CHAPTER 7: Making the Switch: Implementing the 4-Day Work Week in America’s Largest Cities

This chapter focuses on implementation of the 4-day work week in American municipal governments with a population of 100,000 or greater. The chapter first reviews the literature concerning compressed work week schedules including the role of human resource (HR) professionals as change agents. It then addresses the current phenomenon of the 4-day work week through the lens of the following research questions:

The chapter concludes with a further discussion of the human resources director as an agent of change in major human resources-related policy decisions.

Organizations are in a perpetual state of change. A key element to the introduction of change as well as its eventual success or failure is the human resource manager. Paul Light (2005) notes that “organizations do not become robust by merely wishing it so. They must also make the investments needed to achieve and sustain alertness, agility, adaptability, and alignment” (p. 203). Light continues and outlines six lessons learned about change through the study of the Rand Corporation: