Do you REALLY need to work 9-5, 48 weeks a year for 4 decades? (Three alternative career designs)

Picture it. A Northern Irish, cliff-top, catholic school hockey game. Drenched and teeth clattering. Wind speed: “raging”. Rain persistently attacking 22 sets of 15-year-old eyelashes. Defending against far better competitors at 45degree sprints. Every minute felt like an eternity and I wondered for the last time “Is this the only way?”. 

A year later, aged 16, I applied to become one of two students from Northern Ireland chosen to become a foreign exchange student for a year through the wonderful American Field Service. And left my rainy homeland for a year.

Then, again, close to the end of my twenty-year career in head-hunting, I found myself wondering, “If this feels like an eternity, is it the only way?” And you know how that story ended.

A Northern Irish, cliff-top, catholic school hockey game. Drenched with teeth clattering. Wind speed = “raging”. I decided that school didn’t always have to be this way and designed it differently.

What to expect from this article

If you are ploughing through work that doesn’t feel satisfying enough, and you’re wondering if there’s another way, this article will give you food for thought in the form of three alternative ideas to the 9-5, 5 days a week, 48 weeks a year work model. 1. Less than full-time, 2. Quartermastery and 3. Three months holiday every year. 

Sometimes my clients simply cannot change career at this particular moment, but they want to make smaller changes to their model of work to give them time, space and energy to make more changes in the future.

1. Less than full-time

It doesn’t take a huge vat of imagination to conceive of designing a shorter week with a pro-rata salary. Or negotiating to do 5 days work in 4 while still getting paid for 5 days (or any other version of compressed hours).

The less than full-time model of work is very common in professions like doctors, dentists or nurses whose burn-out rate when they work a typical 5 days is ridiculously high. 

When I’ve interviewed those in these high pressure roles, many see less than full-time working - most frequently the 4 day week - as the only way they can sustain their career for the long-term. Compressed hours are common in big banks for certain skilled workers but it has to be said that historically it’s not been viewed as a route to the top. 

2. Quartermastery

This is an idea introduced to me by Peter Fayle whom I interviewed recently.

Essentially, it involves working for multiple companies/clients across the week (by splitting each day into four two-hour slots) “to get a lot more out of yourself, both for your personal satisfaction and for what you can do in the world.”  You can see that Peter speaks my language! 

So you might find yourself working permanently for one client for a few hours or even a half day five days a week, then swapping to other clients for the other two quarters of the day.

After being referred to Peter by someone in our Midlife Unstuck community, I couldn’t wait to get under his skin about the whys and the hows behind this exciting new mode of working. Read more about it here. 

3. Three months holiday each year

This is the dreamy idea that really grabbed my attention when I came across it a few years ago. I initially dismissed it as fantasy but have been convinced.

It’s possible to cleverly design your work (usually your own business) in a way that means you can take three months off on holiday.

I’m not talking about being a freelancer who takes three month off each year while not getting paid (although if that is your thing - check out Liz, a motor-biking, tango-dancing grandmother and financial consultant).

I’ve discovered that it is possible to design your business in a way that you have three-month breaks while still earning as much as you need - to live how you want to live. It takes needle-eye precision planning, a campaign driven business and of course you have to do something that people are lining up to buy or invest in. 

Are you raising an eyebrow, wondering if I’m on Planet Bongo? 

You might be thinking who can afford to work a 4-day week and still have a great life-style?

You might be thinking that splitting your day across 4 different clients sounds like a pain in the backside?

You might be thinking that you don’t want to travel the world and leave your kids behind for extended periods. 

Here are a couple of examples of professionals who’re experimenting with their work models because the 9-5 for 4 decades wasn’t interesting enough. 

Examples of working in alternative models

Here are two examples that might convince you to think even just a little differently.

• Sean D’Souza (3 months off each year)

I’ve followed Sean’s career and his podcast Psychotactics for about 5 years and have even become one of his clients. He trains business owners how to write better, faster and more engaging content.

Evolving his model of work involved a great deal of work to learn how to design his business around teaching campaigns where he meticulously plans the timing, restricts the volume to maintain very high standards and has waiting lists for every one of your courses that sell out often in less than 24hours. 

Sean D’Souza is one of a few people I’ve come across who has designed their business model around having three months of holiday each year where they don’t work. His podcast is called “Three Months Vacation”. This is the image he personally created (he’s also an amazing cartoonist) for his podcast.

By deliberately and consciously learning all the necessary skills to design his business in this way, Sean and his wife, who works alongside him, take 3 month holidays every year where they do zero work and do nothing but travel the world, read, drink, eat and explore new countries with friends. I’m in! 

• Peter Fayle (Quartermastery)

Peter Fayle has been experimenting with his career design for a while before he landed on his concept of Quartermastery. (Read my interview with Peter in full here.)

He currently spends two of his daily quarters of every day in a full-time technology role and is working on other projects for the other two quarters. This is an evolving model for him and I, for one, will be following his career with interest.

Peter Fayle spends two of his daily two-hour quarters in a permanent technology role and works on other projects for the remaining two quarters.

Here’s Peter’s response when I asked him how differently it feels working in this way rather than the traditional 9-5, five days a week, 48 days a year for one company:

“Here’s my guilty secret - While I’ve fundamentally enjoyed every job I’ve done, I’d never before gone a month in a job without a day where I considered packing it in. Since converting to doing half-days (same activities, same people) I haven’t been to that place once, and I have an inner confidence that this is much more than a honeymoon period. Read his full story here.”

Three work design ideas

So, in this article, you’ve heard about just three of many ways to design your current career differently. One easy to comprehend (Less than full-time), one is more difficult to imagine (Quartermastery) and one sounds absolutely dreamy but somehow possible with the right skills. (Having 3 months holiday each year.) 

Back to that hockey pitch

That hockey game on the cliff-top pitch at the tip of Northern Ireland was played by 22 players with rain blasting their eyeballs while many of them wondered if there was a different way to enjoy school sport more.

I wonder if this article has got you wondering if there is a different way to “do” your career, rather than accepting the ubiquitous 9-5, for another decade or two.

Your next step

If you’re interested in having a chat about your career design, I currently offer a free half-hour “Light at the end of the tunnel” conversation which might be just what you need to help you to see your career from a different angle. Check it out here. 

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