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1 Take a 3-Week Vacation From Your Business 2 Building Websites Is Like Managing a Landscape Design Project 3 The 5 Keys To Job Costing 3 Upcoming Events 4 Does the 4-Day Workweek Work for Landscapers? INSIDE
Does the 4-Day Workweek Work for Landscapers?
Have you ever thought about running a four-day workweek at your landscaping company, but you weren’t sure if it would work or how it would impact overtime or recruiting or retention? I recently interviewed one of my clients, Kelly Slater, the vice president at Pleasant Landscapes in Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina, who has been operating the company on a four-day workweek for the past three years. This schedule has helped the Pleasant Landscapes team attract new employees who are interested in having three-day weekends and who are looking for an alternative work schedule. Kelly also let me know that the transition to a four-day workweek was not as drastic as you might expect it to be: “You’re only really extending the work day by two hours … And if you talk to your people and you really look at it, they’re probably working more than eight hours anyway.”
an eight-hour shift, they most likely won’t want to work additional hours after a 10-hour shift. Then, if needed, crews can work overtime on the fifth day of the week. This is a great option, especially if weather conditions tend to mess with your schedule. Overall, a four-day workweek can be a big selling point for new employees and can really help boost your recruiting efforts. At Pleasant Landscapes, employee retention has improved since they began their four-day workweek. Kelly says her crews come in Monday mornings feeling rested and ready to take on the week. A podcast listener emailed me saying that they tried it; it worked for a while, but they couldn’t handle the seasonality. You can design your work schedule to ebb and flow with seasonality. At Ramblin Jackson, for instance, we do four-day workweeks during May, June, and July and then are back to five-day workweeks for the rest of the year during our busier seasons.
So, what do you think? Would you ever try this at your landscaping company?
In fact, Kelly told me that this can be a good way to control overtime. While employees may be willing to work extra hours after
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