Four day working week

blackbox

theteal wrote: »

What's the detail?

4 * 10 hour shifts?

I worked 4 * 10 hour days many years ago in manufacturing industry. Very efficient; only 4 start ups and shutdowns per week and employees got 3 day weekend. Extra 2 hrs per day was worth it.

c68zapdsm5i1ru

I think a lot of people could probably get through their work in less hours if they had the carrot of a four day week dangled in front of them. A lot of time wasting goes on in lots of jobs - people chatting, having cups of coffee, posting on forums like this one, daydreaming, dragging a job out because they can't go home until 5.30 etc etc.

If people thought they could have every Friday off while keeping the same pay if they could get their work done during normal Mon - Thurs hours I bet they'd be very willing to sacrifice coffee breaks, long gossips around the photocopier, time wasting meetings, unnecessary phone calls and so on and work as efficiently as possible.

Grayson

biko wrote: »

Sure, but will I keep my pay?

Also, are you expecting me to do the same work, just in 4 days instead of 5?

If I remember correctly most people naturally do the same work. Productivity rose over the 4 days so they ended up doing the same work they would over 5.
(That's for office type jobs obviously. I can't see a waiter serving an extra days worth of customers since there's only so many they can deal with at once).

jimgoose

I think it's a jolly good idea, quite civilised.

Attitudes to work are changing. Had a very interesting conversation about this

30 years ago a 30-year old deciding that a career in say civil engineering was too hard and feck that they were retraining to be a teacher for a less stressful life and more time off would have been seen as a looser or at least it would be viewed as a strange thing to do.

Now its perfectly accectabel thing to do.

I'm in favour of it.

4 X 8 though. None of this 4 X 10 lark.

Balanadan

mariaalice wrote: »

Attitudes to work are changing. Had a very interesting conversation about this

30 years ago a 30-year old deciding that a career in say civil engineering was too hard and feck that they were retraining to be a teacher for a less stressful life and more time off would have been seen as a looser or at least it would be viewed as a strange thing to do.

Now its perfectly accectabel thing to do.

What's hard about civil engineering?

Balanadan

Balanadan wrote: »

What's hard about civil engineering?

With great power comes great responsibility.

ILoveYourVibes

Deleted User wrote: »

With great power comes great responsibility.

Great post!:D

Balanadan

Balanadan wrote: »

What's hard about civil engineering?

That is not the point, the point is the attitute to work and this is maybe a good thing the ideas that work is not everything and that more time off is what is improtatnt to the person. It has become accectabel to say that with out it being viewed as the person is lazy which is how it would have been precived in the past.

Bigbagofcans

Deleted User wrote: »

I'm in favour of it.

4 X 8 though. None of this 4 X 10 lark.

Agree with 4 X 8. 10 hours a day in the office sounds like torture. People would definitely be happier and more productive with 3 days off.

Balanadan

Deleted User wrote: »

With great power comes great responsibility.

That's electrical engineering m8.

OMM 0000

I think the 4 day working week (or even 5 day working week) is the wrong way to look at things.

So in my company we allow people to work from home whenever they want, we have no set working hours, and we have unlimited holidays.

The only thing that matters is you try your best, and you meet your deadlines.

If you're competent and can get your work done in two hours a day, or two weeks before schedule, that's great, easy life for you.

If you're junior, or slow, and at your current rate you'll need to work 10 hours a day, or will be two weeks late, then there's something wrong and we need to solve the problem (e.g. reduce your workload, training, shadowing, etc.)

What actually happens is when you're very kind to your employees, they stop seeing work as work, and end up doing a better job because their tasks just become a part of their lives.

The people who take the piss (uncommon) or have a bad attitude (rare) get fired.

Chris_Heilong

I already work this, 4 days, 10 hours. It is handy to have a day off for going to Doctors, dentists, Banks or even being home for collecting a parcel which are all the things almost impossible to do during a working day.

jester77

Half my team do 4 day weeks. They have different ways of doing it. 1 lad takes every Wed off, others takes every Fri off and the one I like most is taking Fri followed by Mon, so every 2nd weekend is a 4 day weekend.

I'll probably go with the Fri/Mon variant once the kids are a little older.

I would love it, 3 days even better and I’d have no problem working 12 or 14 hour days to allow it since I already work 5 x 10 hour days a lot of the time (sometimes work 6 or 7 days due to also helping on a family farm) and sometimes have to work in the evening when I get home. Not going to happen anytime soon though as things are too busy to take holidays never mind a 4 day week.

bullpost

OMM 0000 wrote: »

I think the 4 day working week (or even 5 day working week) is the wrong way to look at things.

So in my company we allow people to work from home whenever they want, we have no set working hours, and we have unlimited holidays.

The only thing that matters is you try your best, and you meet your deadlines.

If you're competent and can get your work done in two hours a day, or two weeks before schedule, that's great, easy life for you.

If you're junior, or slow, and at your current rate you'll need to work 10 hours a day, or will be two weeks late, then there's something wrong and we need to solve the problem (e.g. reduce your workload, training, shadowing, etc.)

What actually happens is when you're very kind to your employees, they stop seeing work as work, and end up doing a better job because their tasks just become a part of their lives.

The people who take the piss (uncommon) or have a bad attitude (rare) get fired.

And you think that will work across anything but a small elite group of workers?

The companies that offer it tend to be demanding and all-consuming workplaces, so taking time off can make employees feel guilty – particularly as it may show their boss and their colleagues that they are not fully committed. If you are up for a promotion against another colleague, it is unlikely you will book that four week Asian holiday. This means employees often end up taking less time off, not more.

where I work its only available to the higher-ups, and is meaningless as they always need to be available in reality.

jester77

bullpost wrote: »

And you think that will work across anything but a small elite group of workers?

The companies that offer it tend to be demanding and all-consuming workplaces, so taking time off can make employees feel guilty – particularly as it may show their boss and their colleagues that they are not fully committed. If you are up for a promotion against another colleague, it is unlikely you will book that four week Asian holiday. This means employees often end up taking less time off, not more.

where I work its only available to the higher-ups, and is meaningless as they always need to be available in reality.

It will work for anyone not working for a US company

Sky King

Mr.S wrote: »

4 day working week, but paid for 5 and you don’t need to work longer to just make up the hours. You can pick which day you take off during the well, with a mix of people taking Monday / Wednesday or Friday off usually.

Has had zero disruption to business....

In fairness I don't know what industry you work in so maybe this works for you but this sounds to me like an unmitigated disaster and hugely disruptive! A mix of people taking various days off every week? What about meetings? Or even basic dealing with customer stuff??

"Why did nobody get back to Widgetco with the delivery schedule? They're on the phone and seriously pi55ed off"
"Oh Seamus does that - he was off yesterday"
"I thought Seamus takes Mondays off"
"Yes but he swopped this week. Gave the delivery details to Mary"
"OK can you send Mary up to me?"
"Mary doesn't work Wednesdays"
"What about Paul?"
"He does work Wednesdays but he's on annual leave"

:eek:

Etc etc

SirGerryAdams

victor8600 wrote: »

I am all for it and ready to be take a cut (say to 80%) to my current salary.

You should talk to your boss then because I know loads of lads who have taken a 20% cut for a day off.

irelandrover

I dropped down to a 4 day week when my kid was born. Take every Wednesday off.
My pay dropped to 80% of my old wage but after tax its about 87%.
I love it and really like Wednesday with just me and my daughter.

Not sure i could go back to a 5 day week really.

SirGerryAdams

Really surprised to see people expecting the 5 days pay for working 4.

The expectation surely in work is that you work 40 hours a week and that those 40 hours are spent on work. (or pretty close to it)

Let's say a scientist works 40 hours a week and gets 400 a week. That's 10 euro an hour.

So when they get put to a 4 day week, how can they get the same work done? You're talking about a 25% increase per day in productivity.

If someone is able to make up 25% productivity in a day then they have clearly been a slacker!

So for that, I think it's not possible to do 5 days work in 4 days and in that case getting 5 days pay is akin to a payrise which would be given willy nilly.

Glebee

Fcuk that, I go to work for the break.

Cryptopagan

SirGerryAdams wrote: »

Really surprised to see people expecting the 5 days pay for working 4.

The expectation surely in work is that you work 40 hours a week and that those 40 hours are spent on work. (or pretty close to it)

Let's say a scientist works 40 hours a week and gets 400 a week. That's 10 euro an hour.

So when they get put to a 4 day week, how can they get the same work done? You're talking about a 25% increase per day in productivity.

If someone is able to make up 25% productivity in a day then they have clearly been a slacker!

So for that, I think it's not possible to do 5 days work in 4 days and in that case getting 5 days pay is akin to a payrise which would be given willy nilly.

Many jobs don’t involve the same continuous intensity of labour. It’s not the workers who are slack; it’s the whole organization of the working week. Often there are more hours allotted to it that are really needed, and it’s padded out with interminable meetings and all the rest.

bullpost

jester77 wrote: »

It will work for anyone not working for a US company

How so?

Sleepy

Couldn't afford to take the salary hit for it now but had it imposed on me during the recession and rather enjoyed the extra time at home with the kids.

Definitely couldn't see it working in my industry (or any other professional services based business) where customers are billed by the hour / day.

c68zapdsm5i1ru

Cryptopagan wrote: »

Many jobs don’t involve the same continuous intensity of labour. It’s not the workers who are slack; it’s the whole organization of the working week. Often there are more hours allotted to it that are really needed, and it’s padded out with interminable meetings and all the rest.

Totally agree. There seems to be this 'one size fits all' approach to office/admin type work regardless of the actual tasks involved, deadlines to be met etc. Some jobs can be done in short intensive bursts, others might need steady regular application and so on.

There are a lot of people who waste a lot of time in offices dragging out jobs until they can go home, when they would have the same work done in half the time if they could work to their own clock and not some pre-decided one.