Reducing Work Hours: Why a Balanced Lifestyle Boosts Productivity

The classic nine to five. Five days a week. Maybe two or three weeks off during the year. This is what the typical work structure looks like for most Americans. My experience working in Brussels was only twenty-four hours a week but observing the work schedules of my coworkers and hearing about the schedules of other offices my friends were interning with painted a very different picture of what office schedules look like. I usually arrived to the office promptly at nine every morning, and it would not be uncommon for me to be one of the first five in the office. Many of my coworkers would come in as late as 9:45 or even a bit after 10:00. If the work was done for the day, my colleagues would have no issue with leaving before five. I found that in my office, the only thing that mattered was getting the job done. Putting in hours was not important; it was what the employee did with those hours.

In addition to having flexible hours, many of my workers did not work five days a week. The four-day work week was quite common. Whether it was selecting Friday or Wednesday, I emulated this schedule and spread my twenty-four hours over four days each week and found that I was very productive each day as I spent three full days out of the office each week. This highly balanced lifestyle made me feel more complete as a total person and allowed me to focus on areas of my life I had been neglecting under high intensity schedules of the past. The much-needed breaks and relaxed structure truly left me hungry and ready to work on the days I was in the office as opposed to unmotivated and waiting for the clock to hit five each Friday.

Does this feeling of boosted productivity under less strenuous required hours actually hold true? According to CNN, in august of 2019, Microsoft tested a four-day work week program called “Work Life Choice Challenge” among their employees. Employees were also asked to shorten meeting times and to lessen the amount of time spent answering emails each day. Microsoft found that company productivity in that August jumped over 40% due to the structural change. Such an eye-popping statistic should cause employers everywhere to rethink the archaic composition of the nine to five, five-day work week. If a company such as Microsoft can achieve vast improvements at such a large scale from a small change, other corporations should certainly look into it.

(A gym in Brussels I would occasionally visit)

Allowing myself to have more time outside of the office gave me the opportunity to have amazing life experiences. I could travel more often and spend more time in places I may never visit again. More time off meant further developing friendships and discovering new places and activities littered about Brussels. Most importantly a lessened work week allowed me to focus more on my health and to spend quality time running or in the weight room without rushing through exercises. Working out became fun, not an objective on a checklist that had to be hurriedly completed. I would seriously recommend testing this schedule out if you are in a plateau or even decreasing performance at work. Talk to your boss, or if you are the boss, consider revising the schedule.