Time Theft - The Chess Match Nobody Wins

For maximum irony, read this while on shift

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If there were ever two things that I believe people universally could agree that they want more of, it's Money and Time. Money enables us to do the things we want and to live (hopefully) the life we would like to live. It allows us to satisfy our needs and any left over goes towards either savings or something special for yourself (or others). And really, if I were to offer you a bag full of money with no strings attached, would you say no?

As for time, it just seems like there's never quite enough. What could you do with an extra half hour in a day? An hour? Two? If you're like me, the idea of wasting time seems attractive, yet you can never really enjoy it because you feel like you should be doing something with it. It's quite literally the time of your life after all, and why wouldn't you want to make the most of it. Do more. See more.

In 1748, Benjamin Franklin wrote an essay called "Advice to a Young Tradesman" and coined the term "Time is Money". Conveniently, it appears that the two things we want more of can be thought of as one. So where is the best arena to marry these two together and talk about them interchangeably?

Business. Industry. The Job Market.

Work is the epitome of this statement. It is the trade of time for money. You go and punch the clock, trading in the time of your life for money in your pocket. You are essentially converting one into the other. They are the same... "Time is Money".

Like you, businesses also can't get enough of either. Businesses exist to make money and they will use time to do it. The issue is that the means of making money is also the means by which they lose money. They have to pay employees to have those employees generate that income they want, and that's a risk. Conversely, if you're the employee, you are trying to get as much return on your investment as you can. How much money can you get for your time? It becomes a chess match.

So how to get the upper hand when both company and employee need each other to succeed? You both signed a deal to play nicely in the sandbox so that's set in stone, but can't you just... you know... take extra? You can't go and just take money from one another; Society has established that's a big no-no at this point. But "Time is Money", so what about stealing time? Is that even a thing? Yes, Time Theft is a thing, and it's leading to increasing amounts of tension in the workplace.

So what is Time Theft? Who benefits from and is impacted negatively by Time Theft? And how should Time Theft be handled in the workplace?

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A moment of your time

How does someone go about stealing time? It's not like you can just go up to someone and take literal minutes off their life and add them to your own. In reality, it boils down to how you get paid, and it truly requires you to take a "Time is Money" view of the situation. Time Theft is defined as accepting any money in exchange for work wherein you didn't actually work. Consider this...

You are paid $15 per hour. That means you are making 25 cents per minute. You've reached the end of a long shift and you decide to clock out 6 minutes before you are scheduled to do so but you collect pay for the full shift. This is Time Theft. You stole $1.50.

Yes, this is seriously a thing that people get into arguments over in the workplace, and it can get very petty very quickly...

That bathroom trip you took when you weren't technically on a scheduled break was 3 minutes.

You spent another 2 minutes talking with a coworker.

You took 30 seconds to re-tie you shoes.

Which ones are acceptable? Which aren't? Is an employee seriously expected to work at 100% efficiency for the entire duration of their shift or be labeled a thief? What's the cutoff between a pause in your duties and a malicious invasion of the company coffers? Is the theft hidden in the intent behind the actions taken? Is this starting to seem like the world's silliest rabbit hole yet?

What about Time Theft the other way? Surely if the employee can take money from the employer, there is a way for the business to blindside the workers right? In many places there are laws that say you can't do that and that you need to pay workers for their work, and you'd be hard pressed to find a place that doesn't pay workers unless they agree upon volunteer or internship conditions. That being said, what happens when a manager asks an employee to stay that extra couple minutes? Maybe the supervisor asked an employee to end their break early because the store caught a rush. Maybe you work for a business that states that errors in accepting payment will come out of their hours worked. This is also Time Theft.

With the exception of that last example, we are once again dealing with minutes here. Is there going to be many places on payroll that are dolling out pay on a literal by-the-second basis? Probably not, and especially not in a salary job environment. And yet both employees and employers complain that the one is taking advantage of the other, and it almost always boils down to a matter of minutes and seconds.

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Eye for an eye

We've talked about the employers and the employees, but what about that third party that makes up a business operation? We've been so focused on looking internally at the effects of Time Theft that we've not even touched on how the customer is impacted. So are they impacted? Interestingly, for most cases of Time Theft, the customer sees little to no disruption in the operation. Yes, in extreme cases where someone literally doesn't show up to open the store (or something similar), they will see it. That being said, that's not Time Theft at that point... that's just someone not doing their job (and unlike Time Theft, they likely will not get paid for missing their shift).

So Time Theft is pretty much a one on one battle between employer and employee, and like a chess match, it becomes a game of strategy between the two if left unchecked. If you read the entire title of this article then you've spoiled it for yourself, because this is a chess match that nobody wins. Here's why...

Both the employer and the employee want to get the most out of the other without crossing the line between acceptable and unacceptable. Where's the line? Nobody knows, and it's different for every industry. So both will test the waters in subtle ways. "Can you stay a few minutes late?" may be a request made by the employer. How much time is acceptable? 3 minutes? 5 minutes? On the opposite end of the spectrum, an employee who is done their duties for the day may want to leave early. How early is acceptable? 5 minutes? 7 minutes? Is it truly the expectation that they sit there for the last two minutes of a shift before they leave simply for the sake of being there and justifying the pay? How about bathroom breaks? Most people wouldn't have a problem with it, but for some businesses, do they see it as taking a loss on their pocketbooks?

I ask again, does this not seem silly?

Therein lies the chess match. How do you get the most out of the situation? How do you get them more than they get you? The effort it takes to engage in this back and forth benefits nobody and only wastes time and resources. At the end of the day, both will participate, and in an effort to come out on top, both will lose.

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Where's the balance?

Every business is different and handles things in their own unique way. There is no way that an intercontinental corporation will have the same level of payroll as a mom-and-pop shop off the side of a busy highway. That being said, both are just as susceptible to Time Theft. So how to handle it? The key here is surprisingly simple and works across all sizes and types of businesses...

Set expectations early and stick to them.

The Time Theft chess match starts when the expectations aren't clearly outlined and allow for ambiguity to creep in. The lack of communication leads to the issues and causes the spiral down for the employer-employee relationship.

So what are some of the expectation standards that we can expect to see? Let's take a look...

Absolute Zero

You can't have Time Theft if you agree to not engage in it. While it seems ideal and can work for some businesses, it's very hard to enforce and upkeep to the point of being unrealistic in most cases. For the employer, it means that you cannot expect a single moment of extra work for whatever reason and can be unnecessarily restrictive. For the employee, it means that you don't work beyond the shift's demands, but you also are heavily governed during your shift. Why? Because the employer can dictate what is and isn't allowed, and you just agreed to abide by it. It requires a mountain of trust between management and employees, and typically is not seen outside of small business environments.

On The Fly

This is one that can see success in businesses with part time or casual employees. It gives some amount of flexibility, allowing for the employer to ask for a favor of the employee while agreeing to surrender a level of freedom over their employees actions in the workplace. It's a chess match where both sides agree to play within a certain set of rules and see the give-and-take return as both sides bargain for what they feel is fair. It can be extremely powerful and empowering to those that use it correctly, but can also lead back to the Time Theft situation where both sides start trying to deal more damage than they take. This setup is an agreement by both parties that there may be a situation wherein they will be asked to take a loss, and it is up to both parties to determine the degree to which they are willing to lose.

As You Must

The most fitting setup for the salaried positions, this is basically the "On the fly" setup but amped up to a certain degree. It copies the "Can I take a few extra minutes of your time" attitude but forces it to be an already agreed upon expectation that it can and will be done if required. If a job needs to get done, it will get done. If a job is done, then yes I will take a few minutes to myself. While it offers the most freedom to both the employee and the employer, it also requires the most trust to be successful. Combined with the right company culture, this setup can allow for truly great things to be done.

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Time's up

As I just mentioned, it really is up to the culture that you cultivate to dictate how best to navigate the chess match that is Time Theft. Creating this culture requires trust, and it is on both the employee and the employer to decide what level of trust will work for them. To ignore Time Theft is to let it fester and get worse. Communication is key to deciding where the line is, and removing ambiguity means removing any potential for the Time Theft issue to crop up.

Time Theft is, for the most part, a piece of the business relationship between employee and employer. It's a matter of acting in good faith and deciding how much Time Theft is acceptable in both directions. For the third time now... does it not seem like a silly waste of everyone's time to argue over literal minutes and seconds? It benefits nobody to make a mountain out of a molehill, and both employers and employees have a vested interest in solving their unique Time Theft agreement. After all, Time Theft is only really theft if one of the parties feels they are being stolen from.

Thanks for letting me steal some of your time.

~IR

Have you been affected by Time Theft? How is Time Theft handled in your workplace? Or maybe you just have a comment to add? Check out the Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or LinkedIn page and let everyone know. Don't forget to follow or like the page for updates! And share this article if you feel others should give it a read!

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