The world's biggest memory chipmaker, Samsung, is revising its arrangements to retain talent amidst the gloomy semiconductor market. The company will start giving one Friday off every month to its staff in South Korea to instill the value of work-life balance among young workers.
According to Bloomberg, this arrangement will start next week for non-factory workers and full-time staff. Employees can take the day off in the period they get paychecks, which is usually the week of the 21st, as per a company spokesperson. Samsung's move comes after SK Hynix, another big memory chip maker, decided on a flexible workweek last year.
An extra day off will help one of the most overworked working populations maintain a work-life balance
SK Hynix also allows its employees to take a Friday off a month if they work for more than 40 hours in a week. Another popular South Korean firm that has adopted the flexible workweek arrangement is Kakao Corp., a popular social platform. This new flexible one Friday off every month arrangement will be beneficial for the 1,20,000 Samsung employees.
Also, it shows how the work culture has evolved post-COVID-19 pandemic, even in a country with a more conservative work culture. To give you some numbers, South Koreans are among the world’s most overworked workers. They will log about 200 hours more in 2021 than the average among OECD members, which is quite insane.
