Four-day working week: Offerings increase by 25%

JOBLIFT ANALYSES THE INCREASE IN COMPANIES OFFERING A FOUR-DAY WORKING WEEK London, 17th October 2018 – Will four-day working weeks become the norm in the United Kingdom? The rise of artificial intelligence in the workplace, and a growing importance on employee mental health and wellbeing has already led to successful trials of four-day weeks at Prospect Guardian in New Zealand. To investigate this trend, job search platform Joblift has analysed how far the UK has already adopted a shorter working week in the last two years. In short, less than 1% of the UK’s job market has offered a four-day working week, with jobs associated with human interaction seeing the biggest benefit.

VACANCIES OFFERING A FOUR-DAY WEEK HAVE INCREASED BY A QUARTER YEAR ON YEAR According to Joblift, 10,914 full-time jobs advertising a four-day working week have been posted in the UK in the last 24 months. While only making up less than 1% of the UK’s whole job market in this time period, these positions have seen a strong average yearly increase of 25%, over three times more than the UK’s average yearly increase of 7%. The benefits of a four-day working week on productivity have becoming increasingly better known, with the Labour Party recently stating that they would consider passing legislation in support.

JOBS INVOLVING HUMAN INTERACTION ARE MOST LIKELY TO ADVERTISE A FOUR-DAY WORKING WEEK The rise of artificial intelligence is being cited as one of the main driving factors in allowing workers to switch to a four-day working week, reducing workloads and giving employees more free time. However, in the last two years, the professions that have benefited the most from the option of a four-day working week were: Social Workers: 530 vacancies Primary School Teachers: 268 vacancies Carers: 263 vacancies In the last 24 months, these roles have been notoriously hard to fill, taking an average of 37 days (seven days longer than the UK average) and so perhaps the offer of a shorter working week has been implemented to further entice potential candidates. Interestingly, these professions have not yet notably been eased by the introduction of automation, however, they support the theory that jobs concerning emotional and personable roles will be least at risk of future replacement. On the other hand, this positive nod to automation has done little to counteract the jobs that will be lost to robotics. According to PwC’s automation report, the job categories most at risk of replacement by automation are Transportation and Storage, Manufacturing, Wholesale and Retail, meaning the professions at risk are not experiencing the AI benefits of a shorter work week.

CONSULTING AND TECHNOLOGY CORPORATIONS DOMINATE TOP EMPLOYERS

While jobs involving human interaction are the most likely to be offered the perk, this trend is not reflected in the top organisations directly advertising shorter weeks. The top three employers were: Capgemini: 12% of vacancies IBM: 6% of vacancies NHS: 4% of vacancies With the exception of the NHS, the top companies advertising these roles are consulting and technology firms with a lesser focus on vacancies advertising roles with a high level of human interaction and the need for emotional skills. However, as with the jobs mentioned previously, the positions advertising a four-day working week at Capgemini and IBM are almost exclusively offered to Consultants and Programmers, positions which are hard to fill – Consultant roles at Capgemini, for example, have taken an average of 62 days to secure, more than double the time of the UK average.

About Joblift

Joblift is a job search platform providing candidates with the most intuitive and frictionless experience during the recruiting process. By applying the latest machine learning techniques and big data-based algorithms Joblift offers the optimal match between employer and job seeker. Currently active in the US, the UK, Germany, France and the Netherlands, Joblift cooperates with over 4,000 partners to incorporate over 10 million vacancies on their platform. Joblift is a highly energetic and entrepreneurial team led by the experienced founders Lukas Erlebach (CEO), Alexander Rausch (COO) and Denis Bauer (CTO), who most recently held C-Level positions at companies such as Zalando, Amorelie, hear.com and Microsoft.