Is the UK Moving Towards a 4 Day Working Week?
40% of employees experience less stress and 70% feel less tired and burnout working a 4-day week.
KNOWLEDGE
The 4-day working week has been proven to positively impact employee health and wellbeing and productivity within the workplace. Multiple organisations, including Microsoft Japan, have experimented with the 4-day-working-week; an experiment leading to impressive results including:
Physical Benefits
- 40% of employees experiencing improvements in their physical health
- 50% of employees feeling less tired
- 40% of employees experiencing improvement in sleep
- Male employees reported spending 27% more time caring for their children, leading to improved mental health
- 71% reported reduced levels of burnout
- Over 40% of employees noted improved mental health, with many reporting reductions in anxiety and negative emotions.
- Sick days reduced by 65%
- 40% increase in productivity
- Resignations halved
- Despite fewer work hours, revenues increased by 1.4%
With such impactful results, the 4-day workweek is considered one of the best flexible working arrangements that staff can benefit from. So much so, the majority of UK companies that participated in the largest 4-day workweek trial made the policy permanent, with 100% of managers reporting a "positive" impact on the organisation.
IMPACT
There are multiple ways to implement the 4-day working week to meet individual company needs:
- Compressed workweek: providing employees with the option to transfer to a 4 day working week with their full time hours condensed into 4 days.
- Reducing employee hours for the same wage: despite reducing the number of hours employees worked, studies evidenced an increase in productivity and in turn revenue.
- Weekly Personal Development Day: demonstrating personal investment in employees, enabling them to develop new skills and become more productive.
- Alternating 4-day working week: allowing employees a reset day fortnightly, benefitting physical and mental health.
TACTIC
Social Value Model Example
Recognising the positive implications of a 4-day working week on physical and mental health, BeyondNow will pilot the 4 day working structure over a 3 month period. To ensure the our clients needs remain at the forefront of our business, employee shifts will cover the 5 working day week, with employees offered a Monday or Friday off as per preferences. Should all employees wish to take the Friday off, the shift pattern will rotate bi-weekly to ensure fairness.
On our employees proposed 'day off', each employee will be required to engage in a personal development programme. This can include any personal project or development of skills e.g., innovative research, digital skills course, volunteering etc. Work on this project should be undertaken throughout the duration of the normal working day either in the office or from home. We actively encourage the personal and professional development of our staff, recognising the importance of staffs personal wellbeing, as well as the positive impacts it has on workplace retention and productivity.
To assist our employees with professional development, xx will deliver a 1/2 day training session on task prioritisation and time management. Throughout the duration of the pilot, we will continue to monitor employee progression; tracking productivity of work through monthly one-to-one feedback meetings and a project progress dashboard. Meetings will not only provide an opportunity to collate feedback and data, allowing us to track the success of the pilot, but will provide employees with additional monthly support on their projects where possible.
Published by
Emma Smith | Co-Founder
BeyondNow