5 ms·

> There has been no drop in productivity. As in, your output is the same as with a 5 day work week? So essentially a 20% pay cut per unit of work performed?

Closi 6y ago
Out of interest, do you have permanent employment and get paid based on unit of work performed?
- foobiekr 6y ago
  Realistically, all full time employees are paid per work unit. Those who don't deliver the required work units in that time period are eventually managed out.
  - Closi 6y ago
    And those who deliver more work units are paid more, exactly in line with the number of work units performed?
GordonS 6y ago
Well, I work 7.5h per day, so if one "unit" is 1 hour, yes.
- 0xffff2 6y ago
  One unit of work independent of time taken. When you say "no drop in productivity", do you mean you do the same amount of work in 4 days now instead of 5, or that you do 80% of the work you used to do?
  - GordonS 6y ago
    I mean I get the same amount of work done in 4 days that I used to get done in 5. Perhaps Parkinson's law in action: 'work expands to fill available time'.
    - Moodles 6y ago
      Shame you couldn't just do 4 days worth of work and play hooky on the 5th day?
      - bobthepanda 6y ago
        Hooky isn't ironclad though; you can be called out of slacking at any time if you're supposed to be on the clock, so it's not quite the same.
        nightski 6y ago
        This is why I cut out all the political BS and just became a consultant a decade ago. Then you can cut hours and increase your hourly rate to accommodate. Funny enough companies are just fine with paying it.
        ghaff 6y ago
        At a minimum, you need to be reachable and possibly attend meetings. Even if I'm taking a day somewhat easy and running some errands, I'm not going to head off for some 4 hour hike.
    - korse 6y ago
      This confuses me... If I get paid less to work less hours, I expect that I need to complete proportionately less. Working 4/5 of a standard week and getting paid 4/5 of standard salary would not be a win for me unless I only needed to complete 4/5 as much work. This does not sound like winning.
      - pc86 6y ago
        If your goal to provide as little value to your employer as possible without getting fired? If you're getting paid the same hourly rate it's still a win to work less.
        korse 6y ago
PragmaticPulp 6y ago
"Unit of work performed" is one of those concepts that sounds great in business books or when dealing with repetitive mass-production tasks, but doesn't translate well to creative work like software development or engineering. From the management side, it's common for teams to get into routines where Fridays are basically lost. It starts with getting into the habit of leaving a little bit early on Fridays. Then people realize that they only have a few hours between lunch and leaving early, so they start checking out right after lunch. Then people realize that if they get in after 9AM on Friday, they don't have many hours to get anything done before lunch, so they don't want to get started on anything that requires focus. Eventually, Fridays are a short, laid-back day at the office where they catch up on stray e-mails before going home. For those teams, going to a 4x8 workweek has no productivity drop because they weren't doing much on Friday anyway. However, for teams that actually get things done on Friday, going to 4x8 or even 4x10 can start to decrease productivity. Productivity and hours spent working aren't the only things that matter, though. Going to a 4-day workweek is an easy way to keep employees happy, which is valuable in itself. Also keep in mind that we aren't great at judging our own productivity. We tend to perceive percentage of busy time as productivity, and a 4-day workweek will naturally have a higher percentage of time occupied by work than a 5-day workweek. This increase in percentage of busy time can mislead people into thinking they're being even more productive on more time-compressed schedules, even if they're putting out less work on an absolute scale. Frankly, a lot of companies switch to 4-day workweeks because they can get 80-90% of the productivity while offering employees a perk they can't usually get at big companies that pay higher salaries.
- ghaff 6y ago
  And, in the current situation in particular, I'm seeing a lot of groups adopting "no meeting Fridays." Though my experience is that many people sort of hesitate to schedule Friday afternoon meetings in any case. So, yeah, as you say Fridays tend to turn mostly into a clean up any little tasks for this week, come up with a plan for next week, and call it a day. If I'm honest, this tends to describe what I do a lot of the time.

Closi 6y ago

Out of interest, do you have permanent employment and get paid based on unit of work performed?

foobiekr 6y ago
Realistically, all full time employees are paid per work unit. Those who don't deliver the required work units in that time period are eventually managed out.
- Closi 6y ago
  And those who deliver more work units are paid more, exactly in line with the number of work units performed?

GordonS 6y ago

Well, I work 7.5h per day, so if one "unit" is 1 hour, yes.

0xffff2 6y ago
One unit of work independent of time taken. When you say "no drop in productivity", do you mean you do the same amount of work in 4 days now instead of 5, or that you do 80% of the work you used to do?
- GordonS 6y ago
  I mean I get the same amount of work done in 4 days that I used to get done in 5. Perhaps Parkinson's law in action: 'work expands to fill available time'.
  - Moodles 6y ago
    Shame you couldn't just do 4 days worth of work and play hooky on the 5th day?
    - bobthepanda 6y ago
      Hooky isn't ironclad though; you can be called out of slacking at any time if you're supposed to be on the clock, so it's not quite the same.
      - nightski 6y ago
        This is why I cut out all the political BS and just became a consultant a decade ago. Then you can cut hours and increase your hourly rate to accommodate. Funny enough companies are just fine with paying it.
      - ghaff 6y ago
        At a minimum, you need to be reachable and possibly attend meetings. Even if I'm taking a day somewhat easy and running some errands, I'm not going to head off for some 4 hour hike.
  - korse 6y ago
    This confuses me... If I get paid less to work less hours, I expect that I need to complete proportionately less. Working 4/5 of a standard week and getting paid 4/5 of standard salary would not be a win for me unless I only needed to complete 4/5 as much work. This does not sound like winning.
    - pc86 6y ago
      If your goal to provide as little value to your employer as possible without getting fired? If you're getting paid the same hourly rate it's still a win to work less.
      - korse 6y ago

PragmaticPulp 6y ago

"Unit of work performed" is one of those concepts that sounds great in business books or when dealing with repetitive mass-production tasks, but doesn't translate well to creative work like software development or engineering. From the management side, it's common for teams to get into routines where Fridays are basically lost. It starts with getting into the habit of leaving a little bit early on Fridays. Then people realize that they only have a few hours between lunch and leaving early, so they start checking out right after lunch. Then people realize that if they get in after 9AM on Friday, they don't have many hours to get anything done before lunch, so they don't want to get started on anything that requires focus. Eventually, Fridays are a short, laid-back day at the office where they catch up on stray e-mails before going home. For those teams, going to a 4x8 workweek has no productivity drop because they weren't doing much on Friday anyway. However, for teams that actually get things done on Friday, going to 4x8 or even 4x10 can start to decrease productivity. Productivity and hours spent working aren't the only things that matter, though. Going to a 4-day workweek is an easy way to keep employees happy, which is valuable in itself. Also keep in mind that we aren't great at judging our own productivity. We tend to perceive percentage of busy time as productivity, and a 4-day workweek will naturally have a higher percentage of time occupied by work than a 5-day workweek. This increase in percentage of busy time can mislead people into thinking they're being even more productive on more time-compressed schedules, even if they're putting out less work on an absolute scale. Frankly, a lot of companies switch to 4-day workweeks because they can get 80-90% of the productivity while offering employees a perk they can't usually get at big companies that pay higher salaries.

ghaff 6y ago
And, in the current situation in particular, I'm seeing a lot of groups adopting "no meeting Fridays." Though my experience is that many people sort of hesitate to schedule Friday afternoon meetings in any case. So, yeah, as you say Fridays tend to turn mostly into a clean up any little tasks for this week, come up with a plan for next week, and call it a day. If I'm honest, this tends to describe what I do a lot of the time.