20. Why You Definitely Want Your Employees to Work a 4-Day Work Week

I have a confession to make. I wasn't always productive when I was an employee. I did my best, but some days I wasn't that productive. Maybe you've experienced that. Sounds so morbid, no? So if you're an employer, think about something. By the time you reach the fifth day of your week, are you always on top of your game, just nailing everything? Or are you maybe just a little tired and maybe you're not performing as well and you're dragging around? Well, think about something. Your name is on the door. It's your business. If you're dragging on your fifth day of the week, what do you think is going on for your team members? Even if they're pushing through, even if they're performing well, might they do better? Might you keep them longer if they were better rested, if they were working more reasonable hours? Now, be really clear here. 18 plus year entrepreneur, I am in no way talking about giving away money. I'm talking about really focusing on productivity and helping team members understand what results they need to achieve in order to be worth this. I want you to think about something. Think about sports.

When you have players in the twild of their career, if you're a basketball fan, players like Tim Duncan, Shaquille O'Neil, the teams they played on would reduce their number of games they play or the number of minutes they play in a game, to keep them around as long as possible, because they had this sense that there's almost like this odometer on how many miles or how many minutes a professional, let's say, basketball player can play. As an employee, there really is a limit to a certain degree on how long a person can be really excited about the work that you do and working for you to help make money for the company. Now, with great management and great leadership, that can be extended for sure. But also just the basics of helping people make sure that they are able to earn their income in a reasonable amount of time, to make sure they personally are managing their finances well, even though you have no direct control over that, but in helping educate them and encourage them to do that. And then yes, creating incentives that if they hit certain results, if they've done five days worth of work by a certain time of the week, or if they've done four weeks worth of work in three weeks or whatever it might be, that there's some way you can reward that.

It doesn't have to be dollar for dollar. As a simple win win situation, you might say, look, if you can get five and a half days of work done, I'll give you a half day off. If you can get six days worth of work done in four days, I'll give you the Friday off. Now think about that for a second. If I get six days worth of work in four days, do I really care if they show up on Friday? No, I don't. In fact, I want the six days of results. But if you've never had this conversation and never defined it, that can be difficult. Then employers will say, Wait, I can't do that. I'm going to upset everybody. Really? Which ones are you going to upset? Who is it that's not coming to work for you right now that you've never met before? Because when you post your jobs, you don't have flexible time, flexible hours, time or the opportunity to earn more vacation. The youngsters, the millennial generation, I'm in my mid 40s, so they're youngsters to me at least, they're very focused on, and God bless them for this, enjoying life and not just working for the sake of the dollar or money.

Now, some admittedly have a tendency to just outright not know how or where to focus. And then others simply say, No, I want to do meaningful work. I want to make good money, and I want to have time for a life outside of work. So you hear about in countries like the United States and England, the number of pubs or bars or dance clubs has diminished by about 50 % over the last five to seven years because the millennials have said, Look, we don't have the money to pay for overpriced drinks. We can listen to this music on the internet, and we're just not willing or able to simply afford that type of lifestyle, we're okay with that. We'll just slightly shift our lifestyle. In all of this, as an employer, it doesn't have to be so rigid as to say, Well, no, I won't hire somebody unless they work this number of hours. You know what is one of the best untapped sources of just quality, skilled labor, at least in the United States? Stay at home moms. There's so many stay at home moms that have bachelor's degrees, Masters degrees, and their kids, maybe for the first couple of years, they say, No, okay, I'm not going to work at all.

But by the time the kids start getting older, and even especially, let's say the kids go into school from 8 30 to 230, well, why couldn't they work for you from, I don't know, nine to two, or even part time, four hours a day? Would you rather have two part timers working four hours a day who are just super skilled, super intelligent, super focused? Or would you rather cling to a model that says, no, it's got to be 40 hours a week. It's got to be five days a week. It's my way. The world is shifting. So if you want to be attracting the best talent, if you want to keep team members for a long time, if you want to reduce your turnover cost, remember that cost? Remember how much it costs when you turn over a team member? Costs you what? One time their salary for however long they're with you, at least, maybe one and a half to two times because somebody else is training them? Oh, yeah. And then there's the opportunity cost that while they're being trained by somebody else, that somebody else is not producing or selling or whatever it might be.

In all of this, this is not about saying we're going to give people something for nothing. This is about recognizing that if we want to get the best people, the same way you as an entrepreneur, perhaps, have chosen to run your own gig so you can make your own choices, there's a group of people that are just like you, except for one thing. They don't want their name on the door, but they do want to be paid for the results, and they'll jump around until they find a company or an organization will do that. And if you're open to this conversation, all results based, this is something that can happen. So hope you find this helpful. If you need help on creating your four day work week game plan, go to 4day gameplan. Com. As always, look forward to helping you make more money in less time doing what you do best. Thank you.