part time

Part-time work ■

Part-time work is another version of flexible scheduling, but it deserves its own category, since for many families, it represents the golden ideal: it brings in needed income while allowing a busy parent more some time with family. But, as Stacey could tell you, it's not always easy to cut back your hours. 60 percent of adults working full-time who have children under the age of eighteen would rather be working part-time.

Many who want to work part-time become frustrated by a lack of options. Here are some reasons why:

Obstacles:

Your workplace is inflexible. No part-time work allowed, period.
Part-time work carries a heavy price. When you cut back your hours, you lose your benefits completely, which can mean your family no longer has health insurance.
Part-time work is code for "sub-par" work. As soon you cut back on your hours, your workplace sees you as less dedicated or less competent. You might have run the office before, but now you answer phones. You might have been on the fast track before, but now you won't ever be promoted.
Part-time work doesn't stay that way. You may have reduced your hours, but soon your boss is asking you to come in for just one extra meeting, or asking you to take on just one more assignment. Pretty soon, you're working close to the same number of hours as you were before.
There is no formal part-time work policy at your workplace. Reduced hours are a favor from your boss. Once the company is bought out, restructured, or your boss retires, your work arrangement disappears, too.

The list above assumes you want to reduce your hours at the company where you already work. If you're looking for a new part-time job, it's even harder. For the 95 percent of women who don't want to work for the same employer once they return to the workforce, finding a suitable job can be very frustrating.

Searching for a part-time job, however, means more than just typing "part-time" into the search field of an employment site and coming up frustrated when all that comes back are multi-level marketing scams. Remember that most employers have a very difficult time finding and keeping qualified workers. If you can do the job, you might be surprised at what accommodations an employer will make for you.

Benefits:
Part-time work can benefit both the company and the employee. Here's how part-time workers compare to full-time workers:

equal or increased productivity level
less absenteeism
less turnover
fewer breaks
less personal time at work
higher level of commitment
more likely to return to work after a leave

Part-time work helps families, too. An IBM study of married couples with children suggests that if a mother and father split a 60-hour workweek evenly, everyone's happier.

increased job satisfaction
increased family satisfaction
improved job flexibility
decreased work-family conflict

In another study, the same authors cite the "Mac-and-Cheese Effect" to explain the increase in family and work happiness that comes with less hours and more flexibility: they found that parents who ate dinner with their children were happier than those who didn't. What it comes down to is what you probably already knew: Families that spend more time together do better.

When I got pregnant with my first child I was working full time as a receptionist/administrative assistant at a multi-specialty medical clinic, and my employer was very willing to negotiate a reduction in hours to part-time (at my request), including changing some job duties to ones more amenable to part-time work.

Emily G.

Two executives at consulting firm Deloitte and Touche literally wrote the book about nontraditional career paths. Deloitte introduced a "corporate lattice" as a new way for people to configure their careers. Rather than feeling pressure to "move up" within the company, employees can move sideways, diagonally, or any direction they choose. Many Deloitte employees now cut back for a few years and increase their hours and responsibilities later as their family lives or goals change.