you can share jobs? what's that all about?
Although it may sound odd, it is something that exists. Job sharing is where one full-time job is divided between two or more employees. This commonly means that each person involved works about half a day (doesn't that sound incredible?). However, job sharing can also be arranged where each of the people involved in the shared job do tasks and assignments for a whole week or month before passing the job on to someone else. Companies that allow employees to share jobs between each other benefit people who can only work for some of the time. For example, a person who lives really far away and spends a lot of money to commute to his job can just work for one week straight at his job, take one week off, and repeat the cycle.
below is a little dramatization that covers a couple examples of the type of people who can benefit from job sharing.
Before implementing the alternative work arrangement of job sharing in the workplace, a company must ensure that this alternative will work. A manager must ensure that its employees who are engaged in this alternative working arrangement are going to be willing to put their maximum effort into their part time work. However, this is easy to do because employees who are involved in job sharing are often so happy that they received this opportunity that they do whatever they can to make sure they keep it.
Although job sharing clearly has its advantages, such as reduction of stress, it has its disadvantages too. A major disadvantage of job sharing is confusion. When an employee picks up an assignment where the other left off, he or she may be confused without having received proper communication from the other employee regarding what his or her role is from there on. To avoid this, employees must carefully explain, in detail, what they completed so far and what they need the other employee to do in order for the task or assignment to be successfully completed.
Although job sharing clearly has its advantages, such as reduction of stress, it has its disadvantages too. A major disadvantage of job sharing is confusion. When an employee picks up an assignment where the other left off, he or she may be confused without having received proper communication from the other employee regarding what his or her role is from there on. To avoid this, employees must carefully explain, in detail, what they completed so far and what they need the other employee to do in order for the task or assignment to be successfully completed.