Finishing Work Early

At least at my work there's always more to do but that doesn't mean it's always worth jumping in on it.For instance I tend to be put on larger umbrella tasks which take a few weeks. It isn't uncommon for me to wrap up a little ahead of time - sure there are things I could do but usually because of the way things have been planned there are other pieces of that puzzle which aren't fully in place either. So I'll poke around a bit but take it easy for that day or so

We don't want the guy with the most "free time" doing the work.

Work expands to fill the available time, after all.

Again though, how I manage my time is my business. If I'm assigned a task on Monday with a deadline for Friday, I can finish it on Monday and have it ready for the Friday deadline and then spend my time how I wish OR I can report the task completed and then expect to have more tasks assigned. There's no need to have a negotiation with how any tools that I use makes me more efficient. You seem to be unable to manage your own time and need to be told by employer when to have time off. Th

They don't want you getting too much work done, you might catch up with them

"Work expands to fill the available time"This includes other people's time.

Crazy how people would let their managers know they could get more done, instead of getting the same amount done quicker and having more free time.

Problem is you're normally still judged by what you deliver, so you can't just chill and wait for things to get done

I have been in the workforce for almost 30 years now and I believe that everybody is getting more squeezed so they don’t have the time or energy to do a proper job. The expectation is to get it done as quickly as possible and not do more unless told so.In SW development in the 90s I had much more time for experimentation to figure things out. In the last years you often have some manager where you basically have to justify every thing you do and always a huge pile of work that never gets smal

try seeing it from the other perspective: i am tasked with doing X, but i have to spend all day every day discussing X, and Y and Z with the higher ups and other teams, so that i have to get an assistant to actually do X.