While a majority of companies across the world have a five-day working policy, a nation has now embraced a 4.5-day work week for public entities. Sounds cool, right?
In a major change, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Tuesday announced that the country will be transitioning to a four-and-a-half day working week, starting in 2022.
With this decision, the Emirates has become the world's first country to make the employee-friendly transition as part of its efforts to improve productivity and work-life balance.
As per the new schedule, the work timings from Monday to Thursday would be 7.30AM to 3.30PM. This will be followed by a half-day on Friday from 7.30AM to 12 PM. However, private companies will reportedly be free to choose their own working week.
According to the new timetable, weekends for government employees will start at noon on Fridays and end on Sunday, which means, now the employees will have 2.5 days long weekend. Besides that, all Friday sermons and prayers would be held after 1.15 PM henceforth, announced the UAE government.
The new system will kick off from January 1, 2022, and will apply to federal government entities including schools, colleges, and private institutions.
Video Editor: Partha Narayan Das