Solutional
At Solutional, a four-day workweek means four regular working days and three days off for family, friends, hobbies, and rest. It does not mean squeezing five days of work into four ten-hour shifts, and it does not mean accepting 80% of the salary.
Here is what we have learned since adopting the four-day workweek.
Does Working Fewer Hours Reduce Productivity?
The intuitive answer may be yes, but our experience has been different. We do not deliver 20% less work. A shorter week encourages people to use their time more deliberately, stay focused, and approach problems with more energy.
A well-rested team is also less likely to burn out or take stress-related sick leave. In practice, we complete roughly the same amount of work as we would in a five-day week while maintaining, or even improving, the quality of the result.
We asked our clients whether they had noticed a difference between our four-day and five-day schedules. Their feedback was consistent: from a productivity perspective, there was no meaningful change.
What Are the Drawbacks of a Four-Day Workweek?
Our clients generally work five days a week, so questions may occasionally arise on our day off. That can delay a response until the next working day.
Even when clients have internal teams or other development partners working on the same project, we have not encountered a situation where our schedule blocked the entire team. Similar availability gaps already occur during holidays, vacations, and sick leave. We reduce the risk further through the pair programming practices we use across our projects: knowledge is shared rather than concentrated in one person.
The Best Part of a Four-Day Week
Everyone at Solutional knows the feeling:
What is the best part of Sunday evening?
Realizing that it is only Saturday.
