Earning, learning & sharing
how jobsharing enabled two high achieving students to learn academically and professionally - and accelerate their careers
On our Jobshare Stories podcast, we share stories of brilliant jobsharers across a range of sectors, grades and experiences. Lots of our jobshare stories feature women who have chosen to jobshare in order to support childcare commitments, or older people who’ve utilised jobsharing after a decade or more in the workplace. However, in early September we released a brilliant episode featuring a unique jobshare partnership – Georgia Hyland and Abby Murphy who jobshared whilst studying. Georgia and Abby shared the role of Assistant Programme Manager at an amazing charity called “The Challenge” providing opportunities for young people to participate in National Citizen Service. Theirs is a rich story, full of insight and inspiration, about how jobsharing not only enabled them to earn whilst they learned – but also set them up for career success.
Abby Murphy & Georgia Hyland - who jobshared early in their careers, accelerating their success!
Applying for a role – a journey into the unknown
Abby and Georgia didn’t come to the role as a pre-formed pair. Georgia had been in the role, with another jobshare partner who left the organisation. As a result, her role was advertised and Abby applied. Not only did Abby not know who her jobshare partner would be – she didn’t even know it was a jobshare when she applied! She thought it was simply a 3 day a week role.
On the other side of the fence, Georgia wasn’t involved in the recruitment process and, with hindsight, wishes she was. That said, within hours of meeting, Abby & Georgia realised they knew each other and in a strange twist of serendipity, it turned out that Abby had indirectly asked Georgia for advice on the role via a mutual friend!
The pair clearly clicked early on, so this slightly odd approach to recruiting the partnership paid off – however, it’s not an approach we’d recommend at The Jobshare Revolution. When hiring for a new member of a jobshare partnership, we would always recommend including the incumbent in the recruitment process – to assess personality fit – and also, make it clear when advertising a role that it’s open to jobshare! There’s strong evidence that roles advertised as jobshare attract high candidate applications – so it’s a win win to make it clear that the role is a jobshare, not standalone part-time.
Similar and complimentary people combining as a powerful partnership
Prior to Abby starting in role, Georgia’s colleagues told her “Abby’s just like you. She’s basically YOU!” which demonstrated how similar their backgrounds and experiences were. But after working together for longer they realised that whilst they had some similar core skills and values, they also have complementary skills. As Abby said in the podcast, “we’re really similar and where we’re not similar we compliment each other”. This is a common theme we see from strong jobshare pairs – they have a core alignment on values and approach, but different skills and backgrounds. This creates a cross-pollination of learning. Georgia and Abby took these even further as they were both studying for academic qualifications whilst working in a jobshare partnership – so not only did they leverage each others’ professional skills, they also drew on their respective knowledge and educational experience to support their studies.
Accelerated development opportunities
For Georgia and Abby, jobsharing whilst studying acted as a springboard for their careers. It enabled them to do a relatively senior role whilst studying and then opened up many opportunities post-studying. The experience they achieved during their time at university simply wouldn’t have been matched if they’d taken a part-time job in hospitality or other typical student roles. It’s a testament to their own drive and tenacity that they found and delivered in such a challenging role whilst studying. But that experience also enhanced their capabilities – teaching them vital skills around time management, influencing and project management that they wouldn’t have got without the opportunity to jobshare. This in turn opened up opportunities post-studying and set them on a path that has led to their success since. They’re real role models of trying something new and reaping the rewards.
Jobsharing for succession planning
Abby & Georgia’s partnership was as a result of a forward thinking approach by their organisation The Challenge. The leadership team had effectively embraced a revolving door of jobshares – as one leaves another is replaced. Abby joined an existing jobshare when her partners partner left and then when that partner left, Abby was paired up with Georgia. But this created a continuity and induction benefits. Abby spoke passionately about how much having Georgia already in role helped her as she joined the team – there really is nothing that can compare to the induction process from a jobshare partner – who not only knows the role, bu the key stakeholders, the nuances and the subtle ways of working. And not only do they know all of that, they’re actively committed to your success in the role, so want to bring you up to speed effectively and efficiently! It’s priceless to come into a new role with someone there to show you how to do it with real life experience rather that induction from a line manager (or no induction at all!)
What started as a jobshare ended as a lifelong friendship that goes beyond the role.
Georgia (right) on a recent visit to Abby (left) in Uganda
Flex for the individual; flex for the organisations
An often overlooked benefit of jobsharing is that you can create flexible working models around the edges of the core jobshare. This was amplified for NCS - The Challenge because of the nature of the pair’s flexible working demands and the nature of the role. This charity was involved in designing and delivering summer programmes for young people which meant the peak time for the charity was the school summer holidays. Abby and Georgia were both studying on their non-working days but, because of the academic year, their university holidays coincided with the charity peak. So, a win win situation emerged – where the pair could increase their hours, remit and deliverables during the summer, returning back to
This model shows flexible jobsharing at its best – and can be applied in many situations. There are lots of jobsharing partnerships where resource can be dialled up and down as needed for the business and the individuals. Abby and Georgia bring to life how powerful this model can be!
A series of fortunate events – the power of luck
Abby and Georgia’s is a story peppered with serendipity – finding the right role at the right time with a match that seemed perfect. They talked a lot when we interviewed them about “feeling lucky” – lucky that they found each other and clicked! It’s good they’re grateful and recognise the opportunities that came their way and seized them – but they shouldn’t need to feel lucky. They’re brilliant, capable, passionate individuals with a lot to give. One of the core reasons we founded The Jobshare Revolution was to remove luck from the equation and replace it with systems. It shouldn’t come down to the roll of a dice whether you find someone to jobshare with – or whether jobshare is even made available to you. We want to change the world of work to make all forms of flexible working work – and to make jobsharing a core part of the flexible working offer. Jobsharing has so many benefits and so many applications and we want to change the system so it’s normalised and widely adopted.
About The Jobshare Revolution
At The Jobshare Revolution, we’re passionate about the power of jobsharing and want to amplify the message about how it can transform individuals and organisations. We share brilliant stories of jobsharing in our podcast Jobshare Stories. We work with organisations to increase adoption of jobsharing – ranging from one off talks and workshops to full scale jobshare implementation programmes. We also support jobsharers themselves, through our leading jobshare coaching practice where we support jobshare pairs to thrive and optimise their partnership through our unique blend of coaching, mentoring and training.
If you want to find out more about how we can support you or your organisation, get in touch at Hello@TheJobshareRevolution.co.uk or follow us on LinkedIn
