Researchers find four-day work week will benefit employees, starting in SA in February

As South Africa is set to experiment with the four-day work week in February 2023, researchers believe this will benefit the employees.

According to a research released on Wednesday last week, businesses that provided their workers an extra day off each week without reducing salaries saw more income, coupled with a decrease in absenteeism and resignations.

This comes as the four-day workweek is rapidly gaining momentum across the globe as more data becomes available.

While still labelled as radical by some companies and workers alike in South Africa, the findings suggest that the four-day workweek might just be the future.

Additionally, workers described lower levels of stress and burnout as well as higher levels of life satisfaction.

These findings were from a six-month, four-day week pilot programme recently completed by 30 companies and almost 1 000 employees.

IOL reports that over the course of the experiment, revenue rose by more than a percentage point each month for an overall gain of 8%.

Companies were overall impressed by this work mode and Rod Lacey, the chief people officer of simPRO, said that after implementing this new method of working, they discovered that caring for employees and paying attention to their opinions all impacted the company positively.

The programme was organised by the non-profit 4 Day Week Global. A total of 97% of workers who were a part of the research said they would continue with the four-day work week.

Around 70% of workers who were in the four-day week experiment said they would want 10% to 50% more in pay to go back to working five days.

“The four-day week has been transformative for our business and our people. Staff is more focused, more engaged, and more dedicated, helping us hit our goals better than before,” said Jon Leland, chief strategy officer at Kickstarter.

“Greater employee retention and faster hiring have been surprisingly powerful in driving improved business outcomes too,” said Leland.

“We’re achieving more as an organisation while giving people time to start new creative projects, rest, and be with their families. It’s a true win-win.”

South Africa’s own four-day work week trial has seen massive interest from companies and BusinessTech Africa understands that the deadline to sign up for this pioneering pilot has been extended to January 15, 2023.