15 companies' two-year experiment: working four days a week does not reduce productivity, and nearly 40% even improve it

Deakin University Professor Hopkins and his team tracked a four-day workweek trial involving 15 Australian companies over two years, with the results published in the journal Nature: 14 companies chose to continue, none reported a decline in productivity, and 6 even recorded actual improvements, with overall satisfaction reaching 8.5/10.
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• Process reorganization is the core
• Global trial data: Germany remains steady, UK adopts permanently
• Who should benefit from AI productivity gains: Structural questions raised by Hopkins

Using two years of data from 15 Australian companies, one of the most convincing answers about a four-day workweek has been provided. Led by Professor John Hopkins of Deakin University, the research team tracked 15 Australian companies implementing the "100:80:100" model from 2022 to 2024, maintaining 100% salary, reducing working hours to 80%, while still demanding 100% output.

The final results were published in a journal under Nature: 14 companies chose to continue after the trial, with no reported decline in productivity, and 6 even recorded actual productivity increases. The overall average satisfaction score for this model among companies was 8.5 out of 10.

The core motivation of the study was not efficiency but burnout. Six companies explicitly stated that the primary goal of adopting a four-day workweek was to reduce employee burnout, not to pursue higher output. Further background from the Beyond Blue survey in 2025 revealed that half of Australian workers are experiencing workplace burnout, with the highest risks among young people and parents with children.

Process reorganization is the core

The key success factor revealed by the study is that companies first complete process reorganization before shortening working hours—eliminating unnecessary meetings, automating or outsourcing repetitive tasks, improving efficiency first, then reducing workdays accordingly.

Professor Hopkins emphasizes that if a company simply compresses five days of work into four, employee workload actually increases, and burnout issues may not only remain unresolved but could worsen. Conversely, identifying and eliminating low-value activities first allows for reduced working hours without sacrificing quality.

Participating companies span industries such as property management, publishing, and health technology. One company interviewed has been implementing this model for nearly eight years. Customer service-oriented companies adopt a "rotating rest" schedule, ensuring someone is always available to respond to customers rather than everyone taking the same day off.

The only case among the 15 companies that discontinued the trial was due to significant internal changes at the time, not because of issues with the four-day workweek itself.

Global trial data: Germany remains steady, UK adopts permanently

In 2024, 45 German companies conducted similar trials, with no significant difference in overall financial performance. Researchers interpret this as a positive signal: maintaining the same output with fewer hours essentially indicates an increase in productivity per hour. Progress in the UK is even clearer, with over 200 companies announcing permanent adoption of the four-day workweek.

Back in Australia, an earlier trial involving more than 20 companies and about 1,000 employees (2022-2023) recorded that 95% of companies chose to continue, employee burnout decreased by 64%, and sick leave plus personal leave combined decreased by 44%. An ADP survey shows that about 30% of Australians expect the four-day workweek to become a workplace norm.

Who should benefit from AI productivity gains: Structural questions raised by Hopkins

Professor Hopkins points out the intersection of the four-day workweek and AI in his research. He directly states:

"As we deal with high workplace burnout and societal debates on how to distribute productivity gains brought by AI, the four-day workweek might be an interesting solution to these two issues."

The core logic of this question is: as AI tools continue to automate repetitive tasks and boost individual output, who benefits from the extra efficiency? Should companies require employees to do more in the same amount of time, or allow employees to exchange the same output for more autonomous time? The four-day workweek is one institutional response to the latter.

The study also highlights limitations of the model: the "novelty effect" of short-term trials is hard to exclude, industries like emergency medical services, hospitality, and logistics face structural barriers to implementation, and companies' self-defined productivity metrics raise questions about cross-company comparability.

In other words, existing evidence supports optimism, but normalization still requires longer-term systematic validation.