In May 2020, amid the uncertainties and difficulties brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic, a social media tech website decided to allow its employees greater flexibility. It ran a survey to see how they can help its employees, especially the parents who were now taking care of their children at home alongside working remotely.

Share Market Live

NSE

Buffer started with a one-month trial of the four-day workweek and observed that it helped cut stress levels. Also, productivity did not dip. At the end of 2021, it observed that output levels had also gone up and there was an improvement in general happiness. The company then decided to continue the four-day workweek.

Also read: TCS, Infosys, Wipro keen on employees returning to office from next month. Know details

In its latest internal survey, the company observed that 91 percent of the team is happier and more productive working four days a week. Now the company is three months from completing its second anniversary of the three-day weekends.

But Buffer had to overcome some challenges in order to successfully adopt the system.

The first thing to do was to figure out how everyone would get their work done in time, Hailley Griffis, Buffer’s Head of PR, told CNBC.

Also read: Four-day workweek? This Indian company tried it 4 years ago

To get used to the 32-hour, four-day workweek, Buffer teams cut down on meetings and moved to asynchronous communication tools like Threads. They also adjusted expectations of how long it would take to meet project deadlines. It required a big shift in mindset, starting with senior leaders, Griffis says in the report.

The next big challenge was figuring out which day to take off. At the beginning, Buffer let each team decide. But later, this proved to be too disorganised as the different teams still needed to work with each other. Thus, Buffer standardised to Fridays off.

Also read: #FutureofWork - Meesho goes 'Boundaryless', allows employees to work from anywhere

Currently, in terms of getting work done, about 84 percent of the team is able to get their work done in four days. “This has been an adjustment as it isn’t easy to suddenly change the workweek, so each team and teammate have been experimenting over these last years to adjust their work, projects, deadlines, and expectations to be realistic with a four-day workweek. There’s always room for improvement but we’re happy to see this number as high as it is right now” the company wrote in its blog.

According to the survey, 73 percent said they’re indeed working on a shortened schedule. The remaining 27 percent said they are averaging four-and-a-half days as they are using a few hours of the fifth day to catch up on tasks. However, Buffer has a strict rule against scheduling meetings or communication via Threads, email, or Slack on Fridays.

Also read: How HR automation can help organisations retain millennial workforce

Although the team’s productivity remained steady, the engagement rates fell from the beginning of 2021. Many factors, such as team turnover, product direction, and external influences, contributed to this. However, one thing that was highlighted in the surveys was the reduction in team-building events such as Zoom hangouts, guest speakers, and in-person events such as company retreats.

To overcome this, Buffer is diving back into more intentional team-building both asynchronously and synchronously, besides the occasional in-person meet-ups in 2022.

Many countries, including Belgium, Sweden, and the UAE have adopted 4-day workweeks with different rules and regulations.

(Edited by : Shoma Bhattacharjee)