Ayesha Khan says she isn’t sure she could return to traditional work after shifting to a four-day work week.
Her company adopted the new scheme in March. And since then, every Friday, the Milton, Ont., resident has the time for something as simple as getting her nails done — something she says, as a mother of two, used to take months to plan.
“How would I go back to that five-day life? It would be very difficult,” said Khan, who works in client services for Sensei Labs, a Toronto-based software company.
“Being able to focus on both my physical and mental health, and just having the time to do that… it’s been invaluable.”
Khan is one of hundreds of employees in North America who now work four days a week after participating in a pilot project organized by the non-profit advocacy group 4 Day Week Global and researchers at Boston College.
According to their findings released last week, of the 41 companies that participated and were surveyed, 35 said they are keeping, planning to, or leaning toward keeping the new working scheme.
How feasible is a 4-day work week? | Quick Question
Praxis PR co-founder Maureen Juniper and SAP Canada’s head of HR for North America Megan Smith discuss the feasibility of a four-day work week and why some companies are better positioned to implement reduced working hours than others.
Joe O’Connor, the former CEO of 4 Day Week Global who helped lead the study, says it’s the largest trial of its kind in North America to date and the first that involves a “relatively strong participation” from hundreds of Canadians from a total of nine companies.
“We’re seeing that shorter working weeks lead to happier, healthier employees,” said O’Connor, who’s also the director and co-founder of the Work Time Reduction Centre of Excellence in Toronto.
“They lead to organizations that are better positioned to attract and retain talent, and actually, very surprisingly for people, they’re also leading to organizations which are more productive.”
The study had companies, most having between 11 to 25 employees, voluntarily try a four-day work week for six months between February 2022 and April 2023. Researchers let companies choose the best way to reduce hours as long as they maintained pay at 100 per cent.
For the 15 employees at Montreal-based firm L’Abri, it means working 35 hours between Monday and Thursday. Architectural designer Pia Hocheneder says the change has made her and her colleagues more focused during work hours, and actually encouraged work gatherings after hours to make up for any lost social contact throughout the day.
“It’s a quality of life that you’re gaining,” said Hocheneder.
Employers seeing benefits to 4-day work week
Workers and employers in Canada have found switching to a four-day work week is resulting in less stress and fewer sick days without sacrificing productivity, but it may not be an option for all workers.
What about bigger companies?
Maureen Juniper, the co-founder and partner of public relations firm Praxis, says after a series of workshops and webinars with 4 Day Work Week Global ahead of the transition, the company took a split approach: half of its 27 employees get Monday off, while the other half gets Friday off to make sure there’s always somebody to serve clients throughout the week.
The change paid off, she said, with no impact on revenue. In fact, she said internal findings show the company saw a 25 per cent reduction in personal and sick days taken and a 15 per cent decrease on time spent on internal and administrative tasks.
“It’s life changing, and our business has never run more efficiently,” said Juniper.
But Winny Shen, an associate professor of organization studies at York University in Toronto, says while the study’s positive results are consistent with previous literature, they’re limited in that they mostly come from companies with relatively few employees.
“That can be, perhaps, more difficult to scale up in a larger company with lots more people, lots more complexity,” said Shen.
The 15 employees at the Montreal-based architecture firm L’Abri switched to working 35 hours between Monday and Thursday under the program. (Submitted by Nicolas Lapierre)
More study is needed among randomized companies and those with more blue-collar workers, she said.
And for those companies who do try a four-day week, she says there’s always a risk employees could push back if it’s not made permanent, pointing to a similar movement in workplaces trying to mandate a post-pandemic return to the office.
“I think there’s a lot of potential here, but I think before we kind of say that this is beneficial across all circumstances, I think we have to do more work and investigate that,” said Shen.
Tom Collver, a co-founder of pilot participant and remote ecommerce company AddPBJ, says while the shift to a reduced work week comes with a different set of “friction points” for each company, it’s worth the time exploring a way it can work for them given the potential benefits.
“You don’t have to go whole hog right away, but I think it’s something really, really valuable to explore because you never know.”
MONTREAL – Travel company Transat AT Inc. reported a loss in its latest quarter compared with a profit a year earlier as its revenue edged lower.
The parent company of Air Transat says it lost $39.9 million or $1.03 per diluted share in its quarter ended July 31.
The result compared with a profit of $57.3 million or $1.49 per diluted share a year earlier.
Revenue in what was the company’s third quarter totalled $736.2 million, down from $746.3 million in the same quarter last year.
On an adjusted basis, Transat says it lost $1.10 per share in its latest quarter compared with an adjusted profit of $1.10 per share a year earlier.
Transat chief executive Annick Guérard says demand for leisure travel remains healthy, as evidenced by higher traffic, but consumers are increasingly price conscious given the current economic uncertainty.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
Dollarama Inc.’s food aisles may have expanded far beyond sweet treats or piles of gum by the checkout counter in recent years, but its chief executive maintains his company is “not in the grocery business,” even if it’s keeping an eye on the sector.
“It’s just one small part of our store,” Neil Rossy told analysts on a Wednesday call, where he was questioned about the company’s food merchandise and rivals playing in the same space.
“We will keep an eye on all retailers — like all retailers keep an eye on us — to make sure that we’re competitive and we understand what’s out there.”
Over the last decade and as consumers have more recently sought deals, Dollarama’s food merchandise has expanded to include bread and pantry staples like cereal, rice and pasta sold at prices on par or below supermarkets.
However, the competition in the discount segment of the market Dollarama operates in intensified recently when the country’s biggest grocery chain began piloting a new ultra-discount store.
The No Name stores being tested by Loblaw Cos. Ltd. in Windsor, St. Catharines and Brockville, Ont., are billed as 20 per cent cheaper than discount retail competitors including No Frills. The grocery giant is able to offer such cost savings by relying on a smaller store footprint, fewer chilled products and a hearty range of No Name merchandise.
Though Rossy brushed off notions that his company is a supermarket challenger, grocers aren’t off his radar.
“All retailers in Canada are realistic about the fact that everyone is everyone’s competition on any given item or category,” he said.
Rossy declined to reveal how much of the chain’s sales would overlap with Loblaw or the food category, arguing the vast variety of items Dollarama sells is its strength rather than its grocery products alone.
“What makes Dollarama Dollarama is a very wide assortment of different departments that somewhat represent the old five-and-dime local convenience store,” he said.
The breadth of Dollarama’s offerings helped carry the company to a second-quarter profit of $285.9 million, up from $245.8 million in the same quarter last year as its sales rose 7.4 per cent.
The retailer said Wednesday the profit amounted to $1.02 per diluted share for the 13-week period ended July 28, up from 86 cents per diluted share a year earlier.
The period the quarter covers includes the start of summer, when Rossy said the weather was “terrible.”
“The weather got slightly better towards the end of the summer and our sales certainly increased, but not enough to make up for the season’s horrible start,” he said.
Sales totalled $1.56 billion for the quarter, up from $1.46 billion in the same quarter last year.
Comparable store sales, a key metric for retailers, increased 4.7 per cent, while the average transaction was down2.2 per cent and traffic was up seven per cent, RBC analyst Irene Nattel pointed out.
She told investors in a note that the numbers reflect “solid demand as cautious consumers focus on core consumables and everyday essentials.”
Analysts have attributed such behaviour to interest rates that have been slow to drop and high prices of key consumer goods, which are weighing on household budgets.
To cope, many Canadians have spent more time seeking deals, trading down to more affordable brands and forgoing small luxuries they would treat themselves to in better economic times.
“When people feel squeezed, they tend to shy away from discretionary, focus on the basics,” Rossy said. “When people are feeling good about their wallet, they tend to be more lax about the basics and more willing to spend on discretionary.”
The current economic situation has drawn in not just the average Canadian looking to save a buck or two, but also wealthier consumers.
“When the entire economy is feeling slightly squeezed, we get more consumers who might not have to or want to shop at a Dollarama generally or who enjoy shopping at a Dollarama but have the luxury of not having to worry about the price in some other store that they happen to be standing in that has those goods,” Rossy said.
“Well, when times are tougher, they’ll consider the extra five minutes to go to the store next door.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
TORONTO – The U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has ordered TD Bank Group to pay US$28 million for repeatedly sharing inaccurate, negative information about its customers to consumer reporting companies.
The agency says TD has to pay US$7.76 million in total to tens of thousands of victims of its illegal actions, along with a US$20 million civil penalty.
It says TD shared information that contained systemic errors about credit card and bank deposit accounts to consumer reporting companies, which can include credit reports as well as screening reports for tenants and employees and other background checks.
CFPB director Rohit Chopra says in a statement that TD threatened the consumer reports of customers with fraudulent information then “barely lifted a finger to fix it,” and that regulators will need to “focus major attention” on TD Bank to change its course.
TD says in a statement it self-identified these issues and proactively worked to improve its practices, and that it is committed to delivering on its responsibilities to its customers.
The bank also faces scrutiny in the U.S. over its anti-money laundering program where it expects to pay more than US$3 billion in monetary penalties to resolve.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
