To think this is a surefire way to insist that everyone comes back into the office?

[Pleasebeafleabite]

Latest BBC News link today. If I was an employer and I was forced into giving staff compulsory four day weeks based on compressed hours, I’m be making sure they were doing them in the office.

Yet more unintended consequences

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gl5w83z7do

I don't believe those two really are connected. Working in an office and being a teacher/nurse are two totally different jobs.

I'm a nurse and I reflect weekly on the fact that I'm glad my job is so active and I don't sit in front of a computer all day. Partly because of the hours I do. Three 12.5 hour shifts a week but because I'm so busy those days feel like 5 hours. My work days are over before I know it and then I'm off for 4 days a week. It gives me great flexibility.

This is such a great idea! I might request it at my work! I frequently start at 8am and finish at 5pm or after. For all those saying wfh means people are cheating their hours…I dunno, maybe there are people who do this, but my experience is that people are much more productive at home. I know it doesn’t suit everyone and I am glad to go into the office one day a week as F2F is good for all sorts of things. It’s my least productive day by far though. 2 or 3 trips to the loo will take 10-15 mins as I work in a very large office and we have walk a fair way to the nearest loo. Queuing up to get a cup of coffee once or twice a day. 10 minutes each time. Multiple people walking past me and stopping for a quick hello. 5 mins each. Maybe happens 3-4 times a day….. it all adds up. One lady who thankfully has left now had a habit of delegating to people all the time. Every time she walked past me, she would double back and say “oh i’m glad I’ve caught you! I wanted to talk about such and such…” and that would be 20 mins of her explaining a situation which she wasn’t sure how to sort. Then she would subtly delegate stuff to me/my team and before I knew it I had an hour’s work added to my load!!! Every time she saw me! I ended up diving behind tables and plants whenever I saw her coming!!! I get none of this at home. I am extremely productive. And I could easily work 8.25 hours a day and have every other Friday off! That would be utterly wonderful. Thank you for posting this. I’m going to give it serious consideration!!

I do not understand why this is such a polarised debate in general - my suspicion is because the media (e.g. Telegraph, DM) like to provoke it and call WFH lazy, create a stereotype of working in pants etc. WFH works for some people, compressed hours work for some people, hybrid works for some people, all office based for some people. I don't think one size fits all or that one is better. I don't know why that can't be accepted and instead we work on how an individual can work out a pattern that maximises their productivity in their working situation (team / type of work / environment etc)

I think making it legally supported to request four days working is a wonderful step. I don't think working 10 hours 4 days a week is beyond an adults capability if they choose to do it and that there needs to be wringing of hands about how tired people will be. Having the choice and option will be wonderful. No one has to do it if they don't want to.

@Youcantellalotofthingsabouttheflowers and we used a childminder for after school drop offs before the last academic year as when they were younger they of course need more attention. But they are soon to be 10 & 11 so it’s not the same plus they can get to & from school by themselves, I’m just a little resistant to that.

I WFH 4 days.

My days run
7.45, drop ds at school bus,
Log on at 8
Work until 1
Lunchtime, put some washing on, put supper in the slow cooker, make a sandwich, eat
Work from 2.00-5.20
Collect DS from school bus
Check work email for anything that came in between 5.20 & 5.30.

Result - my employer gets 8.5 hours a day when I wfh. I can do school run, have supper served by 6.40 and I don't spend my weekend washing or doing life admin.

Everyone wins.

It is only narrow-minded, inflexible managers who lack good working relationships with their staff who struggle with it.

5 plus? They are SMALL kids who need full time care. So in your logic, an employer has to “suck it up” while you “work” and look after a five year old at the same time? Will ya cop on!

If you love work so much why don’t you marry it. Most jobs are bullshit busy work to keep everyone stressed, oppressed and spending; five-day weeks and eight-hour days and 40-hour weeks, it’s all just a thing we made up, not some natural “this is the correct amount of work” equilibrium or rhythm humans found themselves drawn to. I can’t imagine how devoid of joy someone has to be to get uptight about the possibility of someone working a bit less. “Oh noes! My team won’t meet their arbitrary macguffin KPIs in Q3, better raise this at the 8am standup so we can run it up the flagpole to C-suite!” I just don’t want to be one of those guys that’s in his office until twelve o’clock at night worrying about the WENUS.

I think wfh will mean a shortage of nurses, teachers, those who have no choice but to go out to work because who won't at some time in their lives want to control their hours. Could it mean a drop in salaries as wfh don't have fares /fuel to pay.

I can’t see that happening & im pretty sure train fares for 3 days in the office are not so far off 5 days now.

Compressing five days into four typically means people working nearly 9 hours a day. How many will realistically do those hours?

This is why I will never ever do compressed hours. A four day week should be a four day week, not five days squashed into 4. If everyone is off on Friday, then no one is there to be stressing about something critical. I wouldn't do this if I'm WFH (which I do most of the time) or in the office.

I know this isn't really the point of your post but it annoys me that we see articles in the news about the marvelous "four day week" and they never ever mean that.

I don't really understand the article either - everyone already has the right to ask for flexi working which is what hours compression is? What actually needs to change?

Also - well done all of you doing unpaid overtime for your companies, and who are super duper productive when at home. This isn't about individuals. Some roles are just not suited to autonomy and home working. Some people aren't either, and businesses are struggling to mitigate those that are supposed to be (for example) taking call centre calls, who just aren't, because they have no one directly supervising them. Sure the argument here is that they should get a different job if they don't like the one they have, but at least where I work (v. large high street bank) people take the utter piss when WFH. No one cares in my type of role where I'm very much in charge of my own diary and inputs and outputs, but I'm sorry, those of you doing call centre type positions at home are essentially covering for the lazy arses that CBA.

For all those who say they work harder et etc. Yeah right! Why do you think employers want people to come back into the office? You only have to look at the many many threads to see that many people are doing childcare, running errards, school pick ups and drop offs and cooking the kids tea. We all know (I am sorry it is women) who will decline calls or meetings after 1530 or who say they are doing something else or the classic dentist appointment. I worked for many many years for a large corporate who allowed wfh before it was a thing

I’m not amazed at this. I moved to an almost complete wfh job after wfh became a thing, and it’s crap. I’ve been there 18 months and only recent discovered there are actually seven teams under our section. I had no idea. In my previous in-office job I got to know people and projects, through chatting in person, those overheard conversations leading to actual conversations leading to creating projects. All of that is gone. I now do the essential bits of my job, but there’s no innovation, no added extra. Because I simply don’t have the knowledge or connections to do that.

I also have a safeguarding/ whistleblowing add on and people in that network who started since wfh say the same, there are less likely to raise concerns as they no longer have the personal connections and relationships to feel managers and colleagues would have their back if they received push back.

Learning how to use systems etc is a nightmare without colleagues on hand to ask. That has massively slowed me down.

Other colleagues have also said their work has slowed as they can’t just grab people in person. Getting something done means looking in someone’s diary,,arranging a zoom call etc, whereas previously you could just see someone was free, grab them, sort it quickly.

I work in the public sector and our job is all about partnership working and collaboration. It used to be that co-location was seen as the big thing in improving working and productivity and now we all wfh in isolation.

i have no doubt this has an overall negative impact on multiple levels. But hey, at least I can get a wash on during the day!

This! Like fuck am I "helping the team" as standard meaning someone else can slack off until I have the time to finish their work.

4 days a week would be a massive step for anyone with caring responsibilities.

That is a different kettle of fish but the poster suggesting 5 year olds being taken care of in office hours is ridiculous.

It's fine if they have family who help but don't see how this helps people who are reliant on outside childcare.
If you work until at least 6pm, and then have to get to childcare pickup, many after school clubs or nurseries are shut by then

I apologise, I didn’t understand the abbreviation. That sounds like a good set up for everyone then.

It is & I’m fortunate but it’s pretty common for lots of people I know.

So true, but then there's a contingent on MN for whom all managers are bastards, just out to grind the poor staff down, and they leave very little room for nuance

As it happens I was a manager in favour of flexible working even before it became a "cause", but it has to work for all and can bring challenges where the solutions simply don't suit those who feel it all has to be one way

And I definitely agree with the PP who mentioned this could be the back door for even longer hours, with the "compressed" 4 days turning into 5

It's part of Labour's plan to support Working People and eventually nationalise as much as they can. This is Angela Rayner's plan.

It's all about extending workers' 'rights' and leaving employers fewer options.

A 4-day week is fine if people put in the same hours. There is evidence that it can work really well.

Almost without exception, anyone is business says that having people in the office is better for them and the company.

There have been numerous articles about this, many from behavioural psychologists who say that WFH is not good in many situations.

The reasons are that in many companies, informal discussions (over the coffee machine) and day to day conversations are conducive to growth and a better performance.

The other benefit is that more experienced staff are on hand to mentor younger people who don't experience support and mentoring if they are WFH.

Obviously this applies more at snr management level and anyone doing a low key admin job WFH is not going to see much difference.

I know this isn't quite the same as a 4-day week, but it's all part and parcel of an employment contract.

I'd have to dig out some of the studies to be sure, but from memory hot desking has been shown to exasperate the negative impacts, but the negative impacts are noticeable even with assigned desks.

That is completely different and I apologise. I had 2 employees who would not pay for childcare and had small kids running round all day. I tried to be as understanding as I could but it affected everything from calls to meetings to productivity. It’s impossible to WFH when you have smaller children but so many people do it.. or try to.

Being a team manager, surely you only care that work is completed? Counting hours instead of performance would just be petty, right?

How did you measure productivity?

Your top performers are wfh. If you had to let them work compressed hours, you would force them into the office. But for no actual reason other than, if they benefit from 4 days, you want to take some of the benefit of wfh from them?

Basically, you don’t want them gaining something unless they also lose something?

@Hectorscalling thats the best way to lose good staff!

What, 11 year olds are small kids now? Cop on indeed!

Interesting, either way, that you've completely failed to engage with the reality of the childcare landscape. What do you think employers who don't have the option of an employee who isn't in this situation should do? Be specific. And improve your comprehension too, you've already shown yourself up with the TTO thing.

I WFH. It physically isn't possible to skive in my job so if I was less productive I would have been called back in by now!

Two things conflated here; 'compressed' hours and WFH. There's actually very little to connect them.

Five day's hours over four days works for some people. Given people's natural tendency to want either or both of Friday and Monday as non working days then, depending on the business's customers/clients there might be gaps. Dealing with things like that is why we pay managers. If that means some people working Monday and or Friday when that's sub optimal for them tough titty; maybe you swap shit patterns month and month about. We did that on one place as the service is 08:00 to 18:00 so you did a month one earlies 8-4 and then one on lates, 10-6.

WFH is a different thing. Until the pandemic it was 'impossible' in my sector. Then suddenly, when lockdown was a thing, a dozen laptops and mobile phones were found and a change that would have taken years of osmosis happened overnight. I've been either WFH or hybrid, the latter by choice, ever since.

In the middle of last month I moved to a new post; advice provision in a distributed call centre. The work is something I did from 2019 to 22 so I'm a returnee to the technical skills but telephone interviews/exploration I've done since God was a boy.

I wanted 24hours over 3 days and my offer to do those as Tuesday to Thursday was accepted without demur. As long as the service can run on Monday and Friday, something that can be managed centrally, those days are not my problem.

The supervisor has stuck to me like velcro for the last few weeks. She's listening on my calls and, via webchat and Google conference we catch up several times a day. Just like being in the office really except they're all but 500 miles away.

It's run by a national organisation but from local offices with an immense amount of freedom. Pre-pandemic you'd be working at an office in commuting distance. The one I'm working for now recruits across the UK; a much wider talent pool then along the east coast where they're based.

Horses for courses but WFH works brilliantly in my sector.