What would you do with 8 more hours?
Can working less get everyone more?
The first week back from a break like the one I hope a lot of you had between Christmas and New Year’s is a rough one. You just spent a month or so slowing down, wrapping up, and signing off. Revving back up with a whole year’s worth of expectations ahead is a daunting task.
Hopefully you’re feeling rejuvenated by the time off and excited about your ideas for the year, but, unfortunately, no one has the luxury of channeling that combination toward a singular goal. No matter how much time you block off, the requirements of daily existence add up and chip away at your availability and energy.
The tweet above reminds us that, especially within a gendered framework, the 40 hour workweek is outdated. It’s certainly better than the factory heyday of 16 hours a day 6 days a week, but we’re overdue for another workforce reckoning.
As the “Great Resignation” raged last year, many workers took matters into their own hands by leaving unsatisfactory employment situations. Despite what the media will have you believe, it’s not so much that people don’t want to work 40 hours. It’s that a lot of these “skilled” jobs don’t require 40 hours to get done.
A previous Neary Report™️ covered overemployed folks reporting to two full-time jobs at once. It’s not perfect math to say that those who can keep up appearances at two jobs well enough to not get fired would excel at one job, but it does support the notion that they had plenty of extra time while only holding down one.
You might be thinking that if someone’s getting paid the same for half the amount of work, they should probably shut their trap and enjoy it, but this setup doesn’t benefit employers or employees. Downtime can be unpredictable and the constantly nagging thought that you should probably be doing something related to your job (no matter how inconsequential) while on the clock hangs over the ability to be productive at tasks more meaningful than refreshing your Instagram feed.
With the shift to remote work, many of us have not only gained back the time that was spent commuting but also the time spent just manning our desks, not really doing any work, but getting credit for being present. Time that couldn’t be spent folding laundry or squeezing in a workout or just putting your feet up in between meetings.
And that’s a start, but to truly be able to find more meaning, happiness, and balance while working full time, we need to purposefully reclaim that time. Maybe it’s a four day workweek like the one that’s seen early success in Iceland or half day sprints or maybe it’s just more honesty about how long it takes to get things done and acknowledgement that it’s ok to work less, get the same results, and get back to your life.