Inside the University of Sunderland in London’s four day work week

The University of Sunderland in London introduced a four day work week in response to falling engagement, rising turnover and growing pressure for greater flexibility. Instead of defaulting to hybrid working, it built a model around student needs, supported by employee survey data and refined through continuous feedback. The result was stronger engagement, lower turnover and a more sustainable staff experience.

Flexible working is one of the biggest people questions in higher education. But there is no single model that works for every institution.

For the University of Sunderland in London, the challenge was especially nuanced. Staff wanted greater flexibility. At the same time, leaders believed students needed strong in-person, on-site support and reliable access to campus services.

Rather than moving straight to formal hybrid working, the university chose a different route. Using employee feedback as its starting point, it introduced a four day work week pilot designed to improve staff experience without weakening the student experience.

This case study explores what drove that decision, how the model was structured and what other institutions can learn from the results.

You can also catch up and watch our webinar, where Ilona Lewicka, Head of HR at University of Sunderland in London, discusses the pilot.

The University of Sunderland in London is a satellite campus of the University of Sunderland, established in 2012. Based near Canary Wharf, it has a strong identity as a widening participation institution with a teaching-led model.

Its courses focus largely on business and health, including nursing, health and social care, public health, tourism and business. Its students include home, EU and international learners.

The four day work week was not introduced as a perk or a trend-led experiment. It came out of a real organisational challenge.

After Covid, the university chose to bring staff back on site rather than formalise hybrid working. Leaders felt this best supported students, many of whom needed visible, in-person access to services and support.

But in the London labour market, that created a challenge. Other universities were offering hybrid working more openly, making recruitment and retention harder.

At the same time, people metrics were moving in the wrong direction. Staff engagement was declining. Turnover was rising. Short-term sickness absence was becoming a growing concern. Recruitment was getting harder and retention more fragile.

The university needed a way to improve the employee experience without compromising what mattered most to it: a strong student experience.

The turning point came with the university’s 2023 staff survey, run with People Insight.

Leaders already knew something was wrong. They could see it in rising resignations, recruitment pressure and day-to-day staff concerns. But the survey gave them a structured evidence base they could act on.

All of this moved the conversation from instinct to evidence. Rather than simply stating that staff were under strain, the survey helped quantify the issue and gave leadership stronger grounds to take smart action.

This is a strong example of what employee surveys can do when used well. They do not just surface problems. They can create clarity, confidence and momentum for change.

For many employers, hybrid working became the default answer to post-pandemic flexibility. The University of Sunderland in London chose a different path.

Leaders believed a formal hybrid model would be harder to reconcile with the student experience they wanted to protect. The university also wanted staff to remain visible and available throughout the campus week.

So instead of mirroring sector norms, it asked what type of flexibility would genuinely work in its own context. The answer was a four day work week.

This offered a meaningful improvement in work-life balance without reducing the university’s on-campus presence. Staff gained more flexibility and time back, while the institution could stay open and student-facing from Monday to Friday.

That is what makes this case study distinctive. The four day work week was not chosen because it was fashionable. It was chosen because it aligned better with the university’s culture, operating model and student-first priorities.

The pilot was built around a clear set of principles from the start.

The most important was that students must not be affected. That principle shaped the whole model. The university was clear that service levels, teaching quality and access to support had to remain consistent.

To make that possible, the campus stayed open Monday to Friday. Staff did not all take the same day off. Instead, non-working days were staggered across the week so teams could maintain coverage and students would not experience reduced access.

Student timetables remained unchanged and services continued as normal.

The second principle was fairness. Rather than limiting the benefit to a small group, all staff with defined hours moved onto the pilot.

The third principle was that the change had to be genuinely meaningful. Working hours were reduced from 35 to 32 per week, while salaries remained unchanged.

These principles helped the university create a model that felt valuable to staff while still being operationally credible.

The university’s approach was ambitious, but it was also careful.

The pilot launched in March 2024 and was initially introduced for one year only, running to the end of 2024. Leaders did not present the four day work week as a permanent answer from day one. They framed it as a live test. The university wanted to know whether it worked for staff, whether it was sustainable in practice and, most importantly, whether it protected the student experience.

This cautious approach created space to learn, adapt and assess real impact. It also helped build confidence internally, because staff could see that the organisation was serious both about innovation and accountability.

The pilot has since been extended and is currently in its third year as a pilot. What’s important to note is that the model continued not because of enthusiasm alone, but because the evidence suggested it was working.

The move to a four day work week was not frictionless by any stretch, and that honesty makes the story more useful.

One early challenge was coordination. When employees had different non-working days, arranging meetings became more difficult.

There was also the issue of workload. Hours reduced from 35 to 32, but the work itself did not automatically shrink. Teams had to think carefully about priorities, planning and efficiency.

Daily hours increased from seven to eight, which some staff found more demanding.

Small teams felt particular pressure. In functions with only a few employees, staggered days off could become harder to manage when annual leave or sickness absence entered the picture.

The university also faced mixed views internally. Although the overall response was positive, there was still a vocal minority of staff who would have preferred a formal hybrid working arrangement instead.

One of the most striking parts of the University of Sunderland in London’s four day work week pilot was how clearly staff could describe the difference that one non-working day made to their lives.

The extra time actually changed how people felt at work and away from it. Staff spoke about having more space for walking, gardening, exercise, family time and hobbies. Others said the extra day gave them time to deal with life admin, which meant they came back to work with more energy and focus.

That personal impact came through strongly in the feedback. One colleague said the four day work week was the reason they chose to work at the university, adding that it gave them “head space to work on my research interests and makes me a more effective academic”. Another said, “I never feel burned out anymore, and this pilot contributes greatly to me wanting to continue to work in this company.”

Perhaps the most vivid example came from one employee who shared that lower stress, more time for exercise and better meal preparation had helped them lose over a stone and a half since the pilot began.

These stories brought the model to life in a very human way. They showed how one meaningful change can reshape the wider employee experience.

By the 2025 staff survey, the university could point to a strong set of outcomes, although it’s worth noting that not all the positive results can be directly and solely attributed to the four day week pilot.

The headline result was engagement. The score rose from 71% in 2023 to 81% in 2025. Scores linked to pride, advocacy and intent to stay also improved significantly, suggesting staff felt more positive about working at the university and more likely to remain.

Other people metrics improved too. Turnover reduced by 5.2%. Sickness absence decreased.  Recruitment improved, the quality of applicants improved and vacancies were being filled faster.

One especially interesting finding was that staff increasingly reported feeling more productive, not less, as the pilot continued. Support for continuing it also grew over time.

There are several important lessons here for higher education and beyond.

First, flexible working should not be treated as a one-size-fits-all choice. The best model is the one that fits your people, your culture and your operating reality. For the University of Sunderland in London, that meant choosing a four day work week in the office instead of defaulting to hybrid working.

Second, creating a positive employee experience depends on meaningful action. The university did not ignore the warning signs in its people data. It used employee surveys to understand the problem, shape a response and track whether that response was working.

Third, staff experience and organisational performance do not have to sit in tension. In this case, the university improved engagement, retention and recruitment while maintaining support for students.

Finally, this case shows the power of continuous listening. Employee surveys are not just diagnostic tools. Used well, they help organisations make better decisions, refine new approaches and create more sustainable working models over time.

Join the growing group of HEIs using employee insight to rethink flexibility and staff experience. We’d be happy to share what we’re learning across the sector and what might work for your institution.

Talk to us and today to get started.