On a typical Friday afternoon, one worker at Emtrain, a California-based human sources expertise firm, takes a nap.

One other takes horseback using classes, a pastime they all the time needed to strive however by no means had time to. Others are utilizing their Fridays to be taught piano, apply pictures or go to relations they have not seen shortly. 

They’ll do that as a result of Emtrain adopted a four-day work week pilot program in 2021, one of many many corporations throughout the globe experimenting with a brand new method of working.

Even the boss likes it. “It has been very, very touching to see the period of time that individuals have had again of their lives,” stated Emtrain President Odessa Jenkins. “We hear tales on a regular basis the place our workers are studying one thing new, participating with household that they have not earlier than, and it truly is altering the best way they dwell their lives.”

Profitable pilots of the four-day work week, each within the US and overseas, have seen a mess of advantages to each corporations and workers, together with improved worker well-being, elevated productiveness and a brand new approach to retain and recruit expertise in a aggressive labor market. 

We requested three enterprise leaders and one Fortune 500 govt coach about why four-day work weeks are gaining recognition. Here is what they are saying are the primary advantages of this new method of working — and learn how to successfully promote your boss on the concept.

Staff have extra time outdoors of labor

A four-day work week offers again to workers certainly one of their most precious sources: time.

After Emtrain switched to a four-day work week, Jenkins was struck by the affect the change had on her staff. 

“Giving your folks extra time to do what they need to do — to seek out out issues about themselves, to discover — offers you an worker base who’s extra dedicated to you, but additionally extra dedicated to their private well being,” stated Jenkins. “That is bringing more healthy workers and happier workers to us.”

Katie Klumper, CEO of Black Glass Consulting, a CMO consultancy based mostly in New York, stated she’s seen comparable outcomes at Black Glass throughout their four-day work week pilot. Lots of her workers are utilizing their Fridays off as a “private admin” day to maintain fundamental duties like laundry, grocery buying or cleansing. 

“This enables them to have really two days of break [on the weekend], which permits them to have 4 days [at work] refreshed, current, centered, and extra productive,” Klumper stated. 

Having extra private time also can enhance optimistic psychological well being outcomes for workers in a time when burnout is on the rise. “It is extremely useful for folks’s psychological well being and wellbeing to know that they now have an additional day to simply [do life],” stated Dr. Daryl Appleton, a licensed psychotherapist and Fortune 500 govt coach.

Productiveness typically improves

A four-day work week forces you to be extra environment friendly in all points of your work, together with communication, stated Jenkins. “It means committing to being very, very centered once you’re at work. And we instantly noticed that from our worker base.”

In response to an inside firm survey, 92% of Emtrain workers agreed that they had been in a position to meet their high-priority work milestones throughout the four-day work week. Odessa has not seen an uptick in workers working longer days, both. “It’s extra centered work possibly, no more work,” Jenkins stated.

Klumper stated that transitioning to a four-day work week has led to her staff being extra intentional about how they handle their restricted time at work. 

“Time is among the most precious property we now have as professionals, and valuing that and being actually deliberate about the place you apply that was undoubtedly a profit,” she stated. “It wasn’t constructed to be longer workdays. It was meant to be the identical hours that we had been working, however do it in 4 days.”

The opposite piece is focus, stated Klumper. Engaged on a tighter schedule has helped her workers hone their craft and abilities to get by means of their work faster. “There’s been quite a lot of optimistic outcomes when it comes to the groups with the ability to collaborate at a faster velocity and with the ability to be rather more intentional and intense about how the work will get performed,” she stated.

It helps recruit and retain expertise in a aggressive labor market

In a 2022 survey carried out by the Forbes Well being-Ipsos Month-to-month Well being Tracker, 90% of employed respondents stated it was vital that their job provided work-life stability. And 82% stated it was vital that their job provided flexibility in once they labored. 

“I believe if there’s something the Nice Resignation has taught us, it is that given a chance to take a seat again, folks need to be part of corporations the place they’ll really feel that it helps the approach to life they need to dwell,” stated Anthony Reynolds, CEO of Utah-based expertise expertise platform HireVue. (As an alternative of a four-day work week, HireVue offers its workers each different Friday afternoon off.)

Permitting extra flexibility within the office also can assist corporations retain current workers and assist staff to achieve their most potential.  

“It has been an enormous expertise driver,” stated Klumper. “Individuals are accountable. You probably have the fitting folks on the staff, you might make on daily basis [paid time off] and they might nonetheless be part of as a result of they’re passionate concerning the enterprise. … You probably have the fitting expertise, they’ll do the job they usually’ll do a fair higher job once they get to do it on their phrases.”

Each the workers and the corporate profit

“It is exhausting to say [the four-day work week pilot] hasn’t been helpful, each from a qualitative and a quantitative standpoint, as a result of we’re additionally smashing our enterprise aims,” stated Jenkins. “Understanding that each from a delicate abilities standpoint we have improved, in addition to from a monetary or enterprise productiveness standpoint we have improved, it is exhausting to say that it wasn’t an awesome thought.”

In response to an inside survey, 82% of Emtrain workers reported that they had been experiencing higher well being and well-being on account of the four-day workweek, whereas 71% to 75% of workers stated they had been experiencing much less unproductive stress at work. 

Emtrain is not alone. In response to a survey by the Society for Human Useful resource Administration, 60% of the surveyed organizations that had carried out a four-day work week famous features in worker satisfaction and productiveness ensuing from fewer conferences.

The nonprofit Four Day Week International, which is working a pilot program serving to over 70 UK corporations check a four-day work week, additionally reported comparable ends in its newest survey of the taking part organizations. In response to the survey, 88% of respondents acknowledged that the four-day work week was working “effectively” for his or her corporations three months into the six-month trial. As well as, 95% of respondents stated that productiveness has stayed on the similar stage or improved, and 86% stated they had been “doubtless” to contemplate retaining the four-day work week coverage after the trial ended. 

Learn how to suggest a four-day work week to your boss

Until you are a high-level govt in your group, trialing a four-day work week will doubtless require getting your management on board. Listed below are some knowledgeable tips about the best methods to pitch the concept.

1. Compile the info

Earlier than proposing an thought to your group’s management, do your analysis, stated Appleton. Pull collectively the info and the sources, and most significantly, be ready to elucidate why your thought issues. 

“That is the factor with management — they do not need extra work,” Appleton stated. “Come ready with every thing you might have on the desk as a result of that is perhaps the one probability that you just get.”

2. Think about how a four-day work week suits along with your firm’s current values

Most “new” concepts are merely an iteration of one thing we have seen earlier than, stated Jenkins. Take a look at your organization’s current core values and see if any of them naturally match with a extra versatile schedule or four-day work week.

For instance, Emtrain already had an infinite PTO coverage earlier than its four-day work week pilot, which meant the corporate was already used to not having workers within the workplace on a strict schedule. Switching to a four-day work week was simply one other step in the identical path for a corporation that positioned flexibility as certainly one of its core values.

“[Ask yourself] what are the issues you have already got in your organization that may lend to extra versatile work, and amplify that,” stated Jenkins.

3. Concentrate on enterprise targets and aims 

On the finish of the day, you may want to point out your boss how a four-day work week will profit the corporate. Pull collectively success tales from different corporations much like the one you’re employed at, and be ready to point out how your proposal will enhance or preserve income, whereas probably chopping down on bills and boosting productiveness.

“Include a proposal that is centered on establishing success after which transferring ahead from that success,” stated Jenkins. “That is all the time very consumable from [a leadership team’s perspective]. As an govt chief, if you happen to carry me one thing that feels decrease threat, increased reward, and confirmed, it should be very exhausting for me to say no.”

4. Recommend a pilot program 

In case your management is hesitant to implement such a giant change, beginning with a brief pilot is an efficient approach to ease right into a four-day work week. 

“Begin sluggish,” advises Jenkins. “Do not attempt to take your organization any quicker or additional than it is perhaps able to go. Pilot it.”

Emtrain and Black Glass each began their four-day work week packages as a pilot, and HireVue did the identical with its biweekly Friday half-day schedule. 

In case you’re searching for a spot to start out, the nonprofit group Four Day Week International is coordinating six-month pilot packages that present coaching, mentoring, and analysis for organizations fascinated by testing a four-day work week. 

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