The Roving Weekend
“We like to give people the freedom to work where they want, safe in the knowledge that they have the drive and expertise to perform excellently, whether they [are] at their desk or in their kitchen. Yours truly has never worked out of an office, and never will.”
Richard Branson, Founder & Chairman, Virgin2
There were at least a dozen of us waiting outside the women’s changing room in a mall in Bangalore on a very busy Sunday afternoon. The ladies after changing would come out to show their dresses to their partners who in varying degrees of enthusiasm appreciated or gave their views. There was a waiting line to get in the changing room, there was a waiting line to get your clothes billed and there was a waiting line to get a table to sit and eat.
A typical Sunday afternoon in a metropolis.
Cut to Monday morning at eleven when I visited the store again, the employees were more relaxed and even friendly, the changing rooms were vacant and there was no one waiting at the billing counter. You could count the shoppers on the fingertips. Between the stressful Sunday and relaxed Monday, I would always go for Monday.
The week as we know it came much earlier during the reign of Emperor Constantine who in 321 CE converted the Roman eight-day week to a Christian seven-day week and designated Sunday as a day of rest. However, the advent of the industrial revolution snatched the rest day from the masses when they were forced to work on tight schedules and longer hours to boost productivity. By stroke of luck the British perfected the wall clock in 1658 by adding a pendulum to the grandfather watch, so now the factory owners could regulate the time of work for the workers, their rest time and the concept of work shift emerged. Prior to industrial revolution, the production was mostly in smaller scale and the concept of time was elastic. Man, thus became slave to the clock and incidentally still is.
In the nineteenth century Britain made Sunday a break day so that the workers could attend to their spiritual need, ie, visit the church, pray, and look after the family. However, a lot of workers started spending their time on nonreligious affairs and would turn up late on Monday and be not tuned to work, this led to the birth of the concept of St Monday wherein the workers will absentee themselves from work on Mondays[i]. St Monday led to a losses in the factories and thus by middle of the century, Saturday was given as a half day which could be devoted to merry making.
While Sunday was a holy day for Christians, it was not so for the Jews for whom Saturday was the Shabbat, or Sabbath. This begins at nightfall on Friday, running through to nightfall on Saturday. So, in 1908 in New England a mill allowed the Jews to take leave on Saturdays therefore leading to a five-day week.[ii] Henry Ford in 1936 made Saturday and Sunday off for the staff and set down 40 hours work week. The spinoff was that with more time in their hands, the workers spent more money on consumer products thus circulating the cash in the economy. The US government officially adopted a five-day week in 1932 in a bid to counter the great depression. Across the lake, the British followed suit in 1934 after a successful experiment by Mr John Boot owner of the Boots Pharmaceutical Company.[iii]
The plan was workable in Britain and USA in the 19th and early 20th century in small parish towns or industrial cities, where one could work for five days, carry on festivities on Saturday and sober down on Sunday by praying and come to work on Monday. The plan was however not tailor made for a populous country like India. With an average work commute of an hour in major cities, an individual spends up to eleven hours out of the house, that is half the day. There is hardly any time left for routine administration like upkeep of house, buying groceries and letting your hair down. Everyone has the weekends for these tasks.
The disadvantage of universal weekend is that everyone is free at the same time. Leading to a surge of crowd for shopping or at tourist destinations. Everyone of us would have faced the long waiting for billing ques or would have struggled to find a room in a hotel or reservation. To manage the surge businesses temporarily employ some additional staff, and movie theatres and hotel owners hike their charges. So, in effect we lead a life of dormant five days followed by very active two days. Unfortunately, these two days add to the stress because of the crowds and long waiting time.
Now just imagine a scenario, where the weekends are not fixed, every employee within the boundaries of reason and commitments, can take any two days off in the week.
Let’s look at the advantages.
The employee can choose his weekend on any two weekdays. This can be spent much more fruitfully and stress free with lesser crowds to manage. Personal requirements can be met through roving weekends and not leave. It gives them better control over their time especially people who have pressing domestic commitments or health issues.
The businesses will gain by having strong customer base all through the week and not just the weekends. Some shoppers who avoided the crowds on weekends will readily shop on weekdays which will boost sales. Hotels will have a weeklong booking and so would the movie theatres. Business will be continuous and not weekend centric.
Traffic during the weekdays will be reduced as almost one fourth of the people will be on leave.
Job generations will be better because now the consumer industry will hire more permanent employees and not temp helps during weekends.
More productivity will be ensued as the work will go on through the week though this may be debatable as a lot of work force will still be on leave however there will be continuity in work and the employees will not have to pick up threads again from a Monday.
Now the cons.
Firstly the idea will be rejected as it is new and would require a change of work norms. Nobody likes a change. Next it will be difficult to coordinate meetings within the office, the Boss may not like the idea of not having every employee at the beck and call during the week. People in Sales and marketing will have a tough time trying to coordinate presentations not knowing which potential client is on his weekly leave.
Is it Possible?
The answer is YES, with employees and businesses having gone through WFH during the pandemic, can work out a way to have the flexibility in working hours and days. As a matter of fact, the concept of flexible timing for work or ‘Flextime’ is not new, it was introduced somewhere in the 1970s and thereafter in a limited way has been existing in many countries. Countries like UK, USA and Australia have legislation implementing flexible timings either for the work life balance of the employees or to cater for special requirements of pregnant ladies or parents with young kids. [iv]
The term ‘Flextime’ is registered by a HR management firm hfx. Ltd. As per the company brochure the top reasons for adopting flexible timings are Family Commitments, Travel/ Commute, External Studies and Lifestyle, with a majority of the requests coming from employees with the age bracket of 25 to 44.[v]
So how will it work.
Each organisation can set Core Days/ Hours where all employees of the organisation or of the vertical must be present. Important decisions, meetings can be held during these hours.[vi]
The next step is to decide inter — vertical interaction days wherein nominated personals of each verticals will be present to interact or meet. With fixed days and hours, the work will finish faster and not extend beyond the requisite hours. Working will be crisper and business oriented, long unproductive meetings will have to be avoided. There are software and solutions available to ensure smooth employee management with no loss to productivity.
People in sales and marketing will have to plan in advance to organise meetings with their clients to catch them on their working days.
It seems like a win win situation where the employees will have a better work life balance, the companies will get what happier workers, commercial businesses will improve, lesser strain on infrastructure and easier on traffic.
[ii] Who invented the weekend? — BBC Bitesize
[iii] How the weekend was invented by Boots — right here in Nottingham — Nottinghamshire Live (nottinghampost.com)
[v] A New World of Work | HFX It’s About Time
[vi] What is flexitime (flexible work) and what are its advantages and disadvantages? | Spica