There is untapped talent right here in Aotearoa
This week I had a conversation with an exec-leader in the public service about how to attract and retain people when you can’t simply pay more.
We named the reality that moving to a hybrid way of working is effectively just standing still. Offering the ability to work from home is the new baseline. It’s necessary but not sufficient if you want to hire and retain the right people.
He then asked me a great question, “What is it we’re not doing that you think we should?”
My answer, “Job sharing”.
There is a dormant talent pool inside every organisation right now. These are the people who have potential and capability for bigger and more senior roles but they have opted out.
Why do people opt out?
Our work culture here in Aotearoa is one of long hours which fuels low productivity. People who want a full-life with space for priorities other than work see this culture and think, “No thanks''. They choose to keep their full-life rather than trade it in for a narrow one that only has space for their career. They’re capable of more, but not willing to sacrifice other important aspects of their life to achieve it.
Who misses out?
We all do. Individually, many choose not to fulfill their potential because it has too high-a-price attached. Collectively, we’re not making the most of the talent that already exists here in Aotearoa because the conditions we expect people to operate in just aren’t attractive enough.
Why job sharing?
It seems we have an aversion to job sharing here in New Zealand and it’s harming us. The UK Civil Service has been driving job sharing in a big way since 2015. It’s now a really well established way of working and offers people high-quality, guilt-free, part-time work that keeps them growing in their career without the burnout dangers of being ‘always on’ and able to engage in all other important aspects of life.
Zurich did a 12-month experiment in 2020 and advertised all roles as flexible, including job sharing. This doubled the total number of applications for roles overall. That dormant labour supply finally found somewhere to go. Zurich stood out from the crowd and has never looked back.
What’s the downside of job sharing?
The main rub is that a job share partnership needs handover time between the two partners. This costs money. Most job share arrangements are two people working three days each, which is 20% more than one full time person.
What do you get for that money?
Skills and experience of two people that you couldn’t possibly get in one person
Part-time coverage from one partner in weeks when the other is on leave
Peer coaching between the job share partners that:
Accelerates their growth
Drives high-trust for them and their team
Relieves some pressure from their manager to fulfill the coaching role
Why is it better than regular part-time work?
Working part-time in a senior role is so often much closer to full-time than it appears on the surface. The responsibility of the role doesn’t go away because the person isn’t working that day. So often the part-time leader will still be checking emails, answering phone calls and never really switching off until everyone in the team has finished for the day. This is an example of guilt-ridden, ‘flexibility gratitude’ that can lead to resentment over time.
That resentment can lead to two choices. The first is that the person chooses to move into that dormant talent supply and opt for a smaller job so they can live the life they value most. The alternative is that they move up to full-time so they at least get paid for the work they’re doing and make compromises in other parts of their life. Neither of these options is ideal.
Job sharing is different. If you’re still working when your job share partner is ‘on’ then you end up creating more problems than you solve. You make a decision when you’re not the one with the latest context and create a headache for your partner to clear up. You're much better off being fully ‘off’ to let them get on with it. They’ll bring you up to speed at the next handover when it’s your turn.
This key difference allows each job share partner to truly work their part-time commitments and do it guilt-free.
How do you start job sharing?
Before the pandemic I was doing a lot of research into this idea and I created a checklist to guide a hiring manager into job sharing. You can download it here.
If you need to recruit and retain some brilliant people next year, wouldn’t it be great to tap into this dormant talent supply before anyone else does? Give it a go!