A 3-day weekend every month? How this employer is making it happen

With stress and burnout on the rise, more companies are looking for ways to help combat the impact of poor mental health with some much needed downtime.

Health insurer Sidecar Health has implemented a new benefit called “recharge days,” which will provide its 225 employees with a three-day weekend each month. The company decided to implement this policy in response to the increasing pressures and stressors employees have been under as a result of COVID-19.

“It's been a long two years,” says Alex Coonce, chief people officer at Sidecar Health. “We’ve really been listening to the feedback from our team and what we're seeing is that people are really burned out. We put our heads together to try to think of creative ways to continue investing in our team, and to create more space for people to focus on their well-being. One of the things that we decided to do was change our time off approach and really enhance that benefit.”

Workplace stress and burnout has been skyrocketing since the onset of the pandemic. Job posting site Indeed found that 52% of employees are burned out and that 67% believe the feeling has worsened over the course of the crisis. Having extra time off not only helps employees rest, recharge and catch up with the rest of their lives, but it can improve productivity, too: when Microsoft Japan instituted a four-day work week in 2019, the company saw a 40% boost in employee productivity, according to a report from NPR

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At Sidecar Health, employees have already had Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and will also have President’s Day off in February. Starting in March, all employees will have an employer-provided three-day weekend. The company strategized over which weekends would work best for the team as a whole, and their individual employees, Coonce says.

“We looked at the whole calendar for the year and tried to space the recharge days out so that we had a good balance of keeping up with our really big goals, with being able to take some time off,” Coonce says. “We also wanted to make sure we were being really inclusive with how we were thinking about this time off by considering religious holidays, and also thought about our employee parents and making sure that we were offering days off that made things easier for them.”

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While other employers might have concerns about the financial fallout of shutting down for an extra day each month, Coonce believes the benefits will actually boost morale and productivity, ultimately helping their bottom line.

“This is actually going to fuel the business more than having any financial impact,” she says. “Because ultimately, with more time off, we know our team is going to be rested and recharged and they can come back and bring their whole self to work, and be more effective in the role.”