institute a four-day workweek wherein every employee would be paid the same, so long as they continued to reach their previous productivity goals, just in 80 percent of the time. At the end of a two-month-long trial, they found that productivity had risen 20 percent—while “work-life balance” satisfaction scores rose from 54 percent to 78 percent. In 2019, a similar trial at Microsoft Japan resulted in a 40 percent rise in productivity.6 Rest doesn’t just make workers happier, but makes them more efficient when they’re actually on the job.7
