Nokia’s Work-Life Balance
Stefan over at Ring Nokia started a series on Finnish culture to try and better understand Nokia as a company. His first piece talks about the Finnish proverb “Aamun torkku, illan virkku, se tapa talon hävittää.” In English, that means “Asleep in the morning, awake in the evening; this way will destroy a house.”
The interesting piece that comes from Stefan’s piece is that Finnish people are apparently not allowed do not have to work over 40 hours a week. I’ll have to confirm that with my Finnish colleagues, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it were true. While there is no such restriction on us working more than 40 hour weeks here in the US, Nokia’s vacation policy is basically “use it or lose it.”
Many companies will compensate you for any vacation you don’t take in a year. Nokia actually wants you to take vacation. Work-life balance is important to the company. Many of the policies or benefits provided prove that. Even the Employee Handbook directly mentions work-life balance, or it did the last time I checked.
Meanwhile, I need to go adjust my wake-SLEEP balance. It’s now out of whack. 
Update: Obviously didn’t get the link to Stefan’s site right (fixed). Also misread what he said too (corrected that above).
