Reducing weekly working hours: Temporal strategies and changes in the organization and experiences of work-Results from a qualitative study of a 30-hour workweek experiment

Mullens, Francisca; Glorieux, Ignace

doi:10.1177/0961463x231156948

Cited by 3 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 31 publications

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“…In large companies, the decisions are usually more formalised (Mullens and Glorieux, 2023), top-down, and significant efforts are made to measure performance after the introduction of WTR schemes. Even though most large companies in our sample opted for low-risk WTRs, which essentially streamline and restructure work instead of meaningfully reducing workloads (Delaney and Casey, 2021), they run long trials and use lengthy introduction phases as they seek to strike a balance between offering attractive conditions to workers and preserving profit rates.…”

Section: Decisions On Wtrsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Working time reduction: Employers’ perspectives and eco-social implications – ten cases from Hungary

Hidasi,

Venczel,

Antal

2023

European Journal of Social Security

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Working time reduction (WTR) refers to an increasingly popular group of eco-social policies, with various potential implications for social security and sustainable welfare depending on the details of implementation. Despite the growing number of international examples, WTRs constitute a countertrend in Hungary where the government aims to create a ‘work-based society’. In this context, we investigate whether and how companies launch WTRs, and study their effects. Our approach is comparative and explorative. We draw on interviews with managers of 10 companies to understand the motivations behind WTRs. In addition, we use 34 interviews and two focus groups conducted at four companies, considering impacts on employees’ workload and working conditions. We show that the drivers, mechanisms and impacts of WTRs differ by company size. There is far more diversity among smaller companies, where the attitudes of managers and personal relationships are decisive. Larger companies either choose low-risk WTRs that offer low gains, or target further growth and potentially cause a reduction of sectoral output while maximising profit. The latter may be the first example of profit-driven degrowth in the literature. Insights generated here can be useful to understand the potential reasons for, and barriers to, a more widespread adoption of WTRs, as well as the role of positive and negative impacts on workers in this process. We argue that this is important not only for social and economic outcomes, but also for the environment, since WTRs are necessary for a precautionary approach to sustainability. We highlight the limitations of current WTRs, in order to catalyse thinking about more radical variants.

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Section: Decisions On Wtrsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Working time reduction: Employers’ perspectives and eco-social implications – ten cases from Hungary

Hidasi,

Venczel,

Antal

2023

European Journal of Social Security

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The Care of the Self and the Meaningful Four-Day Workweek

Pedersen,

Muhr,

Dunne

2024

Philosophy of Management

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Those who find their work meaningful often need to be more committed. Over-commitment, in turn, frequently results in stress, personal conflicts, and burnout. Such over-commitment, in other words, leads to employees needing to take more care of themselves. This paper considers the prospects for meaningful self-care in the context of working time reduction. For this, we consider the case of the four-day workweek, asking employees of such organizations to explain how they make meaning out of their newly found time off. Conceptually, we rely upon the work of Michel Foucault, particularly his analysis of the care of the self. On its basis, we coded five self-care practices: (1) rest and recuperation, (2) professional and personal development, (3) domestic work, (4) balancing work, and (5) additional work. We conclude by highlighting the theoretical and practical implications of work reduction for the analytical, ethical, and practical pursuit of meaningful work.

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Time management between the personalisation and collectivisation of productivity: The case of adopting the Pomodoro time-management tool in a four-day workweek company

Pedersen,

Muhr,

Dunne

2024

Time & Society

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Time-management technologies and their adoption into daily working life have been discussed as solutions for managing individual productivity and as problems that intensify individualised productivity, enhance the norms of busyness and disconnect colleagues from one another. However, drawing on the case study of a company that implemented a four-day workweek, this paper argues that this is not always so. In our case company, a digital marketing agency, the Pomodoro time-management tool led to the personalisation of productivity and instances of collective working towards better work-life balance. We end the paper by suggesting that this fruitful adoption of time-management habits can be understood through John Dewey's notion of habit. Deweyan habit allows us to know how time-management habits are plastic and open to change while always being part of a material and social assemblage. We argue that these two features explain why time-management tools might lead to personalising productivity and enhanced neoliberal self-discipline. At the same time, these features point to how time-management habits under the right circumstances can be part of cooperation and better work-life balance.

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Reducing weekly working hours: Temporal strategies and changes in the organization and experiences of work-Results from a qualitative study of a 30-hour workweek experiment

Cited by 3 publications

References 31 publications

Working time reduction: Employers’ perspectives and eco-social implications – ten cases from Hungary

Working time reduction: Employers’ perspectives and eco-social implications – ten cases from Hungary

The Care of the Self and the Meaningful Four-Day Workweek

Time management between the personalisation and collectivisation of productivity: The case of adopting the Pomodoro time-management tool in a four-day workweek company

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