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TECHNOLOGY REPORT

Fitting a quart into a pint pot

The Covid pandemic eyond these considerations, the pandemic be confused with compressed hours – where the usual
40-hour week is worked over four days.
changed so much. It altered how society felt about the work/life The concept of a four-day working week isn’t new.
balance with some effectively demanding to
redefined retail, work (more) from home, work less hard or, in Throughout the last century, many, including econo-
forced organisations a good proportion of cases, leave the work- mists, psychologists, philosophers, politicians and others,
debated a reduction in working hours. Indeed, in a speech
to change working B force entirely. in 1965, Richard Nixon, then the nation’s vice president,
With a redefinition of the importance that individuals
practices, led to the attach to workplace flexibility and benefits, employers called for a four-day working week to improve American
rise of remote work- wanting to recruit in a tight labour market need to con- families’ lives. At the time he said that “our hope is to dou-
ing, and proved that sider how they use the tools at their disposal, of which the ble everyone’s standard of living in 10 years”.
But while talking about the four-day week, Gordon
technology has a very four-day week is one. notes that it was only at the beginning of the 20th century
distinct role to play in The four-day working week defined that the UK ended the then traditional six-day working
keeping commercial To describe the four-day week, Lucy Gordon, a director week. But times have changed and as Gordon comments,
plates spinning. at Walker Morris, uses the example of the notional full- “the pandemic was a catalyst for accelerated changes to
the world of work, causing both employers and workers
time employee who traditionally works five eight-hour to reflect on what they value most”. She says that for
Words by days a week. They would simply reduce their hours to many, “removing the commute and spending more time
Adam Bernstein work only four eight-hour days a week instead (totalling with family and pursuing hobbies and interests resulted
32 hours), while still receiving their full-time, 40-hour in a paradigm shift towards more flexible ways of work-
week salary. ing; remote, hybrid, flexible, part-time, and so on”. In her
“The rationale,” she says, “is that employees working view, the four-day working week was, perhaps, an obvi-
those hours will, so the hypothesis goes, give the same ous next step.
level of output as an employee working a five-day week.” And that step was tested over a six-month period from
She adds that the concept of the four-day week shouldn’t June to December 2022 in a trial that was organised by

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