Four-day week grows revenue and maintains productivity

SINCE introducing a four-day week in February, Ballymount company Typetec has grown revenue and maintained productivity, according to its chief revenue officer Ken Tormey.

The journey began three years ago before covid, when it started allowing staff to work from home.

“There was a recognition that the most valuable commodity we could give to our staff was time, so why spend countless hours on the M50?”, said Tormey in an interview with The Sunday Times.

“For us it was about talent. As an SME we can’t go head to head with big US multinationals on pay. We felt a four-day week was something unique we could give to staff, that might help us attract and retain the resources we need to compete.”

Typetec, an IT and cyber security solutions provider, were one of the first Irish IT services companies to apply the ‘100-80-100 model’.

It sees all employees receiving 100 per cent of their pay for 80 per cent working hours while achieving 100 per cent productivity for the company.

“The rule is you get 100 per cent of your pay, give 100 per cent of your productivity, and 80 per cent of your time,” said Tormey.

As one of first members of the Four Day Week Ireland programme, Typtec initially introduced it as a six-month trial with plans to make it permanent for all employees upon successful completion of the trial.

Typetec measures the success of its four-day working week across multiple KPIs including commercial, financial and operational targets. It also collaborates and shares data with independent researchers from UCD and Boston College. Results will be analysed and shared at a macro-level, so that more Irish private and public sector organisations can be informed and encouraged to make a similar commitment to their employees.

Tormey says the company is growing and “hiring to plug gaps but as a reflection of the new customers we won during this period”.

“We’ve had revenue growth of 20 per cent year on year, with quite a lot coming in the last six months.”