The 4-Day Workweek: Should You Try?

The 4-Day Workweek: Should You Try?

Are you worried that your employees look anxious and tired? Are you concerned about losing your best employees to higher paying jobs at big companies?

Little Sales Pitch Before You Keep Reading: Looking to consult with someone about your HR needs? We can help with any of your small business needs: HR for Small Businesses

We consult with our clients constantly about the "Hiring and Retention Levers" that small businesses can pull to reel in the best talent for their organization. We suggest levers such as more PTO, schedule flexibility, personalized anniversary gifts, and more to set you apart as an employer. However, there is a new concept that is turning a lot of heads: The 4-Day Work Week.

Before you stop reading this email because a 4-day work week is impossible, I suggest you look at this case study in the UK. Companies are testing out this 32 hour work week hoping to reduce burnout, retain staff and recruit excellent employees. You may call 32 hours part-time, but many companies are calling this full-time and providing regular benefits and PTO. Let's break down the positives and the negatives:

Positives due to case studies mostly done outside of the US

• Work satisfaction is up

• Work happiness is up

• The most shocking: Job productivity is actually up

• Without surprise - Retention is up

Negatives:

• We don’t know the long-term effect on productivity because the studies are too new

• Employees might also be more stressed to get their work done in a 32-hour week

What do I think:

• It really depends on your company and what you are hearing from your employees. 

• A good way to see if it might work for you is to do a test period. Tell your employees that from June to August, everyone will be expected to get their full jobs done, but that the office will close at noon on Fridays. Talk with your leaders first about how this can be accomplished. This will not work for all companies, but it might work for yours.  

You will be surprised how excited your employees are with just the 4 hours off.  You may even be surprised by how much productivity increases. You also may see less people giving their notice to quit.

I know it is one of the stranger concepts we have suggested, but you won’t know until you try. Sometimes you have to be different to set yourself apart.

Check out recent articles on the study and the articles that are being written right now around this concept:

NY Times Article

WSJ Article

Book Buzz on Mental Health in the Workplace - "Wellbeing at Work"

We get it. You do not have time to read all the books you need to. That is why we are here to break this important one down in the area of "mental health at work." 

Picture this scenario: I take 10 of your employees to lunch without you there (where they felt safe to respond honestly) and ask them this question: “On a scale of 1-10, how would you rate your wellbeing at work?”

What do you think they would say? 

In a Gallup poll in 2022:

• Only 33% of Americans said they were thriving in their wellbeing

• 41% said they experienced sadness every day

• 50% said they experienced daily stress

• Only 20% of employees like what they do everyday

If I were a betting person, I would bet that for the next 5 years, the largest topic related to your employees will be this – Employee Wellbeing. Your employees can only be productive when they have wellbeing. Since people spend so many hours a day at their job, what they do at your company has a profound impact on their personal wellbeing. As CEOs, we really are not trained or equipped to handle that type of responsibility. 

“Wellbeing at Work'' helps you learn more about this as an owner, manager, or any type of leader. It helps you understand the things that you can do to make people have better wellbeing as it relates to their work day. It also helps you understand the factors to someone’s wellbeing that you have NO control over.

Wellbeing has several key elements:

• Career wellbeing

• Social wellbeing

• Financial wellbeing

• Physical wellbeing

• Community wellbeing 

Some of my favorite takeaways from the book in the career wellbeing section are:

- This book encourages you to learn how to have “wellbeing” conversations between employees and their managers. It doesn’t spell out exactly what these should look like but they might involve asking the employee if they love what they do every day and talk about career development as well as how they are doing in their personal life.  

- It also talks about making your managers move from bosses to coaches. This is a trend we are seeing with our clients as well. The reason for quitting or staying is really how great their manager is at coaching them.  

- Other items to help with career wellbeing that are discussed:

• Setting clear goals with your people

• Providing adequate resources

• Lead goal setting sessions

• Set clear expectations

The one thing I don’t like about this book:

- The back half of the book is really a regurgitation of Strengths Finder profiles. I do love Strengths Finder, but I do not believe it was necessary to print it again at the back half of this book.

Overall, I recommend the first half of the book for CEOs and owners who are struggling with retention, hiring, or truly wanting to know how to make their workplaces great places to work for their people.

I’m convinced that if a CEO spent just 2 hours a month on the strategy and execution of employee “health”, that organization would have a better workplace and many less HR issues on the back end!

Please forward this to someone you know who would benefit from it. Thank you!

Resources: "Wellbeing at Work" by Jim Clifton and Jim Harter

Sales Pitch of the Day:

The HR Audit is a tool designed for small businesses in any industry to identify the strengths and weaknesses of their HR function. We evaluate the 14 areas of HR from compliance to retention. We develop an HR strategy to make your employees proud of where they work. Watch the video to the right for more information or visit our HR Audit Page on our website.