Perceived Internal Effectiveness of the House of Representatives under the Four-day Workweek Program

Abstract

In the Philippine Labor Code, Article 83 states that the normal hours of work of any employee shall not exceed eight (8) hours a day. However, in the past, several private companies and government agencies needed to adopt a shorter workweek program as an austerity measure. To be able to require the government employees to render service and work up to ten (10) hours a day for a period of four days in a week, the legislators authored the House Resolution No. 629. A four-day workweek may be a good austerity measure but its effectiveness in the organizations that adopted it, such as the House of Representatives, is still not yet proven. The House of Representatives is divided into two sectors 一 the Congressional Staff and the Secretariat. Under the Secretariat is the Committee Affairs Department, the standing and special committees of the House of Representatives, which is in charge of providing technical and administrative support services to the lawmaking duties of the Members the House of Representatives. According to Schermerhorn (1997), internal effectiveness has two characteristics. These are task performance and human resource maintenance. Task performance pertains to achieving timely and high- quality work results while human resource maintenance pertains to having your employees adequately satisfied. Since vital changes in an organization could affect its effectiveness, this study entitled "Perceived Internal Effectiveness of the House of Representatives Under the Four-day Workweek Program" seeked to answer the main problem How does the four-day workweek influence the internal effectiveness of the Committee Affairs Department in the House of Representatives?" The Open Systems Theory Model, which aided in discussing if the four-day workweek motivates and satisfies the employees to become more effective, was used to answer this question. By using a survey, the researcher was able to use a descriptive approach in answering the problem. The survey questionnaire identified the advantages and disadvantages of the four-day workweek and the level of effectiveness and efficiency of the operations. To analyze the data gathered from the 50 survey respondents, frequency, percentage, and the Likert scale were used. From the quantitative responses of the respondents, the four-day workweek program was rated favorable. From the respondents' profile, majority of them are female, mostly married, and all have been of service to the House of Representatives for at least three (3) years. The majority of the respondents consider the four-day workweek as a motivator to persevere in work and to produce good results. The respondents also consider the four-day workweek to positively affect their efficiency in producing accurate results faster. The level of satisfaction of the respondents with the facets affected by the four-day workweek is also favorable. Based on the responses of the survey participants, it can be concluded that the four-day workweek can be used as a gauge for the effectiveness and efficiency of the operations of the Committee Affairs Department. These conclusions about the four-day workweek were also drawn: it positively affects the internal efficiency of the employees because it causes them to work quicker and produce precise results; it affects the level of satisfaction of the employees toward their work; it has several advantages such as positively motivating the employees and satisfying them; it is disadvantageous to a minority of employees as it brings work inaccuracy; it positively affects the employees' satisfaction with the employee benefits, the productivity, and the efficiency of the employees; and it causes the superiors to have very high expectations of the employees* work effort and performance. Altogether, these positively affect the efficiency and effectiveness of the operations of the Committee Affairs Department. From these conclusions, several recommendations were made to assist further studies. Future studies can include the assessment of how their superiors* level of expectation affects their efficiency and effectiveness. Future studies can analyze the overall effectiveness of an organization under the four-day workweek. It can also try to focus on the effectiveness of the four-day workweek on other departments or companies. Further studies can look at the effectiveness of other workweek programs. A comparative study on the effectiveness of a company before it applies a four-day workweek program and while using the four-day workweek program can be done. Finally, future researchers can do a comparative study on the effectiveness of the four-day workweek in the two companies.