A landmark agreement will see Australian staff at one company guaranteed a four day work week at full pay.
Full time employees at Oxfam Australia will see their working time reduced to just 30 hours a week, while permanent part time staff would have their hours calculated on a pro rata basis.
The Australian Services Union (ASU) has secured an agreement with Oxfam Australia to introduce the four-day working week at full-time pay – the first such arrangement in the country to be formalised within an Enterprise Bargaining Agreement.
Oxfam, which has 97 full-time and 37 part-time employees in Australia, of which about 90 are permanent, has committed to a six-month pilot as part of its latest negotiations with the union.
ASU Victorian private sector branch secretary Imogen Sturni said it was a significant win for both the workers and the company.
“It is pleasing to see Oxfam publicly recognising that productivity comes in different forms and that work-life balance is essential for workers mental and physical health,” she said.
“When a worker is well supported and has the flexibility at work that they need in order to keep up with the varying demands in their lives, they actually perform better in their jobs.
“This agreement also acknowledges the caring responsibilities that many workers, usually women but not always, have outside of work.”
The EBA will go to a vote between March 31 and April 4 but Ms Sturni said she was confident it would attract strong support from workers.
“The rigid Monday-to-Friday, five-day working week is a thing of the past and no longer serves the modern workplace or its employees, particularly workers with caring responsibilities,” she added.
“We are looking forward to seeing the outcomes from this groundbreaking trial and encourage more companies to consider how they too can improve work-life balance for their staff. It’s time to change the way we work.”
It comes at a time that a landmark report released in Australia this month recommended employees continue to be paid full time but just work 80 per cent of the week.
Research released last year found one-in-three Aussies would leave their current job for a company that offered a four-day working week in search of a better work-life balance.
But while Oxfam Australia could be the first to legally enforce the right to a four day work week, it is a concept that has been gaining momentum already in Australia.
Unilever, the multinational behind a catalogue of 400 products, including Dove soap, Magnum ice cream, and Lynx, had recently completed an 18-month trial of the four-day work week in its New Zealand operations.
The trial, which concluded in June, saw a 34 per cent drop in absenteeism, a 33 per cent drop in stress and a 67 per cent drop in work-life conflict.
The success saw it implement the same in Australia which began in November last year with a trial running for 12 months.
Shorter working week edging closer
Australians could soon be paid their full-time wage to work just four days a week should sweeping proposals from a senate inquiry be adopted.
The landmark report by the select committee on work and care backed a raft of changes, including a year of paid parental leave and the right to disconnect from work outside of hours.
Greens Senator Barbara Pocock, who chaired the inquiry, called on the government to seriously consider the “ambitious” reforms to boost the quality of life.
“In our history, Australia led the world in reductions in the working week in the 1850s. We’re at the other end of the spectrum with too many Australians working very long hours,” she told ABC News Breakfast.
“We need to think more seriously about how we deal with a changed workforce.”
The report recommended the Albanese government trial the 100:80:100 model. Workers would continue to be paid a full-time wage and maintain productivity despite working 80 per cent of the week.
“We heard a lot of evidence … of people who are already working a four-day week in workplaces that are trialling a reduction in working hours and getting very positive results,” Senator Pocock said.
“We’re seeing in the evidence improvements in productivity, a lot greater work and family balance, and really good outcomes in the workplace and at home in terms of relationships and putting your life and your job together.”
The pilot would be spread across the workforce and conducted in partnership with an Australian university.
Another key recommendation from the report was restricting employers from contacting employees outside of work hours unless it’s an emergency.
“What people are saying is, can we work our working hours and once we’re beyond those, unless it’s absolutely urgent, we should be able to turn the phone off and not be at its beck and call,” Senator Pocock added.
Research shows dramatic impact of four-day week
This all comes as recent research has found that staff on a four-day work week are more productive, with companies which took part in the experiment seeing their revenue dramatically increase.
The first large-scale study of its kind, released in December, is the latest in the push to reduce the mandatory five-day working week.
Australia was one of the countries involved in the study, which also included New Zealand, the US, Canada, the UK and Ireland.
Canberra-based lending firm More Than Mortgages, Melbourne not-for-profit group Our Community which has 75 staff, and marketing agency The Walk plus Queensland’s Momentum Mental Health were some of the organisations who took part in the scheme.
Over 10 months, nearly 1000 employees at 33 different companies took part in the trial.
Their hours were cut down by an average of six hours and they worked one less day a week, while still receiving their regular full-time salary.
The report found that revenue rose 8 per cent during the trial, but it was up a whopping 38 per cent from the same period a year earlier.
Employee absenteeism also dropped and 67 per cent of employees said they were less burnt out.
Staff also reported less fatigue, with levels going down from 66 per cent before the trial to 57 per cent after the trial. Insomnia and sleep problems for employees also went down by 8 per cent.
It was such a success, that two-thirds of the firms decided to retain the four-day work week, including the Australian offices of Unilever.
Companies rated the overall experience a nine out of 10, with resignations dropping slightly and the ability to attract new workers also increasing.
The research was co-ordinated by not-for-profit advocacy group 4 Day Week Global in partnership with researchers at Cambridge University, Boston College and Oxford University.
Other than the US, Australia was the largest participant in the study.