30 People Share What “Work Ethics” Are Like In Different Countries

:D

It's fair

Likely fired as did not answer the phone while getting anaesthetics.

Something definitely wrong with this thinking when you think going on maternity leave is time off.

I had paid leave for months. I am the father. That this is not the norm saddens me deeply, and I have sympathy for anyone who suffers from being deprived of taking care of their baby due to broken social systems.

And still get paid

My German brother in law, working in Germany, once found himself locked out of his office. He hadn't taken a vacation in three years and Personnel decided that this behaviour was bad for his health.

Fair enough.

Actually I'm (German) jealous of some Skandinavien work places. They practice 6h per day (instead of 8h) 5b days a week and studies show, that you can accomplish the same amount of work in that time. They get paid full time. And I know for a fact that it is true, I can be as productive in 6 hours (or even more productive) than in 8h.

People need a healthy work/life balance. I would go mad if every hour was just work.

When my son was born I took 1 week off as paternity. It was not worth taking the second week off as it would have cost me too much in lost wages and there was no shared parental leave at the time. I booked the week after as paid holiday instead

And you'll still need that second and possibly third job so you don't have to sell your food stamps to pay the rent.

I remember when I had that much vacation, I had a union job and had worked there for 20 years.

A saying I have picked up is "Your query is not my emergency"

My boss said we had to give him a vaccine schedule 1-2 weeks in advance just in case you might have to be out. He also suggested to tough it out if you don’t feel well right after.

We shut down for Christmas

I've been to the beach in Croatia, I wouldn't want to work if I was there either. Absolutely beautiful!

Trust me, we'd LOVE more time off. We're just not offered the chance. Workers here are considered replaceable at any time. If we're taking time off we can be fired. We have to have our days off approved most of the time. It's very very frustrating to worry about your job if you want to go to things at your kids school or appointments or have to leave early to take care of an emergency. If you don't have any time off left you're in real danger of disciplinary action.And we don't get much time off.

Only people who think that they are indispensable do that. The majority will tell you that you shouldn't even dare to consider contacting them during their holidays.

USA needs to do more than catch up.

Like she should

Or get lunch, or stretch your legs......

I do this. Call me before a) we lose a customer b) i have to do damage controll afterwards. It works well if your team knows what an emergency is.

Well, usually there's someone listed who can be contacted if necessary, but that's only for emergencies.

Find another job, your current employers are obviously assholes.

LOL.

Also unlimited sick days. (I was so bewildered to learn that some countries limit them. As if you can decide if you get sick.)

Ouch. Yeah that hits home. I work when sick because I will use all 5 of my "sick" days to take care of my kid through the year.

Clear communication is of the essence.

Feeling good Luis!

That's just idiotic.

First child back after 6 weeks. Second back after a week. I was self employed. If I didn't work I didn't get paid. Also after insurance her birth was $8k

Things don't close in the UK over August, but as soon as the schools are off the whole pace of businesses slows down. Roads are noticeably less busy in the morning. I personally don't schedule any significant work for the month of August as it's too quiet to get much done.

Kiss Army

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Touché

"and generous people help with the gofundme to help them afford the bills"

Uh.. what would have been the solution without him taking one of his vacation days?

And that's when think of your own and the baby's health and get out without even answering the fool.

I'd be pisssed if I HAD to take 4 weeks in a row in summer. That would eat up two thirds of my vacation days and I want/need those days at other times of the year. I like to take more time off around Christmas and New Years.

And the big surprise is, nothing, absolutely nothing bad happens if you don't check your emails.

I'd say, "So, what's your point?"

Good for you that you did. I has minor surgery a few years ago and had two weeks off medical leave. It took that long for the aesthetic to wear off enough for me to be somewhat functional.

I get what this is saying, but there's some part of me that breaks out in a cold sweat thinking "yes, but what if there's a deadline and you watching the world cup instead of being in the office means that your counterpart in the US doesn't make their deadline? What if they get reprimanded? What if they get fired?"

This is just sad

My cousin is legal counsel for Greensill. Between their current catastrophe and the American work culture, i have never seen a human being crumble into a shell faster. 18 hour days for years and panic every second of the way.

How tf can work be so important?

lol, in the USA a bank holiday is only a day that banks take off. No one else.

Sure, boss. Just let us know when it's convenient for you. Her mother will hang in there until you find an opening in your agenda.

My job: 'yeah, we should plan too much from June up to October, people take holidays then.'

I am sorry for your loss.

My UK-based wife once considered a job offer in her company's New York office. Not talking scrubbing toilets- a good white collar publishing job on 85,000. More pay than the same job in London, but by the time we worked out the costs of things like health insurance that difference was wiped out immediately. And then there was the fact her paid leave would be less than HALF what she gets now, and the company wouldn't give her a contract with guarantees of basic workplace expectations such as a guaranteed notice date or even a guaranteed FIXED leave entitlement (company's US hiring policy document actually said *leave entitlement subject to change). It turns out that for not a lot more money we would have a terrible overall package. I think you'd need to be earning well over £150,000 a year to make moving to America work out better than in the UK- and that is about the top 2.5 percent of earners here. I don't understand why the middle class put up with it in America.

teacher here too--Covid rules- if health dept quaratines you then 14 days off with Personal Days no email/no work (close contact/tracing etc)..if you become sick without notifying the health dept the you take sick days and are still responsible for your class via zoom in your classroom (we're in school, not remote)...we also don't have a union

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Not true

Tricky, what country can this be?? It's so hard to guess!!! *rolling my eyes*

My (US) company has an office in India. Even though we try to be cooperative and balance meeting times so fewer people get the bad end of it on late evening meetings, it's not unusual for me to be starting work in my morning, which is their late evening, and they're still at it on our group chat, or staying up past their midnight so they can collaborate with the US team. Also, their managers don't seem to hesitate to give them weekend work whereas something better be on fire here for our managers to mandate it. Sure, we sometimes do it anyway because of our deadlines, or we'll take courses on our own time, which I imagine would appall our European pandas, but that's far less often than our India teammates. The standard work week in India is 48 hours, and from what I can tell, that's a minimum, at least in tech.

They have this amazing invention called a "kitchen". You can find one in all German houses. You use it to prepare and cook your own food because adults should be able to feed themselves. They have time to do this because they don't live in a backward country where they work ludicrous hours and have no holidays.

The world makes fun of us for not being worldly and untraveled and ignorant of other cultures. This is why. A Canadian friend of mine asked me why i would travel to a far away place for only 5 days. I told her that even that was stretching it and that is all i could possibly muster for that period of time.

shame, if you tried to phone be between 13:00 - 14:00 - YOUR BAD!

Wait, what? Why are you not geting paid during your lunch break?

What! Sick days and PTO aren't either/or in civilised countries.

Why did you reply??

I'm sure the American reaction would be "I hope I don't get fired, because if I do, I won't be able to pay for my mother's insulin injections."

I'm in end stage renal failure and am on dialysis (3/week at 4 hrs/session, plus travel time) and work full time. The only way I get in 40 hours is to skip all lunches, start at 7:30 am. I keep my laptop up and running next to me all evening and answer e-mails immediately. Why? Because it's the first job I actually wanted that would hire the sick girl who can't work until 11:00 am every Tuesday and Thursday. My mom told me to NOT tell potential employers I'm on dialysis, but how do I explain that absence every week? I hope when we're back in the office, they'll let me work from home on Tuesday and Thursday, otherwise, I'll have a hard time getting in a full 40 hours. Plus, I'm kind of a mess after treatment. It sucks the soul out of you and you just want to not be around people. Working remotely those 2 days is a gift!