[iofiiiiiiiii]

European context here. It is not even an option - you work 40 hours per week, end of story. Working more than 40 hours per week is seen as something wrong, something you need to bring up with a manager to address because someone's work/life balance has gotten off on the wrong path. It is a problem to be addressed.

We have high flexibility in terms of when we work - we can do 4x10 hour days or work a weekend to take some days off in the middle of the week, things like that. But this is an option for the employee, not something the employer can enforce on anyone - the choice is always your own.

If there is a deadline that cannot be met, this means:

1. The company needs to work with the stakeholders to set proper expectations about what will and will not be delivered, perhaps cutting up the work into multiple iterations.

2. The problem should be raised in advance so there is time to address it and prepare the stakeholders to face the facts. If an engineer speaks up on the last day of a 4 month project and says "actually we cannot deliver it, we need one more month" then that is a problem with that engineer's performance (he should have communicated the problem earlier) and/or a lack of leadership (someone should have noticed/cared by then!). It does not change the facts of #1.

This is based on a bit more than 15 years of experience, very consistent from mid-size company to megacorp.

[shoo]

Thank you for sharing, yours is the healthiest perspective I can see. This aligns with how things should (and can!) work. My context: more than 10 years experience in commercial software/IT projects in Australia.

[thorin]

Where in Europe? Do you have any jobs going?