our innovation and copy it without any creativity" is wrong. Completely, utterly, to their own detriment, WRONG.

      It screams "whistling past the graveyard" /at best/ and probably veiled racism depending on who you hear this stuff from.

      "China's economy will collapse"

      Whose economies don't have cycles of boom and bust? Ours? HAVE YOU FUCKING LOOKED AROUND?!

      Christ on a stick. You have no fucking clue. You are complacent and have not looked past the headlines at all.

      --
      BMO

  2. Reminds me of the Dot Com bubble by decipher_saint · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I remember basically living at work for a few years, slaving away for no good reason (other than ship-ship-ship). I had a friend of mine who worked for a fairly well-known maker of tax software, half their year was basically crunch time complete with in-office cots. They were treated well outside crunch time but I swear to god it aged him prematurely.

    I don't think I'd ever work like that again, at the end of the day the code quality was poor and it burnt out all the talent. I didn't think it would be possible to be sick of pizza, but you learn these things.

    Sure made the bastard CEO a hell of lot of money...

    --
    crazy dynamite monkey
    1. Re:Reminds me of the Dot Com bubble by istartedi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Did you find that it was unsustainable? There were two periods in my life like this: Bachelor's degree, and a start-up. The start-up was just slightly easier than the bachelor's degree. YMMV based on how hard your school is, how much of a task-master your boss is, and let's face it--how smart you are. I'm sure there were some people that just absolutely cruised courses that made me cram... but then again there were people who dropped out and never came back. I dropped out of start-ups, and when you're middle aged you start to think twice about a diet of late-night pizza and soda. If you pass out with a coronary at 50, what's the point?

      Still though, if you think it's really important--if it's for God and country, or family, or just trying not to end up homeless or working a shit job for the rest of your life, you'll do it. Sometimes I think about the excitement and for the right project, maybe... one more time. I ran into a 20 something like that a while ago. He wanted me to help him code his stuff; but unfortunately it was the kind of software I hate. It was easy to turn that one down...

      --
      For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
    2. Re:Reminds me of the Dot Com bubble by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I did this for a couple of decades and comfortably retired.

    3. Re:Reminds me of the Dot Com bubble by barc0001 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Similar experience with me in the 90s and early 2000s. We worked 16 hour days in many cases, sometimes for weeks on end to ship and at one place I worked at they finally did an audit of our bugtracker after one release. It was discovered that the amount of mistakes on code worked on during those pushes went up dramatically, and especially tellingly - during the last 4 hours of those 14-16 hour days, frequently working all weekend as well for up to 2 months. As a result during the next release cycle, the "push" was started earlier but days were limited to 10 hours and we took weekends off again and our ship time on the release was actually faster.

      Another after-release audit of the bugtracker showed that the number of introduced bugs was significantly lower than on the previous death march release and the conclusion was that the extra work hours were being burned up by mistakes to no benefit and much lower morale. Going forward, that company continued the 10 hour max rule and continues to do well.

      I moved on to other things and places and sometimes there was the old work long cycle again, but I've decided that I will no longer work at places that institutionalize that kind of time commitment. I work in systems so I am on call 24/7, and if something breaks at 3am I get up and fix it because it's what I signed on for, but I am definitely not putting in crazy overtime as part of general employment.

    4. Re:Reminds me of the Dot Com bubble by sootman · · Score: 3, Interesting

      "I slept at work again last night; two and a half hours curled up in a quilt underneath my desk, from 11am to 1:30pm or so. That was when I woke up with a start, realizing that I was late for a meeting we were scheduled to have to argue about colormaps and dithering, and how we should deal with all the nefarious 8-bit color management issues. But it was no big deal, we just had the meeting later. It's hard for someone to hold it against you when you miss a meeting because you've been at work so long that you've passed out from exhaustion."

      - Jamie Zawinski, 1994

      https://web.archive.org/web/20...

      --
      Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
  3. From a picture in TFA by argStyopa · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "God rewards the diligent."

    Is that Chinese for "Arbeit macht frei"?

    --
    -Styopa
  4. Re:Coming To an American Statup Near You? by kilfarsnar · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "giving the entirety of one's being" to one's company is already a pretty big trend.

    Those of us who know what it's like to actually have a life know what stupid bullshit that is. I have worked with people like that and they seem to think they were put on this planet to work for some company or other. I was not put here for that purpose.

    --
    "What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
  5. Re:Coming To an American Statup Near You? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    At one time it was a reasonable deal. You'd give your youth to a company, and they'd provide a pension when you're too old to work. Now we still give our lives to companies, but we don't get the pension, or even steady employment in a lot of cases.

  6. Hard to say if it's really that bad by foxalopex · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I think it's hard for a lot of folks to see both sides of the picture. I've worked both "crappy" jobs at a call center all the way up to a programmer for a telecom. There are times I wonder if I get paid way too much for doing so little work as a programmer compared to the crazy non-stop work as a call center agent. And while the call center job was a lot of work it always impressed me how some folks could handle that job happily and make thing seem a lot better. While sometimes my very well paid co-workers in telecom would complain about ridiculous things. I think some of those folks despite that crazy life style are having fun. They're pushing their abilities to the limits and accomplishing more than a lot of folks are. It's sometimes nice to be able to focus on one thing and to give it your all in life. Also letting your workers nap is a good thing. They've shown a 15 minute nap can double productivity. If I was the boss I'd encourage it. Life is a lot of things to different people for some it's anything but work but for some it is work. So either way, I wouldn't see it as bad necessarily.

  7. Re:Coming To an American Statup Near You? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I've slept on the floor at my last startup. Whatever.

    When I first moved to Silicon Valley, I didn't even rent an apartment for the first 2 years. I just lived at the office and slept under my desk. Many others were doing the same. The company provided showers, a full kitchen, and laundry service. Then I got a girlfriend. We had sex in my office a few times, but then she insisted that I get an apartment. That was quite some time ago, since we are married now, and our daughter is in high school. But I will see people living out of their vans in tech company parking lots, so I think the startup culture is still alive and well.

  8. Even now true of some startups by SuperKendall · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I went through the same experience pre-2000, I would sleep at the office and work 100+ hour weeks at time.

    The thing is I don't actually regret it because it was just at the start of my career and I learned a lot of stuff extremely rapidly that has served me well though the years.

    It's not like I'd do it again but I don't see anything wrong with other people working like that if they desire to.

    Unlike you, I have not yet found the amount of pizza that would make me sick of pizza...

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  9. Re:So... by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 3, Informative

    And btw, reducing the work hours one is allowed to work, forces the employers to let go some of their greed and actually hire more people.

    Economists call this the Lump of Labor Fallacy. Real economies don't have a fixed number of jobs to be divvied up, and reducing working hours did not reduce unemployment in France.