Employees at Shinsegae Group have mixed feelings about the retail giant's 35-hour workweek, which began this year, citing positive improvements in work-life balance but heightened labor intensity.
The South Korean retailer, which operates Shinsegae department store and E-Mart hypermarket chains, adopted the shortened workweek Jan. 1 to help its workers utilize their time to work more effectively. The company claimed reduced working hours allow people to spend more time with their families and engage in other activities like going to the gym.
In most Korean companies, the legal workweek is 40 hours with employees on average working eight hours per day. From January, Shinsegae workers come to work at 9 a.m. and call it a day at 5 p.m. minus their lunch break.