In the note, shared internally and viewed by the New York Times, Brin urges staff working on Google’s Gemini AI projects to put in long hours to help the company lead the race in artificial general intelligence (AGI).

Some have praised Brin’s commitment to pushing the company’s success, but others argue that his approach reflects an outdated and harmful mindset.

“The hustle-centric 60-hour week isn’t productivity—it’s burnout waiting to happen,” wrote workplace mental health educator Catherine Eadie in a post shared by LinkedIn’s news editors.

Others said they feel that hard work is essential for success, with a COO of a business analytics business writing, “Brin is just being honest—successful people have always put in long hours."

  • AdamBomb@lemmy.sdf.org
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    6 days ago

    Last summer there were a bunch of stories reporting findings that companies that experimented with a 4-day work week saw productivity gains over the traditional 5-day, so this billionaire’s opinion sounds out of alignment with reality

  • Phoenixz@lemmy.ca
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    6 days ago

    It’s burnout waiting to happen

    So? Then you fire them and hire fresh meat.

    Humans are replaceable, no?

    /S, of course

    • EzTerry@lemmy.zip
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      5 days ago

      Don’t worry the full mindset is: work 60h/week until you train your replacement… The AI…

  • varnia@lemm.ee
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    6 days ago

    We are slowly shifting to a 4x8=32h work week here. 60h long term has nothing to do with productivity anymore.

  • meowmeowbeanz@sopuli.xyz
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    6 days ago

    Irony alert: pushing humans harder while building AI to replace them—brilliant strategy, Sergey.

    😾

  • Empricorn@feddit.nl
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    6 days ago

    I’m sorry that Sergey Brin apparently doesn’t have hobbies or family/friends that care about him, but 60 is still wrong. We have computers and work multipliers and have perfected efficiency… We don’t need to spend the majority of our lives toiling anymore! Some would argue against 40, but at least that gives a balanced workday: 8 hours of work, 8 hours of sleep, 8 hours of leisure. And I say all that as someone who actually likes their job…

    • turnip@sh.itjust.works
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      6 days ago

      It is if your an ineffective manager trying to justify their salary in a time of economic crisis.

  • Triasha@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    60 hours is the sweet spot for maximal control over your employees life with only the normal amount of suicides.

  • OmarDontScare@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    Well, if Sergey Brin wants to work 60 hour weeks, be my guest. Sounds like a good idea for the CEO class, since they should really justify what they’re paid.

    • boonhet@lemm.ee
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      6 days ago

      Sounds like a good idea for the CEO class

      Mate, he’s a class or two ABOVE the CEO class. He’s in the “trillionaire soon maybe?” class where you don’t get to be by just being a CEO, you have to own major stock in a massively overvalued company that just keeps on growing.

      He should be working at LEAST 50000 hour weeks to justify his continued growth of wealth at this point. Why the lazy bastard isn’t doing it is beyond me.

      • OmarDontScare@lemmy.world
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        6 days ago

        Totally agree! I use CEO in that way, but yeah, he is definitely an uber rich asshole, who is paid way more than could ever be fair. Definitely more than could ever be what he ‘deserves’ or ‘earns’.

        Right now, i think some of these people are absolutely unable to participate in society because they literally exist outside of the normal bounds, far outside of them. And exactly that will create major problems, well it already has and we’re living through it. What’s to keep these assholes from actually demanding this kind of work hours from workers? Like, they will do so, absolutely, once you let them.

        I’m just not at all sure in what way in the current liberal system, we’re able to limit the wealth and power of these individuals. Yeah, taxes of course, but these people are so deeply connected to political class and are able to bully the legal system… So, that’s a hard challenge there.

  • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    Ahh, the typical manager misconception. Nope. Long work hours don’t equal high productivity.

    But I can understand that misconception, as it takes those people up there many more hours to get a single useful idea compared to those under them who actually do the work and earn the money.