Ask anyone the shape of their ideal working week and you’ll likely to get answers ranging from "six days in seven of nonstop hustle" to “two hours on a Tuesday morning, rest of the week by the pool”. Yet we still find ourselves wedded to the grinding familiarity of the standard 9–5. Whispers of better ways to work are nothing new, but the pandemic has accelerated the conversation. Many have adopted home working as the norm, or realised, after the world changed overnight, that their priorities were out of whack, and want to focus on that work-life balance. Workers are ready to demand more – LinkedIn’s latest research shows three in ten are now feeling confident enough to ask for flexible working. The four-day week – and more importantly, the three-day weekend – is back on the table. A number of UK companies have already signed up to a six-month trial of the “100:80:100” working model – 100 per cent pay for 80 per cent of the time, yet committing to 100 per cent productivity – and some firms have already made the shift. But how likely is that our weekends will go from 48 hours to 72? Will bosses really give us the same money doing fewer hours?
It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve made a dramatic change to the way we work – the weekend is a relatively modern concept. On the surface, the pros are pretty simple: you get more free time, with no drop in salary and, you’d assume, everyone will work more efficiently and industriously to make sure everything can be done in time and avoid jeopardising the extra leisure day. But it’s not really as simple as shoving on your ‘out of office’ and checking out. We live in a digital age, where we demand the availability of products and services 24/7, and deliveries right to our door. The internet is our servant and we are the reclining Romans gorging at the feast. How does that chime with workers striving for more me-time and the perfect work-life balance? We already have shortages of nursing staff, and drivers – where do the extra bodies come from to maintain the round-the-clock coverage we expect? And what if you’re a business relying on others working five days a week – say a café in a commercial district or child care services?
Former England cricketer turned business coach Jeremy Snape reckons the extra decompression time will make us more patient, more considerate and community-minded, but wonders whether the four-day week might encourage divisions among colleagues. While some kick back, there’ll always be a brown-nosing creep using the supposed “day off” to get ahead – chasing leads, being available to customers. “The weekly opportunity to jump in the camper-van for extended weekends will appeal, but what about financially and target-driven sales folk?” he says. “Will we see more surveillance of who logged into the company servers and when, or will they be inaccessible?” Snape also has concerns that leaders’ silent expectations might make workers feel obliged to use the “extra day” to play catch-up. “Will Thursday afternoon emails hint at expected progress to be made before Monday?” Asks Snape, whose company Sporting Edge has worked with some of the world’s top CEOs, business leaders, and sporting stars. “There’s only one thing worse than working on a Friday, and that’s working on a Friday when you’re supposed to be on holiday!”
It’s a results-oriented world, where comparison culture thrives, and social media is only too happy to serve us snippets of better, richer lives. Snape thinks this is unlikely to change. “People will become dually competitive, firstly about how much they can achieve in their working hours, and then brag about how much they can switch off in their downtime.” God, Instagram will become unbearable, won’t it? Well, more so.
But how does a four-day week work in practice? When Rachel Allison founded communications agency Axe & Saw, she wanted to overturn traditional high-pressure culture of long hours and being “always on”. A four-day week proved difficult when building a start-up, however, so she settled on a compromise. “To avoid people having to catch up on work, and clients potentially feeling neglected, we offer a four-day week every fortnight, so everyone can enjoy a three-day weekend without stress.” Allison’s team also nominates a “deep work” day to free diaries of meetings that could’ve been emails, and checks in with each other to get tasks completed. It’s been a hit with staff. Says senior creative publicist Tom Neilson, “I’ve never been someone that’s enjoyed working around the clock. Work-life balance is extremely important to me and the four-day week has definitely improved this. 5:2 isn’t a balanced ratio so it’s weird we’ve always used the word balance!”
The major plus of a four-day week is that the weekend swells by fifty per cent, but we have a tendency to embrace the soulless drone within us – martyrdom is as much part of work as the “treats in the usual place” email the morning after Bake Off is on TV. Might it be difficult to shake off the idea a weekend is “earned” by five days’ work? Rachel Allison concedes, for her, it can make time off feel less special, but adds: “I really believe it helps your mental health and that’s honestly worth the feeling of being rewarded”. Rachel also reckons a longer weekend can take the “shock” out of a bleary-eyed Monday and Tom Neilson agrees: "There’s huge pressure to fit so much into the two days of a weekend; having that extra day makes your time off less stressful.”
There’s no way of knowing whether a four-day week will work for you until you try it for yourself. “A shorter working week is perfect for Mr or Mrs Intensity, who come in, smash their to-do list, then head off to their triathlon or yoga retreat,” says Jeremy Snape. “To them a life of extremes is a life in balance and this is just a new kind of interval training.” Those effortless mini-Beyoncés who breeze in at 8:59am, get everything done, and float out again on the stroke of five will thrive too, relishing the idea of punching out a day early. But for less organised employees, who may be passionate and ambitious but spend their days drowning in Post-its and staring into the abyss of a 1,500 email-strong inbox, the four-day week brings challenges. “In the new condensed schedule, they have too much to do in too little time, they skim through their week and as a result, never feel satisfied,” says Snape. But even perfectionists might find themselves in trouble, pulling late-nighters to get their work to its usual flawless level. Is it likely that an extra day off only makes the days at work even more stressful?
LinkedIn career expert Charlotte Davies says making a four-day week work is all about finding some equilibrium:
– Pinpoint your most productive hours: Some of us are morning people, others are zombies until 2pm. Acknowledge this and use your most “on” moments to tackle the biggest tasks that require more brain power.
– Set a new, realistic to-do-list every day: Time slots for completing each one will help you manage expectations, even if they change through the day. Davies also advises adding your finish time at the bottom, to remind you to down tools.
– Block out time for yourself: Boost productivity with a set time to step away from work. Go for a walk, listen to a podcast, eat a whole packet of Jaffa Cakes. Anything.
– Build buffers into your day: Avoid dramas when meetings or tasks run over by adding cushions of 10 or 20 minutes that let you transition between items on your to-do list.
It’s not just the schedule that has to change, though, it’s us: we work the most hours of anyone in Europe, except for Greece, a dedication that doesn’t tally with our productivity. We must let go of long-ingrained, miserable work habits. The ghoul of presenteeism, that “pick me” dude who’s always answering emails at midnight, “man up” bollocks that keeps our sorry asses at our desks during a bout of flu, fake team spirit that guilts you into never leaving early or taking a day off. It’s no good having an off-switch if we don’t use it. It may take time – research by the Chartered Management Institute showed almost 80 per cent of senior managers under the age of 35 were in favour of shorter working weeks, compared with just 56 per cent of those over 55. Old habits die hard – or die out.
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