Can adopting Bare Minimum Mondays increase employee productivity?

Monday again?

Research has shown that hating Mondays is more than a meme. Since offices have gone hybrid or in-person, employees dreading going to the office on Mondays is back.

(Gif via Giphy.com)

It’s nothing new. In the old 9-to-5 corporate world, facing Monday in a fluorescent-lit cubicle was an inescapable part of life.

In the new, more remote-friendly world, where nearly half of office-based employees are either remote or (more commonly), hybrid workers, Mondays aren’t necessarily a sudden switch back to the grind. Some call making a soft, remote transition at home “Bare Minimum Mondays.”

A 2023 survey by B2B Reviews and Fractl of 1,003 American workers working on-site, hybrid and remote found that about a quarter of all employees (22% on-site, 24% remote and 33% hybrid) practice Bare Minimum Mondays in some way:

• 75% say they start the workday late
• 54% admit to streaming shows while working
• 50% get extra rest
• 49% spend time on self-care morning rituals

It’s also a day to plan for the rest of the week, catch up on emails and do some virtual networking.

And it isn’t just staff who sneak in an extra hour in bed and a couple of episodes of “The Witcher” on Monday: The survey found that managers are 22% more likely to indulge in these activities.

So what should employers looking to keep employees happy while maximizing productivity do?

“The main takeaway for employers from this survey is that starting the workweek in-person on Mondays may not foster positive energy or productivity among workers,” Fractl digital project manager Ricardo Rodriguez told Technical.ly. “A significant percentage of hybrid workers preferred to return to the office on any day other than Monday, and only a small percentage believed that being physically present in the office on Mondays brought fresh-week energy. Understanding employee preferences and considering flexible work arrangements that align with work-life balance could contribute to a positive work environment and enhanced weekly productivity.”

In other words, there’s reason to believe that allowing lazy Mondays can be good for business.

A 5ish-day workweek

While the concept of Bare Minimum Mondays is in the same realm as the Four Day Workweek, they’re not the same. A Bare Minimum Monday is a work day, just a less intensive one that allows employees to ease into and prepare for the week. Come Tuesday, employees aren’t coming in from a total day off, so they’ve adjusted from weekend mode and are, at least in theory, ready to do more.

Whether companies actually call it Bare Minimum Monday or not, a good number of hybrid offices are doing it. 60% of workers surveyed said they work remotely on Mondays, with only 16% of employees (and 19% of managers) rating Monday as the most productive day of the week. (It wasn’t the least productive overall, either — Friday takes the cake there, with only 6% calling it the most productive).

An emphasis on Tuesdays and Thursdays

On the Technical.ly public Slack, it wasn’t hard to find a community member whose company is doing something similar.

“Our office is hybrid and emphasizes T-Th (with a bigger emphasis on T, Th specifically),” commented Barry Wright III. “Mondays and Fridays are the most common vacation and holiday days, so scheduling recurring in-office stuff those days is tricky, and the overall density for connections is lower.”

Wright doesn’t necessarily correlate that way of running a hybrid office with increasing productivity.

“Personally, I think it has less to do with the work intensity (which I think tends to be very role specific) and more about not having an in-office day turn into a ‘zoom from office’ day,” he said.

Ultimately, says Rodriguez, it’s about giving employees flexibility and balance.

“Employers can potentially enhance overall productivity and employee satisfaction by embracing employee preferences and fostering a work environment that aligns with modern work-life dynamics,” he said.