The Four Day Workweek – On my own production floor, the four consecutive 10-hour day workweek has been a success. And the employees love having a three day weekend. With this schedule you save one day of starting up and shutting down production. Instead, that saved time translates to more productivity. And that translates to another step on the road to doubling your production.
Another plus with the four day workweek is the availability of an entire day (Friday) for overtime work when necessary. Having a crew for a half or full day of overtime on a Friday is tremendously easier to pull off than arranging overtime for Saturday. All this overtime work is accomplished while employees’ friends and family are at their own jobs or school. And the staff still has a traditional two day weekend ahead.
For the front office, the fifth day with no production staff allows them to get things done without questions and issues from the production floor. It’s the perfect opportunity to work on projects and long term planning, or to just get caught up or ahead of the game.
If management squirms about the idea of shutting off the lights in production on Friday, it’s usually because they’re afraid some last minute rush order won’t get done. The easy solution is to have one all around versatile employee work on Friday to take care of any out of the ordinary order or issue, while in reality this employee is just there to make other managers feel better. Before long, everyone will discover that this one Friday employee-in-reserve will be unnecessary.
