The rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) has not only changed workplace expectations (long hours and gruelling schedules) but also threatened jobs in various fields. Amid these talking points, author Chetan Bhagat has offered a contrarian view: Four hours of genuinely focused work a day can be enough. Bhagat made the remarks while speaking at the 18th edition of the Project Management South Asia Conference (PMSAC) in Bengaluru on October 3.
He said the emphasis should be on the quality of work rather than the number of hours spent at a desk.
He clarified that his definition of a four-hour workday excludes the time often consumed by meetings, breaks and workplace interruptions. Bhagat’s remarks come at a time when the traditional idea of a long working day is being questioned from another direction. The debate has also seen prominent Indian business leaders advocate longer working hours.
“I work 4 hours a day and that is enough if you do it with full dedication,” Bhagat said at the event. “If you genuinely do work for four hours in a day, that is enough, good enough,” he said, adding that employees should “prioritise everything you put on the table” during those hours.
The rapid adoption of AI has intensified concerns about automation, productivity and the future of white-collar jobs, with employees increasingly being asked to become more productive while adapting to technologies that can perform tasks previously done by humans.
Bhagat, meanwhile, stressed on a different equation: Focus, prioritisation and personal well-being. Infosys co-founder NR Narayana Murthy had called for India’s young workforce to work 70 hours a week, arguing that greater productivity was necessary for the country to become more competitive. Murthy later said that he himself had worked 70 hours a week for more than four decades and, when India followed a six-day working week, had worked 85-90 hours a week. Asked about work-life balance at the Bengaluru event, he said people should focus on doing what makes them happy, referring to principles from his book ’11 Rules for Life’.
