More Aussies workers admit they can’t work productively all week

One in four Australian workers admit they can’t work the whole week.

Productive - but not every day. Picture: iStock

The formal four-day week may be a fantasy for most Australian workers but for almost 70 per cent of them 40 hours of work already looks more like 30 – or even 20 – hours.

That’s because they happily admit that while the boss might want them at the desk for five days, they are really only productive for three or four days a week.

They are not saying they want less work, but signalling that productivity declines after 30 hours.

Research conducted by Census Wide for the freelance jobs platform Fiverr shows that seven in 10 (68 per cent) feel they can complete the same amount of work in four working days rather than five.

Michal Miller Levi, senior director of market research at Fiverr, points to a significant shift in workers’ values: “We have been doing research at Fiverr on the workforce for a long time. We have been saying that the workforce is changing, so when Covid-19 came, it fast-forwarded (things).

“In the past people employees would have been embarrassed saying that they’re productive only 30 hours a week. This is not something that they would have said freely. Now, there’s a lot of values they put upfront, in terms of flexibility, in terms of their skills, work/life balance, childcare … It takes a lot for a person to say, I’m not productive the whole 40 hours (but) I’m doing the same work that I would have done in 40 hours. They’re not measuring themselves in hours, they’re measuring themselves in output, in what they’ve done, in their skills, in their deliverables, in what they are bringing to the table at the end of the day.”

Miller Levi says that mid-management is increasingly aware they use the wrong metrics to measure productivity and realise that “they’re not saying give me less work, they’re saying, I like what I do, I just want to do it in a way that I’m measured with my output, not with the hours that I put on a clock”.

She says: “In order to maintain a diverse and competitive workforce there needs to be an embracing of various working styles.

“There could be some working styles that are still nine to five, but there could be also a more progressive working style that values skills and output more than hours worked.”

Is it then, the end of the five day week?

Miller Levi says the debate goes on, but the challenge is not so much in formally reducing days of work as allowing a range of working styles with people choosing their hours, for ­example.

In short, employers don’t need to be fearful of a four-day week but rather open to measuring output, rather than hours, even if spread over five days.

The Fiverr research found that corporate work structures often fail to accommodate workers who seek the control to work where and when they are most creative and ­productive.

“Gen Xs who prefer to work from home say they’re less productive in an office space because they find it distracting (48 per cent), followed by millennials (43 per cent) and gen Z (41 per cent),” the report says.

The global work preferences study surveyed 9129 workers (employees and freelancers), including 1008 Australian workers, and found flexible work was increasing popular.

“People can do great work outside the bounds of a nine-to-five,” says Miller Levi.

The Australian data showed generations are divided on remote versus in-office work: 36 per cent of workers surveyed say they prefer to work from home or to choose where they work each day. Millennial workers surveyed are most likely to prefer flexible or remote work, with 42 per cent citing their optimal work environment as either at home or being able to choose different places depending on the day. Gen X, gen Z and baby boomer respondents are less likely to say the same (33 per cent, 32 per cent and 31 per cent respectively).

Among workers surveyed who say they prefer to work from home, 67 per cent say they want to save money and time commuting. Over two in five (43 per cent) say they find it distracting to work in an office space.

Three in 10 (32 per cent) of millennial workers surveyed who prefer to work remotely say it is because it makes it easier to manage childcare responsibilities.

Three-quarters of Australian workers surveyed (68 per cent) say they could complete their current workload in a 4-day week.

Millennials are most likely to report feeling they could complete their work in 4 days, with 74 per cent agreeing.

Australian workers surveyed estimate they are productive for an average of 31 hours per week. Just over one in 10 Australian respondents (14 per cent) estimate they are only productive for at most 20 hours per week. Entrepreneurs are the early birds – almost half (43 per cent) of business owners surveyed say they are most productive between 7am and 10am, rather than during the standard work day.

The survey also found that workers want to cut back on meetings and collaborate in-person when it matters.

Globally, 46 per cent of workers whose work requires them to work with or around others, either virtually or in person, prefer to have no more than one meeting a day and 59 per cent prefer them to be in-person, either in an office or in another location, such as a coffee shop.

Senior workers are more likely to prioritise in-person interaction – close to half (48 per cent) of respondents at the director level said they want to work with colleagues regularly or all of the time. In contrast, 29 per cent of entry-level workers prefer to communicate with colleagues through messaging platforms.