Pay Attention To Employee Welfare, This Bank Applies Four Working Days And Reduces Office Hours Without Deductions From Salary

JAKARTA - Paying attention to the physical and mental well-being and happiness of its employees, this bank has taken a number of important and different steps compared to other banks and companies.

In addition to reducing working hours, the bank also reduces employees' working days, allowing them to take time off at the end or beginning of the week, without deducting their employees' salaries.

Atom Bank, the Durham-based British bank yesterday announced a reduction in weekly working hours for its 430 staff, from 37.5 hours to just 34 hours, expecting most employees to take time off on Monday or Friday. This change is voluntary and means staff work slightly longer hours.

The policy, which took effect on November 1, was introduced to promote 'mental and physical well-being', increasing productivity, the company said, with the majority of workers already switching to new work schemes.

"A four-day work week will give our employees more opportunities to pursue their passions, spend time with family and build a healthier work-life balance," Atom CEO Mark Mullen said in a statement.

Mullen said Atom's experience during the pandemic has blown many modern workplace myths, including the need to work in an office.

To note, Atom was launched in 2016 as a mobile bank. Offers savings accounts, business loans and mortgages through its app.

Mullen further told CNN Business, Atom did not test the new schedule in a smaller team before implementing it.

"Everyone has to do it, so we really understand if it's going to work," he said.

He added that, so far, he hasn't seen a drop in productivity or customer service levels, but it will "take time for people to adjust."

"If you've just spent 20 years in one model and, all of a sudden, you're thrown into a new one, you wake up on a Friday morning thinking 'what was I going to do all this time?'" Mulan says.

Mullen said in a statement the five-day work week, a relic of the 20th century, was "no longer fit for purpose" and he hoped more companies would follow Atom's lead.

To note, workers have long demanded a greater work-life balance. Two studies in Iceland between 2015 and 2019 that piloted a four-day work week at the same pay rate, found no corresponding decrease in productivity among participants, and a dramatic improvement in employee well-being.

And as the pandemic pushes millions of people to work remotely, calls for increased flexibility are growing louder.

Elephant Ventures, a software and data engineering firm in New York City, said it had permanently moved to a four-day work week after successfully testing it in August 2020.