The three biggest part-time lies

The three biggest part-time lies

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The following article deals mainly with the German job market. However, from my time in other countries I learned that the situation there is at best different but scarcely better regarding the topic of part time work.

Click here if you want to read the German version of this article

The labour market has undergone drastic change in recent decades. There are now 11 million part-time positions, 75% of which are filled by women. As a result, 38% of all working couples live in a so-called "modern breadwinner constellation": The man works full-time, the woman part-time. He makes a career and earns most of the income; she largely supports him. Many women state that they need part-time arrangements to combine work and family life. The sacrifices for this compatibility are great: lower recognition, less money, reduced career opportunities and up to 45% less pension.

The latter in particular leads to a risky financial dependence on the husband (about 40 percent of marriages end in divorce), which enormously increases the pressure on women. Many take on further training in addition to work and family life in order to break out of the so-called part-time trap. And the recommendations of politics, the media and business (not surprisingly) also go in this direction: women must not allow to be pushed into part-time work if they want to avoid the negative consequences. I call Bullshit! In my opinion, men need to work part-time more if something is to change.

If men gave birth, painless delivery would have been invented ages ago.

• Dorothea Stiller, Author

The double burden of work and family, which women in particular have to take on in order not to lose out, is outdated and is extremely damaging to our society. Helen Heinemann, who offers burn-out prevention courses paid for by health insurance companies, describes the average course participant as a 42-year-old mother with a half-day job.

The socially questionable appreciation of part-time work and domestic work does not help here: "Women are ashamed, they think: 'I'm only half-working, and I'm still completely exhausted.'"

I would like to emphasize what part-time is not: The concept of part-time is not a commitment that everyone must work at least x%! The freedom of choice that so many of our ancestors have fought for also allows us to choose not to work. This particularly affects parents who can live on a single income and whose values and life plans are fulfilled through this. Unfortunately, such decisions are often negatively connotated. To bow to social pressure (to work) and financial pressure (prefer full-time work) has nothing to do with free choice. I hope that this article will give an impulse to think differently about part-time work and thus take a step towards real freedom of choice. For this I would like to deal with the three biggest part-time lies. What do I mean by lie? A lie in this context is a false claim, which we tell each other and also ourselves.

Lie 1: Part-time employees are less available than full-time employees

Jobs advertised as part-time positions often involve less responsibility. This is also shown by a study by Marie-Therese Herbers, which examined job advertisements for highly qualified positions. Only 1.2% were part-time jobs, of which only 20% were real part-time jobs (the rest referred to the possibility of part-time work). While part-time positions for administrators increased sixfold over the 5-year observation period, part-time management positions remained consistently low.

One of the most common arguments why a job can only be processed full-time is the reduced availability of part-time staff. Decision-makers in particular are expected to be able to react promptly. Where would we be if managers needed half a working day or two to reply to an email or respond to a message on their mailbox? How unreasonable would it be if your own working hours were only 50% the same as those of a project partner, so that you have to hold meetings on the fringes of the working day?

I hope you see what I'm getting at: With very busy managers (rule rather than exception) and project partners in other time zones, we seem to have no problem with these restrictions, only part-time jobs seem to bother us. In my opinion, there is a misconception ("all my colleagues are always available to me") that prevents companies and managers from accessing the complete solution space.

Besides reducing misconception, however, we can also reduce this problem technologically:

1. The reduction of email as a means of communication and the introduction of collaboration platforms does not only help busy employees to get a quick overview of the status of the discussions held in the meantime after e.g. a week full of customer appointments, but also parents who had to stay away from work for a week due to day-care-center acclimatisation.

2. Ticket systems not only help to reduce (coordination) overhead and the efficient documentation of activities, but can also help part-time staff to quickly identify the most urgent tasks of the day.

3. Virtualizing meetings is not only necessary for colleagues from other locations or in the home office, but also a way to record and relive meetings.

Lie 2: Part-time employees don't have enough time to get a grip on a topic

Many employers say that part-time would not be a problem in principle, but that you first have to get into a topic before taking this step. This may be true for young professionals. Experienced professionals (and thus the majority of part-time employees and aspirants) already know how work works. The argument that one cannot completely grasp an activity if one does not spend 40+h per week at work, must also be considered in a more differentiated way: How many of you work on more than one project? Chances are good that more than one task is required, especially as careers progress. These often have little to do with each other. So nothing should stand in the way of separating these activities into several jobs.

Some will now say that in all projects you learn something that you can use in the others, and I agree! As already mentioned in other articles, however, nowadays we no longer primarily need strong technicians but strong people (and the trend is rising). For this reason, the projects that are being worked on in parallel should also include raising children, building houses, volunteer work, caring for parents and hobbies. Because these projects make a huge contribution to the training of people into social, reflected and value-conscious beings.

Lie 3: Part-time employees work less efficiently

Surveys have shown that although part-time employees are less willing to work overtime and are perceived as less available (see above), their efficiency often exceeds that of full-time employees. For example, 30% of Austrian managers stated that part-time workers would work in a more focused manner, 62% saw no difference.

This means that companies that pay for performance rather than attendance (this is another issue for another contribution) are better off with part-time workers. 50% positions should therefore not be compensated with less than 50%, but with more than 50%. That the opposite is true is shown by the erroneous perception in the economy and is also the reason why too few part-time applications are made today.

What's the next step?

In my opinion everyone can help!

• Men: Do more part-time, take on the disadvantages that otherwise only women experience and complain.
• Managers: Question whether vacancies could also be filled by a busy manager. After all, most part-time workers are nothing else.
• Applicants (whether you want to work part-time or not): Question whether you want to work for a company that does not actively offer part-time work. Although most companies allow part-time work, the disadvantageous part-time jobs are more likely to be found in those who promote a reduction in working hours as a favour.
• Women: Who am I to give you tips?

The pressure on women has increased enormously, but not much has changed for men.

• Prof. Dr. Dr. Hans-Peter Blossfeld, family researcher, on the development of the labour market.