WORKING TREND WATCH
Although vacancies are increasingly asking for staff without a ‘9 to 5 mentality’, eight hours of work per day in the Caribbean region has been the norm for 100 years. In other countries there is already a lot of experimentation with fewer working hours. The Swedish experiments with the 30-hour working week have reached many international media.
Work five days, 6 hours a day
The Swedish experiments first compared two different (working) models. The first model focuses on the 30-hour working week (five days working six hours a day), where managers give employees more freedom. From that freedom, as more can decide for themselves, they also produce more and their motivation is higher.
The second model is just the opposite, and uses the traditional 40-hour working week. In this model, the focus is on management decisions and management. Managers motivate employees by properly indicating what happens in the process and when. In this way the company runs fully efficiently.
Experiments abroad
In a nursing home in Götenberg (Sweden) they experimented for no less than two years with this 30-hour working week from the Swedish model, after which they were thoroughly evaluated. What turned out to be? Everything had become more positive. Less fatigue, less absenteeism, less stress and higher client satisfaction. The only downside was increased costs. Logical, when employees are paid eight hours and work six hours. The revenues turned out not to be large enough to compensate for this gap. That is why the experiment at the Svartedalen nursing home was not continued, but the tests are continuing elsewhere.
For example, there is a Toyota maintenance center that works with complete satisfaction with shifts of twice six hours. A marketing agency in Scotland with highly skilled knowledge workers has also been working with the six-hour working day for two years. They start at 9:30 am and close the door at 3:45 pm. The result: the output and quality of that output are just as high as before – with the 40-hour working week. Absence and stress have decreased and there is a better work-life balance.
Experiments in the Netherlands
The Dutch are good at part-time work. A logical consequence of the one and a half earner model: man works full time, woman works part time. With the arrival of the 30-hour working week, the equal division of tasks between men and women suddenly comes much closer. To achieve that, customization is required. After all, you have to complete tasks from a 40-hour working week to a 30-hour working week. Employees must decide for themselves what the improvement should look like, and continue to hold onto this. If employees are given more room to determine the customized work themselves, then the motivation remains higher in the long term. And to achieve that, the biggest change is in the mindset – especially of the employer.
By experimenting with shorter working days or weeks, their fear can be relieved because they start to see the benefits. Offering freedom in working hours and workplaces (and thereby offering technologies such as video conferencing ) also helps to increase attractiveness as an employer.
Shorter working days also offer a solution to the debate about hard professions, longer working hours and sustainable employability. The generation pacts and deals on part-time work during the final phase of working life already show this.
Cost
And what does this mean for the costs (also a frequently heard objection from employers)? Can working shorter hours be rewarded with a full-time salary? We can conclude that at least half of the hours is earned back by the increase in productivity. Whether that is sufficient to invest by employers in sustainable employability or by the government in a distant future in which fewer people are needed to do the same work can be seen. It would be interesting and strengthen our position as a pioneering country.
Focus is the engine
To make a 30-hour working week a success, it is important to give a clear focus to your employees. The fact is that if people have less time available, they are more critical of what really needs to be done. They often achieve the same quality in less time. It is a combination of the right assignment, the right deadline, sufficient appreciation and room to excel. On that leads to motivated employees, whether you should start with that motivation is chicken and egg.
In the Caribbean region (CARICOM), Governments must come together to discuss about this.As the climate is changing very fast, we have to change systems.