A growing number of smaller companies are adopting a four-day workweek. Now the results of a recent trial at Microsoft suggest it could work even for the biggest businesses.
It turns out if you stop making people pretend to work, they work! What a concept.
Anybody else find it a bit gross that with an already productive workforce, the ‘issue’ of the 4 day work week needs to be framed like this…instead of it being about giving people their time and lives back without a reduction in pay?
But they need da moneey
Cool, nice to see so many places taking this more seriously recently.
As someone who’s working 3 days a week (à 8h), I approve this. 😎
Would you mind sharing what you do for work? That’s a dream schedule.
Software Engineer. IT “consultant” (actually just engineering). Company is quite goodwilled and they value sustainability (economic, social and environmental).
On one hand, I was lucky. On the other hand it was important to me, so I asked after 1.5 years there to reduce to 60%.
That’s awesome that you approached them for the adjustment and they accepted! Did your pay scale as well or remain the same if that’s not impolite to ask?
I’m a project manager in software and it’s lovely to know there are good places out there still. Thanks so much for sharing your positive experience!
Pay scaled linearly. But it’s still a “pay raise” because lower income means lower taxes 😂
I’m a project manager in software and it’s lovely to know there are good places out there still. Thanks so much for sharing your positive experience!
At my company, there are quite a few PMs actually also doing 4 day work weeks - or workations. It’s quite nice. I like that the company isn’t like “you live to work for us” but instead they’re like “Hey, here are some nice things you can work on - but we know, that work is simply part of life and needs balance.”
Really appreciate that.
I initially started the reduction, as I realised, that pro-actively speaking, I think that my current work “deserves” 24h of my week rather than full 40h. It’s just not so important for my life. And I’m happy to be able to proactively make this decision.
If you’re interested, I can tell you about the company via DM 😄
“Hey, here are some nice things you can work on - but we know, that work is simply part of life and needs balance.”
That sounds like a great approach to take!
I initially started the reduction, as I realised, that pro-actively speaking, I think that my current work “deserves” 24h of my week rather than full 40h. It’s just not so important for my life. And I’m happy to be able to proactively make this decision.
That’s a good mindset to practice! I’ll have to keep it in mind. Thanks for taking the time to respond!
Edit: I did try to DM you but it keeps kicking me to my subscription page
That’s a good mindset to practice! I’ll have to keep it in mind. Thanks for taking the time to respond!
Happy to hear your appreciate it 😊 Pro-activity is a game changer for life.
I sent you a dm via the web interface. did you receive?
I’m only mobile for kbin at the moment so it doesn’t appear I can receive them (and setting my browser to desktop mode doesn’t change anything). But thank you so much for reaching out! I’ll try to get my hands on a non-work computer and check it out.
still waiting for this to happen in the global scale! One can hope for it
Did they switch to 4x10 or to a 4x8?
There’s been lots of research on this before; nearly universally productivity goes up when companies move to a 4 day week.
The problem is that this would lessen corporate control on people because they’d get one extra day off, and that’s not acceptable to conservatives. It’s the same as with demaning people not work remotely; it’s all about power
Yep. People are being pushed back to work in offices even though studies indicate most office workers are more productive when they work from home. I saw someone on Mastodon sum it up as “people are getting paid for attendance” and that’s absolutely correct.
I was lying in bed last night thinking about how great a 4 day work week would be and how it would allow me to actually accomplish things that I can’t today because Saturday becomes the day to do all the errands I can’t do during the work week and Sunday is a hybrid of chores, socializing, and relaxing… assuming I don’t have training or maintenance scheduled at my volunteer gig. Having a day where I can focus on a hobby or interest in a relaxing manner without other obligations lurking would be so delightful!
And while I recognize that people manage to do all those things and don’t have an issue with it, that’s great for them! I struggle thanks to being neurodivergent and that additional day not working each week would drastically improve my quality of life. I know this because when I take a Friday or Monday off, I’m able to do all the things I need and get the me time I also need to be a happy, healthy human.
My workplace implemented Summer Hours. I’m remote as is, but being remote and only doing 4 days a week? My friend I feel like I finally have time to do what neuro-typical do. Although I’m still not satisfied with 40 hour work weeks, this finally feels like what people described living to feel like. No more task initiation problems, less piling backlog of health things I never have the time or availability to schedule for. Glorious
That sounds delightful and I’m so glad it’s helped you! Agree on the 40 hours - it should be 32 hours max.
Microsoft, for its part, says it will conduct another experiment in Japan later this year.
Cool.
So this from 2019, I wonder did they keep this up and did productivity stay at this level. I’m guessing there would be at least a slight dip after the initial enthusiasm but who knows.
