Eidos Montreal to switch to 4-day workweeks

[Maniakkid25]

So, this is about a day old, but hey, no topic on it, and it seems pretty big. Eidos Montreal, the Square Enix studio currently working on the anticipated Guardians of the Galaxy game in the works, have announced that they are shifting fron 40-hour-a-week schedules to 32-hour-a-week schedules, along with Eidos Sherbrooke, an off-shoot of Montreal. Among other things, this is neither expected to compress workloads nor affect paychecks for the workers involved; it is merely a way to lower the stress on them and make a more sustainable workload.

This immediately set off red flags for me, given its such a massive and knee-jerk pivot away from the standard of "Crunch Culture" endemic in the industry, so I did a bit of digging. Turns out, the hours of work in Canada is HEAVILY regulated. You cannot work a worker more than 8 hours a day or 48 hours a week, which is the absolute maximum before penalties are assigned. You are expected to max out at 40 hours a week, with anything over that being Overtime. This, to me, screams in my cynical self that this is how they are going to crunch their employees without  running afoul of any laws; they'll have normal 32 hour days, but in crunch time, they'll be assigned an extra day of work. Boom, no overtime pay, no running afoul of laws. If I am right, then this is an ingeniously insidious way of getting great PR without actually changing anything. We will see how this plays out...

[Moonface]

I saw this yesterday but forgot to mention it anywhere so thank you.
I hadn't read anything in detail about this so I thought it was actually an interesting and good move, but only if four day weeks are more often than not considering crunch and stuff like you said. If it turns out to be too good to be true I expect it won't take long for it to get out through Jason Schreier considering his track record with reporting on this sort of stuff.

It could also be a way to try and get more work done in less time and turn crunch into a cheaper system by not making it an overtime matter.

[ShiraNoMai]

This sounds exceptionally familiar to how my company ran during much of this pandemic: Cut down on staff til it was a mere skeleton of its former self, added extra work onto the load, and cut pay down and hours to 40 max (no overtime allowed). So, yeah, I wouldn't be surprised myself. I'll ask my friend in the industry what he thinks will happen here and see if our cynicism could lead into a future like that.

[Moonface]

I read last night that salaries are not being cut as part of this change. So a 32 hour week is going to pay the same as their 40 hour weeks did.

[Kyng]

Yeah, I smell something fishy here.

Normally, when companies switch to a 4-day working week, it means one of two things. Either you go from five 8-hour days to four 10-hour days, or you lose one-fifth of your pay. But here, they claim the're doing neither... so, what's the catch?

If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is.

[Nightingale]

Have seen less fishy stuff at a harbor.

[ShiraNoMai]

Yeah, I smell something fishy here.

Normally, when companies switch to a 4-day working week, it means one of two things. Either you go from five 8-hour days to four 10-hour days, or you lose one-fifth of your pay. But here, they claim the're doing neither... so, what's the catch?

If it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is.

Well, technically, they are losing 1/5 of their pay by having one whole 8 hour day cut, right? 
Still, it's kinda shitty there's no balance to compensate. They're just essentially mandating a reduction in work hours.

[Maniakkid25]

That's just it; they explicitly say salaries are not being cut. They're working for 32 hours, but being paid as if they are working 40. That's where the whole story gets fishy. And I did a bit more digging, and I might know an alternate reason: Japan is also trialing an "opt-in" 4 day work week system, where individual workers can ask for it. This is in a country that has a word for committing suicide from being overworked (Jesus Christ): Karoshi.

It's entirely possible that, as dumb and head-in-the-sand as executives can be, that the higher-ups are seeing the writing on the wall, and want to get ahead of the curve, so they are picking a high-profile studio to trial run it to see how it works out. Microsoft did the exact same thing in Japan in 2019, and it actually lead to an UPSWING in productivity by about 40%. This, of course, requires executives that don't make every decision cravenly thinking about their bank account, so it's a stretch, but it's possible.

[Moonface]

Microsoft did the exact same thing in Japan in 2019, and it actually lead to an UPSWING in productivity by about 40%. This, of course, requires executives that don't make every decision cravenly thinking about their bank account, so it's a stretch, but it's possible.

Said executives may just attach their bank account to shorter work weeks with no pay cuts by considering the saved costs that come with the increased productivity. If developers can get games out more efficiently, that means overall you're paying them less because things are going faster by up to 40%. In turn, this means games can come out faster because if a game is finished x% faster than before, the next one can start sooner. Although this still sounds like a win/win situation if developers get better work conditions which in turn boosts their productivity. I don't know if Eidos does bonuses based on game performances, but if they do then if a developer could get more games out or get them out at lower cost maybe the bonuses will become bigger and more frequent too. Although I know for companies that do do such bonuses they're not normally done very well.

[Maniakkid25]

The only problem I foresee with this is the classic problem of "institutional inertia". It's basically the thought of "Well, this is how we've always done it, and it's worked for us, so why change it?" that has plagued companies, militaries, and even nationa for centuries. Oh, sure, that company saw this benefit from doing it, but that's not how WE operate; we shouldn't need to do the same thing! This same exact reasoning is why World War 2 had such stupifying armor engagements in the early years: everyone had to learn the same mistakes that other nations made on their own before figuring out how to do it right, because they all had their own tank doctrine that had worked for them in their practice runs, so why change it (a notable asterisk is, oddly, the US. who saw the blitzkrieg happening, and said "OH SHIT, WE NEED TANK DESTROYERS!")?

[Moonface]

The only problem I foresee with this is the classic problem of "institutional inertia". It's basically the thought of "Well, this is how we've always done it, and it's worked for us, so why change it?" that has plagued companies, militaries, and even nationa for centuries. Oh, sure, that company saw this benefit from doing it, but that's not how WE operate; we shouldn't need to do the same thing! This same exact reasoning is why World War 2 had such stupifying armor engagements in the early years: everyone had to learn the same mistakes that other nations made on their own before figuring out how to do it right, because they all had their own tank doctrine that had worked for them in their practice runs, so why change it (a notable asterisk is, oddly, the US. who saw the blitzkrieg happening, and said "OH SHIT, WE NEED TANK DESTROYERS!")?

I expect it will go the same way as it will for all the companies who have been hemorrhaging employees over the past year and blaming it on "no one wants to work" rather than "we treat our employees like shit so they left for better jobs". If this 4 day week approach turns out to be better overall, it only takes enough companies to adopt it too that those who try to dig their heels in will end up being forced to adapt or they'll struggle to retain employees.