Four-day workweek pilot a success

A four-day workweek pilot was so successful most firms say they won’t go back 15 percent of employees who participated said that “no amount of money” would convince them to go back to working five days a week.If the idea of working four days a week for the same pay sounds like music to your ears, the results of a pilot program from the United Kingdom may give you cause for hope.

Dozens of companies there took part in the world’s largest trial of the four-day workweek — and a majority of supervisors and employees liked it so much they’ve decided to keep the arrangement. In fact, 15 percent of the employees who participated said “no amount of money” would convince them to go back to working five days a week.Nearly 3,000 employees took part in the pilot, which was organized by the advocacy group 4 Day Week Global, in collaboration with the research group Autonomy, and researchers at Boston College and the University of Cambridge.

Companies that participated could adopt different methods to “meaningfully” shorten their employees’ workweeks — from giving them one day a week off to reducing their working days in a year to average out to 32 hours per week — but had to ensure the employees still received 100 percent of their pay.

At the end of the experiment, employees reported a variety of benefits related to their sleep, stress levels, personal lives and mental health, according to results published Tuesday. Companies’ revenue “stayed broadly the same” during the six-month trial, but rose 35 percent on average when compared with a similar period from previous years. Resignations decreased.

Of the 61 companies that took part in the trial, 56 said they would continue to implement four-day workweeks after the pilot ended, 18 of which said the shift would be permanent. Two companies are extending the trial. Only three companies did not plan to carry on with any element of the four-day workweek.

The results are likely to put the spotlight back on shorter workweeks as a possible solution to the high levels of employee burnout and the “Great Resignation” phenomenon exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic, amid a global movement calling for businesses to ditch the in-office, 9-to-5, five-day workweek and adopt more flexible working practices instead.