{"id":4827,"date":"2022-01-20T19:46:07","date_gmt":"2022-01-20T19:46:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2022\/01\/20\/a-year-and-a-half-later-heres-how-the-four-day-workweek-is-going-at-buffer\/"},"modified":"2022-01-20T19:46:07","modified_gmt":"2022-01-20T19:46:07","slug":"a-year-and-a-half-later-heres-how-the-four-day-workweek-is-going-at-buffer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2022\/01\/20\/a-year-and-a-half-later-heres-how-the-four-day-workweek-is-going-at-buffer\/","title":{"rendered":"A Year And a Half Later, Here\u2019s How The Four Day Workweek is Going at Buffer"},"content":{"rendered":"

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When we experimented with a four-day workweek it was initially for one month. As our CEO, Joel Gascoigne<\/a>, wrote about in May 2020<\/a> when we first started the experiment, \u201cThis 4-day workweek period is about well-being, mental health, and placing us as humans and our families first.\u201d <\/p>\n

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Joel\u2019s announcement about the four-day workweek in April, 2020.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

At the end of May, while we were collecting the data on how the experiment went, we continued working a four-day workweek. In June, after we saw that the results were overall good for us, we shifted to a four-day workweek for the rest of 2020. Our team was surprised by these results, having expected naturally diminished productivity with fewer workdays. At the time, our Chief of Staff, Carolyn Kopprasch<\/a>, wrote: <\/p>\n

\t\u201cSince the intention was to give temporary relief from typical expectations to teammates during an especially hard and unprecedented time, we did not set goals around productivity or results. In fact, we expected a tangible drop in productivity due to reduced hours.<\/em><\/p>\n

However, due to increased rest and reflection, many of you have shared that you felt your weekly productivity was in fact not all that different, and that your quality of work was higher while experiencing improved overall wellbeing.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

In the end, we shifted to a four-day workweek for the foreseeable future at the end of 2020<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now, we\u2019re three months away from having operated by a four-day workweek for two years. We recently ran an internal survey to check in with the Buffer team on how many days they are working, if they feel happier and more productive, and finally, if they are able to get the work required of them completed in four days. <\/p>\n

Here are the results: <\/p>\n

91% of our team are happier and more productive working four days a week <\/strong><\/p>\n

This is a great piece of data for us \u2014 91 percent of our teammates either agree or strongly agree that they are happier and more productive now that they work a four-day workweek, as for the remaining nine percent, on the scale they all selected \u201cneutral.\u201d <\/p>\n

This was our hope when we first started out experimenting with a four-day workweek and we\u2019re thrilled that this is still the impact nearly two years later. <\/p>\n

Most of our team is only working four days a week <\/strong><\/p>\n

One of the most common questions we get is if we are really<\/em> only working four days a week, and now we have the data to confidently say \u2014 yes, most of our team are only working four days a week, or they choose to work five shorter days, which is an option several parents felt better suited their families. <\/p>\n

In our most recent survey, 73 percent of Buffer teammates are only working a four-day workweek (or five shorter days which is an option). The remaining 27 percent said they are working more than four days, most commonly people work four and a half days and use Fridays to catch up on tasks. On Fridays we don\u2019t schedule meetings and no communication via email, Slack, or Threads<\/a> is expected of our team. Some people do choose to use it as an \u201coverflow\u201d day and that\u2019s something we support as an organization assuming this doesn\u2019t turn into overworking. <\/p>\n

84% of our team are able to get all of their work done in four days a week <\/strong><\/p>\n

Finally, we also wanted to know if teammates feel they can get all of their work done in four days a week, and 84 percent of our team either agree or strongly agree that they are able to get the work required of them completed in four days.
This has been an adjustment as it isn\u2019t easy to suddenly change the workweek, so each team and teammate have been experimenting over these last years to adjust their work, projects, deadlines, and expectations to be realistic with a four-day workweek. There\u2019s always room for improvement but we\u2019re happy to see this number as high as it is right now. <\/p>\n

We\u2019ve communicated to our team that we know changing long-standing habits and expectations from a five-day workweek will take time. After all, we\u2019ve worked our whole careers with a five-day workweek paradigm. <\/p>\n

So when we see responses in our survey about people who don\u2019t feel like they can get all the work they need to do done in five days, it prompts us to question a few key things:<\/p>\n