Just like many of our members, ASA staff worked hard over the last few years during a particularly difficult period. We managed our own work and personal lives through COVID and supported our members during their COVID-related and various other challenges. In 2023, we joined people in workplaces across the world in seeking ways to regain a healthy work/life balance in a post-pandemic environment. We turned to the sociological literature for guidance, and discovered the work of ASA members Wen Fan, Phyllis Moen, and Juliet Schor on the Four Day Work Week (4DWW). In January 2024, we began a six-month 4DWW pilot.
The 4DWW aims for 100% of the pay, 100% of the work, and 80% of the time. Sounds impossible, right? We too were skeptical at first. Is it really possible to gain that much time through structural adjustments to an organization’s approach to work? Indeed, our colleagues’ work over several years studying the 4DWW around the world and across industries and organizations of different sizes demonstrates that it is. ASA staff’s 4DWW pilot confirms the research findings and demonstrates that it is possible to do while offering the same high quality member service we currently offer.
How does this work? As you can imagine as sociologists, improvements come from collective, structural changes. We’ve spent the last six months working together as a team to collectively restructure our workdays, develop improved meeting protocols, revise our approach to email, and more. This is something the staff has co-created and implemented together; the pilot would not have succeeded if people were approaching it individualistically. And prior to launching the pilot, we spent several months learning how to transition to a 4DWW along with people from other organizations and companies that were also preparing to start their pilots.
Our colleagues’ research shows, and our experience with the pilot confirms, that the 4DWW has very positive results from both employer and employee perspectives. Almost all organizations that have piloted the program continue beyond the pilot period. Many participating employers report stable or even increased productivity and performance. Surveys of employees show significant improvement in more than fifteen wellbeing measures including burnout and stress, anxiety, fatigue and physical and mental health. Many of the participating organizations report declines in employee turnover and increased applicants for open positions.
We’re very excited to adopt the 4DWW. We want to do a great job of serving ASA’s mission and continue to be an employer of choice. The 4DWW helps us accomplish these goals. Adopting a 4DWW also helps us continue to serve the discipline of sociology well with a happy and healthy staff.
What’s important for you to know is that we are committed to ensuring continued good service for our members. We will not be in the office on Fridays, so it is possible you will need to wait an extra day for a response if you reach out to us then. We will make sure there aren’t any Friday deadlines or anything else that might prompt needs for immediate attention on that day. Otherwise, you should expect the same high quality and timely service you’ve come to expect when you reach out to the ASA staff.
To learn more about the 4DWW, read “Does work time reduction improve workers’ well-being? Evidence from global four-day workweek trials” by Wen Fan, Juliet B. Schor, Orla Kelly, and Guolin Gu and watch Juliet Schor’s TED Talk.
Again, we don’t expect this to have any impact on our service to members, but if you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact ASA Interim Executive Director, Heather Washington, at [email protected].
