Does anyone have an arrangement like this at work?

[Davidfergus]

I am wondering if I could work 9-4, then and 7 to 8:30, so that I can drop dd at nursery and collect her for bedtime routine etc. I know I basically need to propose this to work but I just wondered if this is common? I have an office job mostly working from home and I have no involvement from DD’s dad except on Sundays. I’d prefer not to be collecting her from nursery when it’s dark at 6pm as she’s only 10 months.

DH and I both do this. DS has quite profound SEN and LDs so we flex our hours around his care needs.

Yes I do this sort of arrangement around school hours and it works really well.. in the office 9-3, pick up child and then carry on wfh for two more hours.

I would consider the difficulties of doing it. As others have said, you are relying on your baby going to sleep at the right time and staying asleep to allow you to work. Will your employer mind if the work isn't a full chunk or is done much later? And you do need to think of your wellbeing as sat in the evening working again can be draining.

I picked dc up at 6ish from nursery a couple of days a week and with dc2 we had a bus ride home and often didn't get back until 7. You get into a routine - I did bit of toast, quick bath/wash into bed. This was pre covid flexibility but I would definitely pick that over starting work again in the evening.

My friend works from 6am - 2pm and takes her 1 hour ‘lunch’ break at 8am. She uses this hour to feed the kids breakfast, dress them and drop them to school around the corner. She then has an hour before she picks the kids up to have something to eat, run the hoover round etc. As a naturally early riser it works perfectly for her.

i swapped to working 8 - 3 and work through lunch (well eat my lunch at my desk!) works out great - husband drops off and i pick up

I have a colleague who does this kind of thing.

Assuming you wouldn’t be regularly missing important meetings/tasks etc. at the end of the afternoon I would not have any problem with this as a manger, especially if I wanted to keep you.

I have a flexible working arrangement where I do this if it's needed. So I'm usually working 8-6 for example, and DH does all drop off and pick ups. But if he's working away I do it, and make my hours up later. I'm in a senior position and it's quite common to work like this in my organisation though.

I think as an employer I’d be worried about your well-being doing those hours. It’d be very draining. You’ll have one eye on needing to get back to work during dinner/bed routine.

Could you start earlier? My nursery used to do a 7.30 drop off which meant I could be at work by 8. It worked for us because mine was an early riser.

Personally, I find it too hard to go back to work again after I’ve switched into ‘mother’ mode so I did earlier and then finished earlier, taking ‘lunch’ over school/ nursery drop off. Then switched to 8am-4pm with no lunch break.

Yep I do 9-4 and then make up the hour in the evening once they’re in bed. I had to submit a flexible working request form but they agreed to it

Ask and see - you never know!

I know a few of my colleagues nip away to do the school run.

As long as you can demonstrate that your work would be unaffected, and that you aren't impacting on your colleagues then it's more likely to be considered. Even better if you can demonstrate that your logging in at different times could even be beneficial to the company, say, clearing the backlog of overnight queries so the morning staff are less swamped, or running a certain report that's always a pain to run when busy... get your thinking cap on and see if you can present it as a mutually beneficial arrangement? Even if it's just like "I can get that overnight report to you by 9am instead of midday if I start at 8am"

I asked for 2 days WFH and got it no problem because I made it clear that the flexible arrangement wasn't going to affect my output or my team.

I’d probably try and mix in 1/2hr early and 1hr late or you’ll feel you never have any downtime with an 8:30pm
finish every evening.

If your employer is in any way reasonable and values you, they will work with you on this.

Careers are long and this particular period in your life is really only just a brief moment in the overall scheme of things.

I do this sort of pattern and it works for me. It also means that I pretty much ignore my inbox most of the day and then spend the evening shift getting through email. It creates fewer responses as sometimes others have answered any questions/ issue solved itself and fewer people online for instant response

I work for the NHS and this isn’t uncommon. Several people in my team work 9-3 and then put in a couple of hours admin/note writing/referrals in the evening.

Can you start earlier? I'd rather do 8-4.30 than log back on after bedtime. I'm not a single parent but DH is away a lot so by the time I've worked, nursery pick up, made dinner, done bedtime for DS, dishes, laundry, any cleaning that urgently needs doing, I'm knackered and want to watch TV! Doesn't leave much downtime for you.

Hi, so I do 40 hours in a week, 8 of the hours are done outside of childcare... I actually do 4 hours before he gets up on a Monday and a Tuesday (so longer overall hours on those days) at home and I just have a really early night those days, only because I find it nicer to get them out the way early in the week, and it means if something happens I have some flex later in the week to do another early and make up time. Personally I know if I did 2 hours a day I would likely disturb my son when I got up as it would be too near 'his' getting up time when I got up and chances are he'd hear me and wake too!

I should say - I did try evenings for a period after he went to bed but for me I found it a bit depressing, just feeling like the day wasn't done. I've tried quite a few things!

Evenings - I tried 2 hours a day for 4 days, I had a feeling of doom when he went to bed, wasn't so productive in that time and small bits of tidying etc really bugged me but I felt like I couldn't do them or have any evening time to reset myself

2 hours a morning for 4 days I didn't mind and may do again at some point (my work is fully flex on hours of work as long as the number of hours is completed), I did find it a little hard going to bed early nearly the whole week, and a few times I woke him up so had got up early and then he wouldn't go back to bed so I that was really hard on those days!

The stupidly early start on a Mon and Tues I've done for over a year and I go to bed fairly early Sunday, as soon as he goes on Monday, then a fairly normal time tues as I know I don't have such an early start after that, so it doesn't impact life too much!

My job allows working whenever, wherever so this would not be a problem for me at all, but you know your companies policy.
Like if you’re covering tech support on the phone for example, or doing any type of phone coverage, it probably won’t work

So I used to work a split shift like this - now I work 9-3 and then 3:30-5 as they couldn’t promise my break between 3 and half past for the school/nursery run.

Sorry, clicked unreasonable by accident. I think that this is fine. Absolutely fine if your employer has flexi and it’s a reasonable request if not.
We have core hours of 10-4 but my current team starts about 9:30 at the earliest and a few people finish at 4pm due to childcare.

There are people who start at 7 and have two breaks due to child things and one person works 7-3 (not really allowed but he gets away with it).

So I think that 9-4 and making up your hours in the evening is more than reasonable. You can also add your working hours to your email signature and teams if you use that.

I know someone who does something very similar to fit round school hours. Where I work out would be fine as long as:

The child is actually in bed (or being looked after by someone else) so not disturbing you.

You get all your work done.

You clearly show in your calendar when you're available for meetings.

I often work 11-midnight and find that this works very well for me. I am a night owl and focus well at this time. It’s crazy how much work that I can do when I know I just need to get it done so that I can go to bed. Plus it’s quiet and there are no external distractions (from my phone or being able to play music etc). If I know that there is nothing keeping me up other than getting the work done, then I can actually focus on just doing that work! Not waiting for the end of the day to be allowed to procrastinate.
I’ve told my team that they shouldn’t worry if they see me working late or if I save the work late, because it suits me. I haven’t been tied to my desk since then. I also like being able to finish early, to do something social and then do a totally uninterrupted hour late at night when nothing is on my mind other than some easy tasks. Obviously that’s just my preference though.

Since WFH I often go offline 4-7ish to greet kids, cook tea etc and then come back online for an hour or two later on. I have a good reputation, my work is high quality and my manager knows ill get stuff done. I extend the same to my reportees as well- if you’re a good employee, chances are they’ll want to make it work for you :)

All you can do is ask. We have a lot of flexibility in my work but those hours wouldnt be practical every day or even on fixed days for us as most of our work requires collaboration with other people.

There is also the issue of what you do if your child, and I think most do, goes through a phase where they won't settle for bed.

Yes, I do.

I know what needs to be done and as long as it gets done by the time it needs to be done, it is up to me when I do it. It's 1.30 ish on a Saturday afternoon, DH has popped to B&Q so I am just been updating Sage and checking the TFL account to see if I need to recharge any congestion/ULEZ charges.

On Monday morning I am meeting a friend to do a bit of early Xmas shopping and have some lunch.