Employee Performance, Working Time and Tiredness in Creative R&D Jobs: Employee Survey from Estonia

Optimal use of the intellectual resources of R&D employees is a significant success factor for achieving innovation and socio-economic development. Statutory and company level regulation of working time, including the durations and timing of a working day and a working week, remains a common feature in many countries, and these rules often apply, among others, to creative R&D employees. Our study seeks to investigate the relationships between the drivers and outcomes of creative R&D employees’ work performance with particular focus on working time arrangement and the related tiredness, workability, work satisfaction and creativity issues. Our survey covers a sample of 160 creative R&D employees in Estonia. This conference proceedings paper gives an overview of some aspects of the first phase of our survey, while the more detailed results will be published in separate papers. Our findings include that 79% of the surveyed employees would prefer to work under a different working schedule compared to the standard 5-day working week, and 81% would prefer to have a daily schedule with an irregular start and/or end time of the working day. Emotional tiredness, sleepiness, low salary and inefficient time use are seen as major obstacles to achieving creative work results.