On November 7 – five months into the six-month pilot – group managing director Denis Moriarty told the firm’s 80 staff the shift to a four-day week would be permanent.
Orgil Tumurbaatar,a data analyst,is able to spend Fridays with his children now that Our Community has moved to a four-day week.Simon Schluter
The all-staff meeting at the North Melbourne office erupted in cheers.
Our Community is part of the Australasian pilot of the world’s largest trial of the four-day working week,where employees get an extra day off a week with no loss of pay.
The pilot,run by the not-for-profit,is based on the 100:80:100 model – workers get 100 per cent of the pay for 80 per cent of the time at 100 per cent productivity.
This week,Unilever Australia – which makes toiletries including Rexona,Dove and Sunsilk,as well as Streets ice-creams – also began a separate based on the 100:80:100 model.
This follows a successful 18-month trial in Unilever’s New Zealand operations,which led to revenue growth,absenteeism dropping 34 per cent,stress dropping 33 per cent,and feelings of strength and vigour at work increasing by 15 per cent.
Our Community – a software company that provides training and resources to not-for-profits and the government – introduced new workplace practices to make up for the reduction in days.
There are now fewer emails,fewer and shorter meetings,and staff are encouraged to take non-urgent medical appointments on their days off. Non-essential services – such as a jobs website,which wasn’t a market leader – were axed.
Our Community group managing director Denis Moriarty (right) and partner Brendan Shanahan (left) with their son John Nguyen at home.Eddie Jim
“There’s not an exact science of measuring productivity,but my sense is we’re getting more in four days than what we got in five days,” Moriarty said.
Sick leave had dropped 36.5 per cent in the past 5½ months. “People are more energised,they’re more rested. There are no clients that are unhappy. We’re answering phones,we’re getting back to people within the critical times that we had to. It’s been absolutely – not surprising – amazing.”
Orgil Tumurbaatar,a data analyst at Our Community,initially wondered how he could fit his workload into four days,especially because he works with outside clients.
“I try to spend my time as efficiently as possible,like making a schedule for daily tasks and reducing the time spent on unimportant things,” Tumurbaatar said.
I would never go back to five days if I could help it.
Stef Ball
Although he occasionally has to work a couple of hours on his day off,Tumurbaatar said he was now able to spend Fridays with his youngest daughter and then pick up his two older children from school.
This frees up his wife to do more work as a Mongolian language producer for SBS,swim and meet her friends.
Stef Ball,who manages Our Community’s funding centre database,said she worked with developers to automate some tasks. Staff also did a chronotype workshop to determine what time of day they were most productive.
“The appeal of having the Friday off is motivation enough to be like,‘get off your phone,stop being distracted,get these tasks done’,” Ball said.
Stef Ball is able to spend more time practising yoga after her company moved to a four-day week.Wayne Taylor
She uses her Fridays to practise yoga,catch up with friends,call her family and complete life administration tasks.
“I would never go back to five days if I could help it,” she said.
The push to shorten the working week is gaining steam.
Last month,as part of the state election campaign,the Victorian Greens to support public service workers and private businesses to transition to a four-day working week.
Both major parties have quashed union calls to allow some Victorian public servants to work a four-day week.
Victorian Reason Party MP Fiona Patten has also called for a trial in the public service.
And Victorian Labor would examine the merits of a four-day working week,according to a manifesto,which forms a set of guiding principles for the party but does not always materialise in government policy.
Professor John Quiggin,an economics professor at the University of Queensland,is one of the academics who will examine the experience of workers in the 30 companies involved in the Australasian trial of the four-day week.
Quiggin said,while he didn’t think all organisations would be able to maintain or exceed productivity when working a four-day week,many workers would prefer more leisure time and flexibility than wage increases.
“I see the four-day week as something whose time has come,” he said. “It is long overdue to have a reduction in standard working hours and the four-day week is a simple and dramatic way of organising that.”
“The pandemic had that direct effect of people rethinking their own lives and saying ‘things don’t have to be the way they are’.”
The pilot,which will conclude in January,coincides with similar trials in Ireland,the United States,Canada,Spain and the UK.
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