Flextime: Creative Ways to Get More
Personal Time
You can mix and modify the four major
flextime work arrangements (see left menu) to precisely match your
specific personal needs. Be creative!
Need some ideas?
Consider the following three part-time work solutions to ease your
work-life time crunch.
1. The Seasonal Part-time Solution
Maybe you like the idea of working three or four days a
week but a long-term, open-ended arrangement isn't practical
right now.
Why not propose a short-term,
part-time schedule to last about two months?
Tactical Tips:
- While summer, school sports
seasons and November/December holiday time are appealing
short-term picks, match your request to your workplace's
seasonal, slower times of the year.
- Emphasize the
closed-end, short-term aspect of the proposal, pointing
out that two months is shorter than the typical flexible
work arrangement trial period of three to six months.
- When it comes to department budgets, managers are
looking for pain-free ways to save money. Emphasize the
cost savings that come from your temporarily-reduced
salary.
- Redesign Your Job to
Part-time
to show your manager how the job will get done in fewer
hours.
- Present your
proposal to work fewer hours
at least a month before that seasonal shift is due to
occur so there's time for the negotiation and approval
process.
Assuming all goes well, you can repeat it annually
until the time you're ready to propose a year-round
part-time arrangement.
2. The 10% Solution
Your employer has just announced that they can avoid job
lay-offs if all employees take a 10% pay-cut for six
months. Could you trim some of your lifestyle expenses
to live on 10% less in order to keep your job?
Would you be willing to do the same thing in order to
buy yourself a few extra personal hours a week?
If you're living on less than you earn now and avoiding
consumer debt (smart money moves no matter what),
managing a 10% pay cut is doable and has the potential
for improving your quality of life.
The 10% Solution assumes you currently work five days a week,
eight hours a day (40 hours). It has you
proposing a 10% reduction so that you still work five days a week,
yet work seven hours
a day on
four out of those five days (28 hours + 8 on the
fifth day = 36 hours a week).
Variation: Proposing 35 hours—that's seven
hours a day all
week—would be The 12.5% Solution.
What busy person hasn't wished for more hours in the
day?
While an hour a day may not sound like much, those “extra” 60 minutes either before or after work, or ½
hour on both ends, could release a pressure valve which
reaps you...
- healthier meals (more time to pack a lunch or
make dinner),
- a calmer commute (or at least saner driving habits),
- or a walk with the dog (you may
not be the only one whose pounds are creeping up from
lack of exercise!).
Tactical Tips:
- The (US) federal government definition of
part-time employment is fewer than 35 hours a week; when
crafting your proposal, use the term “slightly-shortened
workday” instead of “part-time.”
- Nonetheless, you'll
want to use the “part-time” set of
Redesign Your Job
worksheets to address your manager's concern of how
the work will get done.
- Emphasize the salary savings to
the employer.
3. The Trade-Pay-for-Time Solution
At your
next performance review when you're expecting and
offered a raise, acknowledge your employer's recognition of your
performance and contribution to the company.
Then say
you'd like to forego the pay raise and trade it instead
for time. From that point, negotiate for more hours than
pay.
For example, while a 10% raise could be traded for four hours off
each week, that's a hefty pay hike most
people are unlikely to see in one shot.
However it costs
your employer nothing in direct pay
dollars to give you more time, so it's possible to
negotiate those same four hours off (10%) as a trade for
a raise of 3 to 7%.
Get more specifics in Fridays Off, Option #1.
Do this for a few years in a row and you could end up
working 30-35 hours a week for your current pay. At that
point, you could start accepting pay raises in dollars.
The Fastest Way to Write a Convincing Flextime Proposal
If you want a short-cut way to put together
a professional proposal to work
flexibly, order the Part-time
Proposal Package.
“Working
at a company with no flexible work arrangements at all, I presented a
proposal well-tailored to meet my needs as
well as my employer's. I am the first to have a
part-time schedule. The proposal received high praises from my Director
and VP.” Normalee Sirota, Senior
Tax Accountant, Burlington, NJ
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