So these management consultancies...

[Olf]

My best mate starting working for one of the big ones about 18 months ago. I'm sure he's getting along fine. We haven't spoken since.

Well nearly not. He spends every working week up north somewhere. Says he finishes work at nine most nights. The won't pay for his overnight accommodation on the Sunday night or the Friday night so he has to drive up early Monday morning and come back Friday night in his own time. From what he's saying I guess he's doing a 70 hour week almost every week.

Only I'm not sure to believe it. I mean I'd tell them to get fked if it were me. 70 hour weeks, no personal time in a crappy hotel miles from friends and family. His boss is apparently an arse so no fun there either.

Is this for real. Do people really do this? Do these companies really demand this over a long term or is he either:

a/ a sop?

b/ a liar?

[Tycho]

People will put up with a hell of a lot if they are getting a shed load of money for it.

[Neil_Sc]

Some people do it, you can get yourself stuck in some bad roles in large consultancies/tech companies.

I work for a large tech company and charge everything to the customer, so apart from travel which is my own time, I pretty much stick to 37 to 40 hours a week. Add on travel and a usual week is usually around 50 hours.

I very much do not want to work for free. I don't particularly mind the travel however.

[Olf]

But he doesn't earn 'amazing' money. It's good but not amazing. His hourly rate must suck.

[Tycho]

Olf said:

But he doesn't earn 'amazing' money. It's good but not amazing. His hourly rate must suck.

Prospects must be good though? What about bonuses etc?

[Turbo5]

It could be worse, I was assigned to a team of consultants at my place of work for 9 months full time. same pay because I am on management(also I was tarred with the same brush as the consultants because jobs were lost in certain areas) and yes I was doing silly hours.

[Olf]

Tycho said:

Olf said:

But he doesn't earn 'amazing' money. It's good but not amazing. His hourly rate must suck.

Prospects must be good though? What about bonuses etc?

He says he doesn't really know but anything up to 30% of salary. Also says he's not in it for the long run. Even less point in squandering his youth then.

[kiwisr]

Loads of people do it, I've met plenty in the IT industry especially service providers who will place their permanent staff all over the country depending on what programme they are currently working on. Many aren't exactly paid fantastic salaries either.

It certainly isn't for me and I don't understand them putting up with it. Stuck in miserable B&Bs or generic Travelodge style places, usually out in the commercial zones, eating in Frankie and Bennys every night and then a 6 hour drive every Fri and Sun night back/to home. That's no life.

[drivin_me_nuts]

That's not that unusual at all. Regularly had to work 70+ hours a week and fit in 5-600 miles of driving. I don't miss it. At all. You get used to living on 4 hours sleep. You don't see many in their 30-40s doing it. Divorce rate is high, stress rates very high...

[FourWheelDrift]

Tycho said:

People will put up with a hell of a lot if they are getting a shed load of money for it.

And they will be charging him out for substantially more.

[hornetrider]

This thread is useless without figures

[Olf]

drivin_me_nuts said:

That's not that unusual at all. Regularly had to work 70+ hours a week and fit in 5-600 miles of driving. I don't miss it. At all. You get used to living on 4 hours sleep. You don't see many in their 30-40s doing it. Divorce rate is high, stress rates very high...

Thats the one. It's not going to make him his fortune either.

[immigrant]

There's a certain stigma to leaving the office at a reasonable hour. Lots of people stay on late for the sake of appearances. Frankly, its a pointless waste of time and hardly demonstrates skill or capability. If senior people mark people down for not sticking around till 9pm then they're being extremely callous and short-sighted.

I'm happy to work long hours, but I'll keep that in reserve for when its actually required.

[Colonial]

immigrant said:

There's a certain stigma to leaving the office at a reasonable hour. Lots of people stay on late for the sake of appearances. Frankly, its a pointless waste of time and hardly demonstrates skill or capability. If senior people mark people down for not sticking around till 9pm then they're being extremely callous and short-sighted.

I'm happy to work long hours, but I'll keep that in reserve for when its actually required.

My boss buggers off at 1.30. In the afternoon. Manager sticks around to 7.00 at the latest.

Work a minimum of 40 hours a week, usually 50 so nothing to crazy. Spend one day a week 300kms north which i do as a day trip.

[zcacogp]

Interesting thread ... I'm watching with interest ...


Oli.

[Colonial]

Also have a friend who works in the field.

He has averaged 80 hours a week, paid for 40 of those hours and is not paid enough to live close to work, so has 3 hours of commuting each day on top of that.

So essentially 95-100 hours a week.

[FourWheelDrift]

hornetrider said:

This thread is useless without figures

Mancons charge rates.

Consultancy hourly rate = £150 per hour x corporate cost + overheads + expenses = £500 p/h

All for somebody with no chin and an Adam's apple that makes him look as if he's constantly trying to swallow a ballcock.

[petrolhead76]

I worked for McKinseys for a while - 70hrs a week sounds right. But its the effort and reward principle - at the end of the year the bonuses were mega.

[ewenm]

Olf said:

Tycho said:

Olf said:

But he doesn't earn 'amazing' money. It's good but not amazing. His hourly rate must suck.

Prospects must be good though? What about bonuses etc?

He says he doesn't really know but anything up to 30% of salary. Also says he's not in it for the long run. Even less point in squandering his youth then.

If it's IT consultancy he could be learning valuable skills that can later be applied in the more lucrative contract market.

Likewise, business consultancy can lead into decent managerial positions within his specialist industry.

There are usually upsides to most crappy roles within consultancy but the individual needs to make sure they know what they (rather than the company) are getting out of it.

[gasket69]

Olf said:

My best mate starting working for one of the big ones about 18 months ago. I'm sure he's getting along fine. We haven't spoken since.

Well nearly not. He spends every working week up north somewhere. Says he finishes work at nine most nights. The won't pay for his overnight accommodation on the Sunday night or the Friday night so he has to drive up early Monday morning and come back Friday night in his own time. From what he's saying I guess he's doing a 70 hour week almost every week.

Only I'm not sure to believe it. I mean I'd tell them to get fked if it were me. 70 hour weeks, no personal time in a crappy hotel miles from friends and family. His boss is apparently an arse so no fun there either.

Is this for real. Do people really do this? Do these companies really demand this over a long term or is he either:

a/ a sop?

b/ a liar?

Hello Everybody,

This is probably straight out of Olf's worst nightmares but it's actually Olf's "mate" (quite possibly ex-mate,) here. Small world; huh?

I've wondered for the last few months how to respond to this thread (in between asking Olf when he's free to meet up and getting no reply).

As the most boss eyed, funny and politically incorrect person I know, Olf is without question my best mate but it's fair to say that we've been "distant" for a while now, though thankfully that doesn't mean 'distant' in the sense of either of us browsing singlesandswingers.com for some sideways action or either of us looking for some "alternative continental companionship" in the bar at the Paris Ritz.

One thing that Olf nearly got right is that I do indeed spend every week working up north somewhere and have done so for a year now.

Like many unfortunate sods, I leave home on Sunday night or very early Monday morning (at 5:00 a.m.) for a bracing 220 mile drive - I work away all week and then return home very late on Friday night. Most of the working week is an exciting but fairly draining blur involving very long hours with the result that I like to plan the limited personal time that I do have at home to make sure I cram in as much time with my mates as I can - so for the benefit of Olf, no; I'm not a liar or a 'sop.'

Unfortunately, the fact I work away is not really the reason that Olf hasn't seen me in 18 months as my other friends who I continue to see regularly can testify.

What's actually happening is that because I want to see Olf and need to plan things in advance due to not being around much, I repeatedly ask Olf for advance dates when he's likely to be free at a weekends. When Olf can't give me any dates at all when he might be free I tend to make other arrangements to avoid the disappointment of driving 220 miles home and then having to sit round with nowt else to do.

As Olf has an admittedly fab baby Olf, when we do get together I normally go over to his. Despite driving 500 - 1000 miles a week for work I'm very happy to drive over to his to save the Olf family on the hassle factor. On average, for every 10-20 times I've been to Olf's in recent years he's been to mine once - which is a shame as I'd very much like the opportunity to reciprocate Mr & Mrs Olf's excellent hospitality and fine choice of beer / whisky / cake / bread and tea - my commitment to my and Olf's non gay relationship is absolute even if that means doing yet more driving at the weekend. Mr & Mrs Olf actually met through me so it's fair to say they are both two of my favourite people - I'm therefore quite sad that it's come to reading Olf slating me on here.

To get to the point, what normally happens is that as Olf is rubbish at diaries when I do actually manage to see him and ask when he's next free he just tells me to ask Mrs Olf i.e. not at all like -

"yes, I'd love to see you mate, let me check our diary, we're really busy but I'd like to do something so let me get back to you shortly with some dates, yours, Olf xx"

but instead,

"you'll have to ask Mrs Olf, I'm off to play role player games with people I've never even met."

If I was being cynical, it feels like a case of:

"I'm not going to say I actually want to meet up or give you a date. If you want to see me, despite me being home by 5 and having plenty of free time to sort this out and you being a lot busier and emailing, texting and calling, you'll still have to ask Mrs Olf as I'm far too busy playing role playing games with geeks to ask her myself or find a date when we can get together to do something daft."

Since the last time I asked Olf (again) when he was next free to meet, he's had time to start or reply to 76 threads on here, but apparently hasn't had time to check his diary. I'm not an expert on timetocheckdiaries but it's hard to read that any other way than "can't be bothered".

The thing that really annoys me about all this is that the "18 months" has little to do with me being away and a lot to do with a change in Olf's family circumstances. Don't get me wrong - many of my friends now have little olf's and know that they can be a handful - but I still see them, and fairly frequently. In fact since I last saw Olf, I've seen some other friends - let's call them "The Sprockets" and their baby "sprocket" twice. I don't however see or these days even talk to Olf very much and in the same vain as asking someone out on a date and getting knocked back a few times I've found myself reluctantly giving up asking.

Maybe if Olf could find time to call me we could talk this through. As it stands, I've more chance of running into him in COD3 online rather than actually seeing or speaking to him.

At this rate, our relationship would appear to be heading towards me throwing a jug of water over his 'brief' as we try to resolve our 'relationship problems' through formal means. I like to think my jug is bigger and deeper than Olf's, so maybe he'll call me so we can kiss and make up and avoid having to feather the nests of already overpaid lawyers.