Municipalities weigh in as Saint John begins an experimental four-day work week

Monday marked the first day of a new trial period in which the City of Saint John will test a four-day work week for city employees. The city announced previously in September that the municipality would try the experiment for one year before deciding whether it makes it permanent or temporary.

According to the City of Saint John, core services like Saint John Transit, garbage collection, snow clearing, and other essential services will stay in place throughout the week, with the biggest changes coming to customer care and community services departments.

“Saint John is not unique in Canada. We are experiencing the same demand on our workforce, the same shortages in terms of talent attraction, and we want to retain the quality we have within our workers,” said John Collin, the city manager of Saint John, in September.

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But the city isn’t the first New Brunswick municipality to try the model.

The Town of Sackville’s chief administrative officer said that while the program is finished, for now, they plan on holding a review that will determine if changes are needed to the pilot project.

“Generally speaking, the anecdotal evidence that we’ve had back hearing from our workforce, it was overwhelmingly positive,” said Jamie Burke.

Quispamsis began its six-month trial in April, and according to acting CAO Aaron Kennedy, the tests worked.

“We’ve decided to maintain the five days a week; the traditional work week. We were able to do that by dividing our team, and it’s worked exceptionally well,” Kennedy said.

“We’ve been able to provide additional services to our business and our community and we’re excited to see it continue.”

Kennedy said that as the town extends their program to become permanent, he’s noticed many New Brunswick businesses switching to the model, and he says that schedules could change in many organizations.

“It’s a way to retain employees as well. With everything that has gone on in the world over the past few years, primarily the pandemic, we’ve learned there are ways to work more differently, more efficiently, and more effectively.”