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'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

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Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#101

Post by harperlee »

Doxin wrote: post #77
xarope wrote: post #75

I know people think a 4 day work week is the bees knees, but I'm not sure I would enjoy working a 10 hour day (assuming we are still expected to work a nominal 40 hour week). With commute, it means 12 hours+ a day, so less time for fitness or post-work de-stress. As it is, the current 8 hour work day is really a 9 hour work day since lunchtime is not considered part of that 8 hour day, so if employees take that into…

I dunno about other people, but cramming a 40hr workweek into 4 days seems bananas to me. On the other hand from experience I can say that doing a 32hr workweek in 4 days is, in fact, the bees knees.

Some people are in areas where overtime is common, and a longer official schedule protects them from unofficial overtime.

Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#102

Post by gorbypark »

aussieguy1234 wrote: post #34

A 4 day, 40 hour workweek works suprisingly well for international teams, because the longer days usually mean more timezone crossover.

I worked this schedule for many years (not in tech, "skilled" labour) and it's amazing. This was a 7 day a week operation and it worked quite well in terms of crossover here too. Each person had a fixed schedule but the day of the week for each person would vary so there'd never be a full "shift change over", so to speak, but always some overlap between the shifts and it helped with information exchange greatly. The guy working Monday-Thursday would overlap with people starting their weeks from Tuesday to Thursday, for example, so there was always a "working knowledge" of what was going on.

It worked well on the management side of things too, but with an actual "changeover", as you'd have a Monday-Thursday supervisor and another Thursday-Sunday supervisor, with one day a week of overlap however that Sunday-Monday changeover didn't have an overlap (although there was a lot of OT on this job so it did frequently happen).

Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#103

Post by lm28469 »

Xenoamorphous wrote: post #85

I find it odd that everyone here is talking about productivity. Although I guess it's to be expected since posts about increasing productivity are popular in HN; lots of people here focusing on their careers I suppose. Personally I find we work way too many hours. We spend the good part of 5 days a week (if we're lucky) at work, often literally all the daylight hours, at least in winter. I have to take my daughter ve…

It's so internalised that people gatekeep working long and hard...

I assume the "commute -> work -> chill -> sleep" cycle is doing a lot of work, you basically have no time to even think about what you're doing. Add some kids, a mortgage, health issues, it's the perfect cocktail. The "work -> vacation" cycle is also a good one, you can rationalise wasting 3-6 months in a work you don't enjoy to have a few weeks of peace (and spend all your money so you have a "good" reason to go back to work)

In a way it's also more pleasing to be fully invested in the rat race, once you start to want get out of it you'll hate every single second of your work week wondering where we as a specie fucked up so bad

Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#104

Post by lm28469 »

sk11001 wrote: post #33
azinman2 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems you think that a 4 day work week is paid as 5 is currently. I don’t see why that’d be necessarily true. In that scenario, it’s kind of like a part time worker and I can see many businesses finding appeal in that.

> Seems you think that a 4 day work week is paid as 5 is currently. It should be. Most people won't accept less pay even if it comes with reduced hours.

I know many people who do it in Germany, above a certain size companies can't really deny you if you ask for part time (unless you're critical to the system and have to be there every single day), of course you get the pay cut that goes with it

Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#105

Post by marcus_holmes »

_glass wrote: post #97
marcus_holmes wrote: post #89

When I was nomadding around SE Asia, I worked 5 hours a day, 6 days a week (so I had time to do all the cool stuff in the places I was travelling through). That worked really well - I was at least as productive as I normally am in a standard 40-hour week. A decade ago I was working 5 days a week from an open-plan office, and mentally clocked out around 2pm each day. Office culture meant I was just moistening a chair…

I was nomadding in Istanbul, working 4h per day, whenever I wanted to. This was the perfect setup. Unfortunately, as one gets older the classical developer role is not really possible anymore. Now I work 8 to 9 hours, 2 days in the office per week, 3 days at home. While it is better than the normal 9 to 5, quality of life really suffers. But I think it is mostly about that the 4 hours I could do whenever I wanted wit…

I'm in my 50's, was nomadding around SE Asia when I turned 50. So yeah, age isn't it ;)

Getting into management is definitely more of a hours thing. But manager productivity is different; it's about talking to lots of people and not maintaining focus on one thing for hours. It's a shit-load easier to do from anywhere. But at the same time, it's definitely time-intensive. When I was CEO of a 200+ organisation I worked 10+ hours a day. The hours were a lot easier, though. Less hard thinking and focused concentration, more half-hour meetings which seemed to be mostly about listening to other people tell me why they decided to do something.

I was in Germany for COVID - I can see why you say this. But that's still only true if you stay in large organisations. In smaller orgs you get more flexibility, even in Germany. You can still become an expert developer and get the decent money without getting into management. Having said that, it is easier to climb the salary ladder if you get into management. But you can never go back; it's very hard to get back into a developer role if you've been a manager. Beware of what you wish for.

Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#106

Post by frizlab »

I work in a remote friendly company (I can but don’t have to work fully remote). In addition to being remote friendly, they are also schedule friendly. If I have to take two hours for a personal matter during the day, I just say I’m afk on a chan on slack and I take two hours, the company trusts me to just do my job, time management is up to me.

Honestly with this setup I don’t need a four days week.

Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#107

Post by Jensson »

hkt wrote: post #91
kettleballroll wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The entire point of this is that productivity does not go down in a 4 day workweek Just an anecdote, but: my productivity definitely took a huge hit when I reduced my hours to 4days/week. All of the "working harder/more efficiently/more focused" doesn't help if you already worked hard/efficiently/focused. If you have a job with a lot of slack/downtime/waiting time... Sure. But sometimes, working 20% less means that…

This is why people also talk about retention. Personally I'd think of the extra day as rent paid on not having to hire and onboard someone new.

Why would retention change if everyone works 4 days a week? At that point it is no longer a perk, you get it everywhere, so retention should be as before and the advantages of 4 day weeks is now gone.

Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#108

Post by ornornor »

globular-toast wrote: post #92
Xenoamorphous wrote: post #85

I find it odd that everyone here is talking about productivity. Although I guess it's to be expected since posts about increasing productivity are popular in HN; lots of people here focusing on their careers I suppose. Personally I find we work way too many hours. We spend the good part of 5 days a week (if we're lucky) at work, often literally all the daylight hours, at least in winter. I have to take my daughter ve…

People spend all their lives doing pointless work, accumulating wealth, then have nothing to spend it on so buy something like a car they don't need (like an SUV). It's odd there aren't more people questioning this. Wouldn't they rather enjoy their lives while they're young and not worry about having tons of disposable income when they're old? I guess there's something about security that drives people to the latter.…

> It's odd there aren't more people questioning this.

I’ve been questioning this for a long time. It’s not an enviable position: it’s isolating (very few people understand), it’s very hard to keep any kind of salaried position (since you’re not a devoted doormat), and it’s mentally challenging because you can’t ever really feel safe nor fit in.

Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#109

Post by Jensson »

Shaanie wrote: post #82
kettleballroll wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the amount of work you're able to do is. And companies need to make money, they're not s charity. I took a 20% paycut to work only 4 days a week. And I think that is fair, because my output definitely did decrease by 20%. This might not be true for everyone, but all of the "working more efficiently" thing doesn't really help you if you were already working pretty efficiently 5 days a week.

I kinda doubt your output decreased by 20%. Probably fairly close to it, but I'm guessing you got slightly more done on the other days.

> but I'm guessing you got slightly more done on the other days.

Or slightly less due to having to spend more time on overhead and reading up on things. There is a minimum amount of time you have to spend just to be ready to do your job, many current jobs are so poorly managed that most of their time is spent that way.

Re: 'It's better for humans in general': The 4-day workweek is closer than you think

#110

Post by acchow »

frizlab wrote: post #106

I work in a remote friendly company (I can but don’t have to work fully remote). In addition to being remote friendly, they are also schedule friendly. If I have to take two hours for a personal matter during the day, I just say I’m afk on a chan on slack and I take two hours, the company trusts me to just do my job, time management is up to me. Honestly with this setup I don’t need a four days week.

This is just how it is for software engineers in general, right?
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