The arguments in favor of a shorter working day

Concern about the well-being of professionals and the productivity of companies during the pandemic has led some employers to test new work formats.

Much has been said about the four-day week. Turns out, three-day weekends are great, but condensing five workdays into four can be stressful for some workers and their employers — or even unfeasible.

But there may be alternatives. Some organizational psychologists are suggesting shortening the length of the workday.

Working for less time—six hours instead of eight, for example—can be a practical solution for a greater number of companies and also greatly improve the lives of professionals.

“There are companies that really need to be available five days a week,” says Celeste Headlee, author of Do Nothing: How to Break Away from Overworking, Overdoing and Underliving. minus”, in free translation). “And for those companies, it may be easier and more convenient to cut the workday.”

In theory, the shorter workday might seem fanciful — after all, employers want employees to work as long as possible, and “the idea of ​​the eight-hour day is very ingrained in industrial society,” says Headlee.

But there are powerful arguments in defense of the shorter working day, which involve greater well-being of professionals and possible increased productivity. It may be that, contrary to ingrained norms, employees will be able to work with more concentration if they go home earlier.

‘It is beneficial to set priorities’

Eight-hour workdays are the norm in many industries, and it’s hard to shake that structure, says Adam Grant, a professor of Organizational Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania in the United States.

“People often consider the pattern they were raised to be immutable. Everyone they know worked five days a week, eight hours a day. It seems inevitable.”

Employers also help to perpetuate this framework, according to Grant. “Instead of measuring results, it’s simpler to count the number of hours worked, considering that the more the better. It’s a premise that needs to be broken.”

Headlee agrees that the eight-hour journey is not the best format for professionals.

“Cognitively, we actually have a limited amount of hours of concentration per day,” she says. “When you try to force your brain to focus outside that window, you will actually see the results diminish, culminating in burnout. You end up making more mistakes, your ability to innovate decreases, and that makes you less efficient.”

Studies show that working longer is not necessarily correlated with higher productivity. A survey by Stanford University, in the United States, indicated that the income of professionals begins to show strong drops after about 48 hours a week.

Other experts indicate that the ideal number of hours can be even less, depending on the type of work. Some calculate up to 35 hours a week, or six hours a day. Norway and Denmark have workweeks of less than 40 hours and are among the most productive countries in the world.

After all, employees need breaks, which means that even the most productive professionals are not always focused on their tasks. A survey of around 2,000 UK workers found that, on average, people only feel that they are truly productive for around half of the workday.

Therefore, the reduction of the journey can motivate them to expand this window. By working fewer hours, instead of combining work and breaks, professionals can be even more productive.

Improved morale and physical health, as a result of a better balance between personal and professional life, can also increase productivity.

This is what happened to nurses at a nursing home in Sweden, where an experiment reduced the working day to six hours for two years. Nurses reported that they were happier and took less sick leave, which allowed them to organize 85% more activities with residents.

Grant says it makes sense that a condensed work schedule results in increased productivity.

“It’s beneficial to set priorities,” he said. “When you have less time, you start to focus on what really matters. This can make managers distribute less workload and have fewer unimportant meetings.”

The result is that the efficiency of many professionals can increase, with fewer errors. “In a world where we can all get distracted by a series of priorities, the shortest workday is more likely to be a real workday, as opposed to a workday with more of a host of other things in mind. “, says Grant.

“If you think of hospitals or people who work in software engineering or accounting, for example, where attention to detail is important, I would also expect a shorter workday to reduce errors.”

Potential pitfalls

Even with the clear benefits of reducing the daily workday, Grant points out that this does not mean that everything will work out.

First, there is no guarantee that everyone will be equally productive during a shorter journey, especially those less committed. But if people really shirk their responsibilities, “it’s a mismanagement,” says Grant.

“If you can’t trust your work team to be productive by doing a little less work, you’ve failed — whether hiring, designing the work, or leading.”

The shorter workday can also complicate matters for multinationals in some industries, according to Headlee. For them, the reduction of working hours can reduce the coverage of different time zones.

In addition, there may be unseen costs for employers. In the Swedish study, for example, the nursing home needed to hire more nurses to compensate for the reduced hours.

But it is important to note that 24/7 companies, such as in the healthcare sector, already need to have more employees, so the impacts on their costs may be different than in companies in the knowledge sector, for example.

But perhaps most important is the risk that shortening the workday does not change the number of hours worked much. As with eight-hour shifts, employees can continue to go beyond normal hours.

In other words, according to Headlee, if companies let people leave early, it’s important to make sure they’re not actually working overtime, as is the norm in many jobs.

Dream or reality?

Despite the disadvantages, the reduction of the daily journey may now be closer to reality.

With the pandemic, some employers are rethinking — and even questioning — working conditions. Many companies have decided to offer new standards, such as remote work, where they can’t necessarily look at productivity in the same way.

And the four-day workweek is another particularly significant development. While it has not yet been widely adopted—it is still being tested in many countries and companies—it has become an increasingly popular discussion.

The four-day week isn’t ideal for everyone either. For companies that are reluctant to close for one more day each week, shorter workdays can be “sold more easily,” in the words of Adam Grant.

He adds that there is a specific group of professionals that would certainly benefit greatly: employees with children. Grant believes that in much of the world, the workday that ends in the late afternoon is problematic.

“The chaos it causes for parents trying to care for children should not be underestimated. It is one of the most stressful and challenging experiences people have in their professional lives and there is now a great opportunity to try to create a better alignment,” he points out.

It is not yet known how many companies believe that reducing working hours is feasible. But for those who make the switch, Grant says they will see the benefits very quickly.

“Most people who can work a shorter working day will find this opportunity a huge benefit. They will be grateful for it. There will be more loyalty. And their motivation will increase. They will work harder and better in the time they have.” “

This text was originally published here.