The concept of the four-day working week started in Scandinavia, but now a growing number of UK firms are switching over.
The idea of paying your staff for a full week and only expecting them to turn up for four days might seem like madness from a business owner’s perspective, but are there any real benefits and could they be worth considering?
Well, you might be surprised, actually…
Here are just three good reasons why your office should start thinking about making the transition to a four-day week.
Increased Office Productivity
A New Zealand financial services firm Perpetual Guardian gave all of its 240 staff an extra day off each week for eight weeks. The study showed that there was no decrease at all in the total amount of work which got done over the two month period.
Just as much work got done in four days as usually got done in five days.
After observing the results of the experiment, the founder and chief executive of Perpetual Guardian, Andrew Barnes, encouraged more businesses to switch to a four day week, saying:
“This is an idea whose time has come. We need to get more companies to give it a go. They will be surprised at the improvement in their company, their staff and in their wider community.”
It Can Reduce Stress Levels In The Office
The same study, carried out at the end of 2018 but whose results have only just been released, also showed that giving staff an extra day off from their working week lowers the stress levels of employees whenever they are back in the office.
Annual work-life balance scores of employees shot up from 54 percent to 78 percent. At the same time, staff stress levels dropped markedly to 38 percent from 45 percent.
Surely that’s a win-win, no?
It Reduces Office Overheads
With shorter operating hours your electricity, heating, water, cleaning, security and consumables bills will all fall, typically saving over £10,000 every year on expenses.
So staff are happier, get just as much work done as before, it helps to attract and retain the best talent and it will also save your business money. Think about it…
All of those savings can start to add up very quickly and will be reflected in your profits.
So there you go! Give all your office employees an extra day off each week and you should soon start to reap the many benefits.
