Context: I initially wrote this document to navigate my thoughts around aiming for four day workweeks. I then shared it with my then manager, and discussed with him. It was eventually approved. My manager was not a direct EM but slightly higher in the hierarchy, and had perhaps more leeway than a typical manager would.

See also: My values

Summary

I would like to aim for a 4-day workweek. I’m currently working on average a 4.5 day workweek, but would like a 4-day one. To do this, I’d need to figure out, which day I can effectively cut. I prefer to cut an entire day rather than two halves as I believe and it has been my experience that having a “free day” leads me to a free-er experience overall and I have an easier time sticking to the boundaries I define.

It has been clear to me for some time that when I have the time to recover energy, I become far more creative and innovative. This is one of the goals, and it can make me a better person for myself, and a far better worker for the company. During my creative time I have ideas which save the me and my colleagues days or weeks of work.

Productivity

It is important to make sure that my reduced time does not come at a perceived loss of productivity. While most studies that have been conducted in this field show increases of productivity enough to counteract the less hours worked and provide an overall increase, I should make sure to both keep my actual productivity up, as well as my perceived productivity. Perceived productivity in toxic workplaces is often linked with presence, whether physical in the office or digital in Slack. Many folks in Miro are probably not consciously thinking like that, though the they could use it in their unconscious impression of “how productive Alex is”.

Actual productivity:

  • Fix my sleep schedule ✅
  • Improve my efficiency with productivity apps ✅
  • Review and improve my workflows ⏳

Perceived productivity:

  • See “Attend in office” below
  • See “Slack” below

Breaking it down

The main actions I perform in an average week are:

  1. Write code and PRs
  2. Read code, PRs and documents
  3. Discuss with people over Slack
  4. Discuss with people in the physical office
  5. Participate in meetings where I have a key role
  6. Attend informational meetings that are often recorded (e.g all-hands)

Write/Read things

This refers both to code as well as PRs. This work is highly asynchronous and requires focus. It requires a quiet environment and lack of distractions. I feel like I am better at doing this work at the second half of my day, but I haven’t confirmed that with data. I can do this work at home, or in any personal space. In my full setup (with extra screens), I find that I am better at reading and processing these documents.

I cannot do this work effectively:

  • In the office
  • In a noisy/uncomfortable place
  • While distracted

Attend in office

I tend to do this on Tuesdays and Fridays, as that was the old schedule that the previous team at Miro followed when I was a part of them. I should probably change this.

Potential actions:

  • Pick out new days after asking in some sort of poll. Avoid Monday and Wednesday which are the main days I’m thinking of potentially taking off.

Slack

A part of my job is responding to people on Slack who have questions or thoughts. Reviewing my performance in the past week of May 13-18 2024, I see that I typically responded in 15-30m to most of these requests. It is good to maintain a good response speed in this, to ensure I don’t end up being friction in people’s requests.

Potential actions:

  • Have Slack be permanently open, or switch to receiving phone notifications on specific days so that I can switch to a push-based workflow. Note that my phone will not be able to open PRs or perform other requests requiring VPN access.
    • But why? What type of notifications should I be receiving on my “day off”? Why would I need to respond to them promptly? I need to invest some time in defining “tiers” here
  • Review and cleanup “noisy” Slack channels ✅

Informational Meetings

I care about the information in these, and sometimes also the messaging. Nevertheless they often take a long time (e.g 1h) during my working day. I notice that I regularly skip these if busy. If I try to catch the recording, I often postpone it for quite some time as my perceived value of writing code is higher than watching the recording. Some of these have the chance to be very important (e.g company all-hands), or contain important cues for ongoing company work. Could I be engaging with these in a more efficient way?

  • Thanks to the Miro Digest, I can read a summary of all company announcements in a text way which I’m far more efficient with

Links:

  • https://www.dutchnews.nl/2024/06/dutch-software-firm-shifts-to-four-day-weeks-for-five-days-pay/