Could the 4‐day week work? A scoping review

Abstract

The 4‐day work week (4DWW) was popularised in the 1970s, but has recently gained significant global attention again, with a growing number of organisations experimenting with the 4DWW in response to increasing demand for more flexible work arrangements (FWA) in the aftermath of the COVID‐19 pandemic. The emergence of generative AI tools like ChatGPT, with their potential to support worktime reduction strategies, are also refuelling interest in a shorter working week. This renewed interest motivated this scoping review of 1769 4DWW records from the past 52 years and enabled the authors to identify five major themes: employee acceptance, allocation of time, leisure, gender and career advancement, and productivity. These themes are used to consider specific forms of 4DWW in terms of whether days of work are fixed or flexible, whether the 4DWW is an employee option, and whether total weekly hours worked or pay are reduced. Conservation of resources theory is used as a lens for interpreting the themes. The authors believe these themes and lessons have significant implications for a growing number of scholars and practitioners, who are investigating, trialling, and implementing 4DWW arrangements, in response to growing demand for more FWA options from employees across all sectors.

Managing the Right to Disconnect—A Scoping Review

“…In this instance, the scoping review method was preferred to a systematic literature review, which would have been more appropriate had the literature sources been more narrowly focused in, say, one discipline area [27][28][29]. Scoping reviews have been used to study similar topics impacting modern workers in recent years, such as teleworking and work-life balance [30] and the four-day work week [31], and can provide a useful platform for identifying potential areas of future investigation.…”

An organizational working time reduction and its impact on three domains of mental well-being of employees: a panel study

“…Organizational commitment and change to accommodate a shorter working week together with employee consultation seem important for successful implementation, especially regarding positive impacts on workers’ well-being (e.g.,[ 11 , 25 ]). Aware of this importance and committed to not increasing employees’ workload, Femma Wereldvrouwen sought support from organizational change consultants and installed a work group of employees who were co-responsible for the organizational changes in the run-up to the 30-h workweek.…”