Anybody WOH in a client facing role?

[Proudmummy2014]

Hi,

At the moment I'm working full time in a client facing role. Ideally I would have loved to work part time, however my role doesn't allow it. By client facing I mean I have a group of partners where I'm their point of contact, and the business doesn't want to have someone covering me every week if I work part time.

I'm now starting to get anxious as DD will be starting school nursery next year which is half days, and year after that Reception which finishes at 3.20pm.

Is anyone else in a client facing role and managed to work part time/ change their hours to allow a good work/life balance?

I'm really keen to get more insight in to how/if it can work. X

I would suggest that you don't think of it as "someone covering you" - which suggests a temporary person, probably not as well trained or knowledgable as yourself, but talk of a "jobshare" which means that there are two of you who are equally able / responsible / capable / well trained / whatever else is worrying them.

Difficult to be more specific as obv. we don't know what you do / how easy it is to separate out parts of your role.

Yes me. I'm about to go on mat leave with DS 2. Only went back after 10 mths off with DS 1 last July. When I went back I used vacation days is accrued to do 4 days although always ended up working a little bit on Friday which was fine. Do t mind that at all I'm taking 6 mths this time but when o go back I really want to drop half a day - ideally Friday afternoon. But to make it worthwhile I'd ideally need to work from home Friday morning. I think it's 50/50 whether they'll allow this as I'm quite senior now and have a team but we'll see. I figure you only get one life so got to try and make it as happy as poss! Planning to offer to do it on a trial basis. I know I can make it work so they'll have to be pretty stubborn to say no. Probably going to put in the request whilst on mat leave. Eek!

I was and left. Just couldn't make it work. I have a much better PT job now

I have a client facing role. I work a 4 day week over 5 days so end up doing 3 pick ups and 3 drop offs with husband and childminder doing the others

Generally this works really well but I have to be careful about managing expectations (particularly as my boss "won't let me" tell the clients I'm part time - don't even get me started!). Im sure they'll realise at some point that I always have meetings already booked in on certain days!

Generally it works well. I do tend to log on in the evenings to keep things moving. Occasionally if I'm really busy or one of the girls gets poorly, it all goes to pot so I fm have to get the grandparents in for a day or two but generally it's ok.

Sorry, just to clarify- I mean school drop offs and pick ups so 8.50 and 3.10.
I do also get to work from home 2 days per week so that reduces the commuting time (40 mins each way).

The support you need is that of your customers/ partners.

Could you maybe agree that you work a split day, catching up on email etc from home in the evening to ensure that things aren't missed? If so, then if your customers/partners tell your management that they would be ok with that, would there be any need for cover?