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

Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

npr.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

271–280 of 311 posts

Re: Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

#271

Post by TecoAndJix »

suzzer99 wrote: post #253
wes-k wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

3 day work weeks are best. Most well paid developers would gladly take a 20% reduction in income for 50% more weekend right? So 4 days it is! Well why stop there? I’ll take another 25% reduction for 33% more weekend. So 3 days it is! But only the rich or a fool would then take an additional 33% reduction for a measly 25% bump to your weekend. 3 day work weeks are best. QED

For me 6 months on and 6 months off would be incredible. But of course by the time 6 months goes by, someone has learned how to do my job and maintain all the shit I built, and I'm no longer valuable. Also I lose my health insurance and probably seniority. But man would it be sweet if I could make it work.

This would be my dream setup as well. Heck I would do 7 days a week 12 hour days (with a few mental health days built in) for 6 months if it meant not having to think about work for the other 6. I'll even live on a cot at the office during the work 6!

Re: Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

#272

Post by FirmwareBurner »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #193
sokoloff wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> EDIT: Put some contact info in your profile. That’s a particularly strange demand to make as someone who doesn’t expose your own contact info.

> I'm struggling to find a job I’m connected with over 2k recruiters and was low key trying to help.

My email is in my profile if you wish to reach out. Cheers!

Re: Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

#273

Post by belval »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #270
RHSeeger wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Believe it or not, many workers don't actually enjoy their work, their company, their boss or their job There are a lot of people that don't enjoy their jobs, but do the work because they're getting paid to do it. You seem to assume that anyone doing their job _only_ because they're being paid to do it will _not_ do their job if they can get away with it (even though they're still being paid to do so). Not everyone…

>There are a lot of people that don't enjoy their jobs, but do the work because they're getting paid to do it. How's that different from what I just said?

> they don't care for the work itself, so of course they'll take every opportunity they get to slack off and watch Netflix if they can.

Overall you do make it sound like you condone this, I got the same read as the person you are responding to...

Re: Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

#274

Post by FirmwareBurner »

belval wrote: post #273
FirmwareBurner wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There are a lot of people that don't enjoy their jobs, but do the work because they're getting paid to do it. How's that different from what I just said?

> they don't care for the work itself, so of course they'll take every opportunity they get to slack off and watch Netflix if they can. Overall you do make it sound like you condone this, I got the same read as the person you are responding to...

I don't condone it, I'm just saying it how it is in reality.

Re: Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

#275

Post by OJFord »

ben_w wrote: post #260
OJFord wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would that make remote work any more mandatory than it is with 'the cloud' or data centres?

Going to space to fix them is very hard. (Only due to your comment did I realise I was ambiguous, I meant remote work specifically for the IT department would be mandatory, not everyone in general).

It could still be office-based though, sure technically remote from the server, but so are the web servers software engineers develop for typically, sometimes even their development environment is. I don't think that really factors into remote (WFH) vs office working at all, at least from an employer's perspective. Maybe it makes it easier to work remotely, but certainly doesn't necessitate it: you can work from anywhere, and that can still be the office.

Re: Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

#277

Post by mbravorus »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #81
jedberg wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure your manager does. They aren't the ones demanding 40 hours and return to office. It's the C-suite that is doing it. The C-Suite got where they are because they are extroverts who excel at in person interactions. They can't use that skill unless you're there in front of them. They also came up in a world where everyone worked in an office 40 hours a week. And since they are in charge, they get to choose the r…

>and are seemingly choosing to ignore productivity studies that show their decisions don't make sense. I also don't buy this. Companies are all profit oriented and don't like leaving money on the table if research shows there is left over money on the table. They can't monetize control but they can monetize money. If research would show they would make more profits using AWS instead of Azure(example pulled out of my…

Your reply seems to assume that companies are efficient. Which is not the case, and the larger the company, the lower internal s/n ratio and, arguably, the larger percent of wastage.

Also, "immediately" switching across cloud vendors is not even a pipe dream, it's an impossibility and the very act of switching is incredibly expensive both short and long term (unless your cloud usage is one VM or so). So there's no simplicity in that example, it's a counter-example.

Re: Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

#278

Post by kwhitefoot »

totololo wrote: post #75
bb123 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d happily take a 20% pay cut for a 4 day work week, if it was offered.

I think that's common in Switzerland. They call it 80% contracts.

Similarly in Norway.

Re: Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

#279

Post by kwhitefoot »

wahnfrieden wrote: post #211
bb123 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d happily take a 20% pay cut for a 4 day work week, if it was offered.

And would you work as much unpaid overtime as you would with a salaried 5 day work week job when pressured to by your boss, owner and peers?

I never have been pressured by my boss to do unpaid overtime.

Re: Study: 61 UK firms tried a 4-day workweek and after a year, they still love it

#280

Post by Jzush »

jjcm wrote: post #71

There's no doubt that there's a benefit to the employee, but for corporations to adopt this there has to be a measurable benefit to the company as well. I do think there is one clear benefit as measured in the article - employee retention. It's an extremely strong incentive to stay with the current company, and domain knowledge gained over decades really is a competitive advantage if your employees commonly have it.…

I have to wonder about that. There has been data for years now, confirmed via Covid that work from home not only works but saves companies millions in rent/bills/equipment and that doesn’t even include things like cheaper insurance rates due to having less people on the premises. And yet companies are chomping at the bit to get people to return to the office.

There seems to be a fine balance CEOs and board members want to hit between saving money and ensuring they have their boots as firmly placed on their lessers as possible.

Post reply on HN