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As regular readers know, I'm very interested in work-life in Japan. So I was intrigued when I heard about Microsoft's four-day workweek experiment at its Japan headquarters in Tokyo. While Microsoft earned a lot of attention for the trial, experts in Japan pointed out that this “experiment” has been done before. And for at least one company, it's become the way they do business.

(Disclosure: The author is an employee of Microsoft. All opinions expressed in this article are my own.)

Why Japan?

Even people without deep knowledge of Japan know that the country has a reputation for long hours and harsh work environments. The phrase karoshi (過労死; karoushi), or working to death, has become a loan word in English. Karoshi has claimed numerous victims. We wrote about one victim, former Dentsu employee Takahashi Matsuri, earlier this year. Beyond karoshi, workers are often subject to various forms of harassment, such as bullying, sexist rules, and even punitive relocation.

In recent years, however, more people in Japan have begun demanding change. Reacting to this demand, the Abe government has launched a series of work reforms (働き方改革; hatarakikata kaikaku) aimed at reducing overwork. However, some critics – such as Takahashi Yukimi, Matsuri's mother – say current reforms aren't enough. Takahashi Yukimi continues to press corporations and the government to work towards a “karoshi-free” society.

In other words, modern Japan is ripe for unique approaches to work-life balance. And Microsoft has been well ahead of the curve. The company has conducted multiple work-life experiments in the past promoting concepts such as remote work and flexible schedules.

Microsoft: Jump in Employee Productivity

Microsoft's four-day workweek experiment ran this summer during August 2019. Employees were given “special vacation time” to use to take Fridays off. To help enforce the policy, Microsoft completely shuttered its offices on Fridays. The company also encouraged employees to economize on work time by reforming the way they conducted meetings. Microsoft Japan set out three rules for meetings:

Limit meeting time to 30 minutes;

Cap attendees at 5; and

Hold meetings through Teams (Microsoft's chat/collaboration program for business) instead of in-person.

https://news.microsoft.com/ja-jp/2019/10/31/191031-published-the-results-of-measuring-the-effectiveness-of-our-work-life-choice-challenge-summer-2019/ (JP) Link: Our Project Centered Around a Four-Day Workweek and a 3-Day Weekend: Releasing Results of Our “Work-Life Choice CHallenge, Summer 2019”

In a press release sent out on October 31st, the company declared the experiment a success. It says that the number of 30-minute meetings increased by a whopping 46%, and the number of remote meetings increased by 21%. Employees reacted favorably to the change as well: 94% of surveyed employees said they felt positive about the experiment. The company says it also saw a 58.7% reduction in printing and a 23.1% drop in electricity usage.

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Results of Microsoft's 4-day workweek experiment. (Picture: Microsoft JP Press Release)

Many media reports are citing a statistic that says productivity at Microsoft rose by 39% during the experiment when compared to 2018. However, Microsoft added a footnote to its press release on November 8th clarifying that, while profits and employment did indeed rise during this period, it's can't attribute that result solely to the 4-day workweek experiment.

A Short History of The Four-Day Workweek in Japan

Microsoft's numbers are impressive, and the move gained a lot of press attention – not just in Japan, but in international media to boot.

However, Microsoft isn't the first company to bring a four-day workweek to Japan.

Writing for Nikkei's Comemo blog, researcher Nishimura Souichirou (西村創一朗) points out that the first company to experiment with a four-day workweek was IBM Japan in 2005. Fast Retailing, the parent company of clothing retailer Uniqlo, introduced a limited version of the system in 2015. Yahoo! Japan ran a similar experiment in 2017. And the company 600, which operates automated mini-convenience stores for businesses, introduced a four-day workweek last year, giving all of its workers Wednesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays off. 600 follows in the footsteps of firms outside Japan, such as New Zealand's Perpetual Guardian, which also moved to a four-day workweek in 2018.

https://comemo.nikkei.com/n/nff2f8e0b145b (JP) Link: Will the “Three-Day Weekend” Take Hold in Japan?

Nishimura notes, however, that both of these last two companies have something in common:

ご紹介したニュージーランドの会社も無人コンビニの600さんも、いずれも若い会社で、小さな組織なので、「週休三日制」にするという意思決定もしやすいです。 Both Perpetual Guardian and 600 are young and small companies, so it's easier for awareness of a three-day weekend system to take root.

The largest employer to introduce the system in Japan is Fast Retailing, which did so in response to massive turnover. At the start of the decade, Fast Retailing saw up to 50% of the employees they hired quit within three years. However, Fast Retailing's system only covers employees in certain areas, and it's not a work reduction: Workers are expected to put in four 10-hour days.

Future of the Four-Day Workweek in Japan

The challenge is expanding this practice, not just throughout smaller companies like 600, but larger corporations such as Microsoft. And that, says Nishimura, will take a lot more work. As Microsoft's experiment shows, companies that adopt four-day workweeks have to tighten up their operations and encourage their workers to invest their time wisely. Meanwhile, workers under a four-day workweek system face the real possibility that they'll feel pressured into working from home on their “time off” to compensate for lost hours. Employees may also feel pressured to respond to clients on non-business days. This is of particular concern in Japan, a country that prides itself on sometimes insane levels of customer service.

Nishimura argues, however, that the challenge could well be worth it. He points to the case of 27-year-old Satou Sarina ( 佐藤沙里那), who used Microsoft's 4-day workweek experiment to resuscitate her family's tofu shop. He urges employees to conduct their own month-long 4-day workweek experiment using their vacation time, and see what possibilities it opens up.

The fact is that very few companies anywhere have embraced a four-day workweek. Japan's no exception. And with Japanese businesses finding themselves increasingly short-handed, it may not become commonplace anytime soon. Still, it's good to see both native Japanese firms and international corporations embracing the idea. Given the shifting mood of the Japanese public regarding work-life balance, it's possible that, in the decades that follow, employment in Japan will look very different than it does today.

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