In the UK there are over 600,000 women with children who want to work but can’t find the job opportunities to fit around their family life. Most have plenty of experience. So why then are they finding a job search so difficult?
The truth of the matter is that it remains a struggle for women with children to find a job that not only suits the hours they require, but to find a role that is at the level of their skill-base and experience. Despite recent improvements, there is still a severe lack of part-time opportunities at more senior levels in companies. One of the problems is getting more companies to realise the many benefits that can be gained from recruiting part-time staff – at every level.
Benefits for employers of hiring part-time
By hiring part-time an organisation can:
- buy-in a higher level of expertise and talent with the same budget. F or example securing a part-time senior employee for the price of a full-time junior;
- split a full-time job between two people. This way an organisation might acquire a mix of skills and talent that might be impossible to find in one person alone;
- Employ staff only for the time necessary to deliver a job. This can greatly improve both productivity and profitability; it also lends itself to higher staff retention rates;
- open up a pool of talent and experience that would otherwise be excluded from a typical job search: the woman returner.Simply by reducing a prospective job down from 5 days automatically widens the appeal of the job to women with children who want a part-time job for the long-term and are keen to remain loyal and committed in exchange for flexibility.
Women Like Us research https://imagineear.com/pharmacy/generic-nexium/ shows employers recognise these benefits
Interestingly, research conducted by Women Like Us has pointed to the fact that the tide is starting to turn and employers are beginning to wake up to these benefits. For instance, 73% of employers Women Like Us surveyed said they thought the 9-5 day was an outdated concept and no longer reflected the work patterns of the UK. 96% of survey respondents said they believed part-time isn’t just for low skilled roles – but that they believed it could also work for experienced, highly-skilled roles. 42% responded saying that senior managers and directors already work part time in their organisations.
It is this kind of innovative HR thinking that, if embraced by more companies, will herald a revolution in the number of existing part-time job opportunities, and in turn will affect the current perception of part-time roles –organisations will see: part-time pays.
Author: Alex Campbell, Women Like Us. Women Like Us was conceived in 2005 and has been growing fast ever since as an award-winning leading recruitment specialist in part-time work. They have not only built an organisation that is commercially successful but also one that has a core social value – enabling women to find – not just any job – but the right job.
Over the past six years Women Like Us has built up a candidate-base of 22,000 women in London, all looking for part-time work to fit with family, and has 3,000 employers of all sizes on its books, from SMEs to the UK’s largest retailers. It has also witnessed a 41% growth in jobs advertised through their service in the past year. Looking for a part-time opportunity or more information? Visit: www.womenlikeus.org.uk
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