Friday, 21 June 2013

From 9-to-5 mentality to flexible 24/7 society part 1





Introduction
In the beginning of the 20th century contracting parties were free to determine any contractual terms, due to the large differences in power that existed between employer and employee. This led to great abuse of the employees, to the detriment of the worker. Therefore the government decided to limit the contractual freedom of the parties by law to protect the rights of the workers. For example working hours were limited by law, so workers could no longer be exploited[1].



In the 21st century there is little talk of freedom of contract. Every employee is protected by law, but new laws have stretched the working time legislation. Why specifically this law has changed? Well, this is obviously because our working schedule has changed! In this report I will describe a few elements of working that have drastically changed since the last decade, along with our lifestyle.



A shift in the working environment
It is clear that something is changing on the labour market. We are dealing with a shift. The 9-to-5 mentality is no more. Work doesn’t necessarily stop at five and the weekend isn’t per se the couple of days in the week when we relax. Globalization has made it possible to be connected with the rest of the world 24/7. Every minute of the day people around the world are awake, awake and working. And as big companies have offices and partners from all around the world, they expect their employees to be very flexible in their working hours. Skype has become a normal way of communicating or alternatively we just fly to the other side of Europe in a few hours to meet up with a business partner face to face. 


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