As someone of the same mission as you Andy, you know I share the views of pretty much all of this piece.

I am also a 20-month in 4-day operating week which came about because of COVID-recovery induced fatigue and waste.

Our shift to 4-days was consulted on in the spirit of our self-management approach, and we had the added advantage of being asset free bar our connecting devices and what was in our hearts and minds.

We have now made a 4-day operating model one of cornerstones of our operation and that materialised in a 100% up on work volumes etc. last year; and a 20% reduction in consequent "time at the helm". The math doesn't stack up but it's not about the sums, it's about what it does to you as a human being with varying needs and energy levels, concentration and intensity, creativity and application.

So today, I'm typing this to you because I'm distraction free on our non-operating day. I can read, research, walk, do life-admin, take my Dad to appointments, look after my wife and her ill-health. All would be MORE difficult without our punctuated week.

We shunned the additional day for a long-weekend because partly just being contrary to what others would do, but also because we were clear on our motive - increased energy when we're "on the clock" and a space to recover and recharge in a mid-week day sabbatical when we're off it.

So in the ways you describe, it's not a gift from management but it (4-day frame) does catalyse and force a long hard look at what we do, when, how and why.

That recalibration - for me - justifies the thoughts and look into an alternative model.

What I think it ALSO does is address the imbalance and unfairness of working parents and carers, those who are studying who opt into 3-day weeks and are "part-time". Who are systemically barred from promotion and progression to jobs that are cut as 5 days because of their "seniority and complexity, demands and needs".

3 into 5 might be impossible but 3 into 4 might be a whole lot easier to adjust.

It does seem farcical in a 7-day working world (think retail, logistics, essential services and key workers, health and social care, policing and justice, maintenance and utilities, broadcasting, sport, science, hospitality and aid/humanitarian work), that 4 days shift should be considered progressive. Days are days to folks in these more always-on entities.

It might be evolutionary just as 6 to 5 was all those years ago.

Interest, research and heated debate on it is now more prevalent than ever.

What I know is, for my enterprise and many others (Bolt and Atom being just 2 ), it's their way forward.

So I objected strongly to that post you referenced here and 78,000 LinkedIn views and very few detracting posts to my objections later, shows there's more interest in this than ever before.

I'm going to become a dogmatic defender of 4-day approaches to the working week, as I am with self-management/non-hierarchical constructs and other things I've made part of my beliefs system.

So I'm biased towards it. I declare it and don't pretend otherwise. I see the shortcomings in even things I believe in because of others' perspectives, needs and belief systems.

So thanks for all the insight here and for continuing to spotlight things like DAOs and more.

4-day working weeks are simultaneously non-progressive, same but different ingredients AND progressive departures from an orthodoxy long untouched and held as sacrosanct for no other reason than "well, it just is how it is..."

It's my experiment-based, lived-experience informed and now held belief that shifting to 4-days both symbolically and practically, works for me and those with me.