Work can be exhausting. However, it’s the only way the vast majority of us can get the means to survive. Too many people in the world think about returning to work on Sunday nights with a grueling sense of dread. Don’t you think they would want to work only four days a week?
Conventional wisdom around this topic always returns to phrases like “You have to soldier through it!” “You must find love in what you do!” or, the worst one, “Once you work doing what you love, you won’t work a day in your life.”
That last one is often cited as having been said by Mark Anthony, Mark Twain, or Confucius, and whoever you see being credited as the author, it’s equally harmful to the reader’s well-being. Could it be that I don’t love what I do? And if that’s not the case, does it mean I’m lazy?
The answer to both those questions is no.
Why Do We Work 5 Days a Week?
This dilemma has existed for as long as the standard work week has. Back when industrialization changed the economy, social structures, the places where people lived, and how we think about working, it was decided that the best way to bust up production and get the most profit possible was for people to work as much as possible.
For factory owners, the well-being of workers was secondary to increasing their profits. Did you know that having weekends as days of rest from work came about as recently as the 20th century?
There has been much written about how this schedule was just a subtle transition from slave labor to industrial labor, with worker rights far from a priority in corporate structuring.
But now, more than a hundred years after the invention of the five-day workweek, maybe it’s time to ask, is it essential? Those problematic years are long, and even though we still fight different issues, many recent studies have shown that 21st-century workers are more productive when they feel appreciated by their employers.
That’s when the 4-day workweek comes into play.
What’s the 4-day Workweek?
The four-day work week is a new corporate initiative to shorten the conventional work week by one day, reducing the usual 40 working hours a week to 32 working hours. This model has been applied to significant degrees of success in other countries worldwide (and for solid reasons).
Iceland, New Zealand, the United States, and some major trials in the United Kingdom have demonstrated that reducing work to a day-work week has excellent results in many different areas and can bring us closer to a more humanitarian way of looking at work while still achieving more productivity.
The benefits for individual companies and employees alike have raised this initiative’s relevance, and major political parties have introduced plans to start their 4-day workweek with significant public support.
Other than national initiatives to implement the four-day week, private companies have tried the 4-day work week, and results show that employees find great benefits from trying this new, compressed work schedule.
Four-Day Week Benefits
Having an extra day to rest, handle domestic tasks, and engage in non-work activities will relieve the pressure on the workers. The value this has for the well-being of the people working at a company speaks volumes about how neglected this aspect of corporate life is traditionally thought of.
An example worth talking about is Microsoft Japan. Japan is one of the countries with the highest job-related stress globally. This is due to a history of corporate culture that does not value employees but expects self-exploitation from them.
Peer pressure to always go above and beyond to get the best results and productivity at any cost tends to translate into people spending much of their time away from home, always working extra time without necessarily expecting to be compensated for it.
The consequences of this are easily observable, with a high suicide rate and high turnover rate from most industries.
The 2020 coronavirus pandemic emergency state forced Japanese companies to work from home, and the reported good mental health results from employees, even in the middle of a pandemic, threw light into how important it was to look for solutions to the pervasive and dangerous results of the current state of Japanese corporate culture.
The aforementioned four-day week’s trial by Microsoft Japan, along with shortening the duration of meetings and putting a cap on the number of people needed to be present in these meetings, ended up saving electricity costs for the company, as well as increasing sales by up to 57% at the end of the year.
This pilot program and other studies pushed the Japanese government to recommend all companies implement similar strategies in 2021. Since then, the results have been shown to repeat themselves wherever the approach is applied. This helps us push on to our next point.
Aren’t There Disadvantages to a 4-day Workweek?
The most common comment labeled at someone pushing for trying out an alternative workweek schedule is the claim that it would hinder productivity.
If you think about it, you get the feeling that it could be possible that less work will be done by working one less day per week. This has been proven wrong numerous times, with multiple explanations for why.
More Rest Is Good For Productivity
Employees will try to finish tasks faster with one less day in a week to work. Less time to complete a pending activity pushes people to be more efficient. A four-day workweek offers businesses more robust results in reduced hours while giving employees the same amount of money for their abilities.
In addition to the ones we already mentioned, employees in other countries reported having less dead time since everyone pushed themselves to be as productive as possible. Shortened workdays lead to more concentration and productivity during the rest of the working hours.
This can also be attributed to these workers having had one extra free day before entering the 4-day work week. More rest leads to less burnout, better sleep, less anxiety, and more enthusiasm when the time comes to start working again.
Data Shows That Workers Love This
Workers value this experience so much that many claim that “no amount of money could get them to go back to a 5-day work week.” This is not an irrational feeling spit out by lazy workers; it is a smart decision any person would make to favor their work-life balance.
That’s how we prove that companies that adapt to this philosophy faster can show their employees that profit and performance don’t come before their well-being.
This message comes from the employer and not the workers having to rationalize their own need for survival against a deteriorating mental state.
Mental Health Comes to the Forefront
Another benefit of having four-day weeks is having an extra day to take your mind off work and focus on your internal life and private affairs. The four-day workweek allows full-time employees to schedule appointments to look after themselves.
Psychological therapy is not as stigmatized as it once was, and in much of the developed world, it is encouraged by the best employers. You don’t have to be damaged or crazy to go to a therapist, and staying productive for long periods often requires maintenance.
This extra day in workers’ lives allows them to be themselves for longer. Workers can breathe in and enjoy the things they value about themselves without the pressures of corporate language.
Think briefly about how many movies start with characters reaching a breaking point due to feeling trapped in their jobs. Maybe a four-day workweek would have prevented that.
Better Work-Life Balance
No employee wants to be that character, and no employer should want to make someone reach that point of mental decay.
Much has been written about how the relationship between a worker and their employer is problematic. It’s straightforward to see it as exploitative, and employers need to take any possible steps to ensure their workers’ time serves a humane and well-intending purpose and communicate this to employees.
This has to be done by taking progressive measures, such as a four-day workweek, health benefits, PTO, extra payments when milestones are achieved, etcetera.
Are 4-day Work Weeks the Future?
The short answer is yes. During the world’s largest trial for the four-day workweek experiment, we saw that all the countries started embracing new work models. It all begins by reducing work hours without cutting pay. This happened in much of Western Europe, and the results have significantly been documented as a success.
The 35-hour work week in Germany, the highest-performing European economy, shows that thinking about work as a permanent grind that one has to soldier through to achieve one’s goals is not healthy or effective.
Think about how many people you know who, even though they work doing something they love, are often overwhelmed by work. Loving what you do does not guard you against work stress and burnout, and being good at what you do requires great care and caution to keep it up for long periods.
Most people value self-betterment and education significantly in our modern age. Workers who leave workplaces that require them to put themselves aside to succeed are held accountable, and corporate environments that harbor resentment at the walls that have the company are destined to fail in the long run when the future catches up to them.
What Makes Freelance Latin America Different?
For one, we implemented a four-day workweek. This is revolutionary in outsourcing companies, and we have found great results since. Our Corp Team can attest to how significant the impact has been in their lives, and we can tell you from a productivity perspective that our results have been in line with all the findings we’ve been discussing thus far.
Four-day workweeks aren’t a luxury but a way to improve work-life balance. Less working days are nothing when you see more significant results and increased productivity in all participating companies.
Leaving archaic corporate mindsets behind sets companies apart and allows them to succeed in our current day and age. Freelance Latin America values workers’ well-being above all else, and our productivity scores because of this.
You can count on our services whenever you need outsourced help for your business, and having a healthy corporate culture is an asset you can now count on, ensuring work is an expression of pure human talent and excellence. If you want to know more about how you can hire talent with us, book a meeting with our business manager here.
See more articles by Andrea Corona.
