Effective January 2, the country will move its official weekends to every Friday noon until Sunday.
This makes the UAE the world’s first country to formally implement a 4.5-day workweek and a 2.5-day weekend—a sweeping facelift in work systems that private companies are expected to follow suit.
Although it’s up for individual companies to decide if they’re following the new workweek or not, people were thanking and cheering for the UAE’s constant emphasis on work-life balance for everyone. For them, it sends a strong message about the UAE’s work mantra that the workforce’s happiness is a prerequisite to achieving productivity, and the 2.5 day weekend very well exemplifies that.
Mary Ann Dela Cruz Mendoza, an Abu Dhabi-based expat from Abu Dhabi, said: “As a teacher, I am positive that the new weekend would bring both teachers and students the best teaching and learning journey by turning a tiring five days into a relaxing 4.5 school days.”
“As an expat, it would affect me since my country is having the same weekend – Saturday and Sunday. I would enjoy my weekends with my families back home through video chats, without having to worry that I have to go to work.” said Mendoza.
Jay-mar Ismael, Head of Recruitment at an HR firm in Abu Dhabi told The Filipino Times: “The new work week introduced by the UAE government starting January 2022 will provide more benefits than challenges because it promotes a healthy work-life balance in the workplace. This will also, in one way or another, increase retention of workers and reduce the attrition rate for companies. Most of the employers I know are aligning their work timings with the new workweek starting next month as they find it more cost-effcient both the employees and employers at the same time,”
Meanwhile, Ann Misharie David, a Filipina business owner based in Abu Dhabi said:
“From an economic perspective, this new schedule will improve our communication on our import & export transactions as it will be aligned with the working days of the global market. We also anticipate that this change in work schedules would be more productive for our staff.”
The new workweek comes on the back of UAE’s major, pioneering labour reforms in the Middle East which were announced in the last quarter of 2021 and coming into force next month. Last November, the UAE Government had approved Federal Decree Law No 33 of 2021 on the Regulation of Labour Relations, which repealed and replaced Federal Law No 8 of 1980. The new legislation was deemed as the most significant collection of employment reforms aimed at empowering employees in the private sector.
