Why No One Goes into the Office on Fridays Anymore

Black Friday Comes Once a Year. Blackout Friday Comes Every Week

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Five years ago, following an emotional college reunion in which I heard story after story of people whose lives had been upended by personal crises, I had an idea: Nobody knows how to tell their life story anymore. I should go talk to people and find out how they got through their difficult times. The result was the book Life Is in the Transitions, which offered a roadmap for navigating times of change.

That book came out in 2020, in the midst of a collective crisis: the global pandemic. Once again, I had an idea: Nobody knows how to think about work anymore. I should go talk to people and find out how they decide what they want to do with their lives. The result is a new book, The Search, which offers a roadmap for how to find meaningful work in a post-career world.

Order The Search: Finding Meaningful Work in a Post-Career World

Two years later, following the biggest transformation in work in a generation, including the Great Resignation, quiet quitting, and work-from-anywhere, one specific change seems to be locking in place: Nobody goes into the office on Fridays anymore.

Photo credit Kutyut Subyianto from Pixls via C

A wave of new studies has confirmed how the new rallying cry of knowledge workers is TGIF. Black Friday may come once a year; Blackout Friday comes every week.

The National Bureau of Economic Research runs a monthly survey of working arrangements and attitudes. The most recent report, released in November, found that 14 percent of workers are fully remote, 57 percent are entirely on-site, while 29 percent are hybrid. Knowledge workers, meaning those in traditionally white-collar jobs, spend half their workdays away from the office.

The day most affected by these days is the last day of the week. This summer, Kastle Systems, which provides building security services for 2,600 buildings nationwide, released a report that found just 30 percent of office workers swiped into work on Fridays. By contrast, 41 percent swiped in on Mondays (the second lowest) and 50 percent on Tuesdays.

“It’s becoming a bit of cultural norm: You know nobody else is going to the office on Friday, so maybe you’ll work from home, too,” Peter Cappelli, the director of the Center for Human Resources at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, told the Washington Post. “Even before the pandemic, people thought of Friday as a kind of blowoff day. And now there’s a growing expectation that you can work from home to jump-start your weekend.”

Even more traditional organizations are beginning to buckle under the clear preferences of their workers. Citigroup deemed Fridays “Zoom-free,” and KPMG declared “no-camera Fridays.”

This trend toward separating Fridays from the traditional workweek may turn out to be a last-ditch attempt to keep Fridays in the workweek at all. Two weeks ago, the consulting firm Ernst and Young reported the results of their annual Workplace Index. The headline: 40 percent of companies surveyed either have implemented or have begun to implement a four-day workweek. EY deemed the change a “shifting landscape in real estate management for corporate leaders” and said two-thirds of C-suite executives are investing in this space.

Photo credit shironosov via Canva

“The economic downturn will force leaders to make important decisions regarding their real estate portfolios — from investments to space optimization, to workforce models,” EY partner Mark Grinis said in a press release.

Results of a similar trial of nearly a thousand workers who are experimenting with the four-day workweek found near universal approval. As CNN reported this week, the nonprofit 4 Day Week Global tracked 903 workers in dozens of companies. Those workers said they experience no reduction in pay and are unlikely ever to go back to a standard working week.

“None of the 27 participating companies who responded to a survey by 4 Day Week Global said they were leaning towards or planning on returning to their former five-day routine. About 97 percent of the 495 employees who responded said they wanted to continue with a four-day week.”

Jon Leland, the chief strategy officer for Kickstarter, the crowdfunding site that has participated in the trial, described the schedule as a “true win-win.”

“The 4-day week has been transformative for our business and our people. Staff are more focused, more engaged and more dedicated, helping us hit our goals better than before.”

Photo credit Drazen_ from Getty Images Signature via Canaa

This trend confirms what may be the #1 finding of my conversations with workers of all backgrounds and vocations. The balance of power in the workplace is shifting from the employee to the employer. One thing everyone is searching for is work with meaning: Taking back one day from the office is one important step in that direction.

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Thank you for reading The Nonlinear Life. Please help us grow the community by subscribing, sharing, and commenting below. Also, you can learn more about me, read my introductory post, watch my latest TED Talk, or scroll through my other posts. And if you'd like to do a storytelling project with a loved one similar to the one I did with my father, click here to learn more.

You might enjoy reading these posts:

3 Tips for Successful Family Conversations This Holiday Season

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Or check out my books that inspired this newsletter: Life Is in the Transitions and The Secrets of Happy Families. Or my new book, The Search: Finding Meaningful Work in a Post-Career World.

Or, you can contact me directly.

Click here to preorder THE SEARCH.

Cover image credit from Arman Zhenikeyev