Working less in 2022? There’s a peer group for that

Towards the end of last year, we made the decision as a team to trial 90% working hours from January 2022. We’re taking every other Friday off, with no impact on pay, and every other Friday is a team/strategy/learning day — strictly no delivery stuff.

Reducing our working hours: a voyage of discovery!

This wasn’t a straightforward choice — there were lots of conflicting thoughts…

We’re a small business without much surplus, maybe reduced hours only work for affluent organisations?

We also have a ‘time is money’ model — can we justify paying ourselves 100% salary for 90% time?

What if we just end up working full-time hours in fewer days?

But our hunches about what 90% time might make possible shone through…

Less work means more time for friends, family, learning and rest — a happier, more energised team.

We want to walk the walk with our values — we believe in regenerative economies and a more harmonious relationship between work and life.

It’s a tangible way of taking climate action — research suggests that if we spend 10% less time working, our carbon footprint reduces by 14.6%.

…and so we’re feeling our way. It’s a step into the unknown, and as our work explores how peer learning can support individual and organisational transformation, it seemed a no brainer to apply our own methodology to this transition.

Enter the League of Less Work

This is where the idea for The League of Less Work was born, a peer-led expedition for people and organisations committing to reducing their working hours in 2022.

We’re offering this learning journey in collaboration with our friends at LearnJam, who have already committed to a 4 day work week, and Host David Heinemann, who is experimenting with how to reduce his hours as a freelancing Dad.

Peer groups are proven to accelerate learning, further progress and boost resilience.

There are lots of ways to go about this: why join a peer group?

While the benefits of a shorter working week are juicy in themselves, we’re even more excited about what exploring reduced hours in a peer group might bring. In this context, a peer group offers…

1. A leg up: pooling resources and ideas with a peer group saves you cycles of iteration and potential mistakes. Seeking buy-in from your team? Adapting your contracts for a 4 day week? Chances are your peers have been there before, or can accelerate your explorations by joining you on the way. Isn’t there something radical and refreshing about sharing your working?
2. Momentum: the shape of the League of Less Work is based on the Learning Marathon, a six month learning accelerator, proven to boost individuals’ network of relationships, their sense of purpose, skills and wellbeing. We’ve seen how the Learning Marathon can birth businesses, podcasts, collaborations — what might become possible from this group of explorers?
3. Sticking power: the solidarity of the peer group will keep you feeling resilient and motivated when challenges arise, boosting your capacity to see this experiment through. It’s lonely working to unpick a paradigm as entrenched as the 5 day work week. We know that small groups of committed peers can supply the power to keep going.

So if you’re also won over by the benefits of working less, why not join the League of Less Work and make reduced hours happen for you or your organisation in 2022?

We set sail on March 17th 2022. Applications close 24th February. Learn more: https://www.enrolyourself.com/hosts/League-of-Less-Work