Current Events > New Zealand firm's four-day week an 'unmitigated success'

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/19/work-less-get-more-new-zealand-firms-four-day-week-an-unmitigated-success

The New Zealand company behind a landmark trial of a four-day working week has concluded it an unmitigated success, with 78% of employees feeling they were able to successfully manage their work-life balance, an increase of 24 percentage points.

Two-hundred-and-forty staff at Perpetual Guardian, a company which manages trusts, wills and estate planning, trialled a four-day working week over March and April, working four, eight-hour days but getting paid for five.

Academics studied the trial before, during and after its implementation, collecting qualitative and quantitative data.

Perpetual Guardian founder Andrew Barnes came up with the idea in an attempt to give his employees better work-life balance, and help them focus on the business while in the office on company time, and manage life and home commitments on their extra day off.

Jarrod Haar, professor of human resource management at Auckland University of Technology, found job and life satisfaction increased on all levels across the home and work front, with employees performing better in their jobs and enjoying them more than before the experiment.

Work-life balance, which reflected how well respondents felt they could successfully manage their work and non-work roles, increased by 24 percentage points.

In November last year just over half (54%) of staff felt they could effectively balance their work and home commitments, while after the trial this number jumped to 78%.

Staff stress levels decreased by 7 percentage points across the board as a result of the trial, while stimulation, commitment and a sense of empowerment at work all improved significantly, with overall life satisfaction increasing by 5 percentage points.

Helen Delaney, a senior lecturer at the University of Auckland Business School, said employees motivation and commitment to work increased because they were included in the planning of the experiment, and played a key role in designing how the four-day week would be managed so as not to negatively impact productivity.

Employees designed a number of innovations and initiatives to work in a more productive and efficient manner, from automating manual processes to reducing or eliminating non-work-related internet usage, said Delaney.

Andrew Barnes said he would take the results of the trial to the board to open up a discussion on how a four-day work week could be implemented long-term in his company.

If you can have parents spending more time with their children, how is that a bad thing? asked Barnes, who believes the new work model has the potential to profoundly impact society for the better.

Are you likely to get fewer mental health issues when you have more time to take care of yourself and your personal interests? Probably ... if you have fewer people in the office at any one time, can we make smaller offices?

New Zealands workplace relations minister, Iain Lees-Galloway, said the results of the trial were very interesting and he was keen to encourage businesses to trial new and improved work models.

Im really keen to work with any businesses that are looking at how they can be more flexible for their staff and how they can look to improve productivity whilst working alongside their staff and protecting terms and conditions, Less-Galloway said.

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why would they choose the modifier 'unmitigated' for this

you dont mitigate succeses
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A happy wife is a happy life. Treat your employees as though they're your wives and make them happy and they'll make you happy by taking more pride in their work in supporting your goals.
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I would convert to communism if communists successfully negotiated a 4-day work week
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Darkman124 posted...

why would they choose the modifier 'unmitigated' for this

you dont mitigate succeses

It's a common and correct usage of the word.
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TomNook20 posted...

It's a common and correct usage of the word.

Is it? Dictionary definitions, and all colloquial uses I am familiar with, frame it in the context of damage control or otherwise reducing the intensity of negative events, rather than undermining the quality of positive ones

It just reads very strangely to me, but perhaps it has different colloquial uses in Britain/NZ
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Now THIS is something I can get behind.
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I never understood why more white collar jobs don't do this, especially in industries like tech where more hours worked != more productivity.
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Darkman124 posted...

TomNook20 posted...

It's a common and correct usage of the word.

Is it? Dictionary definitions, and all colloquial uses I am familiar with, frame it in the context of damage control or otherwise reducing the intensity of negative events, rather than undermining the quality of positive ones

It just reads very strangely to me, but perhaps it has different colloquial uses in Britain/NZ

It's pretty much a straightforward dictionary definition. You're probably looking at mitigate then getting confused based on that definition.

https://www.google.com/search?q=unmitigated&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b-1
http://www.hilotutor.com/archives_unmitigated.html
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Sometimes you use this word in a positive sense to mean "absolute, utter, or complete," in which case you talk about an unmitigated success, unmitigated praise, unmitigated joy or excitement, an unmitigated desire to reach your goals, and so on.

But more often, this word has a negative tone: talk about unmitigated disasters and defeats, unmitigated grief or depression, unmitigated anger or boredom or distress, unmitigated hatred or evil or savagery, unmitigated racism or discrimination, etc.

Sounds like it's mostly my experience with the word that is throwing me off. You're right that it can technically be used in the above way. It just has a strange feeling to me when this occurs.
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M_Live posted...

I wish the US would take note of shit like this, and realize that if you take care of your employees they'll be more productive

And the thing with salaried employees is, if you have to work extra hours, no one will pay you more for that, but if you have less work one week, you still have to "work" for 40hrs. I think people would be far less annoyed at working extra hours if the number of mandatory hours each week were less.
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I want this. Five days a week is stupid. I'd rather have 4-10s than 5-8s. 4-8s would be amazing.
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1337toothbrush posted...

I want this. Five days a week is stupid. I'd rather have 4-10s than 5-8s. 4-8s would be amazing.

The company did 4-8s, being paid for 5.
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TomNook20 posted...

M_Live posted...

I wish the US would take note of shit like this, and realize that if you take care of your employees they'll be more productive

And the thing with salaried employees is, if you have to work extra hours, no one will pay you more for that, but if you have less work one week, you still have to "work" for 40hrs. I think people would be far less annoyed at working extra hours if the number of mandatory hours each week were less.

yep, that is the big gripe of the salaryman: i have to work until it gets done, unless it gets done early.
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Minute posted...

1337toothbrush posted...

I want this. Five days a week is stupid. I'd rather have 4-10s than 5-8s. 4-8s would be amazing.

The company did 4-8s, being paid for 5.

Bitchin
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Minute posted...

1337toothbrush posted...

I want this. Five days a week is stupid. I'd rather have 4-10s than 5-8s. 4-8s would be amazing.

The company did 4-8s, being paid for 5.

Yes, I read the article. That's why I said 4-8s would be amazing. Even if they were only getting paid for 4, I'd take that over 5-8s.

time > money
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TomNook20 posted...

It's pretty much a straightforward dictionary definition. You're probably looking at mitigate then getting confused based on that definition.

Darkman's gripe reminds me of my gripe with people using the word "unironic". Since irony refers to very specific situations, unironic is basically everyday life. "Unironically, the sky is blue" "Unironically, he said that". Yes, it's correct usage, but it adds virtually no descriptive value. Same thing with unmitigated success and plain old success. What's the difference between those two choices? At least with saying it's a resounding success or overwhelming success, you could say you beat expectations by proportions you didn't think was feasible. What does unmitigated bring to the table?
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