My dad, my sister, and sister in law all work for Lockheed Martin and they do the 4-10 schedule: 4 days a week, ten hours a day, and they get every Friday off.
I'm a little jealous of it, honestly; it's pretty rare that I work less than ten hours a day anyway, so I think economically it would be better for me.
Is that ten hours including lunch break (and if yes, how much?), or not?
Based on the stereotypical 9-to-5 office job in the UK or elsewhere, a "40" hour work week in those countries must obviously include some amount of paid lunch break (at a guess at least half an hour, maybe even one hour, giving somewhere between 35 and at worst 37.5 actually worked hours)
In Germany on the other hand lunch breaks are typically unpaid, so 40 hours means 40 actually worked hours, plus however long your lunch break is (at least half an hour is the legal minimum when working between six and nine hours per day).
Okay – a four-day week sounds tempting on the one hand, but on the other hand the place I'm working has a smaller-scale version of that arrangement whereby 8.75 hours Monday thru Thursday instead of 8 hours (lunch break not included) gives six additional days off per year plus a slightly earlier finish on Fridays, and personally that already often felt long enough, nevermind 10 hours plus x days.
At least this autumn the working week has been reduced by two hours, so now it's only 8.25 hours + x.
Because our working hours are somewhat flexible within reason, I might possibly get away with unofficially implementing that 4x10 model on my own, but 10 + x hour days really don't sound that tempting to me.
The downside here is that LM pays about 30 to 50% of top tier tech companies with mostly worse benefits.
But otherwise, I agree. That’s a wonderful schedule along with usually great WLB in defense.
The other risk is that defense has been overfunded and high flying for years and years now. Usually goes in cycles with massive layoffs, and we haven’t had one in a long, long time.
I work at LM and most of my colleagues here do the 4x10. I opted for a traditional 5x8 because I have young children at home and found that being gone for 10.5-11 hrs means I don't see them during their waking hours. If I could afford it, I would choose 4x8 and take the 20% paycut.
I'm a little jealous of it, honestly; it's pretty rare that I work less than ten hours a day anyway, so I think economically it would be better for me.