Tried a 4-day work week for 3 months and productivity actually dropped 15%

I run a small marketing agency in Austin with 12 people. Back in January I read all these articles about how 4-day weeks boost output. So we switched from Mon-Fri to Tue-Fri, 10 hour days. Thought it would be great. Three months in and our project completion rate fell off a cliff. Clients were waiting longer for deliverables. My account manager pulled me aside and said "people are burning out on those long days and losing Fridays for client calls." We're back to 5 days now but with a flexible start time instead. Has anyone else found a middle ground that actually works?

2 comments

2 Comments

finley7771mo ago

Did you actually shorten the days to 10 hours or try 8 hour days? That's a common mistake I see people make, they try to cram five days of work into four longer days and it just wears everyone out. The real studies on this usually keep the total hours the same, like 32 hours a week not 40.

jamieperez1mo ago

Did you ever see that one study they did in Sweden a few years back? I heard about it from a guy at the register who swore it cut down on burnout, but then he said they had to keep training people on the new schedule every couple months because nobody could stick to it. Look @finley777, I get your point about keeping total hours the same being better, but honestly the real world messes it up. My buddy's warehouse tried the 32 hour thing and it just meant everyone worked the same amount because the work never stopped piling up. You end up with the same stress, just less pay.