'I will never get my staff to work at 9am': Entrepreneur says employees should only work from 10am to 4pm

The early bird may get the worm, but the early-to-work employee is an unproductive worker.

That's the belief of one Singapore-based entrepreneur, who shared her view on what the optimal work schedule for an employee looks like.

"I will never get my staff to start work at 9am, and I'll tell you why," said TikTok user Thatasianmmama in a video posted on Tuesday (April 11).

Based on content shared on her social media accounts, the user behind the account is believed to be working in the financial services sector and is also the founder of a company providing motherhood-centric products and services.

In the TikTok video, Thatasianmama continued: "At 9am, any typical person reporting to the office, what do you think most of the people are doing? They are going to the pantry to take coffee, tea, take water, eat breakfast."

Explaining why this is so, she stated: "The truth is, everybody's day hasn't started yet [at that hour]", adding that they will need to satisfy their hunger before they can work.

"It is not productive for the people who are working, it is also not productive for the company," she remarked.

She shared that she tells her staff to start work at 10am instead, but it comes with a caveat: "When you start work at 10am, please do not come in at 10am to eat breakfast."

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She added that she'd rather her staff come in after they've settled their breakfast, among other things.

"They eat whatever breakfast, pang sai pang jior [poop and pee] whatever before 10; 10am they start work, stay focused," said Thatasianmama.

If you think the optimal working hours for her would be 10am to 6pm then, you'd be wrong.

The mother-of-three doesn't believe in keeping employees in office till 6pm either. Her rationale? By 4pm, employees who started work at 9am "would have been sitting at their desks for about six hours".

"Their brains are fried, they're thinking about going home, they're already thinking about where they're going after work, they're not concentrating anymore… they're not productive anymore," she stressed.

Increasing happiness index

Working for her would mean ending the day at 4pm.

"They end at 4pm, they go back home, pick their children, do whatever that they want, feel happy and have some work-life balance and then next morning start at 10am, focus on work. That itself will be more productive."

In the caption to her video, Thatasianmama added: "If you are reporting at 8.30am, change [your] job. If companies can be more open-minded, productivity can increase, happiness index will increase [for] individuals who work in the company."

Her TikTok clip has since gone viral with more than 1.3 million views since it was first shared.

Unsurprisingly, many expressed support for her stance on shortening employee working hours, though some were not hopeful of it being implemented in their companies.

"It's true though… people [can] only focus [for] four to six hours… More than that cannot already," wrote one commenter.

Others wondered if Thatasianmama was hiring.

And a few lucky ones shared that their regular working hours already conform to the entrepreneur's aforementioned schedule.

But of course, detractors had their opinion on the matter.

To one commenter who was incredulous that her staff would work for only five hours a day, minus the one hour lunch break, Thatasianmama replied that "It's enough".

AsiaOne has reached out to Thatasianmama for more information.

ALSO READ: Long working hours are a killer, WHO study shows

candicecai@asiaone.com