Thoughts on part time work for high stress job?

[Floobyjooby]

I work in a high stress full time job with long hours. I’m considering asking to go part time (4 days per week) so I can spend more time with our young DCs and not burn out.
I’m worried about the pay cut (we can just about afford it) and also whether I’ll just end up cramming the same work into 4 days and working even later nights/on my day off but being paid less.
Compressed hours not an option.
I’m not sure what to do- does anyone have any advice/opinions or experience of this situation please?

I did this and mostly just found myself cramming 5 days work into 4 unfortunately.

Do you have a supportive manager who would be willing to help reduce your workload by 20%? That is what makes the difference in my experience.

I have tried this and honestly I have up as I tease yes doing the same workload for 80% of the cash! I think it only really works if there's a clear plan for where 20% of your workload goes...

Sorry that was meant to say I had to give up!

I 100% wouldn't do 4 days. You will end up with all the stress and most likely 99% of the work.

I would do 3 days.
The way the personal tax allowance works, you end up taking home considerably more than 3/5 of your FT take home, but you are paying less for Nursery and it is FAR more likely they will get someone else in to do the other 2/5 of the week, and to share the load / responsibility.

I guess the question is whether working 5dpw you end up really working 6dpw so at least reducing it by one day will still reduce your hours. That's pretty much my situation - I work 3dpw but in reality work equivalent of about 4dpw or more. Yes it's a paycut but at least I have the flexibility to do the extra hours around my personal life to some extent. But yes you need a plan to reduce your workload as well as hours.

@AliMonkey it’s more like I’m currently doing 6 days in 5 so there would hopefully be a reduction in hours overall.
I’ll look into 3 days but I’m not sure my employer would agree to that or if we could afford it.
This may seem a silly question but how do people reduce workload- redistribute the work to others who are full time? Outsource? Prioritise essential tasks only?

Everyone I know who has done 4 days ends up going back to 5 and feeling that's an actual reduction in hours I'm afraid. I think there's something about 3 days where your boss/employer HAS to reduce your priorities and workload accordingly rather than just shrinking a full time workload into 4 days.

“This may seem a silly question but how do people reduce workload- redistribute the work to others who are full time? ”

This is the key question. Other colleagues won’t have more free time to pick up work just because you decide to reduce your hours. So either you continue doing five days work or others have to suck up more and may resent it.

Based on every woman I know who went to 4 days in a job that is an actual role (eg. commercial director, client manager) vs a job that is task based (eg hairdresser) it’s 80% of the pay for almost all the work.

in short, it’s a trap…

I work in a consultancy so my work is spread around a number of clients. So in theory I work on fewer clients and I delegate more. Having a great team makes it much easier to reduce your days. If they needed micromanaging, it wouldn't have been possible.

Any chance there's someone else in similar role that would like to job share (eg someone returning from maternity leave?), as that way your firm gets full cover for the role and, usually, great value as you both bring something slightly different. Otherwise, you need to work out what could be taken away from your role and either spread between others or a new role created, so that when you ask your employer you can show them how it could work.

I would consider myself the exception rather than the rule as I am successfully doing 4 days when I was doing 5 days prior to maternity. I spent hours doing a monthly planner and set out all my tasks by hour once I'd put in a request to reduce my hours, i then identified which ones I thought could be delegated, done less frequently or changed to no longer be required. It was worth it as my boss had initially suggested a few things (nothing like enough) but once I'd done the work laying it all out he didn't disagree. If you can come up with a detailed plan there's more chance of dropping hours successfully in my opinion.

This may seem a silly question but how do people reduce workload- redistribute the work to others who are full time? Outsource? Prioritise essential tasks only?

It is going to depend on how your work is "measured"

1. number of clients / number on caseload
2. number of projects
3. targets

I don't think "Prioritise essential tasks only" is realistic. I'd ask why you are doing work that isn't needed in the first place.

If you are in a senior role, might it work to employ an assistant / administrator for 2 days to cover your one, so they could do some of the tasks ?

You are better going to 3 days than 4.
I know too many people who've gone down to 4 days and have just ended up doing their full time job for 4 days pay. The fact your employer may not let you go to 3 days says a lot. They are going to expect you to do pretty much everything you're doing at the moment!

If you go to 3 days then the company have to employ someone else to do 2 days worth of job tasks. That may be someone at your same level, may be an assistant, or may be a reorganisation of work with the dept and someone being employed for backfill elsewhere.
You're much more likely to actually get a part time job if you're 3 days

@ringmybe11 I’m also returning from maternity leave. Did you do your planner before you went back or did you go back full time and negotiate reduced hours?

@NewName24 that’s a good idea about an assistant/potentially someone more junior

I put my request in for reduced hours, we had a meeting to discuss it where they verbally offered 4 days (I had asked for 3). I had partly done this so they knew I was serious about reduced responsibilities. At that point my boss outlined a few examples of things I could delegate or do less frequently and I said I would think about it. After that we exchanged a few emails because after thinking about it I accepted the offer of 4 days but said there wasn't enough tasks to give up - at that point my boss suggested I did something more detailed to be able to take the discussion further. I did it because I wanted to be clear about the role I was coming back to - start as I meant to go on.
What field are you in? Do you know how your role is currently being covered? This may make a difference to how realistic it is in giving up some work and where it goes.

I've only ever worked full time, but all my colleagues and friends who've dropped to 80% said they've had no reduction in workload, just had to cram it in, and get paid less. I think only you can know if it's possible and feasible to reduce your workload.

It worked for me but my director took substantial amounts out of my role so I genuinely had less to do. That often doesn’t happen.

I’m also quite determined so had she not, I’d have just refused to do it all.