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Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

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Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#31

Post by barbazoo »

freitzkriesler2 wrote: post #3

I wish someone would investigate what a 6 day week would look like(4 work, 2 off). This article was always a fun exercise what if scenario and if world wide agreement could come to be, would be an innovation on par with the 40 hour work week. https://calendars.fandom.com/wiki/6-Day_Week_Solar_Calendar_...

This is one of those things that would not work as soon as there's a significant number of people not doing it. It's just not practical. Doing something in the existing 7 day structure is much easier.

Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#32

Post by FirmwareBurner »

mushufasa wrote: post #20

I spent the summer in Berlin and, as an American, was a bit culture shocked by how little time people worked, and how so many people I met bragged about collecting paid time off for reasons they admitted to making up, which the government enforced all employers must allow. As an employer, I'd be afraid of hiring in countries like Germany for an international workforce if that meant I have to have a patchwork of speci…

>I spent the summer in Berlin and, as an American

That's a pretty bad way to get an impression of a whole country. That's like those American tourists visiting only the instagramable parts of Paris and Rome and then say they "saw Europe" lol.

Especially that Berlin is basically an American/Expat enclave in Germany where the native Germans are a minority to the point they're annoyed that nobody at cafes, bars and restaurants can take their orders in German.

Try vising smaller cities in Germany where the locals are a majority to get an actual feel of the country's culture and people. Berlin is too far from representative, it's just the place most foreigners feel comfortable because they're surrounded by other foreigners.

Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#33

Post by yoyoinbog »

shasts wrote: post #18
appplemac wrote: post #4

Instead of a 4-day workweek how about setting reasonable hiring standards so that hundreds of thousands of people out of work, especially non-native German speakers, have a chance of getting past the job application screen. Most jobs, even in tech, in DE currently require good knowledge of German, and "good" is being interpreted as near-native.

Can confirm this. My wife has a master's degree in engineering from a TU9(top 9 universities in Germany).And a B2 language certificate. She has not found a job so far. Been more than a year and half since she started actively applying. At times she ticks all the requirements in the job description, and still no luck. She is planning to go to a bakery starting next week. The guy at the bakery was so surprised to see s…

TU means Institute of Technology. Says nothing about being a good university. Your wife is likely bound to your location what limits her options and like has a degree that is not very in demand, at least not where she lives.

Engineering could be everything. And if she has a degree in, let's say food technology and is willing to work somewhere deep in east Germany for a very low amount of money then she would find a job.

Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#34

Post by lm28469 »

khazhoux wrote: post #12
askonomm wrote: post #2

I once brought up the idea of a 4-day work week to a PM I worked with, and her immediate reaction was very defensive, as she could not understand why would anyone want to work less, and who then would get all the work done. It made me realize that not all people actually want more freedom, some are most likely stockholm syndrom-ed to their job, and these are the people the rest of us are up against trying make positi…

You seem to infer an emotional or psychological reaction to what is a rather straightforward question: today people typically work 5 days/week to get some amount of work done, so the most-simple assessment is that working 80% of that time would result in 80% of the work being done. Rather than saying people are stockholm-syndrome'd ants who dislike freedom and positive changes, by what reasoning does 100% of work get…

The problem is that we treat the baseline/status quo as something which is beneficial and anything "less productive" would be where the tradeoffs are.

When you say 20% less medical service you might also get 20% more time with your kids/friends/family, 20% more sleep, 20% more reading, &c.

People lived with 99% less of all we have not so long ago, surely there is a middle ground. My mom got oranges for christmas, now anything short of a new smartphone is borderline a war declaration on your offspring

Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#35

Post by whstl »

askonomm wrote: post #2

I once brought up the idea of a 4-day work week to a PM I worked with, and her immediate reaction was very defensive, as she could not understand why would anyone want to work less, and who then would get all the work done. It made me realize that not all people actually want more freedom, some are most likely stockholm syndrom-ed to their job, and these are the people the rest of us are up against trying make positi…

I find it kinda ironic that this is coming from a PM.

Software is an area where you can get absurd productivity gains just from having different task definitions, by simplifying things where they can be simplified, or by simply planning better. I've seen plenty of bad PMs making a team work 2x, 3x, 4x more to accomplish something, purely because of unimportant details that ended up being too much trouble.

Not to mention I've seen countless times teams growing from say, 2 to 10 developers and not having even close to 2x difference. Heck, half of Mythical Man Month is about that.

So yeah, amount of time doesn't correlate to amount of work. And especially doesn't correlate to amount of value delivered.

Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#36

Post by dustedcodes »

appplemac wrote: post #4

Instead of a 4-day workweek how about setting reasonable hiring standards so that hundreds of thousands of people out of work, especially non-native German speakers, have a chance of getting past the job application screen. Most jobs, even in tech, in DE currently require good knowledge of German, and "good" is being interpreted as near-native.

> Most jobs, even in tech, in DE currently require good knowledge of German

I mean of course, d'oh!? You say "even" in tech, I'd say especially in tech (or really any job that requires communication in high performing fields) should have high standards for the native language, because good communication is key.

Call me old fashioned, but the jobs for people who don't speak the native language (well) are reserved to be: cleaners, putting tins into shelves, scrubbing toilets, warehouse work, sorting foul carrots from good carrots on a production line, etc.

I'd say you need a decent level of being able to communicate with your colleagues and stakeholders. If someone struggles then they can drive an Uber and practice until they are better.

Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#37

Post by mrks_hy »

Can someone change the misleading title to part of the subtitle? It is "Less work, same money, more happiness and productivity. As of February 1, 45 companies in Germany are testing a 4-day workweek.", which is much more meaningful.

Title makes it sound like there is anything like a concerted effort, whereas these are just 45 random companies. No details on size of those companies, no data on number of employees or fields. I would expect that in particular the traditonal German "backbone" of the economy is not the kind of company amenable to this work week model or even participating in such a study. Example, classic automative supplier with more "blue collar" style work.

The source seems to be https://www.intraprenoer.de/4tagewoche but this is equally opaque.

Overall a weird article with not a lot of original research.

To not have this comment only be a rant, here is some data [1]: There are 3.4 Million companies (definition at link, they need to have employees and taxable turnover) in Germany, with 35 Million employees. That includes small 1-person shops as well as Fortune 500 companies.

Anyone seems to be able to sign up for that study, and without any further details this seems hardly representative. I am very much interested in the outcome of these studies and would probably for myself assume that I can be productive in 4 days as well, but I'm not sure how this gives us usable data.

1: https://www.destatis.de/EN/Themes/Economic-Sectors-Enterpris...

Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#38

Post by enasterosophes »

appplemac wrote: post #4

Instead of a 4-day workweek how about setting reasonable hiring standards so that hundreds of thousands of people out of work, especially non-native German speakers, have a chance of getting past the job application screen. Most jobs, even in tech, in DE currently require good knowledge of German, and "good" is being interpreted as near-native.

As someone in an English-speaking country, I expect my colleagues to have good English.

We operate a helpdesk where clear communication is essential. Internally, we need to be able to quickly coordinate with each other on highly technical problems. If someone from another country came in with a bad attitude about "why do I need good English?" we would be more than a little hesitant about hiring them. It doesn't matter how good you are in tech, English literacy and fluency are foundational to everything else.

It would surprise me if Germans see this very differently.

Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#39

Post by JAlexoid »

appplemac wrote: post #4

Instead of a 4-day workweek how about setting reasonable hiring standards so that hundreds of thousands of people out of work, especially non-native German speakers, have a chance of getting past the job application screen. Most jobs, even in tech, in DE currently require good knowledge of German, and "good" is being interpreted as near-native.

> DE currently require good knowledge of German

That's quite reasonable. No matter how good you're at a certain skill, most jobs will require an advanced level of communication.

Imagine if you hired a builder and the person wouldn't be able to understand the intricacies of the job you need performed?

Having teams that are exclusively English speaking in Germany would make sense, but Germany is large enough to not have them yet.

Re: Germany explores 4-day workweek amid labor shortage

#40

Post by lm28469 »

mushufasa wrote: post #20

I spent the summer in Berlin and, as an American, was a bit culture shocked by how little time people worked, and how so many people I met bragged about collecting paid time off for reasons they admitted to making up, which the government enforced all employers must allow. As an employer, I'd be afraid of hiring in countries like Germany for an international workforce if that meant I have to have a patchwork of speci…

Nobody's forcing you to operate in countries with worker's rights
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