Something for the weekend: Ever fancied having Fridays off work on a regular basis? Or maybe you'd prefer to have Mondays off to enjoy a post-weekend lie-in? Either way, you may soon have the opportunity to take your pick.
Flexibility in terms of employees' working hours has become more commonplace following the Covid-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic, and now an increasing number of businesses are trialling four-day working weeks.
Business support platform Rovva conducted a survey of more than 1,000 UK employees to see how the working week would look if it were up to them. When given the flexibility to choose, the results found that people would rearrange their week to look very different to the norm, with some choosing to mix it up by splitting up their days off.
Almost half (48%) of employees would choose to have Fridays off instead of Saturday or Sunday, with 43% opting to not work on Mondays to avoid the Sunday scaries. Regarding the rest of the weekdays, one-quarter (26%) wanted Tuesdays off, 16% chose Wednesdays and 31% opted for Thursdays.
The research also revealed that 60% of UK workers would select a job with greater flexibility over a slightly higher paid role, and that the majority are early birds, as 60% of people would choose the morning shift over any other time of day. This was followed by 24% who would opt to work in the afternoon and 7% are night owls, wanting to work in the evening.
If the UK decided to trial a four-day working week, the findings highlighted the real-life benefits of flexible working that people would appreciate the most, as 50% said it would suit their lifestyle and 34% believing they would be more productive.
Jon Abrahams, managing director for digital businesses at Rovva, thinks that Coronavirus has thrown many people a curveball, with households having to quickly adapt to new circumstances in all aspects of their lives.
“Our research shows that flexibility is key for several workers, and we hope that the majority of UK employers will be able and happy to offer it to their employees to support their productivity and loyalty,” he said.
Here at Employee Benefits, we're a mixture of early birds and night owls in terms of our work flexibility as long as we get the job done. We say TGIF and wish you a happy Fri-yay!
