IT firm led by Athlone man to bring in four-day working week

The Dublin-based IT firm Typetec, whose CEO is Athlone native Paul Dooley, announced last week that it would soon become the first Irish IT services company to introduce a four-day working week for all of its staff.

The company said the initiative, which is being introduced on a trial basis initially, would see employees receive 100% of their pay for working four days only, provided they continued to achieve 100% productivity.

The four-day week is being implemented from February next, and the company said it would be collaborating and sharing results with both UCD and Boston College in order to measure the success of the scheme.

Typetec said the aim of the four-day week was to improve the work-life balance for employees while still maintaining productivity levels, company growth and high-quality customer service.

"Long before the pandemic, we had introduced remote working for all employees, and this has proved to be highly successful with productivity levels and staff morale seeing a significant boost," commented Mr Dooley.

"As a company that specialises in workplace productivity solutions, we realised that a four-day week was an obvious next step for us. We held a 'town hall' meeting to inform the staff and the reaction was so positive. There's a tangible air of shared excitement as we look forward to next year.

"We are holding empowered and engaged staff-led discussions as to how this will work best for them, while also maintaining team and individual productivity targets.

"We've also begun informing our customers and they have also received the news positively and are fully reassured by our continued focus on delivering service levels that are considerably ahead of industry norms.

"Ultimately, we want to provide every employee with a great work-life balance and enable them to build a long and rewarding career with Typetec. We’re delighted to launch this initiative as the company turns 40 in 2022, and we believe it's central to our continued growth and success," he stated.

The four-day week at Typetec will be introduced for an initial six-month trial period, and if it proves successful it will then be made permanent.

The company also announced that its group revenues were set to grow to €31 million this year, up by almost a third in the last two years, and that it would be creating eight new jobs over the course of 2022.