Emma Jacobs in the Financial Times writes about SHORTER and the 4-day week. (It’s the latest of a run of articles about SHORTER and REST in the Financial Times.)

Inevitably, we touched on the recent election, and the impact the Labour Party’s inclusion of the 4-day week in outs manifesto might affect its adoption:

Mr Pang says that he was “impressed with how effectively the Conservatives were able to paint [Labour’s proposal for a] four-day week as this crazy socialist Venezuelan money tree hatched in some Soviet institute for economic disinformation”.

His own view is that the four-day week is not “a particularly leftwing idea despite the fact that trade unions all over the world have championed it, nor is it a particularly rightwing idea. I think it’s simply good business.”

In his book, Mr Pang researches how companies — in Europe, Asia, the US and Australia — go about reducing their working weeks. He had expected such a practice to be only available in tech and design companies — “places where there is a lot of flexibility already and where being distinctive in how you work can be part of your brand”. But to his surprise, nursing homes and call centres were also implementing shorter weeks.

The piece also features an excellent picture by Anna Gordon. Here’s her working with me on getting the right shot: