4-day working week in the UK: 89% of companies maintain their practices after the trial | The future of work

He trampled 61 British companies Who participated in the six-month pilot program in 2022 to test working hours of at least four days a week 54 (89%) stated that the policy was still in effectThis is according to a new report he published CNBC. In addition to, 31 (51%) said they had changed permanently For a four-day-a-week work schedule.

Participating companies were invited to participate in a follow-up study one year into the project. The findings were published by a think tank independenceIt showed that all project managers and CEOs surveyed said the four-day week had had a positive impact on their organisations, with more than half (55%) describing the impact as “very positive”.

Furthermore, 82% of companies consulted reported positive impacts on employee wellbeing, while 50% recorded positive impacts on reducing staff turnover, and nearly a third (32%) said the policy had clearly improved recruitment. .

Juliet Shore, the report's author and a professor of sociology at Boston College, called the findings “excellent” and said the results showed that the positive effects of shorter work hours were real and lasting.

“Overall results were maintained and, in some cases, continued to improve. Physical and mental health and work-life balance became much better than they had been at six months. Improvements continued in burnout and life satisfaction. Job satisfaction and sleep problems decreased,” Schorr said in a statement. “To some extent, but most of the original improvement remains.”

However, the report concluded that there were still some interesting points in the new policy. For example, four-day workweek models that were highly conditional on achieving certain goals resulted in employees experiencing additional stress around meeting deadlines, resentment toward others, and feelings of inequality among employees based on the nature of their role.

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