Preparing for interview during work time

[Stopyourhavering64]

The dept I work in has undergone a lengthy restructuring process and as such 6 members of staff , all on same pay grade (NHS) have had to apply for 3 jobs across 3 sites, meaning that 3 of them will be displaced and have to apply for other roles ( they will, however have pay protection for up to 5 yrs)
The interviews are today and for the last 2 days one of the interview candidates, and whom I share an office with has spent her entire time preparing for the interview, PowerPoint presentation, hand outs etc
The other colleague on site ,who is currently my line manager, has had full days of clinical commitments and has not had opportunity to spend time to prepare for interview during work time....( not that she would have used work time to do this anyway)...
what are people's views on this other colleague's practice?

Its not appropriate, but there's not really anything you can do about it. Has this affected your performance at all (i.e. did you or anyone else have to pick up their slack)?

I see that as fair game. They aren’t choosing to look for a new on, their current employer wants them to jump through hoops.

When I was being made redundant I was allowed to prepare for interviews during work time. I don't see this as being different - your colleague isn't applying for the role on a whim, she's been forced to because of the restructure. I'd cut them a bit of slack during a stressful time, especially if your job is safe.

Fair play if you ask me. It's not her choice. The employer is making her do it. Why shouldn't it be on their time.

I if thought I was going to possibly be made redundant I would do this too. Work is work, regardless how much you love it, it also more importantly pays bills

Definitely think it is fine to prepare for a restructure interview during work time! Not at the expense of critical work not being done but if you can make the time, then the work setting is the best place to prepare.

Have been through several restructures, and totally normal to prepare during working hours (and evenings and weekends) but the day job comes first.

Totally normal in a redundancy situation. Similarly, I’ve always prepared staff for internal interviews for promotion etc (and to be honest external ones if they’ve asked me for help).

I always have done. Especially if they want to make me redundant!

If she has time to do it at work, then good for her for trying to prepare as well as she can for the interview.

Just get on with your own work unless it is affecting you then raise it with a manager. They could be losing their job.

When this happened to me we were encouraged to prepare in work time and to work from home the day before and the day off the interview to ensure we had space to prep properly.

If this was a commercial organisation, it would be fairly normal to allow people time to prepare for interviews in work time, as long as any urgent work commitments were kept.

The NHS is a rather large organisation, but if people are forced to find other permanent jobs, I would expect that they would use any remaining spare work time to prepare.

When I was being made redundant I was allowed to prepare for interviews during work time. I don't see this as being different - your colleague isn't applying for the role on a whim, she's been forced to because of the restructure. I'd cut them a bit of slack during a stressful time, especially if your job is safe.

Same here, completely agree. A "restructure" where employees have to apply to retain any job is a redundancy surely?

Totally agree ok to prep during work time if you are at 'risk of redundancy ' which is the case in the scenario you describe