09 适得其反的加班文化

人们总将不辞辛苦长时间工作的人当作模范予以表扬，但研究表明，长时间工作并不是什么好主意，它会导致疲劳，让人更容易出错，结果不得不花更多时间去清理烂摊子。

工程师经常谈到的“资产完整性”通常是指在设备损坏前维护和修理的好习惯。使用大量机器的企业非常重视这一点；而主要只使用人力的公司则鲜少重视此事。上个月，日本电通的年轻员工因过劳而自杀又把过度工作的现象推上风口浪尖。

Although to my knowledge no other nation than Japan has a word for death by overwork—karoshi—we probably need one.For while it is tempting to imagine the phenomenon is unique to Japan, it may simply be that it is the first country to look deeply enough to identify it.

尽管据我所知，除日本以外，没有哪个国家有专门指代工作过度劳累所致死亡的词语——“Karoshi”（过劳死），我们很可能需要一个这样的词。人们倾向于认为这种现象是日本独有的，事实上，也许日本是第一个看得足够深入从而认识到这个问题的国家。

Coined in the 1970s, the word returned to Japanese newspapers last month when the Tokyo Labour bureau ruled that the suicide of Matsuri Takahashi, a young employee of the advertising agency Dentsu, had been caused by overwork.She had worked 105 hours of overtime in a single month.

这个在上世纪70年代发明的词语上个月重现于日本报端，东京劳动局裁定，广告公司电通的年轻雇员高桥まつり自杀是因工作过度劳累导致。她生前曾在一个月里加班了105个小时。

Most of the chief executives I know routinely work a 12 or 15-hour day, six or seven days a week.Few of them are familiar with studies that routinely show that productivity is not linear.After about 40 hours a week fatigue sets in, provoking mistakes.Any extra hours spent are needed to clear up the mess: reversing poor decisions, soothing ruffled feathers.

我认识的大多数首席执行官通常每天工作12或者15个小时，每周工作6天或者7天。研究通常表明工作效率是非线性的，但很少有人熟知这一点。在一周工作约40个小时以后，人就会开始感到疲劳，导致人出错，然后又需要花时间来收拾烂摊子：修正错误的决定，平复愤怒的情绪——到头来是白忙活一场。

The classic, but comic, expression of this was produced by the efficiency expert, Frank Gilbreth.He found he could shave faster if he used two razors but then wasted all the time he saved covering the cuts with plasters.

有关这一点，效率专家弗兰克·吉尔布雷思有一个经典又好笑的描述。他发现如果他同时使用两片刀片刮胡子，刮得会更快，但之后他不得不把节省出来的全部时间，浪费在用创口贴处理刀片留下的小伤口上。

While a few chief executives love to boast of their powers of endurance, many insist their jobs simply require long days, weeks and months.But the speed with which the death, in 2013, of a Bank of America intern working in the City of London was interpreted as death by overwork showed how fully everyone knew that the economic crisis and relative scarcity of good jobs was taking its toll on those at the bottom of the heap.

尽管有少数首席执行官喜欢吹嘘自己的忍耐力，很多首席官都坚称，他们的岗位就是需要长时间工作。但2013年在伦敦金融城工作的那名美国银行实习生的死，如此快地被理解为过劳死，表明每个人都完全清楚，经济危机和好工作的相对稀缺正在摧残那些处于金字塔底层的人。

This mirrors what Professor Michael Marmot, the British epidemiologist, discovered when he conducted a longitudinal study of 10,000 Whitehall civil servants: that stress tended to concentrate at the top and the bottom of the pyramid.But when Marianna Virtanen continued the study to look at the long-term consequences of that stress, she found working 11 or more hours a day doubled the risk of a “major depressive episode”.A lifetime of long hours was also associated with cognitive loss in middle years.

这与英国流行病学家迈克尔·马尔莫教授对1万名白厅公务员进行的纵向研究的发现一致：压力似乎集中于金字塔的顶端和底层。但当玛丽安娜·弗塔嫩继续研究这种压力的长期后果时，她发现每天工作11个小时或者更久，会使人出现“重度抑郁期”的风险加倍。一辈子长时间工作也与中年时期认知能力下降存在相关性。

All of this damage is invisible.If some of the wear and tear resulted in visible injury—perhaps companies would take more care.Thinking is a physical activity, performed by the brain—which, like every organ, has limits to its capacity.We can see machinery break down, we notice broken arms and legs.We do not see broken minds—until it is too late.

这些损害都是看不见的。如果一些损害会导致可见的伤害，也许企业会更加注意。思维活动是由大脑完成的一种生理活动，而大脑，就像每一个器官一样，它的能力是有限度的。我们可以看到机械损坏，我们可以注意到断胳膊断腿。我们看不到破碎的心灵——直到已经为时太晚。

近些年来，冥想、韧性训练等人们以为可以消除过劳的项目颇为流行。这些训练或许能带来一些暂时的缓解，但很难称得上治本之策。我们知道机器有极限，但我们却喜欢想象我们自身没有极限。

靠工作时间来衡量员工表现的严酷企业文化不可避免地会导致疲劳和视野狭窄，不利于解决问题。这样的企业文化很危险。如果我们想要创造性、原创性以及掌握复杂问题，我们必须接受人脑存在生理极限这一事实。如果我们无视100多年来对人类工作效率的研究，把人当做配备着有缺陷的电池的机器人一样去管理，我们就浪费了人的才能，也牺牲了我们自身的健康。

词汇总结

razor ['re?z?]

n.刀片；剃刀

He found he could shave faster if he used two razors but then wasted all the time he saved covering the cuts with plasters.

他发现如果他同时使用两片刀片刮胡子，刮得会更快，但之后他不得不把节省出来的全部时间，浪费在用创口贴处理刀片留下的小伤口上。

major depressive episode

重度抑郁期

She found working 11 or more hours a day doubled the risk of a “major depressive episode”.

她发现每天工作11个小时或者更久，会使人出现“重度抑郁期”的风险加倍。

interpret [?n't??pr?t]

v.理解；说明；口译

But the speed with which the death, in 2013, of a Bank of America intern working in the City of London was interpreted as death by overwork showed how fully everyone knew that the economic crisis and relative scarcity of good jobs was taking its toll on those at the bottom of the heap.

但2013年在伦敦金融城工作的那名美国银行实习生的死，如此快地被理解为过劳死，表明每个人都完全清楚，经济危机和好工作的相对稀缺正在摧残那些处于金字塔底层的人。