4 Day Work Week

[btimbit]

Originally Posted by Flaming Homer

I think the bigger issue would be losing a day of operations. I think having an extra day off definitely is better for the worker but it would have a big impact on a lot of services. unless you staggered employees or something? like one week you start Mon-Thurs and next your Tues-Friday?

That's how I've had it in the past, I thought it worked well

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

That's sort of how we do our work from home thing for some positions, like my assistant - i.e., on days you're working from home someone in the office needs to cover for you if there's something that needs to be done in person. So people basically just trade off with each other and come in on different days.

[Leondros]

Originally Posted by KTrain

With the amount of posting going here during work hours, most of you are probably doing 4 days worth of work in 5 days anyway.

Or, we are just like really productive with our time, man...

[Fighting Banana Slug]

There was a good discussion of this topic on Plain English. The upshoot was basically we are way more productive than we were 100 years ago, or whenever we moved from 6 days to 5 days, so why not move to 4? They went through the usual issues and most were debunked. I haven't listened to this one in a while, but I recall it started an interesting conversation in the car while listening.

https://www.theringer.com/2022/12/6/...e-juliet-schor

[Muta]

If my pay goes down 20% as a result, no thanks. If it stays the same, then sure, I'm down.

#### Monday deadlines though, ending on Thursdays will bring on more anxiety, that's for sure!

[Mr.Coffee]

I think Canadians writ large are a bit detached from the rest of the world due to being like basically the best place on earth to live in for decades.

We live in a globalized competitive world and when you go to 4 days a week you’re cutting productivity by 20%.

The way Canadas been managed over the last decade plus the NIMBY BS and FN issues in our resource extraction industries (I mean more than just oil and gas) has brought enough economic damage to start having people only work 4 days a week.

I don’t know why Canadians are so incessant on changing everything that made Canada successful to begin with. You get to the top standard of living on earth and now decide to go change everything? Doesn’t make much sense to me.

[Barnes]

Does this mean we now have liquid lunches on Thursdays?

[Fighting Banana Slug]

Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee

I think Canadians writ large are a bit detached from the rest of the world due to being like basically the best place on earth to live in for decades.

We live in a globalized competitive world and when you go to 4 days a week you’re cutting productivity by 20%.

The way Canadas been managed over the last decade plus the NIMBY BS and FN issues in our resource extraction industries (I mean more than just oil and gas) has brought enough economic damage to start having people only work 4 days a week.

I don’t know why Canadians are so incessant on changing everything that made Canada successful to begin with. You get to the top standard of living on earth and now decide to go change everything? Doesn’t make much sense to me.

Part of the argument is that production does not go down 20%. The study referenced in the podcast I referred to above indicates that companies tend to cut the unproductive meetings and are forced to focus in a 4 day week. I know for myself, a 4 day week (because of a holiday) doesn’t necessarily mean I get less work done.

If it is purely a time based, billing system, this doesn’t work, but then, those systems would act more like a gig economy, which isn’t tied to 5 days in the first place.

[Geraldsh]

I worked on a union job that was 4-10’s with payday every Thursday. I loved it.

In my 20’s I worked 10-14 hours a day for 20-30 days at a stretch (locations surveys), not a real life but my how the money piled up.

[btimbit]

Obviously it depends on the environment, but for me it never led to a loss of productivity because there were other schedules. The days I wasn't there, others would be

[FlamesAddiction]

Pretty much every private sector job I have had in my adult life, you were paid salary assuming 5 day work week, 8 hours per day. But in reality, it was usually 10 hour days and you just didn't get paid the extra time. I'd rather just work 4 days per week and get paid for every hour I worked.

Of course, employers will just make you work 12 hours for 10 hours of pay.

[Hack&Lube]

We have talked about 4-day work week in my team but its up to them if they want to take a 20% pay cut or work an additional 2 hours per day to keep the same pay.

The later is easy since I usually work through my lunches anyway.

[ripTDR]

I work maintenance at a small liquefaction natural gas plant. We used to work 5 8's but was hard to get stuff done. Morning meetings, setup, lockout tagout, breaks and other planning issues resulted in long turnover times for work done. Ever since we went to 4 10's productivity went up and it's not really a big deal to stay those extra two hours plus three day weekends all year and in lieu of stat holidays make work life balance so much better. It's so good that by the end of the year guys struggle to use all of their PTO before the year is up. Another plus is if we work over 40 a week it's all double.



Generally from a management/employee perspective it's been a huge win.

[indes]

I work 4-10s (3 days at home one at the office) and I couldn't imagine ever working 5 days again. That being said I have the option of working Friday if I need to meet a deadline.

3 day weekend with a weekday off to get things done like the doctor or banking is amazing.

Not to mention having a day off where the kids are in school/dayhome let's us get stuff done around the house.

[iggy_oi]

4 10 hour day work weeks have very few downsides if the business can accommodate it. In a lot of cases your overall day can end up only being an hour and a half longer because people save time not driving to and from work during peak traffic times.

[Weitz]

My old job we did 4 8 hour days during June/July and 5 days in the rest of the year. I always found weekly work wasn’t getting done to the same level. 4 10 hour days would be better.

[malcolmk14]

If most of the corporate world goes to 4-day work weeks I think we should keep kids in school 5 days a week so there's an adult day to get things done that you don't want to do with kids.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by malcolmk14

If most of the corporate world goes to 4-day work weeks I think we should keep kids in school 5 days a week so there's an adult day to get things done that you don't want to do with kids.

Aren't you a teacher? I think it'd be a hard sell to your colleagues for everyone except teachers to go to 4 days per week.

[malcolmk14]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

Aren't you a teacher? I think it'd be a hard sell to your colleagues for everyone except teachers to go to 4 days per week.

I don't think I'd mind. In the CBE kids are usually done by 12 or 1 on Fridays anyway and then we get the afternoon to plan, have meetings, etc., I kind of like the way it's set up now.

Obviously I'd love a four day week but we get enough time off now as it is.

[topfiverecords]

Originally Posted by Muta

If my pay goes down 20% as a result, no thanks. If it stays the same, then sure, I'm down.

#### Monday deadlines though, ending on Thursdays will bring on more anxiety, that's for sure!

Stay after 5 once in a while and don’t take so many sick days and you should be able to meet your deadlines easily.