996

In China, its birthplace, '996' always seen as practice of failed management. Because for at least half of the 72-hour workweek, most employee will mentally checkout (in Chinese we call this 摸鱼). Although middle managers know their subordinates are inefficient, they still impose working hour KPI on their team, so they can demonstrate their own value to upper management.

> Because for at least half of the 72-hour workweek, most employee will mentally checkout (in Chinese we call this 摸鱼).

The CEO of one of my employers was smitten with his new China office because they bragged about operating 996.

To everyone else, it was obvious that they weren’t working more. They were just at the office a lot, or coming and going frequently.

When they’d send a video from the office (product demos) barely anyone was at their seats, contrary to their claims of always working.

Their output was definitely not higher than anyone else.

However, they always responded quickly on Slack, day or night, weekend or not. The CEO thought this was the most amazing thing and indicated that they were always working.

It's sad how a lot of things in life now are all about optics.

And it's shocking that it works for leadership/management so well