References
Article on the five-hour workday practice at Rheingans, and their adaptations during the Covid pandemic:
https://blog.dropbox.com/topics/work-culture/haltung--the-german-answer-to-happier--healthier-virtual-work
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Practice desciption
Have you ever wondered, why we work eight hours a day? Why not nine? Twelve?
And why not five?
At German digital consultancy Rheingans, owner Lasse Rheingans wondered the same and in 2017 started an experiment: The five-hour workday. He thinks that in a job that requires creativity, strategic decision making, and critical thinking, people cannot be fully productive for eight hours. So rather than pretending that they could (while taking mini-breaks, checking their social media, or getting the sixth cup of coffee), they should collectively try to do their work in five hours - while keeping the same salary and vacation days. This way, they would have more time for other passions in their life.
What started as an experiment - or should we say prototype? - is holding true at Rheingans until today.
What steps to take for the practice
It is as easy as it sounds: Just cut the working hours back to five hours. Everyone starts their workday at eight and finishes at one.
And of course, that is easily said but not simply done. For this practice to work, at Rheingans they do the following:
- Everyone comes to work at 8 am and stops at 1 pm. This way you have enough time overlap between people. After 1 pm there is only an emergency hotline for clients
- Meetings are very well planned and strictly facilitated, standard meeting duration is 15 minutes
- People focus solely on their work, there is very little social chat during work. They make up for it with regular team events and a team lunch on Fridays
- Goals and tasks for the next week are assigned on Fridays, last-minute tasks and assignments are not accepted
- People check their email only twice a day
The five-hour workday during the Covid pandemic. An update from Lasse Rheingans on how they adapted their practice:
"Actually yes, we did have to adapt a bit! First of all, all of us moved into homeoffice starting in March 2020. And we are still running remotely. Now comes the tricky part: of course not all of us have the perfect home office spot at home, some of my colleagues also have kids (who get homeschooling during lockdown). In short: working from 8 to 1, five hours straight just can't be done at all. We had to move on to a rather "do your work whenever it suits you" approach (while taking care that people don't work all day long!), and be more flexible.
We then discussed that meetings shouldn't take place between noon and 2 pm (because of cooking, kids, household, for example) and we shared our experience, that with all the Zoom meetings taking place during Covid, for many people it feels like we hardly get to our work at all. Therefore we implemented more routines and processes optimized for remote work and tried to reduce video conferences a lot; then added some bits of holacracy, some optimized Microsoft Teams, etc.
I guess in the end, it all boils down to "Haltung" ( https://blog.dropbox.com/topics/work-culture/haltung--the-german-answer-to-happier--healthier-virtual-work )"
Expected results
- As an organization: a very efficient and concentrated work culture
- For the individuals: 3 hours per day more time for other endeavors
- A cautionary note: A concentrated five-hour workday is still straining. Rheingans employees report that they are quite tired after a workday. So if you implement this, don't take it lightly or afterward add more work to people's schedule.
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