One of the conversations I’ve found myself having more and more over the last year isn’t actually about recruitment. It’s about flexibility.
When people come to me to discuss hiring, we inevitably end up talking about what candidates want, what teams are asking for and how the workplace continues to evolve. Whilst the headlines often focus on four-day weeks, remote working and return-to-office policies, that’s rarely what the conversations sound like in reality.
The reality is usually far more practical.
Senior leaders tell me their teams want greater flexibility. They want more time with family. They want to avoid lengthy commutes where possible. They want work to fit around life a little better than it has historically. None of that feels particularly controversial and, to be honest, most of the leaders I speak to completely understand it.
The challenge is that the work still needs doing.
Clients still expect the same service. Events still need delivering. Deadlines still exist. The commercial pressures facing many businesses certainly haven’t reduced over the last couple of years. So whilst employers often agree with the principle of greater flexibility, many are struggling to find a model that works in practice.
That’s why I’ve never been entirely convinced the four-day week is the answer for our industry.
I understand the appeal. On paper it sounds fantastic. An extra day every week to spend with family, pursue hobbies, recover from busy periods or simply have a life outside of work. Who wouldn’t want that?
The problem is that events has never really operated neatly within traditional working patterns. Whether you’re agency side, venue side, organiser side or supplier side, our industry has always involved periods where the workload increases dramatically. There are times when projects demand more of us, clients need immediate support or event delivery takes priority over everything else. That’s unlikely to change.
What I do find interesting, however, is the idea of a six-hour day.
Before anyone accuses me of trying to start another workplace revolution, I’m not suggesting every business should suddenly slash working hours next Monday. What I am suggesting is that we perhaps spend too much time measuring presence and not enough time measuring output.
Over the last twenty-five years I’ve worked with some exceptionally talented people. Looking back, I can’t honestly say the best of them stood out because they worked longer hours than everyone else. They stood out because they got things done. They made decisions. They solved problems. They moved projects forward. They created value.
In short, they were productive.
Yet many organisations still operate on the assumption that more hours automatically equals more output. I’m not entirely convinced that’s true.
Most people can probably identify periods during their day where they’re doing genuinely valuable work and periods where they’re simply being present. Meetings that could have been emails. Conversations that drift. Tasks that expand because there’s time available to complete them. We’ve all been guilty of it.
What makes the six-hour day interesting is that it potentially creates the middle ground that both employers and employees seem to be searching for.
Employees gain something meaningful. Ten additional hours every week. More time with family. More time to exercise. More time to switch off. More time to be a human being rather than simply a worker.
Employers retain the structure of a five-day week. Teams remain available. Clients continue receiving support. Collaboration doesn’t disappear. The business keeps moving.
Will it work everywhere? Almost certainly not. Some roles naturally require different levels of coverage and availability. Some businesses would find it far easier to implement than others. There would undoubtedly be challenges, just as there are with any significant change to working practices.
What I find fascinating though is that whenever I listen to the debate around flexibility, this option rarely gets discussed. We seem to jump straight from traditional working patterns to a four-day week, as if there are no alternatives in between.
Perhaps there are.
Perhaps the future isn’t about asking people to do less work. Perhaps it’s about being more intentional with the hours they spend doing it.
I’m not claiming to have the answer, but I do think the industry is searching for a compromise. Employers want engaged, productive teams. Employees want flexibility and balance. Both are reasonable positions. The question is whether we’ve become so focused on where people work and how many days they work that we’ve stopped asking a much simpler question.
How many hours of genuinely productive work does most work actually require?
