Is a shorter working week in the construction industry smart and sustainable?

Researchers in many countries have long argued that a harmful culture of long work hours and working weeks has become normalized in the construction industry. This has many negative impacts of workers' work-life balance, health and wellbeing, relationships and organizational outcomes. A shorter working week has been promoted by many researchers as one part of the solution to this problem. The purpose of this paper is to critique this debate and present the results of a large-scale empirical study into the pros and cons of a shorter working week in the Australian construction industry. This paper investigates the individual and organizational pros and cons of a shorter working week based on the results of a survey (N = 1,475) and interviews (N = 111) with a representative sample of people and firms from across the Australian construction industry. The findings show that widespread claims about the work-life balance benefits of a shorter working week should be treated with caution. The pros and cons of a shorter working week are highly contingent and vary over time, from project-to-project and person-to-person depending on a wide range of factors such as the shorter working week model employed, people's personal circumstances and life preferences, age, gender, job, marital status, wider economic conditions and the culture, nature and types of organizations they work for and projects they work on. This research addresses the paucity of large-scale multi-method empirical research into the pros and cons of a shorter working week. It questions the overwhelmingly positive nature of this debate and highlights several methodological limitations with existing research. Contrary to most existing research, it concludes that the jury is still out on the pros and cons of a shorter working week and that the development of effective evidence-based policy in this area requires much more research across a variety of shorter week scenarios and contexts.