3,000 employees from 60 British companies are going to participate in a six-month trial of a four-day working week.
Aiming to help companies shorten their working hours without cutting salaries or sacrificing revenues, the pilot is being touted as the world’s biggest so far.
It is being conducted by Alex Soojung-Kim Pang, a programme manager at 4 Day Week Global, who has held similar trials in Spain, Iceland, the United States and Canada. Australia and New Zealand are scheduled to start theirs in August.
Pang has said that the trial will give firms “more time” to work through challenges, experiment with new practices and gather data.
He believes that smaller organisation will find it easier to adapt as they can make big changes more readily.
Pressure Drop brewery, which is one of the companies participating in the trial, is based in Tottenham Hale.
It is hoping the experiment will not only improve their employees’ productivity but also their well-being as well as reduce their carbon footprint.
According to its co-founder Sam Smith, “It will be difficult for a company like us which needs to be kept running all the time, but that’s what we will experiment with in this trial.”
The Royal Society of Biology, another participant in the trial, says it wants to give employees “more autonomy over their time and working patterns”.
Both hope a shorter working week could help them retain employees, at a time when UK businesses are confronted with severe staff shortages, and job vacancies hitting a record 1.3 million.
Countries working fewer hours tend to have higher productivity according to Aidan Harper, author of “The Case for a Four Day Week”.
“Denmark, Sweden, and the Netherlands work fewer hours than the UK, yet have higher levels of productivity,” he told AFP.
“Within Europe, Greece works more hours than anyone, and yet have the lowest levels of productivity.”
(With inputs from agencies)
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