What if your working week was one day less? The New Eco is interested in the four-day week: an organization adopted by only 5% of French companies. Like JBM constructions, a builder of individual houses based in Saramon in the Gers which switched to “four day” mode a long time ago. Michel Castera, one of the co-founders of JBM Constructions, returned to this choice for France Bleu Occitanie.
You work on a four day weekly schedule. Is it quite rare in the building industry?
Yes indeed. But this is not new since the company was created in 2006 and we opted for this organization from the first months, at the request of an employee.
What are the benefits for employees?
Employees can organize their family life and their professional life more peacefully. And what’s more, they only travel four days a week. They have to come to the head office to take the vehicles to be able to go to the construction sites. Some live 20 kilometers away, so they travel 40 kilometers a day to come to work. It is not negligible.
And for the company, what are the advantages?
The staff being more rested, they work in better conditions. We also gain in productivity: we clean our sites every evening: with the 4 days, they do it one evening less per week. There are also energy savings that are not negligible since we have five vehicles that travel an average of 60 kilometers per day, which still represents a gain of 15,000 kilometers per year.
This organization is still very rare in the world of work. How do you explain that business leaders are reluctant to switch to the four-day week?
It’s true that we’re not used to four-day weeks. Maybe that requires some thought. All I can say is that we’ve been on this system for fifteen years and it’s a win-win situation.
Do you think that this four-day week makes it possible to retain employees?
Absolutely. We have a worker who was with us on opening day in 2006 and who is still with us. We also hired in 2013 three or four workers who are still with us.
JBM Constructions seeks to recruit a carpenter team leader and a mason team leader. Two future collaborators who will, of course, work under the four-day week regime. You can send your application to [email protected]
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