evali / photocase.com

An agency-day without overtime is like a holiday without travel-time – you might want to avoid it, but the two are rarely separable. And while we’re on the subject: how necessary is that time which we sacrifice from our much prized free-time?

Let’s look at it this way: how are you going to avoid it? Anyone who has chosen the agency life usually knows what they’ve gotten themselves into. There are the horror stories about choleric bosses and “exploitation-agencies”, and it’s no secret that you probably aren’t going to get out of the office at 5pm any day of the week. But perhaps the overtime is a good investment. A bit like a life insurance policy: you pay in to it a bit at a time and after a certain period it usually was worth it. And then you get the nice life you have earned: success in the workplace, recognition from your peers etc. etc.