0:00

Hello and welcome to Sticky from the

0:13

Inside, the employee engagement podcast that looks at how to build stickier,

0:18

competition-smashing, consistently

0:20

successful organizations from the inside

0:22

out. I'm your host, Andy Goram, and I'm

0:25

on a mission to help more businesses turn

0:27

the lights on behind the eyes of their

0:29

employees, light the fires within them, and create tons more success for everyone.

0:39

This podcast is for all those who believe

0:42

that's something worth going after and

0:44

would like a little help and guidance in achieving that. Each episode, we dive into

0:48

the topics that can help create what I

0:50

call stickier businesses, the sort of

0:53

businesses where people thrive and love to

0:56

work, and where more customers stay with

0:58

you and recommend you to others because

1:01

they love what you do and why you do it.

1:04

So if you want to take the tricky out of

1:06

being sticky, listen on okay, today we

1:13

delve deep into one of the most

1:15

transformative ideas reshaping our work environment today, and that's the four day

1:20

workweek. The concept of trimming down the

1:22

traditional workweek has ignited a global

1:25

debate fueled by a post pandemic

1:28

reevaluation of work life priorities.

1:30

Advocates argue that a four day workweek could herald a new era of productivity,

1:36

happiness, and environmental

1:38

sustainability, pointing to pilot programs and companies worldwide that report

1:43

significant success. Yet as momentum

1:47

builds, so do the questions and

1:49

controversies. How does the idea stack up

1:51

against concerns of workload stress and

1:54

the feasibility about it working across

1:57

different industries amid rising living

2:00

costs, particularly in places like the UK?

2:02

Can a shorter workweek offer a buffer, or

2:06

does it pose new challenges for those

2:08

grappling with economic pressures?

2:10

Furthermore, with the rapid advancement of

2:12

AI and technology, there's an opportunity

2:15

at our doorstep, I think. Could this shift

2:18

in how we work encourage a leap towards

2:21

redefining the role of work in our lives,

2:24

prioritizing long term wellbeing and

2:27

innovation over immediate profits? Well,

2:30

I'm joined today by our special guest,

2:32

Dale Whelehan, CEO of the four day week

2:35

Global. It's a non profit organization

2:38

supporting the idea of the four day week.

2:41

Globally, Dale's a trailblazer,

2:43

championing a shift towards a more

2:45

sustainable, balanced, and productive work life model, which means we absolutely am

2:50

the very, very best person with us today

2:53

to help understand more about it and what those opportunities are that it provides.

2:57

And on that note, today's conversation is

2:59

just about unpacking the four day workweek

3:02

as a concept. It's about critically

3:04

examining its implications, understanding

3:06

its challenges, and envisioning its

3:09

potential to reshape our society and

3:12

economy. So join me as I engage in what I

3:14

hope will be an enlightening conversation with Dale, exploring the possibilities

3:18

that lie ahead and what could be the

3:21

future of work. Welcome to the show, Dale.

3:25

Hi Andy. Thank you so much for having me.

3:27

Oh, fab to have you here. I mean, talk

3:29

about hot topic. I mean, is there any

3:31

topic hotter than the four day workweek right now? Probably not, but that's pretty

3:36

good business from my end. Well, we're

3:40

going to get into this in a sec, but before we do, Dale, just do me a little

3:43

quick favor, would you? Can we just get a

3:45

little bit of a background into you, what

3:48

you've been up to and where your focus is now? Yeah, sure. So my own background is a

3:53

bit colourful. I originally trained as a

3:55

healthcare worker, so as a physiotherapist in the irish healthcare system called the

3:59

HSC. And I was always interested in health

4:02

and wellbeing of people, but realized

4:04

pretty early on that physiotherapy was not

4:06

the way in which I was going to achieve

4:09

that sort of life mission. And so I went

4:11

into the world of research after that and I did a PhD looking at the impact of sleep

4:16

deprivation and fatigue on performance in

4:19

surgeons. And it was during my PhD that the pandemic hit us. So while working part

4:23

time as a physio and doing my PhD and

4:26

evaluating the surgeons that I was working with, I became acutely aware that the

4:31

systems in which we operate are not really working for us. And if anything, the

4:35

pandemic showed us that to a much larger

4:39

degree. I went after that and I went into

4:41

corporate for two years and tried to hone in some of my skills in behavioral science

4:46

and leadership, and worked with public and

4:48

private sector enterprises. And what I've

4:51

realized over the last few years is that

4:53

organizational leaders are really struggling to understand how do you make

4:57

business sustainable? How do you build

5:00

performance in a sustainable way that's not going to constantly compromise on

5:05

staffing or on profits? And I don't think

5:07

many leaders have cracked that code just

5:10

yet. I've been always interested in is getting back to the idea of improving

5:14

people's health and well being. And it was through that lens of how can we create

5:18

sustainable well being to create sustainable performance that the idea of

5:21

the four day week came to the forefront

5:23

for me. So I was volunteering with the

5:25

irish campaign at the time and eventually

5:28

studying as CEO of 40 week Global. What we

5:31

have found is that there is a much broader

5:34

narrative here beyond just people and

5:37

business, but actually reduce working time

5:39

being good for issues of equity,

5:41

sustainability and health within our

5:44

societies. I think with all of the global trends that we're seeing now around mental

5:47

health crises, political turmoil, economic

5:52

turmoil, we need a new paradigm in how we

5:55

approach work in a way that isn't going to

5:57

burn the entire workforce out. And we are

6:01

hoping through the conversation over four day weekend that either the conversation

6:04

around produce working hours, but it's actually a broader conversation around how

6:08

we approach work in a way that's going to

6:10

future fit us for the global challenges

6:13

that we undoubtedly face now and we

6:16

continue to face into the future. I did

6:19

say in the intro this isn't about just

6:22

discussing what the four day workweek is, but just to get everybody on the same

6:26

page. What do you see as the primary

6:28

purpose behind the four day workweek?

6:31

Depends who I'm talking to. So if I'm

6:34

speaking to business leaders, it is how

6:36

can we figure out how to get the most out of your human resource, and how do we get

6:41

people to work smarter but not longer? We

6:43

see in businesses constantly efforts to

6:47

innovate and become more efficient and lean and agile. But what those

6:51

interventions fail to account for is that human motivation is what's going to drive

6:55

the effectiveness of any change in an

6:57

organization. So you need to figure out how do you motivate your workforce

7:01

intrinsically to actually want to improve

7:03

efficiencies. And if your workforce feels that they're doing that with the view to

7:07

getting more work, it's just never going to work. I think guaranteeing time, which

7:11

is a hugely valuable asset for people, in

7:15

return for improved efficiency, it's like

7:17

the, you know, the golden equation when

7:19

speaking, though. And what drives me more so is I look to the future, my future, and

7:24

the future that I hope my kids that I have

7:28

will enter into. And very much I feel this

7:31

burden of responsibility to actually try

7:33

and make change at this point. And my own

7:37

expertise being in the space of organizational psychology and behavioral

7:40

science, that's how I can best improve

7:43

this world by leveraging my skills, is true. Changing how we approach work, it

7:48

certainly. Sounds like a perfect fit. The

7:51

purpose I get of the four day workweek,

7:54

and I want this to be a really positive

7:57

view about where we could go. But I would

8:00

be lacking if I didn't kind of like, flag

8:02

up some of the, I guess, concerns or

8:05

criticisms that four day work week gets.

8:07

And then perhaps we should kind of lay some of those out on the table before we

8:11

start so that we can respond to them and

8:14

take them apart. Dale, listening to what

8:17

you've just sort of said there, there is a

8:19

view that is well, you're just going to get the same amount of work out of the

8:23

employees in a shorter amount of time. And actually that's going to lead to more

8:27

stress, more burnout, more dissatisfaction

8:30

at work. And I'm sure there's a massive

8:33

piece about how we implement and technically what we do with a four day

8:37

work versus what we do today. But how do

8:40

you respond to that? Because that must be a question you get asked an awful lot.

8:44

Yeah, totally. And thankfully, in the

8:47

organizations that we've worked with, over 300 to date, on the contrary, we found

8:51

burnout reducing stress, reducing people

8:54

feeling like they have more control over their schedule and their time. And it's

8:57

because of just what you said. This is the

9:00

40 week implementation alone is not the.

9:04

It is how it is implemented is going to

9:06

lead to the real benefits. So reduced

9:09

working time is good, it helps to create

9:13

better parity between work and life, but

9:15

ultimately, it's the transformation organizations undergo in order to achieve

9:19

the same level of output or performance

9:22

standards while doing so in less amount of

9:24

time. So we use this principle, it's called Parkinson's law, which is that work

9:28

will fill the allocators to the time that it's given. And so if you give someone a

9:33

task that's 40 hours a day of duty

9:35

completed, or we give it to them for 20

9:37

hours to complete it, people will focus in

9:40

and narrow in on what the key activities are that's going to drive the realization

9:43

of that outcome versus if there's a longer

9:46

period of time, they will find work to add

9:48

to it that's not necessarily productive.

9:51

So one of the largest things that we see

9:53

with organizations as they undergo this

9:55

transformation is they do change work. They change how they approach work, both

9:59

within individuals, teams and leadership.

10:03

Working time or meeting time is one of the

10:05

major things we see producing. So we have

10:07

become death by Zoom, deaf by Ms. And

10:11

really what I think is driving a lot of that is actually poor leadership. It's an

10:16

unwillingness of leadership to actually make a decision there and then instead

10:20

kicking the can down the line. So it's a

10:22

behavior within teams, but it's actually a

10:25

change in leadership style as well, to be

10:27

more deliberate, make quicker decisions,

10:29

make more informed decisions. That's one

10:32

thing we see. We see a change with regards

10:34

to how people approach their working week.

10:37

So actually being much more deliberate

10:40

around what are the key outcomes that I

10:42

must achieve by Thursday close of

10:44

business, assuming that it's Friday that we're going to close, and then working

10:49

backwards, so actually saying, okay, I

10:51

will have deep individual flow. Work on

10:55

Mondays and Wednesdays for three to 4 hours, and I'm not be disturbed during

10:58

that time because it's critical time for

11:01

me to achieve my outcomes. I will have

11:04

meetings from two until four on Tuesdays

11:08

and Thursdays. But those meeting times are

11:10

actually an opportunity for me to

11:13

collaborate, create new things, innovate.

11:15

It's not meetings for the sakes of meetings. So every single activity and

11:21

work has to have a deliberate outcome

11:25

associated with it. And I think when people get into that, that outcome based

11:29

way of thinking, they realize I actually

11:32

don't need five days worth of work. I can

11:35

be much more highly reliable with regards

11:37

to how I approach my work week, and I can

11:40

get the most important work done in less

11:42

time and be less stressed as a result of

11:44

it. The reality is, what causes people to be stressed and burned out is actually not

11:50

workload per se. It is actually all things

11:53

around workload. It is not getting

11:56

decisions made quick enough. It's, you

11:58

know, poor communication, it's poor

12:01

leadership, it's poor culture. And 40 a

12:04

week forces organizations to reflect

12:09

introspectively and see what are the

12:11

current barriers to us being able to

12:13

actually achieve the same in less amount

12:15

of time. Identifying those and then

12:18

actually trying to resolve those,

12:21

resolving them works because you have this

12:24

vested interest of both management and non

12:27

management on wanting to make this work,

12:30

because there's mutual benefits for both

12:32

parties. Raoul, I think that alignment piece is absolutely crucial here. I mean,

12:37

only last week I was working with a bunch

12:39

of young, rusting managers in hospitality,

12:43

and we're having a great time talking about productivity and what have you, and

12:46

then all of a sudden we just hit this wall

12:49

of an issue of, like, teams being

12:51

something like, evil, because everybody had just taken mad control of their

12:56

diaries and their calendars and stuff just

12:58

flying in all the time, and they felt completely powerless to really control

13:02

their workweek. And, you know, to me, listening to how you describe that ideal

13:06

four day workweek, it's a nirvana. These are my focus days. These are my

13:10

collaborative days. These are my creative

13:12

days. That takes an awful lot of alignment

13:15

and agreement and the restructuring of

13:18

work and some real discipline right behind

13:20

those things. Absolutely. And humans are

13:22

messy. So, like, organizational behavior

13:25

is one of the most complex things that we actually do. It's why we have whole

13:29

consultancy businesses who are, you know,

13:33

cured to try and help organizations with

13:35

these issues. But what behavior change

13:38

within organizations fails to often account for is actually how do you

13:41

motivate people to want to make the change? And, you know, this is where my

13:45

behavioral science background comes out is that we need to understand the science

13:49

behind human motivation. And all research

13:52

would suggest that there's three psychological needs that we need to

13:56

fulfill in order to feel a high level of

13:58

intrinsic motivation. That's the type of motivation that we want our workforce to

14:03

have. They're doing this change because they want to, because they feel good about

14:06

it, not because it's enforced upon them.

14:08

Those three psychological needs are

14:11

feeling of doing a good job, feeling

14:13

confident in what they're doing. In the

14:15

traditional five day work week, we have

14:18

such poor parameters of what good looks like because we use time as this arbitrary

14:23

metric of dedication to the job, loyalty

14:25

to the job. You're good because you stay

14:27

long hours in a four day week. We say time

14:30

is no longer allowed to be used as an

14:32

evaluation metric. You must focus on

14:35

outcomes, and the oldest is on leadership.

14:37

To actually define what good looks like in

14:40

HR, what good looks like in tech, what good looks like in sales, and that's hard.

14:44

And that's the process that we undergo with leadership. In defining, well, you

14:48

talk about productivity, but what is

14:50

productivity in your frontline staff or

14:53

your admin staff? That's one. Once you can

14:56

define what those productivity metrics look like, you can start crafting

15:00

competency and a feeling of doing a good

15:03

job, because people can see whether they're reaching those standards or not.

15:08

The second thing is a sense of autonomy in

15:11

our work, or a sense of autonomy over our

15:13

time. By gifting people more time,

15:15

obviously you are giving them more autonomy over their lives. But actually in

15:20

the context of work, by giving them time

15:23

where they can do dedicated focus work,

15:25

you are giving them autonomy in that process as well. It's like you said,

15:29

people, managers who have work needs to be

15:32

done, but then they're being constantly

15:34

hijacked by other members of staff and

15:37

teams. That takes away from that sense of

15:40

volition or control over our own time

15:43

that's allowed culturally in a four day week. The last thing is a sense of

15:48

connectedness or relatedness with

15:51

colleagues or with our business or whatever it is. So once people feel that

15:54

they're being part of something bigger than themselves, people tend to get a high

15:57

level of intrinsic motivation from that.

16:00

And organizations know this because they have things like values and mission

16:04

statements and purpose. But if people feel

16:06

a disconnect between what's written on the wall versus the lived reality, there is

16:10

going to be an undermining of that intrinsic motivation. What you find in

16:14

four day weak organizations is that management are putting to the forefront

16:17

and saying, we look after our staff and we

16:20

actually do that because we're doing the hard work. We're changing culture and

16:25

leadership and how we approach work in order to improve the well being of our

16:29

workforce. And people are going to have a higher level of commitment, of loyalty to

16:34

organizations that put their best foot forward like that. So you're fulfilling

16:38

all of those psychological needs in workplaces, but we need to also get beyond

16:43

this idea that work life balance actually

16:45

exists anymore. We need this idea of work

16:48

life integration. So fulfilling those

16:50

psychological needs outside of work is equally important in order to have a

16:54

positive transference into workplaces. So

16:56

if I finish my work day and I feel

16:59

exhausted because I've been working long

17:01

hours or working traditional five day a

17:03

week, I'm much less likely to have the

17:05

energy to be able to fulfill my psychological needs outside of work. So

17:09

I'm going to be, I'm not going to feel like a good parent or a good partner. So

17:12

therefore I'm not going to feel very

17:15

competent. I'm not going to have the time

17:18

to go take up any sports, take up a new

17:21

instrument. I'm going to have a poor level of autonomy over my time. I'm not going to

17:25

have the time to connect with my family or

17:28

my friends. I'm going to have that sense of isolation and loneliness. So really

17:33

what we're trying to do is reducing

17:35

working time, fulfill psychological needs in both work and outside of work by

17:40

transforming how we approach work overall.

17:42

And that's just a massive change, isn't

17:45

it? That is a huge change even. Well, not

17:48

just from a process perspective, but

17:51

psychologically, like how we expect, what

17:53

we expect, or the vast majority of people

17:55

expect to work. I love a bit of science,

17:58

so I love the science of the motivation.

18:01

As a sort of scientist yourself,

18:04

obviously, we're talking about proof and evidence a lot of the time in science. And

18:09

when it comes to a four day workweek, do

18:11

you think we've got the breadth of

18:13

evidence now to say that this is a

18:16

workable thing? It can wait, how long it's going to take, the key factors in not

18:22

falling over and making this another piece of change that doesn't land. What have you

18:26

seen in all the studies that you've done so far, Dale? I do think so. I think we

18:31

have created this body of evidence over the last year and a half and that have

18:35

created a ripple effect beyond just the

18:38

organizations that we've studied into a

18:40

broader narrative and organizations

18:42

experimenting with new, flexible and

18:45

reduced working hours schedules across the world. So the four day week is here and

18:49

it's here to stay. And that I could say

18:51

with confidence now in a way that I probably wouldn't have said twelve months

18:55

ago. And I think that's to be contributed

18:59

by the fact that this is not just union

19:01

people, this is not just employees saying that this is good. This is billionaires

19:05

like the head of JP Morgan Chase saying

19:08

three and a half day work week is coming in the next ten years. There is obvious

19:13

recognition that working time reduction is

19:15

here, and this is not the first time that we've had this conversation, by the way,

19:20

we've been talking about how technology

19:22

and innovation is going to revolutionize

19:24

us and how we approach work and how we approach life, and we have failed at every

19:29

single hurdle that we've been given that

19:31

opportunity. Technology was supposed to be the great barrier of making our lives

19:34

easier in the two thousands. And in fact, what it did instead was suck us in more

19:38

into a perpetual state of feeling

19:41

connected to our work. And we are now

19:44

facing the repercussions, I think, of that in a society nowadays cannot disconnect

19:49

and relax and recover, and instead finds

19:51

itself perpetually stressed out. AI is the

19:55

next generation that affords us the opportunity to look at this critically

19:58

once again and decide what our future looks like. And it would be foolish of us

20:03

not to take this opportunity now. What the

20:06

research shows us is that we need to look

20:09

at it from a micro to macro level. And I

20:11

think business leaders and policymakers need to consider it from that lens. By

20:16

reducing working time, we are, never mind

20:19

the changes that we see in business, which is just generally good for business. We

20:23

see that people report lower levels of stress, lower levels of burnout, coupled

20:27

with increased levels of physical activity and increased levels of sleep quality and

20:31

quantity, really important lifestyle factors for longer term health and

20:35

performance. At the team level, then we

20:37

see this increased level of collegiality

20:40

and cohesion within team dynamics, which

20:43

is actually really important. When teams work really well together, they can

20:46

produce much more, we can produce better

20:48

outcomes, but also quicker outcomes than if individuals work by themselves. When we

20:53

look at business outcomes, then we see

20:55

this high level of reported productivity

20:58

by management of staff, coupled with an

21:01

improvement in level of revenue generation in companies who don't afford a week,

21:05

which is really quite significant when you

21:08

consider that actually organizations main

21:10

fear about going into this is that this is too much work and it is a lot of work as

21:15

weve come to learn. But the fact that

21:17

these organizations are not even just able to maintain revenue, but actually grow

21:22

revenue despite this huge organizational change is testament that this is an

21:26

intervention that is worthwhile experimenting with broadly, then beyond

21:31

that, we spend about a third of our adult lives in work, if not more, in recent

21:36

years. And that is obviously going to have

21:38

a, a positive or negative impact on some

21:41

of the broader societal questions that we

21:43

now face. And they're issues of

21:46

sustainability, issues of health, and issues of equity. What we found in trials

21:50

today is that if we take equity, for

21:52

example, gender pay gap remains one of the

21:55

biggest issues for many organizations. And

21:57

that's because women typically exit, on

22:01

average compared to men exit the workforce

22:04

in the early thirties when they had their

22:07

first child. And that creates this lag in

22:10

regards to career opportunity progression once they return to workplaces. Couple

22:15

that with the fact that then culturally, we still have this issue that women miss

22:20

out on promotions because they aren't

22:22

showing the same level of time dedication

22:24

to the organization as their male

22:26

counterparts. In four day week organizations, we evaluate outcomes

22:29

instead of time. And in those sort of

22:32

situations, the gender parity becomes much

22:34

more equal because women thrive in

22:38

settings of outcome based work, as opposed

22:40

to how much time they can dedicate to

22:43

their work. So the playing field becomes a

22:46

bit more leveled. Similarly, though we

22:49

have found that actually parenting time by

22:51

men doubles throughout the UK trial, which

22:55

was when looking at qualitative findings

22:57

men report. This is the first time I felt

23:00

organizational permission to actually take some time away from work and to help with

23:03

that second labor shift. So there's a

23:07

broader societal change there as well around men and their expectation and the

23:11

cultural milieu around men and work. If we

23:13

move on to the second one, then health. I spoke to you about physical activity and

23:17

sleep, and also the great things we face.

23:20

Many global health issues now around

23:22

obesity, around stress and mental health,

23:25

blood pressure, diabetes, cancer, all

23:27

things that actually are influenced by high levels of stress within societies. So

23:31

we need to be able to start making

23:33

extrapolations as to what the cumulative effect effect of reducing stress within

23:37

workplaces might be on some of the population health issues. And if we look

23:41

lastly then at sustainability, which is

23:43

something that leaders cannot ignore,

23:46

particularly the next generation of leaders like myself, it is going to be

23:50

ever present in how we approach business

23:52

and work. And yet I feel we are still very

23:55

much in an infantile understanding of how

23:59

we can make more sustainable practices in

24:03

businesses. And whats missing is actually

24:06

you need to create sustainable well being in people in order to create sustainable

24:09

performance, in order to create sustainable business practices in order to

24:12

create more sustainable outcomes in society. Thats a narrative that we

24:15

actually need to create. And what weve

24:18

found in 40 week trials is that things

24:20

like commuting time reduces, things like

24:22

energy usage reduces. But more broadly, at

24:25

the behavioral level, we saw 42% of people

24:28

reporting more prosocial behaviors, so

24:30

much more likely to use public forms of

24:33

transport instead of private forms of transportation, more likely to engage in

24:36

volunteering and local community development. All of these things that we

24:39

know are actually really important in order to create a much more sustainable

24:44

ecosystem. And so that's a narrative that we will be continuing to build on across

24:48

the next twelve months is showcasing that

24:51

a four day week is not just good for business, for people, but ultimately good

24:54

for society. I mean, there's so much in

24:57

there, Dale, to kind of like even have

25:00

time to talk about on this little podcast

25:03

in there, the piece around like, you've

25:06

been doing this for now 18 months, some

25:08

trials have been going on, right? Do you

25:12

think that the longer term effects are

25:15

clear within that timeframe? Because I

25:17

guess you've got companies shorter and

25:19

longer within that 18 months and we're

25:21

dealing with systemic change here. So even

25:24

the learnings, I guess you've had to date,

25:27

they're obvious of a smaller time period

25:29

than I guess we would like. But have you started to see some of the longer term?

25:34

And are people moving, are companies moving at very different paces in the

25:38

trial? Is there an industry difference? My

25:40

God, I've got so many questions. I do

25:42

apologize. No problem. So what we found is

25:47

that 92% of companies continue on with the

25:49

four day week at the six month mark. So

25:52

actually about 8% of companies who embark

25:54

on trials will not get to the six month

25:56

mark. And that's because they often fail

25:59

maybe at the first few hurdles around the

26:02

stress and the change resistance and maybe all of those sort of things and not

26:05

setting themselves up for success. What's

26:07

really interesting is that based off that

26:10

92%, when we follow them up at the twelve

26:13

month mark, all have continued on with their 40 week trials. So actually once you

26:17

seem to get over that initial pump, it seems to be a more, you know, a near

26:24

guarantee that this is going to be something that's going to be standard

26:26

practice for your business. We'll actually

26:28

be looking at presenting our 1st 24 month

26:31

findings in the next few months as well. So actually evaluating the first cohort

26:34

who went out and did this a good few years ago, now the US, and evaluating how they

26:40

got on. So I think that when you talk

26:44

about the changes that organizations go,

26:46

yes, some organizations actually approach this from a much more mandated point of

26:51

view. So they actually will close

26:53

business, others will keep business open

26:56

and juggle around their human resource

26:59

structures so that actually business

27:01

service provision is maintained. But

27:04

people are working on alternate days, and

27:08

our academics actually have been looking at how many hours are people actually

27:12

working when doing the four day week. So

27:15

the policy exists, but actually what is

27:17

actually being the reality? And it seems

27:20

that it actually takes about twelve months for people to get down to 32 hours, Mark.

27:25

So there is a gradual reduction in working

27:27

hours despite the policy being in place. I

27:30

think that's probably a testament to the

27:32

fact there is a willingness from employees

27:35

to not just clip the fingers and just drop

27:39

everything, but actually realize that there is systemic change that's required

27:42

here. And so this is a longer transition

27:44

period for us as a business. And I think

27:47

having those findings, particularly from an academic point of view, it was hugely

27:51

powerful in the narrative for an affordable week and in the studies. If you

27:55

looked at what employers are doing with

27:57

their time, I mean, are they actually

27:59

taking the time for, I guess, what this is intended for, for well being, health

28:03

connection, all those sorts of things, or

28:05

are they whacking themselves into the gig

28:07

economy and going, well, I've got another day or two here, I can, I can get some

28:11

more work, and then we're sort of spreading the problem differently. What

28:14

have you seen in the research? Yeah, it's

28:18

great. It's a great question. And look, it's not our role as business leaders to

28:25

determine what people do in their time off, but what we have found is that by and

28:29

large, people aren't taking up second

28:31

shifts or third jobs or whatever. And

28:34

that's the only acceptance to that actually is in South Africa, where we

28:37

found more people taking up, you know,

28:41

some entrepreneurial activities, some new

28:43

side hustles. But by and large, people are

28:46

using the time off to do life admin on one

28:50

day, and on another day, take care of

28:53

elderly parents, take care of kids, and

28:56

more importantly, take up a new hobby,

28:59

engage in volunteering, do things that

29:01

actually make people feel good. They're

29:04

the typical things that we see people do.

29:06

And what's really interesting is people don't come back with that same Monday

29:09

fear. People come back actually on Mondays feeling quite energized, which again

29:15

reflects the fact that the five day week probably isn't working for us anymore. If

29:19

people actually are coming into Monday

29:22

mornings or Mondays overall feeling

29:25

exhausted, it reflects that we don't have enough time off to actually rest and

29:29

recover in the first place. Yeah, I concur with that just because I'm fascinated by

29:35

these things. What do you think it is

29:37

within the four day week that is? I mean, you mentioned theres a more collegiate

29:42

approach to work and that employees are

29:45

working better together. What specifically

29:49

have you found to be the cause of that? Is

29:52

it just because theyve got renewed energy and theyve got some kind of renewed focus

29:56

and maybe theres a minute of time pressure in there, but what have you found? Well, I

30:00

think youre right. I think thats definitely feeding into it. I think the

30:05

right type of leadership creates what we call psychological safety within teams. So

30:09

actually the ability to not call out, but

30:12

to identify barriers to what is stopping

30:16

effective working. And we know that those

30:18

don't tend to be issues of technology or

30:21

procedure as much as it is people and their interaction with those sort of

30:24

systems and processes. So actually,

30:27

organizations become much better at saying, you know, your communication style

30:31

is not working for me. I'm still not clear

30:33

on what you're looking for from me. And

30:35

having those open and honest conversations with the view to actually improving

30:39

performance instead of oftentimes, what it

30:42

is is those conversations going deep into

30:45

the underbelly of the organization and

30:47

creating this churn of or, and toxic

30:51

culture and incivility within workplaces.

30:53

William? Yeah, you've mentioned South

30:56

Africa, so, I mean, the clue is in the

30:59

global element here. What countries are

31:02

leading the way with this? Dale? And why

31:05

is that? Why is there a different approach

31:08

or perhaps a more enthusiastic approach in

31:11

those countries, do you think? Yeah, great

31:13

question. I think that there's probably two continents leading the way, and that's

31:17

Europe and Australasia. And that's

31:20

unsurprising because they're the two continents that have typically had a

31:25

conversation around working time for quite a long time. Australia, I would say, is

31:29

probably really at the forefront of the

31:31

conversation. So we've seen not just small and medium enterprise, but large

31:36

enterprises, government bodies, public

31:38

sector entities all looking and

31:40

experimenting with this. I would say

31:42

Europe, you know, has always, particularly

31:45

the European Union, has been looking at

31:47

conversations around working time and protection of worker protection, worker

31:50

rights, particularly over the last few years since the pandemic. And so we have

31:54

seen, we have the largest, largest

31:56

continental trial happening in Germany at the moment. We'll be launching trials in

32:00

France, Switzerland, Italy, Norway,

32:03

Sweden, Netherlands over the next few

32:05

months. And I think that's going to really create a huge conversation. The nordic

32:09

countries are always pointed to around the conversation, around work life balance,

32:13

but they've equally had converse or issues

32:16

of overworking within their societies. We

32:19

just don't, aren't privy to those conversations as much because we hold them

32:23

up in the gold standard. The UK had the

32:26

largest trial, so 60 companies, and I think the private sector in the UK has

32:31

always innovated and experimented with new

32:33

ways of working. The City of London has

32:36

had nine day fortnights in many companies

32:38

for a long period of time. So we're not reinventing the wheel of a culture that

32:41

often exists within larger cities in the

32:44

UK. The public sector in the UK, on the

32:47

other hand, and political leadership is

32:50

very against the concept. And there has

32:52

actually been a lot of discourse from the

32:57

Tory government, with particularly one

33:00

county council, South Cambridge or county

33:02

council, which brought in a four day week

33:04

and a lot of mandates by government,

33:09

stopped the trial. And the scottish government then have come out with a

33:12

public sector trial. So creating that,

33:14

again, discord between Scotland and

33:18

England and how different sectors are approaching it. So I think the UK is a

33:23

hotbed for activity, but also a hotbed for

33:27

discourse. The US then, has actually

33:29

approached it from a slightly different lens, in the sense that we have had two

33:34

bills come to the House of Representatives

33:36

and the Senate, through Congressman Mark

33:39

Tacano and Senator Bernie Sanders, whom

33:41

we're all aware of, who brought in the 32

33:43

hours work week act. And that has created

33:47

a lot of conversation in the US around

33:50

legislative change, and particularly workers rights. The United Auto Workers,

33:55

famously Henry Ford's workers, had asked

33:58

for a four day week as part of their recent negotiations. So there's a lot of

34:02

trade union conversation happening in the

34:04

US. And then lastly, we looked at South

34:07

America and Africa, and we currently have

34:11

trials happening in Brazil due to launch in Chile as well. We have South Africa

34:15

completed and Namibia forthcoming as well.

34:18

So I'm really interested to understand what those differences would look like in

34:22

some developing countries as well. I'd say

34:25

lastly then, Asia is probably the market that is the hardest not to crack. And we

34:31

have seen experimentation and innovation

34:34

with regards to flexible working in the likes of places like Singapore, Japan. But

34:38

there is long cultures of overworking

34:41

within systems and very rigid hierarchy

34:44

systems. The Middle east is also another

34:47

hotbed for activity and being driven in

34:50

many instances by this desire to be the

34:54

new leaders of the world. So the UAE,

34:57

Saudi Arabia, pumping huge amounts of

35:00

investment into creating new cities, new

35:02

ways of working, trying to create

35:07

attractable jobs for expats to work in.

35:10

And so the Sharjah government in the UAE

35:12

actually brought in a four day week in

35:15

their public sector, their teaching body.

35:17

So I expect we will see some similar things happening in some of the

35:21

competitive regions over there. Over the next while as well. Fascinating. So

35:25

clearly a very interesting global picture

35:28

emerging with this stuff as we go forward.

35:30

There's a couple of other topics I want us to try and cover today, if we can, in the

35:34

time that we have. The first of which is,

35:38

I guess, incredibly timely for us in the

35:41

UK, particularly around the impact around

35:44

cost of living. I mean, you can't turn on

35:48

the telly or read anything or bump into

35:50

someone in the street who hasn't got a

35:52

struggling story to tell about finances

35:55

and what have you. And you don't have to

35:58

be a genius to sort of see link's

36:01

potential positive and negative links between moving to a four day week and an

36:05

impact on people's financial situations or

36:09

businesses financial situations or economic situations. What do you think the

36:13

impact of a four day week could be? And

36:15

could it offer a solution? Could it be

36:17

that buffer? Or is there a chance it could

36:21

exacerbate the situation? Again, I think

36:23

this is all up to leaders and how they

36:25

approach this. So in our trials,

36:28

organizations do not reduce pay for their

36:30

staff. We require organizations to commit

36:33

100% paid, because the proof that we're trying to show is that we're rewarding

36:37

performance instead of time. And with that

36:39

viewpoint, then we would hope that actually this wouldn't negatively impact

36:44

on salaries of people. If we are changing

36:46

the narrative to actually evaluating outcomes and performance, in doing so as

36:51

well, businesses should grow and perform

36:54

better, thus being able to actually compensate people more effectively. We

36:58

know that businesses, theyre all talking

37:00

about how do I reduce my overhead costs?

37:02

How do I stop staffs that leave, and

37:05

presenteeism and absenteeism costs that are huge for our business. And if we know

37:09

that this works, that free up some money for people to be able to play around with

37:14

and hopefully increase salaries for

37:17

organizations and their people in the future. I take the point though. It is a

37:22

risk bringing in reduced working time can

37:25

be taken advantage of by leaders to

37:30

actually cut staffing. But that is totally

37:34

the antithesis of the philosophy of what we're trying to showcase, is that we're

37:38

trying to create sustainable human resource structures here that can actually

37:41

produce outcomes that are sustainable for

37:44

the business longer term. So actually

37:46

cutting staffing is just going to put more of these people under pressure and create

37:50

that great resignation cycle that we've

37:52

seen so much happen over the last few

37:54

years. The other thing as well is that we

37:58

are going to have fluctuating economies

38:01

forever more. And we're highly globalized

38:05

society, which means that we rely so much

38:08

on other countries, actually not facing

38:11

too much turmoil in order for us to not

38:13

face too much turmoil. We take, for

38:15

example, Ireland's economy, highly

38:19

precarious in the fact that we rely so much on foreign investment in the tech

38:23

industry. And so when tech job losses

38:25

happened back in the beginning of year, the irish economy went into fight, flight

38:30

or freeze mode in regards to how it

38:33

reacts. And I think that's a question that political leaders need to question. Is

38:38

globalization in the way that we currently have it actually good for local economy if

38:42

we know that political turmoil of war,

38:46

climate change, all these things are actually going to be here to stay and

38:51

that's going to forever more impact on

38:53

local economies. So I think that's up to

38:57

leaders, political leaders to figure out how do we manage that globalization

39:00

question? That's not for me to answer. But

39:02

what I can say is that people in times of

39:06

uncertainty require some sense of

39:08

stability. And if a thousand euro here or

39:11

a bonus of 400 euro at Christmas time, if

39:14

that's becoming increasingly useless to

39:17

people because of the rising cost of

39:19

living, what is it that leaders can give

39:22

people in return that will equally help

39:25

with their sense of well being? And that is time. So if we know time is a gift,

39:31

it's a precious commodity, we know that

39:33

it's one of the, not having enough time is one of the top five regrets of the dying

39:38

in times of uncertainty, provide people

39:41

with certainty by giving them more time to

39:43

do the things that they would like to be

39:45

able to do. Again, there's so much in

39:48

there. Dale I think what's really

39:50

interesting in the whole globalization piece is it's unlikely we're going to have

39:55

one day. We're all working the five day week, and then globally we say, right

39:58

today everybody switches to four and

40:00

you've got level competition across the

40:03

globe. We're going to have lead and lag. And there's going to be, like you said,

40:07

maybe Asia will be the last last to go.

40:10

Who knows? But I think this is where the

40:12

whole productivity question, what that really means, versus the quality output of

40:17

what that really means, really comes to play. And that's a massive mind shift

40:21

change for businesses and leaders and for

40:24

global economies, because we've got

40:26

hundreds, thousands of years to unpick

40:29

with a lot of this stuff, or at least it feels that way. Raoul and more is not

40:33

always better. In fact, I think AI is going to showcase that to us very quickly

40:38

in the next few years. Raoul yeah, and that's the piece I would like us to have a

40:41

final look at. Dale is that tech AI it's

40:47

going to have a massive role in the future of work. I think. I watched some YouTube

40:50

video this morning on society 5.0 and, and

40:54

how all that kind of aligns. So what are

40:57

these courageous leaders going to need to

41:00

do going forward to harness all this

41:03

stuff? Put it alongside something like the

41:05

four day workweek to really kind of change

41:08

and redefine the role of work in our

41:12

lives? Yeah, great question. I'll use some

41:15

examples, actually, in how we approach AI in our business. So we use notion as one

41:21

of our kind of task management systems to

41:25

leverage AI in a way that helps to

41:28

systemize and simplify our work packages

41:30

for people so that we're not spending 10

41:32

hours trying to do this very complex task.

41:35

AI can give us an 80% completed version

41:37

that we can simply redefine. For me, then

41:41

in meetings, we use otter AI. So actually

41:44

we have these long conversations, but often people aren't jotting down what the

41:47

outcomes are and people need. One of the big things is that people don't realize

41:51

what they have to do after a meeting.

41:53

Otter AI simplifies all that and helps us

41:56

to quickly and succinctly manage those

41:59

sort of things. I take, for example, there was a situation where I had two partners

42:02

that I was working with, and we need to create a memorandum of understanding, and

42:06

Otter AI had summarized the meeting points, and I was able to create an MoU

42:10

using chat GBT within five minutes. In the

42:13

past, that would have taken 10 hours of me

42:16

trying to summarize the main points. Getting legal to design something for me,

42:20

me editing it, you know, it suddenly

42:23

revolutionizes how we can do very complex tasks into simple ways. AI is going to

42:29

either create job losses or create job

42:32

opportunities, and that's up for us to decide. The differentiation we need to

42:36

start saying is that AI must be harnessed

42:38

to do what it's very good at doing, which

42:41

is the grunt of the work and the hard,

42:45

repetitive work that creates huge cognitive burden on people. The

42:49

differentiation of humans and the future work is actually being to critically

42:53

appraise what AI produces and tailor it

42:56

according to specific nuances of a

42:59

situation. But more importantly,

43:01

innovation and creativity are going to be

43:03

critical skills for the future of work,

43:06

and AI is just not going to be able to create that for us. It will help give us a

43:10

blueprint of what it is, but it'll be up to humans to figure out how do we create a

43:14

human centric version for a product or a

43:16

service or an offering. But people are not

43:19

going to be able to innovate or be

43:21

creative. If they're burned out, the two

43:23

things just kind of coexist with one

43:26

another. So that's where the, the opportunity of four day week comes in to

43:30

say, we know that reducing work and time and changing how we approach work will

43:33

help to reduce burnout. So therefore we

43:36

will be able to access these new human

43:38

capabilities of innovation and creativity.

43:42

And we need to realize how good the

43:45

outcomes of those sort of human capabilities are. And if we focus and put

43:48

a time metric on them, we're going to set

43:50

ourselves up for failure. You know, I used to work in academia, and I could read ten

43:56

papers across 5 hours, or I could sit down

43:59

in the morning from four to 05:00 a.m. And

44:02

write for 45 minutes. Guess which one led

44:04

to me complete PhD much quicker. And

44:08

that's the sort of way of thinking we need to focus on it's quality over output, and

44:12

AI will produce more and more and more if

44:15

that's what we ask it to do. But we are.

44:19

It would be foolish of us to think that more is better. In fact, I already think

44:22

we're beginning to see the implications of

44:25

that through content creation, through the

44:28

arts, where AI is being used more and

44:30

more, is creating this prism between

44:34

people actually being able to connect with what's being written. It's just from a

44:39

biological basis. When people feel that

44:41

something's not written by a human, they just disconnect somewhat. So we need to be

44:45

able to rectify that if we want to create

44:48

a world of work that's not just robots talking to robots. I agree. I mean, I look

44:52

at my own productivity. Let's be honest,

44:55

it kind of wanes from being awful to being

44:58

not too bad. The impact that AI has had on

45:01

me has been amazing. And I think your

45:04

point about the 80 20 rule is one that

45:07

needs to be well understood by people, is that it will get you in the ballpark

45:11

really quickly, and then it's about using

45:13

your skill to kind of hone it and saving

45:15

yourself a lot of time. And I agree with you. I think if we can really understand

45:19

how we can take away some of those grunt

45:22

pieces away, then aligning this with the

45:24

four day week, it can make sense in the

45:27

same way that AI's got critics and four

45:30

day week has critics. It depends what we

45:32

do. It really depends what we do. And

45:34

that's, I guess, the final thing I'd like us to think about. Dale. We've come to the

45:38

bit in the show I call sticky notes, which

45:41

is where I'm asking you to summarize

45:44

everything that's in your head on three little sticky notes. So when we're

45:47

thinking about businesses considering

45:50

making a move to the four day week, or

45:53

even thinking about it, what three pieces

45:55

of advice would you give them? Dale, I

45:57

think we need to look at four day week

46:00

beyond just employee well being and

46:02

productivity. But realize that all of the things that you're trying to do around

46:06

equity and sustainability and health is

46:08

people working time. And how we approach

46:10

work is going to be critical in helping you achieve those goals. The second thing

46:16

is this needs to get past the C suite. So

46:19

there is a need to actually have a strong

46:22

business case for the four day week. So

46:24

you need to approach this from the lens of

46:26

risk as opposed to nice to have. And I

46:29

think when you look at the cost for

46:31

organizations around burnout and stress,

46:34

sleeve and absenteeism, and you know that

46:37

a work intervention like 40 week helps to

46:39

mitigate a lot of that, that's your business case for getting you in the door

46:43

on this. And lastly, the last thing I

46:46

would say is it's about time that business

46:50

leaders started learning some of the psychology of work and realizing that they

46:55

would get a huge return of investment in

46:58

their efforts, in their workplace interventions and their efficiency

47:02

interventions, if they could just crack the code how to motivate their workforce.

47:07

And we've spoken today about what are the

47:09

key psychological needs that people need to feel that they have in order to feel

47:13

motivated, feel like they're doing a good job, to feel like they have autonomy and

47:16

to feel connected to people. And that's

47:19

both inside and outside of work. And the

47:21

conversation around working time reduction

47:23

helps to start the conversation around

47:26

fulfilling. Those sort of very, very wise

47:29

words, my friend. Thank you for leaving us with those. I've thoroughly enjoyed this

47:33

conversation with you today. As always with these conversations, feel like we'll

47:37

just open up a whole bunch of questions

47:39

for more research and for more understanding. But I really appreciate you

47:42

coming on before I let you go. Where can

47:45

people find out more, Dale? Where should they go? So we're 40 week.com, so check us

47:49

out there. Our aim is to create a million

47:51

new years of free time. So you'll see how

47:53

we're trying to achieve that by working with more organizations across the world.

47:57

We have free resources like how to

48:00

convince your boss how to make the business case for four day a week. All of

48:03

our research is available for you to

48:06

review, including how organizations have

48:08

approached a four day week, the different versions of a four day week, how rigidly

48:13

it was implemented all of those sort of

48:15

things. And you can check us out on social

48:17

as well. We also post a lot about the

48:20

general conversations around the future work context of hybrid working and

48:24

flexible working and happiness in work and

48:26

all of those sort of concepts. And so

48:29

we're always sharing the latest up to date research on our socials as well.

48:33

Brilliant. Well, I'll stick all of that in the show notes so people can kind of get

48:36

easy access to it. Thanks so much for

48:38

coming on, my friend. Really appreciate

48:41

it. And good luck with everything. Thank

48:43

you, Andy, thank you for having me. No,

48:45

absolute pleasure. Okay, everyone, that

48:48

was Dale Whelehan, and if you'd like to

48:50

find out a bit more about hear more, any of the things we've talked about today,

48:53

please check out the show notes. So that

48:58

concludes today's episode. I hope you've

49:01

enjoyed it, found it interesting, and

49:04

heard something maybe that will help you

49:06

become a stickier, more successful

49:08

business from the inside going forward. If

49:11

you have, please like comment and

49:14

subscribe. It really helps. I'm Andy

49:18

Goram, and you've been listening to the sticky from the Inside podcast. Until next