RESOURCES Talk of the four-day workweek has been around since well before the COVID pandemic. It goes back at least as far as 1956, when then-Vice President Richard M. Nixon said he foresaw a four-day workweek in the “not too distant future.” Nixon may have been way off on his assessment, but the recent changes in the workplace surrounding remote and hybrid work have given momentum to questions about how work gets done: Are we working five days a week just because we have done it that way for more than a century, or is it really the best way? Researchers at nonprofit group 4 Day Week Global, in conjunction with a think tank and researchers at Cambridge University, Boston College and Oxford University, sought to directly address those questions via a four-day workweek pilot including 73 companies and more than 3,300 workers across Britain. Participants in the pilot program, representing a cross section of industry verticals and organizations ranging from small businesses to large corporations, received a weekly paid day off for six months. Nearly halfway into the six-month trial, survey data and qualitative feedback suggested that a four-day workweek does not have a negative impact on productivity and in some cases can lead to a positive impact. According to the findings, 46 percent of respondents said their business productivity has “maintained around the same level,” while 34 percent report that it has “improved slightly,” and an additional 15 percent said it has “improved significantly.” Altogether, 88 percent of respondents stated that the four-day week is working “well” for their business at this stage in the trial; while 86 percent of respondents stated that at this juncture in the trial, they would be “extremely likely” and/or “likely” to consider retaining the four-day week policy after the trial period ended. Looking at how smooth the transition to a four-day week has been (with 5 being “extremely smooth” and 1 By Martin Vilaboy Four-Day Workweek Leads to Full Week of Productivity 30 REMOTE WORK SOLUTIONS rwsmagazine.com
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NTg4Njc=