4-day workweek: Miracle cure or myth?
August 26, 2008 by Jim GiulianoPosted in: In this week's e-newsletter, Incentives, Latest News & Views, Leave, Position descriptions, policies
Seems as if just about everyone’s jumping on the four-day-week bandwagon as a cure for rising commuting costs. If you’re thinking about joining the crowd, don’t step on the gas pedal just yet.
First, let’s get past the old joke about the employee who, when told his company wanted him to work four days a week, said, “Gee, I’ve never worked that hard before and no one seemed to notice.”
OK, now let’s get back to reality and realize that the four-day week isn’t something new; a lot of employers adopted it in the 1970s during the first energy crunch. So we can learn some lessons from those days, and what to expect, good and bad, from switching to a four 10-hour days a week:
- It can be dangerous. If some of your employees work with or near machinery or equipment, common sense tells you that they’ll be less alert and careful in the ninth and tenth hour of each day. And imagine what their condition is like during the last hour of the week. In the ‘70s, a lot of companies saw a rise in accidents and Workers Comp claims after instituting the four-day schedule.
What to do: Based on safety, you can just exclude some workers from the four-day schedule. That may be tough for some workers to swallow – particularly if others are working the abbreviated schedule – but at least if you explain your reasons, you’ll have done the right thing. - It can create dissension. Even when you give your best explanation, such as the safety reason cited above, employees are going to grumble if they don’t have access to the four-day schedule.
What to do: Besides giving an explanation, your best bet is to classify positions, not people, as eligible for the shorter week. That is, you can asterisk certain job descriptions as “four-day eligible.” Just be sure make “eligibility” part clear – that the company is not required to grant the benefit. - It may not be popular. Here’s a way to an employer can dress up like Santa Claus and end up looking like Scrooge (before he met the ghosts): Grant employees a benefit they don’t want. There could be a lot of reasons employees would rather not work four 10-hour days, such as child-care issues or partners’ work schedules.
What to do: Survey your employees about the popularity of the idea, making sure they understand that it’s just a survey, and not a done deal.
Tags: four-day week, safety, workers comp
September 2nd, 2008 at 2:46 pm
I don’t like the idea at all. I have 3 kids all of which play more than one sport and darn good at it. If we make it a four day work week I will miss all the games or won’t even be able to get them to practice on-time. My husband coaches so he could go to the games. There are too many parents out there and kids that this will definately hurt. If a mom works from 7am to 6pm (one hour extra each way), she will typically have to commute for 45minutes and then stop by and p/u a thing or two at the store like most moms do everyday, then get home at 7pm, try to prepare something, 7:45pm time to eat, then showers, brushing teeth and getting your kids to bed if you have more than one, the bathroom schedule can take almost an hour, now it’s 8:45 or later, time for bed or settling down for a good nights sleep, because mommy has to be to work early, which makes them all get up 1 hours sooner than they did before, not to mention the schools aren’t open at 6:15 in the morning to drop off kids. When did you check their homework, when did you clean up the kitchen, when did you visit with your spouse, when did your kids do their chores, when did the dog get feed, when did you get to talk to your kids about their day, etc.
When will we slow down. We are all already a nation or hurriedness or rushing all the time, if we do this, we will still not have enough time in the week to do anything more than we already do now.
That’s just one person’s opinion, though…
September 2nd, 2008 at 2:56 pm
I think the point here is offering a 4 day work week (for certain positions) isn’t a “fix all” but might be beneficial to some. I work in an environment, where one particular area (or department) works 4 -10s and they LOVE IT! I have others that work 5 – 8s, and some that work a rotating 12 hour shifts (one week they work 36 hours then next week they work 48). Bottom line is in HR, we have to get creative to satisify the needs of the business and the employee and “jumping on a bandwagon” of the “fix of the week” doesn’t necessarily accomplish what you wish.
September 2nd, 2008 at 3:24 pm
I have been working 4 10’s for a couple of years now. I work from 5:30 am to 4:00 pm Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday’s. I LOVE IT. My husband gets our child to the baby sitter in the mornings and I pick her up after work. I dont miss a single school event with the nieces and nephews which are practically every evening. I also get Wednesday’s off to spend the entire day with my daughter. I work in HR and my company works 24 hours shifts so I chose the morning time to see the employees. With everything there has to be a balance. My husband loves the one on one with our daughter in the morning and I love the one on one in the evening until he gets home at 5:00 pm. I cherish my days off. I am also a commuter (one hour each way to work). The amount of money I have saved on gas is unbelievable.
September 2nd, 2008 at 3:38 pm
Working 4 ten hour days has several benefits. One of the most important is that it is a way employers can have a positive effect on reducing oil consumption. By reducing oil consumption employees save money out of their already often stagnant incomes, which then results in fewer cars on the road and less oil consumed, creating an overall reduced negative impact on the environment and global warming.
Most of all this is a tangible way that employers and employees, as American citizens can support our service men and women. If we reduce our dependency on oil we have less of a need to send soldiers to war.
And oh, yes, if the demand for oil goes down then the price of oil should go down.
So, 4 ten hour day work weeks can be a benefit or sacrifice, depending on your perspective. If it isn’t a benefit for you to save $ and time, you can see it as a contribution to the effort to end the war in Iraq. Another way to look at it is 4 day work weeks is as a win win because it benefits me, the employee, who needs to save some money and it’s a tangible way for me to support the troops.
September 2nd, 2008 at 5:09 pm
We didn’t send soldiers to war for our dependance on oil…come on. And I don’t believe that it would be a sacrafice/contribution to bringing troops home to change to a 4 day work week. It has nothing to do with the war in Iraq. I only commute 5 miles to work, it would be a sacrafice against my family if I could not spend enough time with them or if I had to go to bed at 8pm because I had to get up at 3am to get ready to work or to commute an hour to work. It would be a sacrafice for my children not to see their mom at their games when I have never missed one. One day extra off per week to spend with my family will be better suited if I could divide that time between each weekday. I am in HR and in Construction. My husbands company has 2 crews who work the 4 10’s week because there are out of town and a 3 day weekend serves them in the family area, he has 4 crews who will absolutely not go for it. We compromise. We live in a community and have a school district that saves gas by only running the buses it needs High School starts at 7:30, then same busses run to start Elementary which starts at 8:00am, then same buses pick up for middle school that starts at 8:50am. By having this staggered start for different levels of school is a way to save gas and make the ozone better. However, anyone who has athletic children, 2 parents divide by 3 kids x 3 practices or games a week divided again by one parent who coaches and one parent who is a Little League Board Member = SACRAFICE FOR FAMILY.
P.S. I can not believe you used this website to display your mis-informed inaccuate feelings about the war into a discussion of a 4 day work week.
September 4th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Interesting comments… I think offering the 4 day work week benefit shows employees you care about their work-file balance and scheduling issues.
What I can’t believe are people who post messages that are written so poorly. Many people might agree with your comment. However, you won’t get your point across with a poorly written comment. Read before you hit submit.
September 4th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
I guess I should read my own comment before hitting submit – should be a work-LIFE balance – not work-file.
September 12th, 2008 at 10:17 am
WOW!! As an HR executive and a member of a soccer board, I can’t believe the comment about working and having a life outside of work. We all have a life outside of work. However, by working you are making a supreme sacrifice and should realize you are not going to be able to spend the time you want with your family. The key is to spend good quality time when it presents itself.
With that being said, my company has given the employees an option of working 4 10’s. Not mandatory, strictly voluntary. It is working wonderfully. I can’t imagine a company forcing a 4-10 on anyone. I would think a plan like that would be doomed from the start. Once we implemented the choice, we knew there would be employees who just weren’t interested. That is okay. We are not a manufacturing plant where we have to be open 24-7. It works just fine. We schedule 30 days in advance and if it didn’t work the previous 30 days for an employee, they have the right to opt out of the plan for the next 30 days. They can then rejoin the following calendar month. However, once they sign up at the beginning of the month, they are not allowed to drop out.
This plan has drastically cut down on PTO useage and call ins. Our payroll is much easier to process and the overall good feelings of choice has been a welcoming benefit to the employees. We do not, however, allow our upper management to participate.
February 3rd, 2009 at 12:32 pm
I have a different thought here to relay on comments made on how the 4-10 hour shifts would not work. The moms and dads that are working and trying to take their kids everywhere because they are in everything is not necessary. Kids are way too spoil and have to have everything and be in everything. It puts too much pressure on the kids and the parents. When I was growing up my responsibilkities were caring for my brothers and helping my parents around the house when I was not in school and my brothers were maybe in one sport in which they found their own way there . We all turned out great and all of us work hard and have good jobs. In fact, one of my brothers is a doctor and a Colonel in the Air Force. And We didn’t even have cell phones to call and text all the time.
June 19th, 2009 at 9:22 am
I am in HR in manufacturing. We have tried many different schedules (especially recently) and I have found that no matter what we do, some people will love it and some people will hate it. 4-10s are great for some employees and a nightmare for others. We will never make the entire group happy so we write the schedule to the workload.
I think employees can be a little spoiled. A four-day work week decision needs to be made on what is best for the long-term success and security of the organization and not based on who has soccer games on Thursdays. I can see where an organization who develops a schedule more for the employees than for the service of its customers could end up with more problems than they can handle. Not only do you risk the business that pays all the employees in the first place but you also risk a lot of arguments and bickering over who got the shcedule they wanted.
H.B. also has a good point about kids being a little spoiled. My three children have always been involved in activities and it seems that wehnever I am not going to one event or another, I am working like crazy to earn the money to pay for the activity (Schools here don’t sponsor band activities which typically run about $2000 per school year). Sometimes I wonder how on earth my 4 siblings and I made it in a one-income family and still managed to all take part in activites, sports music lessons…etc!
June 22nd, 2009 at 1:51 pm
Wonderful comments both for and against 4-10s. How about a compromise? I worked in a govt agency that worked 9 hour days (isnt that what we actually work anyway, even if only scheduled for 8?) Mon-Thur and 8 hours every other Friday. That’s right, we had every other Friday off, so that helped manage the PTO, and yet still had 80 hours scheduled for the two-week pay period. It took a bit for employees to get used to, when first implemented, but most figured out how to make the most of it for balancing work-life.