We're now in the sixth week of our four-day week trial - here's an update:

Cons of working a four day week so far;

• Working more efficiently over four days has continued to feel full-on, fast and busy, but we're definitely getting used to it, and some of us are even preferring that way of working.?It can be more rewarding and exciting being fast-paced and challenging yourself to get things over the line quicker, but at other times you feel like you don’t have enough time, and it can also feel overwhelming.
• We’re all feeling more tired Monday - Thursday because of the change in pace, but team members admitted they don’t mind pushing themselves harder because of being rewarded with a three day weekend.
• One of the changes we made when moving to a four-day week was changing our working hours from 9am - 5pm with an hour's lunch break to 9am - 5.30pm with half an hour's lunch break.?An extra 30 minutes at the end of the day may not sound a lot, but it’s taken a while to adapt. The extra half an hour means we’ve had to get used to a new routine that impacts our families. Fortunately, we’ve kept flexi-time which has helped - our core hours are 9.30am - 4.30pm, which means if team members need to leave early, they can come in earlier to make up the time.
• Having just half an hour for lunch absolutely flies by and sometimes doesn’t feel like enough time and means if you need to pop out to buy lunch, you hardly have enough time left over to eat. If team members want an hour and a half for lunch, they need to make up the time during the week. So it’s not a challenge per se - it’s just taking a little getting used to.
• Arranging for repairs/inspections at the office can be more challenging. We’ve noticed a trend in contractors wanting to come in on a Friday. Most are very understanding when we explain we’re trialling a four day week, and lots have joked with us, asking if we have any vacancies.?

Pros of working a four day week so far;?

• So team members don't have to worry about popping out at lunchtime to buy food, our founder Ed has announced a permanent free supply of food will be available for breakfast and lunch here at the office. His decision was partly based on us working four days a week and having less time to pop out to buy food.?However, his main reason was that he wanted to help the team with the cost of living crisis that’s about to hit us all hard. From April, the team will see their national insurance hiked, energy bills doubling, fuel prices hiked, council tax increases, all other household bills like broadband, water and mobile all creeping up a few pounds a month.??The time and cost of supplying free food to the team as a business is relatively small. It only takes one person less than half an hour to order a large food shop once a week, taking into account the team's preferences and dietary requirements and then the food is delivered directly to the office door.?But the impact on the teams' personal finances and time is huge. It removes the time taken to go out and buy food; it means people don’t have to rush to have breakfast before they come to the office and financially feels like a pay rise because of the savings not having to buy food (which is creeping up in price by the week).
• This isn’t related to working four days a week, but our CEO Ed has also announced that every team member will be given a ￡1500 pay increase, regardless of salary, from the 1st of April in a small attempt to help with the cost of living crisis. In the email circulated to the team, his exact words were;

“There will be no disproportionate personal income increases across the board for all staff, including for directors and shareholders during this time of uncertainty. This isn’t the time for a few to prosper while others feel the pinch - let’s get through this together”.

(Now if that isn’t the words of a true leader, I don’t know what is…)

• Two of our existing clients whose contracts were coming to an end last week renewed with us and asked for more services, despite knowing we work a four day week.
• Our three team members, who are Dads, are really enjoy spending more time with their children on a Friday.
• Arranging personal appointments for things like haircuts, beauty treatments, and sight tests is so much easier because we’re not competing against all the other Mon-Fri workers in the area for a Saturday slot.
• The team feels like they can organise their lives a lot better and see more family, especially older relatives, which they couldn’t do as much before because the weekend was full of doing things with the children.
• We’ve all collectively noticed Fridays are very quiet on work emails and calls anyway. In our industry, at least it would appear Friday is the day people take their foot off the gas, so we haven’t needed to respond to queries on Fridays like we’d prepared to do.
• We had a new starter this week, and this was what he said about the fact he’s entering into a business that works four days per week;

“For me so far, without sounding dramatic, it's life-changing. Going from 60 hour weeks working most evenings and weekends to 32 hours means I can take my children to school and be at home every night to help with homework and the bedtime routine. Having a three day weekend means I can get any appointments/admin tasks for home done on a Friday leaving me free to focus my attention on my children and planning family outings at the weekends. I feel more motivated Mon-Thurs because I know by Tuesday I only have two more days left at work”.

• Our CTO has two kids in secondary school. He made the point that he has more time to spend with his wife on a Friday while the kids are still at school - he explained it’s a rarity for the two of them to have any time alone without the children, and it’s nice to have that time together.??

#fourdayworkweek #fourdayweek