10 Reasons Why the 4 Day Work Week is Good for the World
If you ask someone if they wanted to move to a 4 day work week, chances are they would say yes. Here are ten reasons why the 4 day work week is good for society, the future of work and the world we live in.
How the 4 day work week benefits working parents
One of the most immediate benefits of a 4 day workweek is the increased time for family activities. An extra day off gives parents more quality time with their children, lets them participate in family outings, or simply be more present.
How a 4 day week can increase efficiency in the legal industry
Maria Jędrzejewska, head of PR and Marketing at Maruszkin Law in Warsaw, Poland, talks about their experience as a law firm switching to a 4 day work week.
The 4 day work week: a prescription for better physical health
In the hustle and bustle of the modern world, the traditional 5 day work week has been the norm for decades since Henry Ford introduced it in his factories. But what if we could improve our physical health by simply reducing our work week by one day? The 4 day work week, a concept gaining traction globally, promises not just increased productivity and improved mental health, but also significant physical health benefits.
The impact of a 4 day work week on employees' sleep-related problems
In recent years, several organizations have experimented with a 4 day work week, aiming to improve work-life balance and overall employee well-being. One of the key benefits observed is the positive impact on employees' sleep patterns. This case study explores how a 4 day work week can help alleviate sleep-related problems among employees.
The 4 day work week is your answer to declining employee engagement
The 4 day work week can have a profound impact on employee engagement. While our past research has proven this, what stands out most is the qualitative feedback from employees.
How adopting a 4 day work week can help grow your business
Working less? How could that possibly mean that my business would grow? We’ve helped hundreds of businesses through their 4 day work week and have measured their success. What did we find? Indicators of business growth.
How does the 4 day work week help my mental health?
Our research team who survey participants at the start and end of the 4 day work week trials measure many mental health benefits. We have been measuring the following reported metrics: workplace-related stress and burnout, fatigue and sleep-related problems, anxiety, and work-life balance.
The 4 day work week is a positive for gender equality
Across the world, women often end up spending up to three times more unpaid domestic and care work than men. For women working a full-time job, juggling household and parenting duties on top of that can be a struggle.
The 4 day work week is good for the climate and the environment
The 4 day work week helps people above all else, but when people are happier and healthier, you see a knock-on change in the environment which surrounds them.
Does the 4 day work week benefit business?
Here are 4 ways in which the 4 day work week benefits your business results in areas such as finances, human resources, employee engagement and organization.
What is the 100:80:100™ rule for the 4 day week?
We believe that a 4 day week is a 32-hour week, or 4x8-hour days of work. While many of the companies which trial the 4 day week decide to adopt the Friday-off model, this doesn’t necessarily work for all.
Different industries require different approaches. For example, organizations introducing a 4 day week to customer service centers would need to rotate the day off among their staff so as to maintain service levels.
The young ones these days don’t want to work hard!
We forget, as we take our careers to the level of leadership, that stage of life is often just as important as age in life. The young ones I talk to all want to work productively, they want valuable work where they feel they are valued and their employers care about more than just making money. They also value being engaged with their families, communities and their health. Read more about What is work?
What really is work?
I am often asked, do you work a 4 day week? You would think that as a leader in this conversation globally I would be able to just say yes. However, for me, as it is for many people, the question is, what is work?
We often hear from people who “work” too many hours – “But I love my work!” - “ We have a real work ethic here.”
And this is fantastic, but for me I have been trying to get the heart of what REALLY is work. For our lives to be fulfilling and also to enable our society to be successful, being able to define what we need to work ON might help with this question.
What are the other things that we also describe as work?
FAQ - When is a 4 day week not a 4 day week?
Early in our 2018 experience with the 4 day week in our business Perpetual Guardian, we came across the problem which a lot of you also find. We can’t all take Fridays off; or, we don’t want to. What do we do with people who are already working four days or less, or those who are working more than 40 hours? I sat down with our team and we came up with our 100-80-100™ principle.
Growth and changes
As you have probably all seen the conversation about reducing work time including the 4 Day Week as certainly taken off around the globe since the pandemic. What started for Andrew Barnes and me as a passion project and grown into an international movement. We currently have 5 staff with another 3 to join us in the next couple of months. In the last two years and with leadership from Joe O’Connor, our CEO, our team have been busy with three things:
A life of interesting conversations
It has been an incredible first half of this year. With pilot programs running in Ireland, the United Kingdom, North America and Australasia, our team has grown to 6 full time people led by the very capable Joe O'Connor.
Andrew and I now have the chance to take a step back and work on more strategic plans, it allows us to have the time to imagine a world with reduced hours working for all.
Happy International Women’s Day
I’m posting this a day early because I’m ….. well let’s just say I have a brain surgeon in my life now. Anyway, I wanted to celebrate this important day by announcing that I am moving away from the CEO role at 4 Day Week Global, and shifting over to managing director so I can still be around to champion and drive the movement but also have time for the numerous other projects that I have on my plate.
It’s not a matter of Left or Right, the 4 Day Week is better for everyone.
Over the last few days there have been a couple of opinion pieces critical of the idea of the 4 Day Week. Usually I let these slide, I know our support of companies introducing a 4 Day Week, or some other reduced hour week will, in the end, show the way of the future, simply by the sheer number of companies doing it successfully.
And nowhere more is this likely that in the United Kingdom. And it is not a political issue, it is not a matter of the Left want this, Labour say that, this is a question about creating the society we want.
How the great resignation creates fertile ground for people to demand flexible working
The great industrialists have always understood the relationship between economic stimulus, productivity and time away from work: Henry Ford introduced the five-day week in his business 100 years ago, as a means to give his own workers time to buy his cars. It worked, and the developed world followed suit, shrinking the standard six-day week and codifying the norm that would remain ‘the working week’ for the next century.
In the post-pandemic workplace employees are taking control and deciding how they will work, leaving workplaces that do not listen.