IA good dozen employees are working in the Lyrd GmbH workshop this Tuesday. It smells like a nail salon, of solvents and harsh chemicals, even though the entrance gates to the hall are wide open. Carbon parts for sports cars are manufactured here: rear wings, hubcaps, ventilation. The shiny, black parts rest on tables and racks, ready to be packed. The employees sit or stand behind large desks in a separate room, each engrossed in his or her task. It is formed, sanded, laminated, painted. You’ve been here since seven in the morning, now it’s noon, the break is approaching. A few more hours pass before closing time. Latex gloves and work clothes can only be removed at a quarter to five.
A long day. But there is also a long weekend, when employees can take their children to the campsite or go to the gym first thing in the morning. Here, in a small town just outside of Stuttgart, you can already experience what some consider to be the working model of the future: the four-day week.
“Spending time together with our little daughter”
The four-day week is being talked about more and more often. IG Metall is discussing them for employees in the steel industry. The Federal Association of Employers’ Associations (BDA), on the other hand, warns against prescribing them. Business associations are also rather skeptical. But how far advanced is the implementation in practice? A recently published study by the union-affiliated Hans Böckler Foundation provides an answer. According to this, only two percent of full-time employees currently do their work in four days. That could change, however, because Germans want three days off a week. 81 percent of those surveyed can imagine a four-day week with correspondingly shorter weekly working hours, but 73 percent only if they earn at least as much as they did with five working days.
Full wage compensation was also important to Lyrd employees. “If the four-day week meant that I would earn less, I probably wouldn’t have voted for it,” says Monika Vujkovic, who works at Lyrd with her husband. With the introduction of the new working time model, the company has reduced the number of weekly working hours. Instead of 40 hours on five days, only 36 hours on four days. “Now we can spend time together with our little daughter on the days off,” says Vujkovic. “I think that’s great.” Because Lyrd’s employees alternate between Monday and Friday off, they even have a four-day weekend twice a month.
Plant manager Daniel Scheuerle had the idea for the four-day week while he was having a beer with a friend in the evening. “I complained to him about our quality problems,” reports the 29-year-old. The company, which made sales of around one million euros last year, produces for the luxury segment, every part has to be perfect. And every speck of dust under the paintwork means expensive rejects. “At some point I threw the four-day week into the room, but actually it wasn’t meant that seriously,” he recalls. But the longer he talked about it, the more he thought: why not?
