Juliet Schor

Professor of Sociology, Boston College · Author, Four Days a Week and The Overworked American · Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science

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Juliet Schor turns burnout, turnover and stalled engagement into a working model where teams deliver full output in four days at full pay, tested across hundreds of companies and more than 10,000 workers.

Future of Work Workforce Transformation Business Model Innovation Consumer Behavior

Chestnut Hill, United States

Videos

Watch Juliet in Action

The Case for a 4-Day Work Week | Juliet Schor | TED (Video)

New Research Shows Benefits of a Four-Day Work Week (Video)

Bio

About Juliet Schor

Juliet B. Schor is an award-winning labor economist and sociologist whose research asks a plain question with expensive consequences: what if organizations could get full output in fewer days? Through global trials, she has shown that a four-day week at full pay can hold output steady while turnover drops, absenteeism declines and applications rise. Her book Four Days a Week documents how organizations across industries, including Kickstarter, Meridian Health and Praxis Marketing, achieved 100 percent of output in 80 percent of the time while maintaining full pay.

"In most cases, employees are as productive in four days as they are in five," Schor says. "And beyond maintaining productivity, people just feel so much better. They feel on top of their work and their life, and they're not stressed out."

Topics

Juliet's Keynote Topics

The rise of “agentic AI” – systems that act autonomously and make decisions on our behalf – is reshaping the workplace. Yet companies face a paradox: while executives are eager to deploy AI for efficiency and innovation, employees often resist or even sabotage adoption out of fear for their jobs. Award-winning labor economist and sociologist and Boston College professor Juliet Schor brings a fresh lens: AI succeeds in organizations where trust and security are high and employees place a high value on their employment. Building on her research into reduced workweeks and organizational well-being, Schor explores how cultures that value people see productivity gains, including with more proficient AI uptake and better outcomes. She demystifies agentic AI for leaders, maps where it complements human judgment and offers a pragmatic framework for deploying AI so that it catalyzes well-being, creativity and sustainable productivity and avoids burnout or layoffs. A highly engaging speaker, Schor deftly reveals how to redesign workflows, set clear output expectations and anchor change in transparent metrics so that employees feel open to learning. Attendees leave with a practical roadmap to improve AI adoption, including steps for lowering resistance, safeguarding psychological safety, pairing AI with time-rich work design, and tracking results that matter to both boards and teams.

Companies are finding that even after years of good-intentioned wellness perks like unlimited PTO and free office snacks, burnout, disengagement and costly turnover keep rising. Award-winning labor economist and sociologist and New York Times bestselling author of “Four Days a Week” Juliet Schor argues the problem isn’t employee willpower, but the workweek itself. Drawing on the largest multi-industry trials of reduced hours (including hundreds of companies and 10,000+ workers), she shows how the 100-80-100 model — 100% pay, 80% time and 100% output — drives higher productivity and quality while netting big gains in well-being and dramatic improvements in retention and hiring. Companies report excellent results on KPIs including revenue, absenteeism, quit rate and new-hire flow, as well as case evidence where programs were cost-neutral or even cost-saving. Applicable across sectors from professional services and healthcare to manufacturing, retail, restaurants, nonprofits and local government, attendees walk away with a research-backed playbook to pilot or progress a shorter-week strategy. This includes practical takeaways on where the four-day workweek functions best, how to reorganize and optimize the time (rather than just cutting hours), and which metrics to track to make and prove the business case.

Research & Writing