Interview on Shorter Work Week to Cut Cost

The shorter work week is a necessary step to institute for some companies having excess labor or manpower so that they may stretch their dollar longer whilst withstanding severe lack of business or demands.

For companies undergoing severe shortage of demands or dry pipelines, manpower deployment is a topmost priority as it may drain cash flow and affect the sustainability of the businesses. When machine times are down, companies contend with depreciation and loan costs. For excess labour, it is a pure drain if the resource cannot be deployed where they are most productive. Along the spectrum of options, before any consideration of retrenchment, companies must surely consider the unsavory option of shortening workers' work week so that they may still have a job while the companies stretch the dollar. Also, some companies may have trained their labor resources for specific roles and to immediately release them when there is a down time may mean that the workers may join competitors - so it may be done in the name to retain talent.

Over-riding concerns for such measure as shortening work week must be to conserve cash flow and to stretch the dollar.

What may be the better thing to do for such idle labour? The government is providing a whole battery of up-skilling and re-skilling programs for PMET and the rank-and-file so that they may take this time to learn and relearn. Such effort may be costly for the government but it does spur the workers and an upgraded worker may be worth more than he was before. This, however, is premised that the bad times do not last more than 2-3 quarters otherwise, no amount of training will be meaningful if the general economy slumps with low demand and a general lacklastre in all major industries - from manufacturing, construction, healthcare to services.

I have seen a case where a child care teacher belaboring her low pay wishes to take the opportunity to explore a new career in hospitality and with a plethora of courses available subsidized by the government, she can now go to re-skill and on an upswing, she may embark on a totally new career path with a casino.

In better times, shorter work week work best for working mothers who prefer to spend more time at home while remaining productive in the workforce and it is in the name of better work-life balance.