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Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

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Re: Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

#91

Post by danilocesar »

Fri31Aug wrote: post #67

Those are all advantages for workers. What are the advantages for businesses?

It's interesting that people are not considering the business point of view...

I read some people mentioning about working 10-hours a day and work from Monday to Thursday. If I was a business owner I wouldn't allow that. I would rather offer 5~6 hours work per day than allow him to work more for 4 days.

In my field of work (engineering) as a regular worker, I see people working 8 hours but they are not 8 hours productive. Discussing this with some friends we concluded that usually an average developer can focus for around 5 to 6 hours, tops. Then, by adding two hours a day, he won't be 7~8-hours-productive.

My bet (and that's a my own point of view) is that an average developer will keep being 5~6 hours productive. That's because the development process leads to mental exhaustion. After some time people will be much more distracted, leading to mistakes, etc.

Of course there are some folks that will argue that they can do 10~12h work per day. While this is true, usually they don't do it for long without being burned out. A very few exceptions can do that without getting stressed.

So, If I'm a business man and I want my employees to have more free time without affecting my business, I would reduce the hours per day rather then do 10 hours x 4 days a week.

* btw, that's about software engineering only. I don't think the mechanics of other business would work that way.

Re: Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

#93

Post by maxxxxx »

2sk21 wrote: post #48

What I really need is a weekly study day: Spend a whole day just studying and reading something (which may be completely unrelated to my work). Some of my most productive ideas have come from such study.

What I need is a weekly work day :). My workplace is so distracting that I barely ever get to do focused work. The background noise drives me crazy and then always somebody wants to have another meeting about something that has been discussed dozens of times before.

Re: Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

#94

Post by danilocesar »

failrate wrote: post #92
Fri31Aug wrote: post #67

Those are all advantages for workers. What are the advantages for businesses?

Theoretically, the quality of work per hour goes up. More than half of the observed workday in my experience is taken up with chitchat and other bullshit.

chitchat, facebook and replying to HN =)

Re: Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

#95

Post by strictnein »

I'm surprised we haven't seen more of the mixed compromise:

   Monday - Thursday: 10 hour days
   Friday - Monday: 4 day weekend
   Tuesday - Friday: 10 hour days
   Saturday - Sunday: 2 day weekend
and then it repeats. Same hours worked overall.

Work longer days, but get 4 day weekends every other week. The people I've known who've had this setup would generally work 6am-4pm.

Re: Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

#96

Post by dionidium »

strictnein wrote: post #95

I'm surprised we haven't seen more of the mixed compromise: Monday - Thursday: 10 hour days Friday - Monday: 4 day weekend Tuesday - Friday: 10 hour days Saturday - Sunday: 2 day weekend and then it repeats. Same hours worked overall. Work longer days, but get 4 day weekends every other week. The people I've known who've had this setup would generally work 6am-4pm.

My strong impression is that this is a waste of time. You can keep people in their seats for 10 hours, I guess, but you're not going to consistently get 10 hours of productivity. If we want to give people an extra day off -- and I think we should! -- then we should just do it. You can't really make up the time somewhere else.

Re: Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

#97

Post by amelius »

strictnein wrote: post #95

I'm surprised we haven't seen more of the mixed compromise: Monday - Thursday: 10 hour days Friday - Monday: 4 day weekend Tuesday - Friday: 10 hour days Saturday - Sunday: 2 day weekend and then it repeats. Same hours worked overall. Work longer days, but get 4 day weekends every other week. The people I've known who've had this setup would generally work 6am-4pm.

How does this compare to the recently proposed workday of 6 hours, see link?

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-04-17/how-the-s...

Re: Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

#98

Post by amelius »

dionidium wrote: post #96
strictnein wrote: post #95

I'm surprised we haven't seen more of the mixed compromise: Monday - Thursday: 10 hour days Friday - Monday: 4 day weekend Tuesday - Friday: 10 hour days Saturday - Sunday: 2 day weekend and then it repeats. Same hours worked overall. Work longer days, but get 4 day weekends every other week. The people I've known who've had this setup would generally work 6am-4pm.

My strong impression is that this is a waste of time. You can keep people in their seats for 10 hours, I guess, but you're not going to consistently get 10 hours of productivity. If we want to give people an extra day off -- and I think we should! -- then we should just do it. You can't really make up the time somewhere else.

Yes, and after hundreds of years of technological progress, it seems a bit silly to still force people to work the same amount of time.

Re: Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

#99

Post by strictnein »

dionidium wrote: post #96
strictnein wrote: post #95

I'm surprised we haven't seen more of the mixed compromise: Monday - Thursday: 10 hour days Friday - Monday: 4 day weekend Tuesday - Friday: 10 hour days Saturday - Sunday: 2 day weekend and then it repeats. Same hours worked overall. Work longer days, but get 4 day weekends every other week. The people I've known who've had this setup would generally work 6am-4pm.

My strong impression is that this is a waste of time. You can keep people in their seats for 10 hours, I guess, but you're not going to consistently get 10 hours of productivity. If we want to give people an extra day off -- and I think we should! -- then we should just do it. You can't really make up the time somewhere else.

> My strong impression is that this is a waste of time.

Have you done it or worked with people who have?

Worked really well for the people who I knew who did it. Highly productive and the two 4 day weekends a month seemed great.

My point wasn't that this was better than an additional day off and less work. My point is that this should be acceptable today, and I'm surprised there isn't more buy in for flexible schedules like this.

Re: Every Weekend Should Be a 3-Day Weekend (2015)

#100

Post by carlmr »

Fri31Aug wrote: post #64
carlmr wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Our society is such that we typically work 8 out of 24 hours(33%) I always think you should look at the effective free time you have left. I can't do much in my sleep (-8h), I can't do much on my commute (-1.5h), I can't do much in my lunch break (I have to take a 45 minute lunch break by law, it's way too short to use it as actual free time, but takes another significant chunk out of your day.) I get to 24h-8h-8h-1…

In what city is 1.5h the average commute time, just to make sure I'll never go there.

I don't sleep in the office, so my commute is 45min x 2, which as far as I know is quite average.

I'm in Stuttgart, Germany, it's a very crowded town with very narrow roads though, so there's certainly a reason for this.

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