The four-day work week

每周工作四天

On the 5th day errands

周五的差事

A pilot scheme to compress the working week holds wider lessons

压缩一周工作日的试点计划具有更广泛的经验

 

1 IF LIZ TRUSS can compress a whole premiership into seven weeks, why can’t a standard working week be squashed into something more compact? A six-month pilot scheme, in which around 3,300 workers from 70 companies are testing out a four-day workweek, is due to conclude this month. Proponents say a shorter week delivers a better work-life balance without hurting overall output. Like previous such experiments, it is likely to be hailed a success. A mid-point survey by the trial’s organisers—researchers at the universities of Oxford and Cambridge and Boston College, the 4 Day Week Campaign, a non-profit, and Autonomy, a British think-tank—found that the transition had worked well for 88% of surveyed companies.

 

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如果利兹·特拉斯可以将整个首相任期压缩为七周，那么为什么不能把标准工作周压缩的更为紧凑？一项为期六个月的试点计划将于本月结束，来自70家公司约3300名员工将实验每周工作四天。计划支持者表示，缩短一周的工作时间可以在不影响整体产出的情况下劳逸结合。与之前此类实验的一样，它很可能会获得人们的赞扬。这项试验的组织者包括牛津大学、剑桥大学和波士顿学院的研究人员、非营利组织“四天工作制运动”以及英国智库Autonomy。调查发现，88%的受访公司转型效果良好。

 

2 Sceptics might observe that the companies involved are self-selecting. Roughly one in five employers who had signed up dropped out before the pilot began, according to the 4 Day Week Campaign. Most of the participants that remain are smaller companies, many of them agencies specialising in management and technology. They also include charities.

 

怀疑者观察到参与实验的功公司在自我筛选。根据“四天工作制运动”报告，大约五分之一的雇主在试点开始前就退出了。剩下中的大多数是小公司，其中许多专门从事管理和技术，还包括慈善机构。

 

3 But the scheme holds useful lessons about productivity. In particular a four-day week forces firms to think harder about time management. Most businesses in the trial have encouraged employees to leave meetings when they are not contributing, and to be more selective about accepting invitations. Daryl Hine of Stellar, an asset-management company in London, calls this a “diary detox”. This also extends to reducing commutes.

 

但该计划还是提供了有关生产力的经验。特别是四天工作制迫使公司更加努力地思考时间管理问题。试验中的大多数企业都鼓励员工在没有意见的情况下离开会议，并在接受邀请时更加谨慎。伦敦资产管理公司Stellar的Daryl Hine被称为“排毒日记”。该计划也延伸到减少工作通勤。

 

4 Of the participating organisations, 46% reported maintaining overall output at the same level, and 49% said it had improved. The trial’s largest company, Outcomes First Group, a children’s education and care provider, tracks indicators for its 1,027 participating employees. Its HR department has goals for response time to emails; IT staff are given so-called net promoter scores, which track how colleagues rate their services. On both counts, they have made “rare” leaps, says Sharon Platts, the company’s chief people officer. Participants say that their employees feel more motivated. Plenty use the extra day to get errands out of the way before the weekend.

 

在参与的组织中，46%的组织总体产出保持在同一水平，49%的组织表示有所提高。这项试验中最大的公司Outcomes First Group专门从事儿童教育和护理，该公司为1027名参与试验的员工跟踪实验指标。其人力资源部有电子邮件回复时间的指标；IT员工有所谓的净推荐值，该分数会跟踪用户对其服务的评价。公司首席人事官Sharon Platts表示，在这两方面，他们都取得了“罕见”的飞跃。参与者表示，他们的员工感到更有动力。很多人赶在周末前利用额外的一天时间完成生活中的差事。

 

Becoming a four-day operation can be hard in a five-day world, however. Bookishly, an online shop, chose Wednesdays off to avoid having three days in a row when packages are not mailed out; people are warned about the new schedule before they order. But customers are not always prepared to wait, so most firms in the scheme have tried to spread staff more thinly. Platten’s, a fish-and-chip shop in Norfolk, gives its 50-or-so employees two days on and two days off to cover the week. Shifts overlap at busy periods, but organising training and team events has become trickier as a result.

 

然而，在一个五天工作制的世界里，要完成一个为期四天的实验可能会很难。Bookingly是一家网上商店，它们选择在周三休息，以避免连续三天没有包裹寄出；人们在下单前会被告知新的工作时间表。但客户并不总是习惯等待，因此该计划中的大多数公司都试图将员工日程分布得更稀疏。诺福克的一家炸鱼薯条店Platten's为其50名左右的员工提供两天的工作时间和两天的休息时间。在繁忙时期，班次会重叠。因此，组织训练和团队活动将变得更加棘手。

 

6 More tests are on the horizon. In January South Cambridgeshire District Council will become the first British local authority to try out a four-day week. The lessons learned are likely to be valuable even if the idea does not spread. Mr Hine says that if performance slips, “gift days” will be rolled back. In busier periods employees may need to come in more. But in one way or another, he says, a slimmer work schedule is “here to stay”.

 

更多的测试即将到来。今年1月，南剑桥郡区议会将成为第一个试行四天工作制的英国地方当局。即使这一想法没有传播开来，所吸取的经验教训也可能很有价值。Hine先生表示，如果业绩下滑，“礼物日”（指周五放假）将被取消。在更繁忙的时候，员工可能需要更多的时间。但在某种程度上，他说，一个更精简的工作日程将被“多数人接受”。