Afterhours Blackberry use should equal overtime? Opinions are divided...

By Alex Manchester, Editor, The Internal Comms Hub (Australia), Melcrum

This story has a sense of rumbling inevitability to it.

Last month, three staff at ABC News in the US had their Blackberries confiscated. Why? They were asked to sign a non-compensation waiver regarding out of hours use, but their union - fresh from the US Writers Guild Strikes - advised them not to sign. The station responded by taking away the devices.

Eventually, negotiations were had and the devices were returned, but not before the idea was officially born among US lawyers that there was a class action lawsuit waiting to happen, and money to be made via hypothetical and disgruntled former employees.

Lawyers argue that time spent answering emails after work should count as overtime, or count towards accrued time to be taken when you can.

Of course, this means potentially logging every minute you've spent writing emails, which, as any billable hours lawyer will tell you, is a torturous affair. From CNBC:

To minimize the risk of a lawsuit, attorneys are warning employers to reevaluate their policies. The safest approach, said Jennifer Feldman an employment law attorney at WolfBlock, is to stop giving BlackBerrys to non-exempt employees.

That, however, is not always possible. In such cases, attorneys suggest employers write policies that state non-exempt workers should only use company-issued devices after work when specifically told to.

Another option is for employers to ask non-exempt workers to leave the device at the office at the end of their work day, says Howard Lavin a partner at Stroock and Stroock and Lavan who has advised his clients on these types of policies.

I don't think measuring after-hours use is a workable idea, but that doesn't mean there won't be some crazy lawsuit about it. In most contracts, certainly the ones I've signed, you'll find something like this:

Hours of work are 9am-5.30pm Mon-Fri.

You may from time to time be required to work outside these hours. You may be entitled, at our discretion, to ‘time off in lieu’ for this additional work. Such time off must be authorised by us in advance.

Does that "time to time" cover Blackberry use? [If I had one] it probably would in my book.

Would I bother to record the time spent? Not unless it got stupid, or my company was the type that measures whether you get in at 9.02am one day for a 9am start and moans, even when you get in at 8.45am 99% of the time or, you have to argue for days to be able to go to a doctors appointment without having to take annual leave (I've worked somewhere like that before and never will again).

Surely there are better solutions? I've heard people have lots of success with enforced "Blackberry cut-off times". No answer past 8pm, for example.

On the other hand, a lot of the arguments about work/life balance being skewed, and the justification for letting employees have a bit of freedom when using stuff like Facebook at work, stem from the fact that a lot of people check their emails before they go to bed and as soon as they wake up.

We're connected a lot of the time, let's just get on with it, right?

What to do then? Be on call 24/7 and accept it? Agree on and enforce cut-off times with whoever it is that might want to contact you at 11.53pm on a Wednesday? Or, leave the damn thing at the office when you clock off (as the policy-makers suggest)?

So far, this week's Hub poll on the story (see right) has seen opinion divided pretty evenly.

How about another perspective. Inspired by the diversity of readers' answers to this question, let's put this into Lucy Kellaway territory and pose it differently:

I'm a career-focused marketing executive with a weight around my neck - my Blackberry. What started off as a way to keep in touch with my team, but most of all my boss, has escalated into messages whenever she gets the whim to contact me.

This is causing me a major dilemma. If I keep responding it's just going to stay the same (or get worse), but I feel that I work long enough hours as it is without answering emails all evening at home or socialising.

Yet, if I bring it up, I'm worried I'll cool the relationship or, worse, open up a leapfrogging opportunity for my own ambitious little toad of a number two.

What should I do?

Marketing executive, male, 33

Comments

[Matt Moore]

To answer marketing exec (33): It depends on how demanding your boss is and how badly you want to please them. If the answer to both questions is "very" then you are stuffed. But the second "very" negates your right to complain - you have decided on the priorities in your life.

If you are a little more balanced in your idea of a good life then I'd frame it in terms of efficiency. You need to be at peak performance during the day to keep your boss's bosses happy, to get the best out of your suppliers and to manage your own people effectively. Blackberry messages at midnight will only decrease this.

One thing you might want to discuss with your boss is what a mightnight email means. Do they expect an immediate response? Or are they just using you as an idea filing cabinet? If it's the latter then that's not so bad - maybe put their messages on divert for the morning. If it's the former then maybe your boss is a pyromaniac. They might like to take this quiz: http://money.cnn.com/quizzes/2007/fsb/pyromaniac/index.html

As for your ambitious amphibian number two, they obviously don't have enough on their plate - so give them a serious project to work on. If they are all talk then that should straighten them out. If they are good then you'll just have to raise your game.

[Russell Grossman]

If you have a BlackBerry then implicitly you are accepting you are pretty much contactable all the reasonable waking hours of the day - especially in a communications environment. It goes with a 24/7 world.

It cuts both ways though. You can leave 'the office' early knowing you're still in contact and basically let the BlackBerry help you run your life better.

I love my Blackberry because it frees me from the office.

But if the reverse is happening, give it back.

[Alex Manchester]

That's a good perspective to hear, Russell. Clearly there's a level of discipline that's needed to make the most of them as effective business tools.

@Matt Nice answer - very FT!