In theory, it sounds simple enough—work one day less a week, put in the same amount of effort and get the same pay. The concept of a four-day workweek is gaining momentum as the world emerges from the restrictions and lockdowns of the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to the lead story in yesterday’s Business Guardian, this reduction in the number of working days is being considered by some local companies and overtures have been made to 4 Day Week Global, the not-for-profit body that has been promoting the idea as part of the future of work.
The aim is to transform the productivity culture in the workplace so that there is no loss of revenue, but employees can take time off without losing pay.
The biggest trial of the concept is set to take place in the United Kingdom from this coming June to January 2023. It involves 60 companies and is being organised by 4 Day Week Global, along with the think tank Autonomy, the 4 Day Week Campaign and researchers at Cambridge University, Oxford University and Boston College, who will be collecting and analysing the results.
It follows a study done in Reykjavík, Iceland, in 2015 and 2016, involving more than 2,500 workers who reported being less stressed and said there were no negative effects on productivity or services. By last year, 86 per cent of workers in Iceland were either working shorter weeks or had contracts that enabled them to reduce their hours.
The pandemic may be accelerating this change in the world of work but changes to the work week are not new. Before 1926, when the Ford Motor Company introduced Monday-to-Friday work and it became the norm around the world, people worked for six days and only got Sundays off.
However, as enticing as a shorter work week seems, in the T&T scenario, calculating how five days’ worth of work can be compressed into four is likely to be complicated by this country’s very blemished record on productivity and work ethics.
Statistics from the Planning Ministry show that annual growth rates for productivity have slowed and even declined in recent years.
Getting more work in fewer days is made more difficult by the number of official public holidays in the calendar year, which means paid time-off for most workers and overtime if they work on those days.
There are about 14 official national public holidays in the year and although Carnival Monday and Tuesday are not official public holidays, most businesses close on those days.
But there is no avoiding the fact that COVID-19 has brought about changes in work and it will not be a major surprise if a shorter workweek is among the proposals on the bargaining table in the negotiations between the Chief Personnel Officer (CPO) and various public sector unions.
The outcome of these negotiations could set a precedent for collective agreements in other sectors, so it would be useful if, in addition to increased wages and improved terms and conditions of work, ways of boosting productivity are discussed.
If T&T manages to attain the elusive goal of increased productivity, the path to economic diversification will be easier.