[ad_1]
Early verdict on world’s largest four-day workweek pilot program: It’s changing lives.
That’s what Lisa Gilbert, credit services manager at Charity Bank, says in a new interview with CNN Business. Calling her new schedule “phenomenal,” she explains that she can run errands on Fridays and spend more time with her loved ones without feeling guilty.
“I find myself saying, ‘Yes, we can,’ instead of, ‘No, sorry, we can’t,'” Gilbert says.
The pandemic and the Great Resignation have destabilized the idea that workers have to grin and bear the rat race five days a week. Flexibility became all that workers wanted, some of whom began begging their employers for a four-day work week. Companies are listening: Those who have adapted to a four-day schedule have doubled from 100 since 2020, estimated Alex Sojung-Kim Pang, program director at 4 Day Week Global, a nonprofit that advises companies on the transition to four-day work weeks. Condition In May.
Together with think tank Autonomy, the UK 4 Day Week campaign and university researchers, 4 Day Week Global launched a six-month trial of the flexible working model to 3,000 workers in 70 companies in June. It holds workers to maintain 100% productivity levels even though they work one day less.
Like Gilbert, many of the trial workers CNN Business spoke with said the four-day work week has helped them focus on their personal lives and mental health, allowing them to pursue new hobbies and reducing “Sunday dread.”
More time for family and personal duties is a touted plus to the four-day work week. In the service industry, fast-food restaurant chain Dig began its own four-day week pilot in September 2020 and announced after 18 months that it was implementing a full-time schedule.
Dig hourly employee Libanesa Maria, a pseudonym provided to condition, said the new work-life balance has given her time to focus on her studies and take care of her relationship with her boyfriend and her mother.
In her previous schedule, her mental health suffered. “I was gloomy. I didn’t sleep much. I didn’t eat much either,” said Maria Condition in March. “Because I didn’t think I had time for it.”
A few bumps in the road
4 Day Week Global founder Andrew Barnes has pioneered the introduction of a four-day work week since 2017, arguing that despite the tradition, productivity is unaffected by the change in schedule. After a trial run of just four days, his workers were producing 25% more work than before.
Managers worry that flexible policies will lead to a lack of productivity. A survey by Future Forum found that older bosses are concerned about coordinating hybrid work, productivity and learning when implementing new schedules.
There were indeed problems implementing a new workflow for PR agency Unity, which was part of the UK experiment. Managing director Samantha Losey told CNN Business that the start of the process proved difficult to coordinate. “I thought I had made a huge mistake,” she said. “I didn’t know what I was doing.”
Yet she streamlined the process by cutting long internal meetings and creating a new communication system. Although things are better, she acknowledged that it is not certain that productivity will remain high enough to sustain a four-day work week indefinitely. By November, Unity and other companies in the process will decide whether to implement their new full-time work week.
But if you ask Pang, the research from the few trials right now is conclusive. “A lot of companies have made it work — and made it profitable,” Pang said Condition in May, adding that “the viability, practicality and benefits of the four-day week are no longer in dispute”.
Register for Condition Features email list so you don’t miss our biggest features, exclusive interviews and investigations.
[ad_2]
Source link