Seven minus four equals?
A simple question, or a brain teaser?……Over recent years, there have been several news stories looking at the idea of a four day working week. Whilst some have welcomed the idea, it is probably fair to say that it also has its sceptics. Making a conscious decision to change your working pattern to a four day ‘working week’ can allow you to pursue part time studies outside of work, that can help you both to become more creative and productive and to adopt more effective ways of working and helping others. It can also take you to new places that you may not have imagined.
This article looks at several reasons why we should all consider the four day week more seriously and examine the health and productivity benefits that it could bring to us all.
Become more creative and collaborative
As children, each day isn’t all about ‘school work’. A healthy education is balanced with extra-curricular activities such as sports, playing games, music, crafts, art and drama. Activities that encourage experimentation, creativity and collaboration with others.
When school work is well-balanced with these extra-curricular activities, it doesn’t become all consuming and it allows a child to develop skills and different ways of thinking that aren’t necessarily available from core subjects.
However, as we transition from school and higher education into our adult working lives, it becomes more difficult to find the time to pursue the extra-curricular activities that we once enjoyed as children.
By adopting a four day working week, it frees up time that we can dedicate to out of work activities. And in doing so, it allows us to practice and nurture the skills and thinking that are invaluable in promoting a healthier work environment for all.
It provides more time to work on ourselves as humans
The five day work week can often transition into the six or seven day work week if we allow it to. But doing the same type of work day in, day out can suck us into a vacuum of narrow thinking.
Unfortunately, narrow thinking can also breed bad habits and it is only by stepping away from work and balancing it with non-work activities, that you can start to develop the deeper awareness that is necessary to develop the ‘soft skills’ such as empathy, compassion and the ability to listen and communicate well, which are essential to living healthier and more productive lives.
It promotes better health
If we’re not careful, work can become all-consuming and our creativity, energy levels and health may suffer as a consequence. Not only can illness or injury can creep up when least expected, but our concentration levels and propensity to get irritated or angry by insignificant things can increase if we just focus on work all the time.
In contrast, a four day work week allows us to explore hobbies, studies or an additional part time career which all provide the mind and body with a change from the ‘same old’ routine. In doing so, the variety and enjoyment that brings can in itself provide greater well being and more energy. In turn, better health can also help us to become more creative and productive in our main career.
It allows time to teach and pass on our skills
One of the key problems where people work busy ‘five plus’ day weeks is that there is often no time for skilled workers to dedicate to teaching and mentoring others. However, a healthy and productive society needs constant learning and re-learning in order to adapt to social and economic changes.
Switching to a shorter working week can encourage those later in their careers to develop teaching skills and spend more time nurturing and training younger people. With an ever ageing population, encouraging older workers to share and pass on their skills is crucial in supporting a healthy, vibrant and diverse working population.
It will help to develop better technology
Much of the technology that we have seen in the last 20 years has been focused on doing things more quickly. It is no surprise that the rise of email and the like have made humans busier, but not necessarily on things that are helpful, productive or which enhance the health of society as a whole.
Stepping back off the technological conveyor belt of speed to a shorter working week would allow more of us to see how technology could be moulded to support more creative, productive and healthier working practices, rather than creating more ways for us to be constantly chasing our digital tails.
Greater productivity
Some query how you can ever recoup the productivity gap that switching from a five to four day working week would bring. However that misses the point of a four day work week in the first place.
Children become productive and successful at school, because they have enough hours in the day to spend on ‘non-core’ work. In pursuing extra-curricular activities, children become more resourceful and creative through the skills that they learn doing them.
For adults, switching to a four day work week allows the time to pursue other non-core work activities too. Not only does that enable people to pursue hobbies or studies, but it also provides the opportunity to open our minds and assess what is really important for humans to thrive within society.
In doing so, new jobs and technologies are created from the positive shifts in society that brings and it promotes a more healthy and resourceful society, in which we collaborate and support each other more for the good of all.
Seven minus four – so what’s the answer?
So, in answer to the question, seven minus four could equal three.
But if we all allowed ourselves a four day working week, our extra day could provide more than we might initially imagine, particularly if we all used that extra time wisely to promote healthier and more positive mindsets, that nurtured life long learning and a better and more peaceful world for all.
