How soon do you think this will be here?
Grace and I were having a conversation about that actual subject last weekend.
At the moment, in my mind, this is one of those projects which is swirling about like a coloured gas yet to take form so that we can actually implement something which is truly remarkable and innovative (although we’ll definitely not be the first).
How do you implement a 4-day week in dentistry when patients are scheduled for appointments and when you have to fill surgeries and people can't work from home to do composites or root canals?
The answer is actually quite simple, but first of all, you have to go back to other industries.
On riding our bikes last weekend with a group of Sunday cyclists that I ride with, several of them work for the same architecture firm.
They were complaining now that everybody has to come back into the office and are effectively being forced into the office, even though many are only working one day a week at home.
One of their colleagues had gone to the bosses this week to say, ‘I've been offered this job for this much money for 4-days a week, I'll leave that with you’.
What are you going to do about it?
It's one thing to want the business to be the way you want it to be, but it's another when everybody is leaving because the options are better elsewhere.
Architecture is classically the type of business that could work as a ROWE (results only work environment).
In a ROWE, in its truest sense, people congregate on a Monday morning and agree that this is the work that's to be done this week.
It doesn't matter how long it takes; it just gets done (you can't overset it deliberately).
It means if people work effectively and finish by Wednesday, they're finished, and that is a true ROWE environment.
The 4-day week foils off the ROWE environment.
So, in our business, if we wanted to move to 4 days, it would just mean that we would have to increase our spend on our human resources budget (staff allocation) by 20%.
That would give us enough staff to cover five days on a 4-day rota week.
If we did that and gave a 4-day week to our guys (for the same salary as they currently get for a five), do you think they would be better or worse than they are on a 5-day week?
Do you think they would be grateful and loyal?
Do you think we would be able to be effective and efficient?
Is it conceivable that we could increase our turnover by greater than 20%?
If it did, then we would have won.
Healthier team, happier team, healthier balance sheet, healthier PnL.
I think they're not so far away from this now, and when it tips, everybody will have to do it, because why would you work 5-days a week when somebody else will let you work 4 for the same money?
Blog Post Number - 3368
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