9 to 5 is not boring

Follow your dreams. Channel your passion. Wake up and smell the coffee... 


Words you hear often and with most Bollywood movies endorsing the mantra " You live only once. Follow your passion". Of course with a fancy BGM and even fancier locations, this seems close to reality and worth pursuing. Nothing wrong in this assumption but when you look at the larger 9-5 going regular office going people it's almost like you have assumed they are unhappy. The focus on alternative career paths is just such a eye opener and am glad that things are moving in the right direction. But what I am wary about is the exaggerated sense of finding your passion that doing a regular mundane job is dismissed without any credit. Working in a regular corporate set up for close to 15 years I can safely say the following just based on my experiences and people I have interacted. Of course there are exceptions. Here are a 10 reasons why 9 to 5 isn't passe and it can be interesting for a majority of people
  1. Routines work for people.A lot of people are passionate about making a small difference in the workplace and growing with an organization.
  2. The security of a job is what makes people stick and the uncertainty unnerves them
  3. Companies have now become sensitive towards allocating time to work on your passion. There is awareness and a lot of organizations in fact use these positive examples internally within their offices to encourage more people to follow their passion
  4. Outreach and Citizenship have become a normal household term like strategy and the community built around like minded people is a delight to watch. You could pick your cause and fight towards the same with passion and support
  5. The financial stability works for a lot of people and its a big pull factor. Loans, EMIs are all taken care of and you can dream BIG. Even if this dream is what 100 others are dreaming
  6. Exposure to different culture,countries both within India and outside are immense and there's a lot of learning there.
  7. Childcare,maternity support that is a huge topic and so many changes to the workplace to support this. Its an added advantage to many
  8. Lunch,dinner outings, coffee sessions, away day, family day, bring your child to work day, celebrate " all festivals" from Pongal to St. Patricks Day to Deepavali and Thanksgiving is just a sample of what Fun at work is. 
  9. Of course corporate culture is competitive and there is always a power struggle and that doesn't mean you don't make friends or build a strong network for life 
  10. Learning and personal development and understanding your strength and weakness . This is a journey and you keep learning and understanding more about yourselves and there is a lot of emphasis around this.
 Before someone pounces on me saying its not wrong to follow your passion and all that, please go back and read. I am totally in awe of folks who know what they really want and follow it.It is not this or that. This post is more leaning towards the 9-5 prejudices and assumptions which may not be all very true. Maybe just maybe, 9 to 5 is not all that boring and actually even this timing is changing. But that's for another post.



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