Four Day Week? | Page 3 | Vital Football

Four Day Week?

The Fear said:
at the very least, people could be able to leave work on a Friday at midday, and maybe stop the rat race of a Monday morning and let them get into the office at midday!
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During my last 4 years at work, I was the only person left in the office on Friday afternoon as everyone else went at 12. I had to stay until 3.30 all because they treat contractors like dirt. Nothing I could do except drink coffee and surf the net and all my lads on the shop floor had gone home.
So I'm sitting there breaking H and S laws on lone working on the off chance someone might pop in and find the workshop empty. Total madness but it earnt me an extra 3 hours pay. Heating/air con and lights on etc and stuck in the Friday rush on the way home
 
Villan57 said:
During my last 4 years at work, I was the only person left in the office on Friday afternoon as everyone else went at 12. I had to stay until 3.30 all because they treat contractors like dirt. Nothing I could do except drink coffee and surf the net and all my lads on the shop floor had gone home.
So I'm sitting there breaking H and S laws on lone working on the off chance someone might pop in and find the workshop empty. Total madness but it earnt me an extra 3 hours pay. Heating/air con and lights on etc and stuck in the Friday rush on the way home
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Surely as a contractor you were getting a significant hourly rate to sit there and do nothing though?
 
In " the good old days" nobody cared what hours I worked so long as my sales target was hit, and customers were happy. That didn't take all week, so plenty of fishing got done, and golf got played. I had the factory experience as a toolmaker/ fitter, and it drove me mad being in one place, great if you like it, not so great if you don't.
Done both, the former for five years, the later for thirty, and I know which I preferred.
 
The Fear said:
at the very least, people could be able to leave work on a Friday at midday, and maybe stop the rat race of a Monday morning and let them get into the office at midday!
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My minimum requirement would be to help eliminate rush hour, by expanding flexible hours. I know some place need to be open 9 to 5, but most can offer flexible hours like 7 to 3 and 11 to 7. this gives wider opening hours and spreads traffic out over a wider slot.
 
I work in an industry where very few people do a full day on a Friday. However I once had a lady boss who didn't accept this. Her great idea was to get me to go to head office on a Friday and work from there. As the office was almost a 3 hour drive, factor in Friday traffic and I was getting back home at 9 pm.

Needless to say, I ended up telling her where she could stick her job.
 
HeathfieldRoad1874 said:
My minimum requirement would be to help eliminate rush hour, by expanding flexible hours. I know some place need to be open 9 to 5, but most can offer flexible hours like 7 to 3 and 11 to 7. this gives wider opening hours and spreads traffic out over a wider slot.
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The annoying thing about flexible hours is even though we have that you still get shit for not being in before 9 am even though we have an 8-10 window on paper. Or there is the other annoying thing that happened to a chap I worked with in the UK. He came in at 7:30 and left at like 3:30 or 4 so he could pick up his kid. He still got shit about not doing his hours or leaving early, the man was in 1.5hrs before everyone else.

Unfortunately, these things make their way to management and unless you have a proper boss who will fight for you you're fucked. Office environments are so bizarre and unnatural, perception is all that matters and the truth only matters if your boss is intelligent which is honestly only like 20% of bosses.

Also COVID has thought us that cities have the power to make changes like that themselves if they really want. In the initial phases of COVID NYC contacted all the major employers of the city and had them switch to A teams and B teams and they were to alternate work schedules. One team would come in one week and then the other would come in the following week.
 
CDX_EIRE said:
The annoying thing about flexible hours is even though we have that you still get shit for not being in before 9 am even though we have an 8-10 window on paper. Or there is the other annoying thing that happened to a chap I worked with in the UK. He came in at 7:30 and left at like 3:30 or 4 so he could pick up his kid. He still got shit about not doing his hours or leaving early, the man was in 1.5hrs before everyone else.

Unfortunately, these things make their way to management and unless you have a proper boss who will fight for you you're fucked. Office environments are so bizarre and unnatural, perception is all that matters and the truth only matters if your boss is intelligent which is honestly only like 20% of bosses.

Also COVID has thought us that cities have the power to make changes like that themselves if they really want. In the initial phases of COVID NYC contacted all the major employers of the city and had them switch to A teams and B teams and they were to alternate work schedules. One team would come in one week and then the other would come in the following week.
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Yes, I faced this most of my working life. Even when I was boss, the office would bitch about me when I was gone (I had my spies).

I desperately tried to encourage others to do the same as me, but the resistance was massive. I was rather hoping Covid had changed attitudes.
 
Pangloss said:
I've been to the office three times in two and half years, I don't miss it.
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Glad to hear it. Even if it's just from a climate change position, it is massive. Never mind the quality of life must be so much better.

My sister went from a 40 minute drive each way, 5 days a week, to working from home during Covid. They have now moved to smaller offices, and everyone goes in one day a week, which she looks forward to. It's such a huge change to her life, and she loves it.

I do think we need to value productivity over time working more. I always worked fast, so was it fair I was expected to do twice as much? Of course not.
 
Fantastic idea for me although I guess it wont suit all industries. Travel and Tourism would certainly see a boom as it would make weekend trips away even more appealing having that extra day. I could see it being an issue with schools though. I'm sure teachers would be expecting the same 4 days, which then increases childcare costs for those in industries that cant reduce days
 
garygaryshaw said:
Fantastic idea for me although I guess it wont suit all industries. Travel and Tourism would certainly see a boom as it would make weekend trips away even more appealing having that extra day. I could see it being an issue with schools though. I'm sure teachers would be expecting the same 4 days, which then increases childcare costs for those in industries that cant reduce days
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It would be an opportunity to rethink things. Is a five day school week really optimal? No one really knows the answer.
 
Pangloss said:
It would be an opportunity to rethink things. Is a five day school week really optimal? No one really knows the answer.
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"Nope business as usual thanks, this is how we've always done things". Just the worst attitude imaginable.

In the states they have kids in school as early as 7:30 and they dont get the lengthy summer breaks we give them over here either. The one nice thing they have is better summer camps but other than that it seems pretty horrible. All revolving around work and the parents I am sure.
 
The Fear said:
at the very least, people could be able to leave work on a Friday at midday, and maybe stop the rat race of a Monday morning and let them get into the office at midday!
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This is where I stand on it (sort of). I work with a customer who has a 4 day week system, and the Buyer on the other side of the fence was saying he is going to work tomorrow - his day off.

I think too many companies would see it as too big a risk and a jump to move to a 4 day week, rightly or wrongly. I also think there are nuances when you have different types of workers, at my company it’s office based or in the factory, where we are running the production lines 6 days per week and so shifts needs to be managed.

I would like to see - in the interim - a reduction in the working week of 4 hours per week as standard.

That way, I can leave early on a Friday, or I can rock up at midday on a Monday say after a long weekend. I might want to log off on a Wednesday to go to the gym or play tennis with a mate, or go in late Thursday because the kids have got something on at school I need to go to.

I don’t trust my company to reduce the workload I am doing to fit a four day week just yet, but I think most people could quite quickly become more productive with a 4 hour less working week.
 
Pre pandemic at my old place of work we had a very flexible work schedule , as long as you were getting your job done it really didn't matter where you were. Then after the pandemic HR decided they needed to formally launch a "flexible" working policy which became so rigid in terms of you WILL be in the office 2 days a week and a whole set of rules around the other 3 days. Needless to say I wasn't having that and now work elsewhere with a very flexible policy.
 
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