‘Crap’ or critical? | 'Right to disconnect' laws gather pace - should American employers expect the same?

By the time I finished my first full-time job, it’s fair to say my mental health had never been worse.

I was anxious to the point of physical symptoms like shakiness; I drifted in and out of depression without knowing what I was suffering from; I had stopped exercising and doing many of the activities I love.

Yes, there were extenuating factors, namely a lack of support network thanks to the Pandemic and feeling stuck in a career that I knew wasn’t my life’s calling. But the big, inescapable elephant in the room was that I was working at a company where I had no freedom to disconnect—I was utterly burned out.

I was recruiting Cloud Engineers for start-ups and big corporates across America while working out of London, requiring me to work the unusual hours of 12pm to 9pm. For a short period, the extra lie-ins and rush-hour dodging were a welcome novelty. But before too long, a practice introduced by the company’s CEO meant I was expected to keep an eye on my work phone until gone midnight, in case a client had a request or question that needed answering urgently.