Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Anyone working 4 day week here, as an employee?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 271 posts

Re: Ask HN: Anyone working 4 day week here, as an employee?

#101

Post by bergenty »

bilsbie wrote: post #95
Apreche wrote: post #19

I just recently started a 32 hour a week salaried job. Here’s my story. I was at a very good job. My ultimate goal is to just go to the beach and not work at all. I realized that’s too big of a leap, so I set a shorter term more realistic goal of working 4 days a week. My employer at the time rejected the idea, so instead of ignoring recruiters like usual, I answered them. If a job wasn’t immoral, the interview proce…

You wouldn’t get tired of the beach if you went every day?

No, I could spend all day at the beach for the rest of my life. Same with hiking desert climates. Same with spending all my time in my wood and metal shop.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone working 4 day week here, as an employee?

#102

Post by phendrenad2 »

More like 1.

But seriously: Most tech companies only care if you're doing a fair amount of work for what they're paying you. If you have the skills to do more work than others on the team in 4 hours per day instead of 8 hours a day, no healthy company is going to complain.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone working 4 day week here, as an employee?

#103

Post by sossles »

I'm a long term employee of a large software company. When I had kids I asked to go down to 4 days so they wouldn't be in childcare for the whole week. Now the kids are all in school but I've kept the 4 day week as I'm much happier this way. A few years ago a colleague asked to go to 4 days (with no kids) and was rejected, so I doubt I'll ever give it up, otherwise I'll never get it back, and I don't know how I'd ever find another job that would support this style of work, so I guess it has worked in my employer's favour.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone working 4 day week here, as an employee?

#104

Post by jackvalentine »

jen729w wrote: post #27

Yes. I’m a contractor at a large IT integrator in Australia. It helps that my boss was (see below) a good friend. I think it was mid-last-year, I just realised I’d be mentally healthier if I worked 4 days a week. So I said, I’m going to start working 4 days a week. And he said, okay. Because he’s great. And it is glorious . You go from spending almost three-quarters of your life at work (71.4%) to just over half (57.…

Well that's annoying, I left Canberra last year but would have absolutely loved to both meet you and employ you on some projects I had while there!

Re: Ask HN: Anyone working 4 day week here, as an employee?

#105

Post by Apreche »

bilsbie wrote: post #95
Apreche wrote: post #19

I just recently started a 32 hour a week salaried job. Here’s my story. I was at a very good job. My ultimate goal is to just go to the beach and not work at all. I realized that’s too big of a leap, so I set a shorter term more realistic goal of working 4 days a week. My employer at the time rejected the idea, so instead of ignoring recruiters like usual, I answered them. If a job wasn’t immoral, the interview proce…

You wouldn’t get tired of the beach if you went every day?

Absolutely not. I would live in a beach house, and I would indeed spend many hours laying in the sand, swimming in the ocean, etc. But I wouldn't literally spend the entire rest of my life doing nothing else at all. There would be socializing with friends and family, traveling, and taking care of my affairs. I would also spend plenty of time on hobbies of all sorts.

The key is that I would be living a life of complete and total leisure. Wake up whenever I want. Sleep whenever I want. Eat whenever I want. And each day, each moment, I would do whatever in particular I happened to feel like doing. I would not spend one moment of my remaining short life doing something purely because a capitalist system forced me to do so. That's the ultimate, probably unachievable, goal.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone working 4 day week here, as an employee?

#106

Post by Apreche »

soupfordummies wrote: post #89
Apreche wrote: post #19

I just recently started a 32 hour a week salaried job. Here’s my story. I was at a very good job. My ultimate goal is to just go to the beach and not work at all. I realized that’s too big of a leap, so I set a shorter term more realistic goal of working 4 days a week. My employer at the time rejected the idea, so instead of ignoring recruiters like usual, I answered them. If a job wasn’t immoral, the interview proce…

This is amazing, good for you! Do you mind sharing your job, how long the process took/how many different companies you interviewed?

I'm a software engineer. I'm working at a startup now after basically refusing to work at start-ups, or any kind of tech company, my entire career prior. I always worked at normal stable trustworthy non-tech companies that happened to need software engineers. I would still prefer to go back to the non-tech non-startup industry, but the offer was too good.

The process took less than a year. I entertained pitches from many many recruiters. I can't even remember how many. Most of them I rejected immediately because the jobs were beneath my high moral standard. I had introductory interviews at maybe 10-ish places. I actually went through the full interview process at only 3 places.

I was able to do all this purely because my existing job was stable and excellent. I would go back to it in a heartbeat if necessary. I was negotiating from a position of extreme strength with absolutely nothing to lose if the prospective new employer said no. I'm honestly afraid of a situation where I have no job and have to accept the first offer I can get. I might end up in a spiral of changing jobs frequently while trying to get back to a place that I find acceptable.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone working 4 day week here, as an employee?

#108

Post by mrlucax »

I'm working for a company that was originally a 40h workplace, but since last month and until the end of January will test a 32h week, with preferably the Fridays off (preferably because there are some departments that must have at least one person every day). After this test period the management will evaluate the productivity, basically some OKRs set before the change and if objectives were met we will keep this benefit.

Important to mention that no other benefit was removed or any salary reduced.

Re: Ask HN: Anyone working 4 day week here, as an employee?

#110

Post by smeej »

ddlutz wrote: post #78
philmcp wrote: post #2

In my previous job I asked my boss if he would let me drop down to 3 days per week (60% salary). To my slight surprise, he was totally fine with it I did this after working hard for ~1 year at the company. Once you prove your worth, it's in your employers interests to keep you i.e. it would cost them way more if you left for another job with shorter working hours so don't be afraid to ask If it was doing it again tho…

Is it typical to find completely unacceptable pay on your site? Listings that have requirement for engineers which could pull home 200-300k a year wanting to pay $15 an hour. I guess this is why "nobody wants to work anymore" One listing (company name omitted to protect the witness): Requirements BS/MS in Computer Science Strong in Data Structure/Algorithms, can solve intermediate-level Leetcode questions with ease E…

Where I live, even Walmart can't get people to show up for less than $15 an hour (even though we have no separate minimum wage than the national $7.25/hr).

The KFC across the street from the Walmart was recently advertising $17/hr.

$15/hr for that kind of tech experience would never fly here!

Post reply on HN