Looking At A 4 Day Week

MONEY MATTERS

The Four Day Week: Not So Much A Question Of Productivity, But Of A Culture Of Respect

A four day working week can be a great motivator for staff and doesn’t have to mean a drop in productivity, but making it work is not just an organisational challenge, but a cultural one as well, says Gemma Chapman of Lovewell Blake. In a world where employers are fighting to attract and retain the top talent, more and more employers are considering moving towards a four day week, through making productivity gains to enable workers to turn up for four normal length days, with the fifth day off. Despite concerns about the difficulty of increasing productivity and meeting clients’ expectations, evidence is emerging that it can work well, delivering happier and more motivated employees, without denting productivity overall. Achieving this requires considerable adjustment though – not just in organisational and contractual terms, but also in workplace culture. difficult in smaller teams. Some employers choose to offer a four day working week to some employees, but insist on a five day pattern for client facing teams. This sort of staff segregation can lead to resentment, and a confused working culture. Of course, there are practical considerations to take into account, but even where these hurdles can be overcome, the four day week will only work if there is a genuine culture of respect for everybody’s work/life balance. In some senses the organisational, contractual and productivity issues are relatively easy to overcome – but only if there is a genuine culture of respect in place first.

Practicalities, first, though: delivering five days’ worth of output in four days means identifying where current unproductive time lies. Evidence suggests that much time spent at work is unproductive, through badly organised work patterns or because people working longer hours are less motivated.

Negotiation with staff is a crucial part of making the transition. You might expect some defensiveness at first (no-one wants to admit they are not working hard every hour), but if workers can see the prize of an extra day off, they will be willing to co-operate in finding productivity gains. You must also allay concern that cramming a week’s work into four days might introduce new sources of stress. Making the change permanently will necessitate changing employees’ contracts. Employers must respect the needs of staff (and vice-versa). A good idea is to introduce changes to working patterns on a trial basis before making it permanent, leaving the door open to returning to a five day week if it doesn’t work. You must consider customers’ expectations too. If they expect you to be providing a service all week, then you can’t simply shut down on Friday. This might mean that people in customer-facing teams take their extra day off on different days - more

Gemma Chapman is HR manager at Lovewell Blake