Garfield was right: Mondays are the worst.

(He was also right about lasagna. It really is delicious!)

For many of us, Mondays mean going back to work after a weekend where there somehow wasn’t enough time to take the kids to their various activities, do the yardwork, meal prep for the week, work out, do the laundry, take the dog to the groomer, return those shirts to the mall and of course do all the self-care that social media tells us we have to do like take a bubble bath with a facemask while drinking champagne and catching up on all our books, so instead we just sat on the couch starting at the wall and/or screaming into the void. A whole five days until our precious “me time” comes around again. 

And now some companies are starting to require their employees to come back to the office after they worked from home for the past two years. It’s…a lot. Maybe that’s why some companies are considering implementing a four-day workweek. 

Beyond making the workweek shorter so that employees can have more time to take care of personal matters, there are several benefits to a four-day week. Buffer, a US tech company that recently tested this out, reported on its corporate blog that the four-day workweek trial period “resulted in sustained productivity levels and a better sense of work-life balance.” According to healthline.com, a shorter workweek could also help prevent employee burnout and lead to higher job satisfaction. These are important issues to consider for employee retention any time, but especially now while we’re still in the midst of the Great Resignation. 

A shortened week doesn’t necessarily have to mean fewer hours of work overall. A recent report from Skynova that surveyed 1,001 US managers and employees found that “Gen Zers were roughly 11 percent more likely than other generations to support a four-day, 10-hour workweek” as compared to the traditional five-day, eight-hour workweek.

Read the full blog.