Technology lets us abandon 9-to-5 routine

By Jessica Carroll

 These days, many people have the technology needed to make a living without wasting their time sitting at a desk in an office or cubicle. Like Forbes writer Pia Silva wrote, the 9-to-5 is just something left over from the early 19th century and ran with. It is simply not needed anymore and it is time that we start realizing that.  
Based on the way people talk about their jobs, we believe that a 9-to-5 is ridiculous but we don’t ever do anything about it. According to a CNBC survey, 85 percent of Americans are satisfied with their jobs, however, if you go on social media every Monday you can find thousands of posts reflecting dread for going back to work. I think the problem is that we believe that the 9-to-5 is not necessary anymore but we need to be able to justify why it isn’t. That’s where I come. 
In the new gig economy, we can all be freelancers. Technology allows us to be in multiple places at once with the use of smart phones. We can attend virtual meetings with video calling apps. My grandmother, who has been working 9-to-5 for more than 30 years at the same company now has such a flexible schedule that she can do all of her work from home. After my grandmother had a stress-related health scare, her boss figured out a way to monitor he work while my grandmother is at home on a company-assigned computer. It took my grandmother getting sick for her boss to realize that her position is one that could be done outside of the 9-to-5 routine. She is doing exactly what she has been doing for the last 30 years at a desk at work, in the comfort of her home now. 
With her new freedom, she is able to spend more time focusing on her other source of income, which is consulting from home, and she can do all of these things during the peak hours of the day rather than having to wake up super early and then sitting at a desk all day. Her health has improved and she now is able to have more than one source of income.  
Time is what this is all about. People in this new generation want more time. We want more time to do more things, to freelance and to have multiple sources of income. We have all this technology, yet we aren’t using it to its fullest capacity. We could have meetings through Skype, keep appointments through FaceTime, clock-in and clock-out through our cellphones. We don’t have to be held down at a desk for eight hours. Technology is making it normal to have more than one job and abandoning the 9-to-5 routine will be more suitable for our future needs.  

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