Photo: Jess Bailey Designs | Pexels
In 2011, Simon Ursell and the three other co-founders of the UK environmental consultancy Tyler Grange began giving their workers a day off each month to volunteer. Then in 2022, they took part in the world's biggest ever four-day workweek trial. Daily productivity rose by 22% but the four-day workweek also turned out to be good for the company's carbon footprint, Ursell says, in part because commuting fell -- 10% in the UK trial and 27% in the US trial. But because environmental concerns were not the main driver, climate impact didn't feature prominently in what was tracked. Researcher Philipp Frey, author of The Ecological Limits of Work, says to encourage the trend, governments could reduce maximum limits of work hours or pioneer the four-day week itself. "A shorter workweek with no loss in pay is joyful, " says Jon Leland, vice president and head of sustainability at Kickstarter. "It's something that we all want."
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