A recent largest-ever trial of the four-day work week found that most UK companies participating are not returning to the five-day standard, and a third are ready to make that change permanent.
The study involved 61 organizations and about 2,900 workers who voluntarily adopted truncated work weeks from June to December 2022. Only three organizations decided to pause the experiment, and two are still considering shorter hours, data showed. The rest were convinced by revenue gains, drops in turnover and lower levels of worker burnout that four is the new five when it comes to work days.
Globally, there has been an increasing intent to move to a more productive four days a week cycle. However, not many homegrown companies have endorsed this thought. Multiple countries that are increasingly adopting this shorter work week schedule includes Iceland, Spain, Scotland and UAE among others.
However, in India not many companies have been emphatically talking about a shorter work week cycle.
Storyboard18 reached out to key Indian advertising communities to understand what they feel about a possible four day a week workflow given the unscheduled and crazy hours people put in here in the industry. The executives seemed divided on the four-day a week work schedule.
A senior leader from a global network agency, on the condition of anonymity, believes that since India is a completely different economy running at a different lifecycle, the possibility of a four-day a week schedule doesn’t seem to work.
Agreeing with the executive’s thoughts, Sanjeev Jasani, COO, Cheil India thinks that a four-day workweek is not a practical solution for the Indian ad industry.
“Our work is heavily dependent on client requirements, and it would be challenging to accommodate all their needs within a shortened work week. We are their business partners and it is our role to make them succeed at what they do. There are many other ways of resolving the problem of burnout and I personally think these issues should be addressed to increase better productivity but a shortened week is definitely not the answer,” he argues.
Meanwhile, Naresh Gupta, co-founder and chief strategy officer, Bang In The Middlle notes that principally, four-day week is absolutely possible, despite the notorious work hours of advertising and the crazy unplanned dynamic life of clients.
“This also would be the best thing that can happen to the communication industry that is struggling with talent attraction and retention. There is though one big pre-condition for this to work, and that is clients need to be planned and ensure that they are not always last minute,” he adds.
Gupta is quick to add that though sometimes it can be easier said than done but he also shares that he has seen the industry move from a six-day a week to five days.
“Infact till as late as 2010, one very large network insisted that they reserved the right to call people to office on Saturday and this was even in employment contract, though this was never enforced. I think the four-day week will happen, and the start will happen this year. Both agencies and clients will resist, but this is the best thing that may happen to all of us in advertising,” he quips.
Some industry leaders also believe that there is a need for an input-based way of looking at things to an output-based one.
Mithila Saraf, chief executive officer, Famous Innovations points out that owing to the way the remuneration structures have been, Indians have become too accustomed to judging productivity by the number of hours put in, almost glorifying a higher number of hours.
“But, in my experience, those who don’t feel the urgency to close work in a set number of hours tend to languish the most,” she says.
Saraf asks pertinent questions around the way agencies are being paid as well.
“If a creator can get paid per view or per click for the content they create, why not an agency? This ensures that costs to clients are not burdened on the creation process and are instead spread over the lifetime of an asset. The end goal is that the work we create should sweat longer for clients, without our talent having to,” she argues.
With this larger shift in view, the four-day work week starts making a lot of sense. Because as the agency or the industry becomes more output-oriented, so should talent.
“In an output and KPI oriented world, you create your own rhythm and your own definition of balance. Deliver what you commit to – be it in 4 days, 5 days, 3 days or an entirely flexible week,” she concludes.