I confess! I am a “binge worker” – someone who works long and hard for two or three months and then goes on a complete slack for 2 – 3 weeks. At first I didn’t recognise what I was doing. The long hours were just part and parcel of my job and I didn’t even think about the crash at the end which was usually in the form of a sickness related incident. Now I plan for it and every three months have a two week holiday. It suits my work style as I need intensive concentration to be able to create and deliver my programs.

Now I have found that I am not alone. Other people are not only doing the same thing but they are demanding it. According to the Economist, more and more workers are seeking greater flexibility in their work and that often means undertaking large chunks of intensive time in exchange for a more time off later. "Flexibility is no longer a privilege, but a right," the report said. In a highly competitive market where one of an organisation's key assets is its people, the warning to employers is that, if they can't adapt to these new ways of working, they are going to miss out on an important pool of talented people.

In the past I have been labelled a workaholic for my work practices with all the bad connotations that brings. But the report shows that binge working isn't, in fact, at all bad - and that it allows people to both be more effective at work, and get more time to do other things. Yes, this might actually help you get more out of life.

So what if we want to work 60-hour weeks. If you get to go island hopping in Thailand (like me) for two weeks every quarter on top of your normal holidays, surely intensive working isn't such a bad thing.

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