Employees will be free to choose when to take their extra day off, although they would extend the working day to 9am
The same salary for four working days a week instead of five, but with nine hours of work a day. These are the conditions offered to the unions by Intesa Sanpaolo, the largest Italian bank with more than 96,000 employees, of which just over 74,000 are in Italy. The proposal of this financial behemoth, which in principle would only affect the employees in the central offices and not those in the branch network, is currently being negotiated with the representatives of the employees, who according to the local media seem in principle favorable to accept it. The weekly workload would therefore go from 37.5 to 36 hours. If it goes ahead, it would be a turning point in a country whose labor market has historically suffered from a lack of flexibility. Despite the boom in telecommuting due to the coronavirus pandemic, the eight-hour workday five days a week remains the usual pattern in jobs in Italy.
Intesa Sanpaolo’s proposal offers its employees great freedom: they can continue with the five working days if they want and if they opt for the novelty of the so-called “short week”, they choose when they want to enjoy their third day off . There is no obligation to take it on Friday or Monday and you can choose to rest on Wednesday for example to break the week. That extra day off comes with one condition: it must be “compatible with the company’s technical-organizational and productive requirements,” according to the documentation the company submitted to the unions.
The aim of Intesa Sanpaolo with this measure is twofold. On the one hand, she wants to ensure that her employees are less stressed and more productive by working one day less, which also saves the cost of traveling to the office that day. Ultimately, it improves your quality of life. The company also benefits because the new organization of work crews allows it to reduce workspace and the resulting energy consumption. The ‘short week’ of Intesa Sanpaolo employees would not affect the days they perform their tasks remotely: for employees in the financial sector, telecommuting reaches up to 10 days per month.
That of this bank is not the only recent proposal from a major Italian company to reduce the workload of its employees. Brunello Cucinelli, promoter of one of the country’s largest fashion labels, advocated working up to 7 hours a day and dedicating the rest of the day “to ourselves and our souls”.
Source: La Verdad
I’m Wayne Wickman, a professional journalist and author for Today Times Live. My specialty is covering global news and current events, offering readers a unique perspective on the world’s most pressing issues. I’m passionate about storytelling and helping people stay informed on the goings-on of our planet.
