Four-day workweek checklist: how to start?
Since you’re reading this blog post, I assume that you’re considering the four-day workweek model. By know, you realize that this concept comes with both opportunities and challenges. What’s the optimal way forward? Here’s how you can proceed.
First of all, don’t blindly buy into the hype. You need to keep in mind that, while an excellent option for many teams, the 4day workweek is not a universal solution and not a quick fix. Start by analyzing your organization’s needs and figuring out why you even consider introducing this model. Perhaps your employees express their need for greater flexibility, or maybe you want to tackle your team’s productivity issues. Understanding what and why you want to achieve will help you pick the best way to do that.
If you want to give your workers more time off, but you’re not yet ready for a 4-day week commitment, you could try alternative solutions:
- 9/80 work schedule where employees put in 80 hours into 9 days (usually they work for 9 hours and then take a day off every other week). It’s a less intense compressed workweek, yet it provides people with more time off.
- Seasonal schedules, e.g., “summer Fridays.” You can decide that, for instance, from May to September, your employees are allowed to take half of Fridays (or full Fridays) off. Basecamp has adopted this kind of schedule, and they claim that “Removing a day each week forces you to prioritize the work that really matters, and let the rest go. It’s not about working faster but learning to work smarter. It’s about honing your prioritization, scope hammering and judo skills.”
Make sure to consider legal aspects when picking the best model of a shortened workweek. For example, in some places, people need to get extra compensation when they work more than 8 hours per day.
Take a moment to think about your clients—will they be well-taken care of in the new model? Do you need to plan “customer care shifts” for your employees?
Once you decide on a 4-day workweek model that seems to bode best for your organization, you still need to make sure that your team is ready for a new challenge. Keep in mind that, to maintain a high level of productivity with fewer days, your employees should excel at:
If you don’t feel confident about their skills in these areas, it might be a good time to invest in employee training.
It’s also a great opportunity to discuss optimization ideas with your team. When you have fewer days a week to get the job done, you can’t afford to have operational inefficiencies. It might be the case that your team members notice improvement ideas that you fail to see—give them a chance to speak up.
When introducing a four-day workweek, it’s also critical that you assess your team’s goals. Your employees need to have a clear vision of what they should achieve in order to plan their tasks efficiently and work productively. Otherwise, you shouldn’t count on a miraculous productivity boost from the shortened workweek.
Find a way to measure your team’s performance and track their efforts. Naturally, our recommendation is to use a time tracking tool. With timesheets, you can keep an eye on your team’s workload and see if the condensed week doesn’t translate into overtime for some or all of your team members.
Check our guide to picking the best time tracking software for your company.
How can you tell if the 4-days week mission is a success? One idea would be to use your team’s timesheets and compare estimates with actuals (planned hours with tracked hours). Teamdeck, a complete resource management tool, allows you to generate a similar report: