Asking for part-time in a full time job

[wednesday13]

I work in a professional field and have been with the same employer since university. I've been on mat leave and now work part time. The norm is full time in my field though.

I've now applied for a similar job nearer home, but it wasn't advertised part time, and it was an electronic application where I just put in my CV and didn't have any chance to add any covering note where I might have explained I am looking for reduced hours. I've been invited for an interview in a couple of weeks.

Should I flag up to them before the interview I'm only looking for a part time role (3 or 4 days per week) to avoid wasting time if they really would not contemplate it? It's a fairly senior role and I'm not prepared to start FT and put in a flexible working request with risk of it being turned down, I'd expect to negotiate it upfront as part of the deal.

And if I mention it at the interview do I bring it up at the start or wait till the end?

Mention it now and see what they say. If its a no no and definatly needs to be full time then it saves some hassle on both sides.

Mention it beforehand if you can. In the current economic climate the employer may be glad to employ someone part time rather than full time.

bump, any more thoughts? DH thinks I should go for the interview anyway but mention early that I work reduced hours and would be looking for similar.

If it's hours where you anticipate being able to fulfil the job as is in the hours you want, I'd wait until they've interviewed you and been 'wowed' by you. So that would probably be compressed hours or something - full time over 4 days.

If the arrangement you want would involve them changing the job content/description and/or recruiting a job share, then the courteous thing to do is to ask whether that's a possibility before it gets that far. Very irritating to interview someone for a FT position, like them and progress the application only to find that they will only do 3 days a week so to recruit them you'd either have to look for a suitable job share or restructure internally to accommodate...

I am in the same position have got through first stage for a full time job and really only want part time. Seems to be a family friendly company but I'm not sure how to approach the subject.

I have decided I should go for the interview anyway as I haven't been for one for 15 years and I need the practice. Looking for jobs advertised as part time is depressing - there is nothing I have seen so far.

Good luck JackinLeeds with your interview.

Flowery that is jus what I was thinking, I want to be courteous rather than irritating . It's not really that clear cut as to whether it's a FT position, the workload tends to be more flexible and change from project to project. Definitely not looking for compressed hours, life is compressed enough as it is!

It's a bit of an odd job where I think no human being could meet the person spec except presumably the person who just left, so I think it would be negotiable over the range of responsibilities as only some of it matches my experience anyway.

I would phone to discuss the possibility with them - just say that there was no option to put that info on the electronic form.
Then, while interviewing, they can ask other candidates if they are interested in a job share arrangement rather than go back afterwards. It also means they can look at it as a serious option before hand to see if it works for the job and the company.

It definitely won't be up for a jobshare (male dominated industry). I think I will give them a call first if I can find a contact number. It's very weird to have done the whole application by an automated system.