part-time remote role - what working pattern is best?

[Spookedgoat]

Currently interviewing for a part-time role that is home based. It can either be 3 full days, or spread across the working week.

I've been looking at something like this to balance with my other freelance work as the income from it is unreliable and having a source of solid income each month is massively appealing!

It shouldn't be an issue to balance my freelance work with the part-time role - however, if I get the job I'll have a choice of either working 3 full days, or spreading it across five days. I am trying to work out what is best.

My freelance work involves a large degree of creativity and it's not really possible to do this for more than a 4-5 hour stretch, so in a way, spreading this across the days with the part-time role would work well. But my reservation is that I'll be seen to be more 'available' outside my scheduled hours if I work for this organisation each day, and it will be more difficult to establish boundaries etc.

Has anyone got any experience they could share? Thanks so much in advance.

How about two full days and two half days, working across 4 days?

I work 4 short days and having one designated clear “day off”’does help establish boundaries - people understand that more than they do shorter days!

@BatshitIsTheOnlyExplanation - thanks. Somehow I think that could end up being the worst of both worlds though!

@WheelySquirrel - interesting! Do you find people expect you to be available outside your official working hours on your shorter days?

I would work 3 full days at your job and have 2 clear days to focus on your freelance stuff and have clear boundaries for yourself and your colleagues. I find it helps to get into one or the other work mode to maximise efficiency. If you are in shorter days you may get pulled into working for longer and the boundaries blur.

If nursery age children then 3 full days, if school age then 4x 9-3 ( assuming 3 hours = 24hrs).

I would definitely go for 3 whole days. Many colleagues/clients don't understand part time and will contact you throughout the day/week; it's so much clearer to have clear days when you aren't contactable. Whereas if you work for 5 half days (eg), some people think you're just being lazy.

Also, the waters are muddied when there are occasional evening events. If you work 5 half days you'd be expected to go to them all. If you work only Mon-Wed then you can more easily decline evening events on the other two days.

Thanks so much all. Very interesting food for thought. My kids are teens, so their schedules don't affect things enormously - but it sounds like going for 3 full days is probably going to be the best option.