A 4-day workweek is associated with several benefits, including increased productivity, improved work-life balance, and better employee wellbeing, which can be achieved through greater focus, more efficient processes, and more time spent with family or on passions.

The UK four-day workweek trial involved 3,300 workers from 70 companies, who worked 80% of their normal hours with no reduction in pay.

Several companies, including Panasonic, Microsoft, and Kickstarter, have successfully transitioned to a four-day workweek, boosting productivity and attracting employees.

"Studies and trials on the 4-day workweek have been conducted in several countries, including the UK, US, Canada, Ireland, Japan, and others, with the UK hosting the world's biggest trial."

The 4-day workweek trial in the UK involves 70 companies with over 3,300 workers, who will work 80% of their normal hours with no reduction in pay.

A 4-day workweek trial was conducted in the United Kingdom, involving nearly 3,000 employees from 61 British businesses, and the results showed improvements in productivity and employee retention.

A survey of 1,113 employers and workers found that 100% of workers prefer a 4-day workweek, indicating a strong support for this model among employees.

The UK's four-day workweek trial, involving 70 companies and over 3,300 workers, started on 6 June, 2022, with participants working 80% of their normal hours without a reduction in pay.

Approximately 3,000 employees participated in the 4-day workweek study in the United Kingdom.

Approximately 2,900 employees from 61 companies participated in the UK's 4-day workweek test.

The UK started its 4-day workweek social experiment on June 1, 2022, involving over 3,000 employees from more than 60 companies.

A 4-day workweek is associated with several benefits, including increased productivity, improved work-life balance, and better employee wellbeing, which can be achieved through greater focus, more efficient processes, and more time spent with family or on passions.

Title:

Content: Finally, the four-day work week trial is here

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  • Progressive change is coming

    Britain is officially trialling the four-day work week and I’m thrilled. No, I’m not a skiver, I just believe that flexible working is the key to making life work, and the next step is the four-day workweek.

    Organised by 4 Day Week Global, the world’s biggest trial of the four-day work week began in the UK on Monday 6 June. The six-month-long trial will see 70 companies – totalling more than 3,300 workers – test out the four-day week (working 80% of their normal hours) with, it’s critical to note, no reduction in pay.

    Marie Claire has long advocated flexible working rights, supporting writer Anna Whitehouse with her Flex Appeal campaign, which started in 2019 when she was denied flexible working and told it would ‘open the floodgates’ to others seeking it.

    But for the majority, it was Covid-19 that truly changed attitudes towards the workplace, because the pandemic had so profoundly affected people’s working lives.

    Prioritise flexible working

    In 2020 Marie Claire‘s first Future of Work collaboration with LinkedIn explored how the British population felt about the prospect of returning to the pre-pandemic routine.

    The message was clear: employers need to prioritise flexible working going forward, because we realised we could work from home successfully (and that was during an unimaginably stressful period).

    The future of work

    The believed benefits of the four-day working week include:

    • More productivity through greater focus
    • Drive to adopt more efficient processes
    • Greater mental health through more time spent with family or on passions

    As with all trials, it’s important to recognise the potential negative effects – less manageable workloads, less breaks and longer hours, but I hope this pioneering movement will help shape the future of work for the better.

    Work-life balance

    It is currently impossible to have a work-life balance when we work five days and have two days off. Where is the logic? In my opinion, the four-day working week is less about motivating me to work harder – I already work hard, thank you. The four-day working week is actually about giving people enough free time to be healthy, happy and fulfilled.

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The UK four-day workweek trial involved 3,300 workers from 70 companies, who worked 80% of their normal hours with no reduction in pay.

Several companies, including Panasonic, Microsoft, and Kickstarter, have successfully transitioned to a four-day workweek, boosting productivity and attracting employees.

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Content: NewsNational

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4-day work week catching on at more and more businesses

Posted at 12:07 PM, Jun 04, 2022
and last updated 2022-06-04 12:07:25-04

We all know that getting through a workday can be a grind. But what if your work week was just 4 days long?

It's a model that more businesses are trying out.

"There was no breaks. I was working at night, i was working early in the morning, I was working on the weekends," said Amanda Wessel, sales associate at a Philadelphia bakery.

The nonstop work grind - it's what many have accepted as a norm. But once COVID-19 hit, something shifted.

"That is actually something I was really looking for, work-life balance," said Wessel.

During the pandemic, she quit her job in politics and started working at metropolitan bakery in Philadelphia's Rittenhouse Square.

She's part of a new wave of people, not just millennials, who've realized their priorities.

"People want more time to live their life, they want more time to pursue their interest, they want more time with their family, they want more time for reflection," said Wendy Born, co-founder of

"People didn't want to work full weeks... suddenly, there were fewer people to work, so I had to figure something out," said Born.

At Metropolitan, Born started trying out a four-day work week... and it stuck.

It's ironic because with a staffing shortage, they didn't ask employees to work more hours.

They scaled back the workload, and as a result, boosted productivity - attracting and keeping employees.

"Our retention has been remarkable actually. I've had people with us for years now, and people who started at the beginning of the pandemic who have stayed," said Born.

This model is catching on with big corporations too like Panasonic, Microsoft, and Kickstarter.

"Studies and trials on the 4-day workweek have been conducted in several countries, including the UK, US, Canada, Ireland, Japan, and others, with the UK hosting the world's biggest trial."

The 4-day workweek trial in the UK involves 70 companies with over 3,300 workers, who will work 80% of their normal hours with no reduction in pay.

A 4-day workweek trial was conducted in the United Kingdom, involving nearly 3,000 employees from 61 British businesses, and the results showed improvements in productivity and employee retention.

Title:

Content: World
Get the latest news from around the world, live coverage, off-beat stories, features and analysis.

Four-Day Workweek Trial Proved So Successful Many UK Firms Will Retain It as New Policy

CC BY 2.0 / Nenad Stojkovic / Businesswoman with beautiful nails working on her laptopBusinesswoman with beautiful nails working on her laptop
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It's one of the largest trials to put a four-day workweek to the test. The non-profit firm invited companies to either shorten their employees’ workweeks by giving them one day a week off or reducing their work hours to 32 hours per week, while still paying their employees the same salary or wage as before the trial.
Newly released study results have suggested it might finally be time to implement a four-day work week after a trial revealed the shift provided major benefits to general productivity and employee health.
The trial, which took place in the United Kingdom, involved nearly 3,000 employees and was organized by the not-for-profit group 4 Day Week Global (alongside the research group Autonomy and researchers with Boston College and the University of Cambridge).
Some 61 British businesses including banks, fast-food restaurants and marketing agencies participated in the trial.
Analyzing the study findings, officials determined the businesses found a sharp decline in the number of employees wanting to quit, while about 46% of companies said their business productivity remained the same, and 34% reported a slight improvement in productivity. Another 15% of employers reported a significant improvement in productivity.
One company, Trio Media, reported a 47% increase in revenue from the year-earlier period. The chief executive of the company, Claire Daniels, said she would continue the trial for another six months before making a permanent switch, but added she didn’t “see [the company] going back to a typical five-days-a-week model.”
Overall on a scale of 0 (very negative) to 10 (very positive) employers scored the productivity and performance of their employees at 7.5 after six months of a shortened workweek. At least 18 businesses from the study said they planned to make the shorter workweek permanent, while 56 of the 61 companies said they would continue testing the shortened work shifts even after the trial ended.
Just three companies said they would not pursue a shortened workweek.
About 15% of employees who participated in the trial said that “no amount of money” could convince them to return to a five-day workweek, as employees reported better sleep, lower stress levels, and improved personal lives and mental health.
“At the beginning, this was about pandemic burnout for a lot of employers. Now it’s more of a retention and recruitment issue for many of them,” explains Juliet Schor, an economist and sociologist at Boston College whose team helped conduct the study.
A separate study from October 2021 found that in a survey of over 1,000 Americans, 98% of respondents said a four-day workweek would improve their mental health, nine out of 10 people said that a five-day workweek was outdated and almost 80% of respondents said the COVID-19 pandemic encouraged their desire for a shortened workweek.
Three out of four respondents in that another study also said they would consider leaving their current job if they were offered a position with a four-day workweek. And a Gallup Report from 2019 revealed that high turnover rates cost US businesses $1 trillion in voluntary turnover per year.
Opponents argue that a shortened workweek would not be suitable for every field of work including child care and health care, both of which are experience widespread staff shortages as nurses in England have gone on strike after struggling to secure increased wages from their government.
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A survey of 1,113 employers and workers found that 100% of workers prefer a 4-day workweek, indicating a strong support for this model among employees.

Title:

Content: Europe

Majority of employers in India favour four day workweek: Report

With quite a few corporations internationally proposing 4-day
workweek for workers, a report has revealed {that a} majority of
employers in India strongly agree that this mannequin will assist in
decreasing stress degree, Trend experiences citing The Tribune.

Over 60 per cent of the employers strongly agree that the brand new
4-day workweek mannequin might be profitable in uplifting the general
morale of the organisation with job satisfaction and work-life
stability, serving to to cut back stress and nervousness ranges, a report by
HR Solutions Genius Consultants mentioned.

However, 27 per cent of the employers who participated within the
survey mentioned they weren’t certain of its implications on
organisations’ productiveness.

The remaining 11 per cent disagreed with the notion, arguing
that the 4-day work mannequin would neither enhance nor yield any
drastic optimistic outcomes, it mentioned.

The report is predicated on a survey performed on-line amongst 1,113
employers and workers between February 1 and March 7 throughout
sectors, together with banking and finance, building and
engineering, schooling, FMCG, hospitality, HR options, IT, ITES
and BPO, logistics, manufacturing, media, oil and fuel.

The survey discovered that 100 per cent workers are in favour of
the 4-day workweek mannequin.

Further, when employers have been requested if they’re keen to work
past 12 hours to compensate for an additional break day, over 56 per
cent agreed immediately, whereas the remaining 44 per cent of the
respondents weren’t satisfied about stretching their standard working
hours.

Similarly, 60 per cent workers within the survey mentioned they’re
keen to work greater than 12 hours in alternate for one more weekly
off.

Over 66 per cent of respondents strongly believed that the 4-day
week module will assist them enhance their productiveness ranges, the
report mentioned.

The survey additionally revealed that for employers, essentially the most most well-liked
third break day is Friday (52 per cent), adopted by Monday (18 per
cent), Wednesday (18 per cent) and Thursday (11 per cent).

“The new 4-day workweek module has been fairly an attention-grabbing
development that has been more and more adopted by fairly a couple of international locations
and organisations from a standalone perspective. People have been
praising the module for serving to workers handle each their
private and work lives higher. Some really feel the 4-day week mannequin has
enabled them to push their boundaries, contribute and carry out
higher,” mentioned R P Yadav, Genius Consultants CMD.

The module has piqued quite a lot of curiosity and has made few
organisations marvel if they need to take into account adopting the identical for
their firm construction, he added.

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The UK's four-day workweek trial, involving 70 companies and over 3,300 workers, started on 6 June, 2022, with participants working 80% of their normal hours without a reduction in pay.

Approximately 3,000 employees participated in the 4-day workweek study in the United Kingdom.

Approximately 2,900 employees from 61 companies participated in the UK's 4-day workweek test.

Title:

Content: Most businesses in the UK have not resumed the five-day system after the trial of the four-day working week
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Most of the companies involved in the four-day trial last year did not return to the five-day work system, and a third of the companies are also planning to implement the four-day work system permanently.
The largest four-day trial, involving about 2,900 employees from 61 companies, took place between June and December last year, with only three companies deciding to suspend the trial and two still considering reducing their working hours.
Other companies believe that the four-day work week has brought benefits of increased income, turnover and reduced employee burnout rates.
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The UK started its 4-day workweek social experiment on June 1, 2022, involving over 3,000 employees from more than 60 companies.

Title:

Content: Since June 1 this year, more than 3,000 employees from more than 60 companies in the United Kingdom have conducted a social experiment with a six-month “four-day work ”.
Since 2018, the non-profit organization of "4 Day Week Global" wants to test whether the public interest of "80% working time - 100% wages - 100% productivity" and "three days off a week, labor and management win" really exists.
Due to the COVID-19 outbreak so far in 2020, many enterprises have adopted the method of “working from home, diverting work ”, and in the long process of the epidemic, working from home and working from home has become an emerging work style.
Since the end of the epidemic this year, many countries have returned to their original or new jobs, whether they are blue-collar and white-collar workers who have left or changed jobs.
However, in more than two years, the transformation of various workplaces in the enterprise to survive, and the labor compromise of "unpaid leave + retained work" have made more and more pioneer projects of "four days a week", and the industry category has become more and more diversified, becoming a new opportunity to promote.
Among them, the most representative is Iceland.
According to media reports in the middle of last year: “The three-day weekend experiment in Iceland has been a success, and workers ’ happiness and productivity have improved ”; the reason for this is:“ Employees face less workplace stress, anxiety, depression and exhaustion, and therefore work harder and take fewer sick days; workers feel more leisure time, and therefore are more committed to their work. ”
This conclusion, in addition to the ethical questions of the willingness of enterprises and workers to participate, and whether or not to remain anonymous, also requires the testing of more rigorous research methods, such as the length of the experiment, whether the industry type and size of the experiment is consistent, and the working tolerance of the workers involved in the experiment, are worthy of further investigation.
On the other hand, the three-day experiment, the success stories of Iceland, New Zealand, and British Columbia, Canada, did not clearly describe the type of industry, the development of the industry in each country, and whether the size of the enterprises in the industry varies greatly.
In addition, across all continents of the world, countries have different levels of economic development, industrial structures have their own characteristics, and the government originally conferred statutory labor rights and interests, are also different.
In addition to industries that are not suitable for at-home work, the sense of alienation of human relationships, the synergy of face-to-face communication, and whether innovation requires teamwork have become the focus of discussion.
On the front page of the “Four Days a Week Worldwide ” website, the home page shows where the current pioneer projects are located on every continent around the world. Surprisingly, Central and South America, Africa, and Southeast Asia each launched at least five projects, but in Canada and the United States, there is only one pilot project.
Moreover, the website reveals that “working four days a week makes 78% of employees feel happier and less stressed. ”
It can also be seen that not only developed countries are promoting, in fact, more developing countries are also conducting experiments.
While there is a lack of a more convincing description of the experimental design, it is clear that this is indeed a possible new type of workplace.
Because of this, in addition to the pilot of national enterprises to cooperate with international non-profit organizations, there are also governments taking the lead in responding.
Spain ’ s leftist political party, once launched a “three days off ” policy in 2021, and the Spanish government agreed to test the new work system of“ 32 hours per week (8 hours per day) ” on a limited scale. 200 companies are willing to participate, and 3,000 to 6,000 workers benefit.
The result of such a trial gives more room for imagination to "take three days off every week, and employees will win both."
The social experiment of "80% of working hours - 100% of wages - 100% of productivity" has important policy significance for the harmony of labor relations and the long-term development of the economy.
"High working hours" does not mean "high productivity", which is the general consensus of the current society.
"Shorten working hours, wages unchanged", helps companies retain employees, perhaps without controversy; but whether it can also maintain 100% of the work output is questioned by the business community.
After the epidemic, "three days off a week, labor and management win" is applicable to some specific industry categories, and the nature of the work of individual employees may also be more widely distributed in various industries.
And the flexibility of working hours, the heterogeneity of the workplace, the universalization of work dispatch, and even the high expectations of the young generation for "enterprise decentralization" are all the help of "working four days a week", which may be a major challenge for enterprises in the future.
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