[awildfivreld]

I work as a part time developer right now, however that is in parallel with studies so that might affect my view a little bit. I am also a junior dev, which also might affect my experiences.

I have experienced that the amount of work produced is not linearly correlated with the amount of hours worked. I find that in the periods I work full-time, I get more done per hour than otherwise.

What I have found has the largest (negative) impact on my performance is the context switching that is required when I get back to work tasks. I have to get into that mindset again, which takes time. I've tried to reduce the amount of context switching by grouping work-days and uni-days, but I still notice the difference.

It would perhaps be different if I had time to (sub)consciously think about the problems at work during non-work days, but in my case that is taken by learning other things.

But hey, I like my job a lot, so perhaps full time is not as "soul killing" for me as other people.

[mettamage]

The correlation depends. I am quite an insomniac. By having 4 days of work instead of 5, I can spread my time better in order to work on the good sleeping days and chill on the bad ones.

Example:

Monday: I sleep shit, I work, I survive

Tuesday: I sleep horrible again, I work, I barely survive

Wednesday: if I'd have worked 5 days per week this would be the day that I would be severely underperforming. Instead, it's my free day, I catch up on sleep.

Thursday: I happen to sleep well. I perform well.

Friday: I slept meh, I perform well.

Weekend: I sleep horrible, so I make sure that I just chill the whole day and make sure I'll catch enough sleep somehow.

Monday: I'm well-rested and happen to sleep well. I perform well.

Having a free day at Wednesday in particular makes sure it's very tough to become too tired, even as an insomniac like me. I worked 5 days per week before, it's not possible to perform well when I was hitting sleep issues. Going through a week where I didn't drown in sleep deprivation was a blessing. Now though, it's simply a problem that I can always fix.

And yes, I've tried many things I used to be much worse. I'm improving. I've made a few comments on what I've tried (and what works for me).