How do you know when you are being overworked? What can you do to fix the problem?

Question

I'm in Silicon Valley, you know, land of the dot com gazillionaires, and I'm wondering if I'm being overworked here.

I work probably 10, 11, 12 hours a day depending on how much **** gets thrown at me, and sometimes I even have to come in on Saturdays. I'm a newly minted Software Engineer, and in as much as my company offers flexible hours, I get shitted on by the management for coming in at 10-11am each day. So, that's 10-11am to 9-10pm everyday, if you are keeping score.

Is this right? What should I do here to get my hours down to normal? I really am not a fan of working all these hours, but then I finish one project, and I get overbooked on the next one as well.

The projects aren't even that great. In fact, given the name of the company, I would almost be embarrassed to say what I have been working on.

Also, compared to others at my level, I'm being payed about 10K less, and am doing 2x as much work.

I can accept that I'm just stupid, and have made a bad decision here. What do I do NOW!? How do I stop this from happening? What can I do to stick to these people, or atleast stand up for myself?

This is annoying.

Answer 1

......you will be more stressed.

Answer 2

I doubt you are stupid.  If you break from this employer in a way that leaves a bad taste in their mouth, then, you will get stupid points.  I will guess that you are one to the newbes and tend to get the grunt work.  I suggest you get over feeling put upon and turn the distaste for the work you are getting and volume to your advantage.  Redouble your efforts to deliver the very best work your supervisor is seeing.  Go to him or her and ask advice about efficiency of your work-how to improve.  Ask them, from time to time, when you can receive more challenging assignments.  Be patient and REMEMBER it is easier to find a job when you have a job.