The 6-month pilot enlisted over 60 firms and slightly below 3,000 to suggestions on the “100:80:100” working mannequin: 100% pay for 80% of the time, in alternate for 100% productiveness – and it has been hailed a serious breakthrough.

The findings – which will probably be offered to the federal government, as campaigners urge lawmakers to offer each British employee a 32-hour working week – embrace a 65% discount within the variety of sick days, maintained or improved productiveness at most companies, and a 57% decline within the chance that an worker would stop, dramatically enhancing job retention.

The outcomes even discovered that lowering workers’ working hours had a optimistic affect on the underside line.

Firm income elevated barely by 1.4% on common over the trial interval, and by a a lot greater 35% when in comparison with the identical six-month interval in 2021.

It’s no shock that 92% of the businesses that took half within the scheme, starting from native fish and chips retailers to giant firms, have determined to proceed with the four-day week. 

Joe Ryle, director of the 4-Day Week Marketing campaign, described the outcomes as a “main breakthrough second”.

“Throughout all kinds of various sectors of the financial system, these unimaginable outcomes present that the four-day week with no lack of pay actually works,” he stated whereas including: “Certainly the time has now come to start rolling it out throughout the nation.”

However an employment lawyer has warned Fortune that “there are a lot of practicalities for a enterprise to think about”, in the meantime CEOs cautioned that “firms shouldn’t implement a drastic work change blindly” and that working fewer days, with the identical expectations might result in anxiousness amongst staff.

Don’t bounce on the pattern evenly

Though for probably the most half, workers reported a rise of their well-being and work-life steadiness, for a small minority of workers this was not the case. 

“Similar to any change, it can swimsuit some and alienate others, and the fact could also be that the construction doesn’t swimsuit each worker or enterprise mannequin,” Pierre Lindmark, Founder and CEO at administration consultancy Winningtemp says. “The reality is that the four-day working week isn’t for everybody.”

He warns that “one much less day at work might result in elevated anxiousness and isolation as the results of having the identical quantity of labor to do, however much less time to get it accomplished.”

Employment lawyer, Charlotte Morris, echoes that the 6-month trial merely isn’t lengthy sufficient to measure the long-term implications of a shorter working week.

“Companies could possibly maintain it for 12 months however not for 5 or ten years, and, on the flip facet, the optimistic affect that improved worker wellbeing can have will probably be greatest seen when you may evaluate employees absence, illness charges and burnout over years,” she warns. 

“Subsequently, outcomes have to be taken with a level of warning and so they is probably not adequate sufficient for us to see a seismic shift to a four-day week by companies.”

Ben Thompson, CEO of HR providers Employment Hero can be taking the “spectacular” outcomes with a pinch of salt, as a result of though the employers within the trial had been cross-sector, “all of them needed to choose into the trial – that means they had been considerably invested within the scheme working”.

“Some companies, significantly those who work together with different companies in real-time, might discover actual problem in simply taking at some point off,” he provides.

Issues when implementing a four-day week

“It could appear apparent, however firms shouldn’t implement a drastic work change blindly simply because a pattern is gaining traction,” Lindmark provides.

As an alternative, companies ought to take a thought of strategy to launching a 3-day weekend at their agency, with their workers on the coronary heart of their decision-making. 

“Organisations should seek the advice of their workforce earlier than drastic adjustments to working practices, because it’s doubtless that even workers in favor of the transition could have key inquiries to be answered,” he advises.

There are additionally a number of practicalities that companies want to think about when altering their working mannequin. 

“Companies can’t merely change an individual’s contractual phrases unilaterally,” lawyer Morris warns. 

Earlier than making any everlasting adjustments, she advises companies to trial a shorter week and “that the execution of the trial have to be well-advised”.

“It have to be clear that it’s a trial that is probably not applied completely and contractual agreements or proof of worker settlement to this can be required so you may revert again to a five-day week do you have to want to,” she provides.

Plus there will probably be an abundance of contractual adjustments that have to be made with worker buy-in, resembling what occurs with part-time staff who already work a brief week, which day staff will probably be “off” and the way vacation pay entitlement is calculated.

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