The Four-day Work Week
If Liz Truss can reduce a whole premiership to seven weeks, why can’t a standard working week be squashed into something shorter? A six-month pilot (试点) scheme, in which around 3,300 workers from 70 companies are testing out a four-day workweek, is due to conclude this month.
Of the participating organisations, 46% reported maintaining overall output at the same level, and 49% said it had improved.
Becoming a four-day operation can be hard in a five-day world, however. Bookishly, an online shop, chose Wednesdays off to avoid having three days in a row when packages are not mailed out; people are warned about the new schedule before they order.
More tests are on the horizon. In January South Cambridge shire District Council will become the first British local authority to try out a four-day week. The lessons learned are likely to be valuable even if the idea does not spread.
| A．Sceptics might observe that the companies involved are self-selecting. |
| B．Advocates say a shorter week delivers a better work-life balance without hurting overall output. |
| C．The trial’s largest company, Outcomes First Group, tracks indicators for its 1,027 participating employees. |
| D．The scheme holds useful lessons about productivity. |
| E．Platten’s, a fish-and-chip shop in Norfolk, gives its 50-or-so employees two days on and two days off to cover the week. |
| F．But customers are not always prepared to wait, so most firms in the scheme have tried to spread staff more thinly. |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】Many people believe that working to the maximum is the secret to success, but research has found that moderation(适度) also gets results on the job.
In a study led by Ellen Langer of Harvard University, researchers asked people to translate sentences into a new made-up language. Subjects who practiced the language moderately beforehand made fewer errors than those who practiced extensively or not at all. High levels of knowledge can make people too attached to traditional ways of viewing problems across fields the arts, sciences, and politics. High conscientiousness is related to lower job performance, especially in simple jobs where it doesn’t pay to be a perfectionist.
How long we stay on the clock and how we spend that time are under careful examination in many workplaces. The young banker who eats lunch at his desk is probably seen as a go-getter, while his colleagues who chat over a relaxed conference-room meal get dirty looks from the corner office. “People from cultures that value relationships more than ours does are shocked by the thought of eating alone in front of a computer”, says Art Markman, a professor of psychology at the University of Texas, Austin. Social interaction has been shown to lift mood(情绪) and get people thinking in new directions and in ways that could help improve any post-lunch effort.
Markman also promotes off-task time. “Part of being a good thinker is experiencing things that are seemingly unrelated to what you are working on at the moment but give you fresh ideas about your work,” he says. “Also, there is a lot of research showing that a positive mood leads to higher levels of productivity and creativity. So, when people do things to increase their life satisfaction, they also make themselves more effective at work.”
1. What does Ellen Langer’s study show?| A．It is worthwhile to be a perfectionist | B．Translation makes people knowledgeable. |
| C．Simpler jobs require greater caution. | D．Moderate effort produces the best result. |
| A．is good at handling pressure | B．works hard to become successful |
| C．a has a natural talent for his job. | D．gets on well with his co-workers |
| A．A good thinker is able to inspire other people. |
| B．Experience unrelated to your job is useless. |
| C．A cheerful mood helps make a creative mind. |
| D．Focusing on what you do raises productivity. |
| A．Middle-of-the-road work habits. | B．Balance between work and family. |
| C．Long-standing cultural traditions. | D．Harmony in the work environment. |
【推荐2】The three phases of life are increasingly a thing of the past.Where once working lives fitted neatly into the model of education,employment and then retirement,the simplicity of that division is being challenged by changing standards of the workforce.
Increasing numbers of workers,nearing their long-imagined transition(过渡)into retirement,seem to be actively putting off the moment at which they down tools.Newly released figures from the Office for National Statistics(ONS)have shown that there are over a million more over 50s in part-time work than a decade ago.And with nine out of 10 employers reporting difficulties hiring workers,there’s likely to be a growing market for their talents as bosses extend their searches to older people,including those who are willing to take on part-time responsibilities.
The ending of the three phases of working life isn’t simply down to people living longer or financial necessity-though those are certainly important factors-but also to an increasing desire to maintain a purposeful life. One survey of British retirees over 50 found that 85 per cent of them felt they’d retired too young—stopping working had left a void that they regretted afterwards.
The 2015 film The Intern conveyed this human need to have value.In it,Robert De Niro plays a 70-year-old widower who finds himself a fish out of water when he joins a trendy internet start-up.In the end,not only does he find the sense of belonging that he desires but his colleagues come to rely on his experience and different perspective.It’s a plot we can increasingly expect to happen in real-life offices over the decades to come as people live ever longer.
Already,we are seeing people in their 50s and 60s looking ahead to a retirement lasting 30 years,choosing instead to build second careers that they can maintain into their 70s or beyond. Freed from the financial burden of young children,they can prioritize flexibility,shorter working hours or more rewarding jobs in areas such as charity work or teaching.Many do it for no money at all,volunteering behind the till in charity shops or showing people round National Trust properties.
However,it’s the next generation where the effect of living longer will really be felt,and the financial necessity will start to bite.In the West,more than half of the children born in 2016 have a life expectancy of more than 100 years.In their book,The 100-Year Life,London Business School professors Lynda Gratton and Andrew Scott suggest that acquiring sufficient funds to see oneself through a 40-or 50-year retirement will likely be beyond all but the highest earners.
Then there’s the oft-repeated claim that young people today are the first generation to be poorer than their parents.Certainly property prices are changing the way they plan for the future. In the mid-Nineties,the average home cost less than three times the average wage;last year, ONS stats placed that ratio at eight times wages.
The overall effect of these trends is that young people recognize that they will likely have to postpone dreams of retirement and instead strap on(绑住)more debt spread over longer spans.It’s why 44 per cent of under 30s say they expect to be working well into their 70s and why data this year from the Bank of England show that 16 per cent of UK mortgages(按揭贷款)now have terms of 35 years or more-a figure that has tripled in the past decade.
All of these factors look set to contribute to a workforce that has a significantly wider range of ages in the future.In an ra of work when we’ve all learned to be more inclusive,only eight per cent of firms with a diversity programme have adapted it to go beyond gender,race and sexuality and into age.Incorporating older employees into the workforce is set to be the next big thing at the office.
If Robert De Niro has anything to teach us,it’s that this can be an enormous force permanently for both employees and businesses.
1. The following may account for the ending of the three phases of working life EXCEPT_____.| A．a longer life |
| B．financial needs |
| C．delayed retirement policy |
| D．a meaningful life |
| A．is caused by |
| B．results in |
| C．is responsible for |
| D．gives birth to |
| A．They can live within their means. |
| B．Their life expectancy will be longer. |
| C．They will be richer than their parents. |
| D．They will fail to pay off their mortgage. |
| A．tell us Robert De Niro is a helpful retiree |
| B．indicate that retirees can also benefit society |
| C．share Robert De Niro’s second career with us |
| D．illustrate that retirees desire to live meaningfully |
| A．The new standards of the workplace. |
| B．Age being no hurdle in the modern world of work. |
| C．Financial issues facing both old people and young people. |
| D．Different attitudes to retirement between the young and old. |
【推荐3】If you are a recent social science graduate who has had to listen to jokes about unemployment from your computer major classmates, you may have had the last laugh. There are many advantages for the social science major because this high-tech "Information Age" demands people who are flexible (灵活) and who have good communication skills.
There are many social science majors in large companies who fill important positions. For example, a number of research studies found that social science majors had achieved greater managerial success than those who had technical training or pre-professional courses. Studies show that social science majors are most suited for change, which is the leading feature (特点) of the kind of high-speed, high-pressure, high-tech world we now live in.
Social science majors are not only experiencing success in their long term company jobs, but they are also finding jobs more easily. A study showed that many companies had filled a large percentage of their entry level positions with social science graduates. The study also showed that the most sought-after quality in a person who was looking for a job was communication skills, noted as "very important" by 92 percent of the companies. Social science majors have these skills, often without knowing how important they are. It is probably due to these skills that they have been offered a wide variety of positions.
Finally, although some social science majors may still find it more difficult than their technically trained classmates to land the first job, recent graduates report that they don't regret their choice of study.
1. By saying that "you may have had the last laugh" in the first paragraph, the author means that you may have ________.| A．shared the jokes with computer majors |
| B．earned as much as computer majors |
| C．found jobs more easily than computer majors |
| D．stopped joking about computer majors |
| A．are ready to change when situations change |
| B．are better able to deal with difficulties |
| C．are equally good at computer skills |
| D．are likely to give others pressure |
| A．keep for some time |
| B．successfully get |
| C．immediately start |
| D．lose regretfully |
| A．Willingness to take low-paid jobs. |
| B．Readiness to gain high-tech knowledge. |
| C．Skills in expressing themselves. |
| D．Part-time work experience. |
