Never Not Working: Why the Always-On Culture Is Bad for Business--and How to Fix It

by Malissa Clark

Overview

The always-on, hustle culture creates an unhealthy, counterproductive relationship with work.

Many workers believe that to compete with other top talent, they must embrace a culture that rewards long hours and a constant connection to work. Businesses and society endorse busyness, overwork, and extreme commitment as the most valued traits in workers. Sometimes that endorsement is explicit, as when Elon Musk told X/Twitter employees to work "long hours at high intensity" or get fired. More often it's an implicit contract, a buildup of organizational and cultural norms and the adoption of new technologies that make it easy to tether people to work.

Either way, this workaholic behavior is unhealthy and counterproductive for workers and for organizations. It's time to fight back. Malissa Clark—a preeminent researcher on the culture of overwork—shows you how in Never Not Working. Clark examines overwork and burnout, not just from the individual's perspective but from an organizational perspective too. She delivers a comprehensive, nuanced definition of workaholism, busting myths along the way—working long hours, it turns out, doesn't automatically make you a workaholic. She also helps you assess whether you're falling prey to the phenomenon and whether you're creating workaholics in your organization.

Clark shows you how to escape the trap of putting work at the center of everything and thus losing your well-being—or your company's performance—in the process. Deeply researched and written for everyone from leaders to individual contributors, Never Not Working is the essential guide to identifying workaholism in yourself and others and starting on the road to recovery.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781647825096
Publisher:	Harvard Business Review Press
Publication date:	02/06/2024
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Malissa Clark is an associate professor of industrial and organizational psychology at the University of Georgia, where she leads the Healthy Work Lab. She is one of the world's leading scholars on workaholism, overwork, burnout, and employee well-being. In addition to serving as an expert consultant to many organizations on these issues, Clark and her work have been featured in outlets including the New York Times, the BBC, Time, Glamour, The Atlantic, HuffPost, and others.

Connect with Malissa Clark on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Editorial Reviews

12/18/2023

Workaholism is a “more pervasive problem than ever,” according to this simplistic debut study. Clark, an organizational psychology professor at the University of Georgia, traces how the commodification of time during the Industrial Revolution subjected employees to ever increasing workloads that reshaped the average person’s schedule and led to expectations for workers to prioritize “the interests of their employer over their own.” Surveying the toll of contemporary overworking, Clark notes studies finding that workaholics are more depressed than their colleagues, whom they often stress out by setting unrealistic expectations. She suggests readers might develop a healthier relationship with work by including personal needs (“eat a healthy snack”; “sleep”) on to-do lists and taking up a hobby to redirect the compulsion to keep busy. However, Clark contends such individual-centric fixes are merely “coping” and that ending employee burnout requires organizational change. Unfortunately, she doesn’t offer much support for her assertion that workaholism reduces productivity, and her focus on the health benefits enjoyed by employees with more downtime does little to address the profit motive’s role in driving companies to overwork employees. As a result, her recommendations for employers to “decrease work intensity and reset expectations on timelines” come across as naive. This biting look at the costs of overwork is unlikely to move the needle. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

"You don't have to be a full-on workaholic to benefit from this book: Clark has provided a clear diagnosis of the problems of the "always on" culture we live in—and offers us clear steps towards gaining more balance in our lives." — Financial Times

Advance Praise for Never Not Working:

"In her eye-opening new book, Malissa Clark reveals how our culture's obsession with overwork is keeping us from living our best lives. Clark shows how our culture's expectations of productivity have created a system that rewards overwork and punishes those who don't conform. Integrating cutting-edge academic research, interviews, and personal accounts, Clark provides a road map for getting out of the overwork trap and creating a more sustainable and fulfilling work-life balance. If you're ready to break free from the trap of overwork, this book is for you." — Ashley Whillans, author, Time Smart; Associate Professor, Harvard Business School

"Never Not Working is an absolutely brilliant and intriguing book. Malissa Clark, one of the world's leading experts on overwork, shares incredible, evidence-based insights designed not just to inform but to shine a light on highly compelling and intriguing practices that each of us can implement in order to thrive at work in a healthy and sustainable manner." — Steven Rogelberg, Chancellor’s Professor, University of North Carolina at Charlotte; author, The Surprising Science of Meetings and Glad We Met

"As the world of work evolves, what 'success' looked like in the past must be challenged, and that includes challenging the cultures that reward workaholics. Written from a solid base of research and real-life stories, Never Not Working is a must-read for individuals and organizations alike. . Clark's style is highly relatable, practical, and engaging from cover to cover." — Laura Hambley Lovett, podcast host, Where Work Meets Life; Adjunct Professor of Industrial/Organizational Psychology, University of Calgary

"Today, whenever we're doing one thing, we're almost always thinking and feeling anxious and guilty about the fact that we're not doing something else—working. Malissa Clark's book is the antidote we all need: an opportunity to take a deep breath and rethink the way we look at our work and our lives." — Darria Long Gillespie, MD, author, Mom Hacks; Clinical Assistant Professor, University of Tennessee School of Medicine

"Rapidly advancing technologies are blurring, even eliminating, the clocks and calendars separating work from the rest of life. This amazing book moves from the problem to possible solutions—for organizations and individuals. Required reading for all of us navigating this changing world of work." — Phyllis Moen, Professor Emeritus, University of Minnesota and Cornell University; coauthor, Overload: How Good Jobs Went Bad and What We Can Do about It

From the Publisher