Back to work after maternity - no part time jobs in Dublin?

sareer

We moved here from abroad so I am yet to be completely familiar with how things are done here

We had a baby recently and I am due to return to work when he is nine months. I have been trying to see if there are any part time jobs to change from my current employer where that is not feasible. I am a bit surprised to find openings that claim to be part time but the offer is to work 9 to 5 on four instead of five days a week - that is not what I expected part time jobs to be. I have worked in several countries and part time has been either something like half day (4h a day) all week days or 2-3 days a week. Are there really no such jobs in Dublin in an office setting? How do Irish women manage going back to work and seeing their little ones if they do 9to5 (actually 9 to 6!) every day? Do most stay home for a few years? Given the prices of creches I can see why it would make sense to stay home but I also feel it's expensive either way as not everyone would be able to be a stay at home mom.

Please let me know what options I could consider. Full time seems like working for creche and rent and not seeing my baby outside of weekends as he will go off to bed once I am finally home.

John Mason

My company has a family friendly policy when it suits them.

It suited them for me to work 4 days a week when I came back from maternity leave but then Christmas week, they decided it didn't work for them and said I have to work 5 days from January or leave.

That is just the way employers are in Ireland. They don't care about children o

Penny Dreadful

You are legally entitled to parental leave too and that might be a way to work things to suit you.
I am a public service employee and they are flexible enough (where they can be) around taking thus time. When I went back to work my little girl was just gone a year and I decided to take a Monday and Friday as parental leave.
I'm pregnant again now and due to go on maternity leave at the end of May so won't have used up too many days of my current parental leave and will have a new stock of days for the second baby.

Moonbeam

There are plenty of part time jobs but it depends on what you want to do .
My employer let me switch to a 3 day week but not all jobs would work that way .

uli84

I think part-time jobs the way she described are not plenty (half days 5 days a week). Unfortunately.

fro9etb8j5qsl2

I've been looking recently and have found that there are part time jobs out there but most of them are not office based. It surprised me because a few years back when I was working in offices, most bigger solicitor firms would have 1 or 2 full time secretaries who would run the office and one part time secretary who would work 9-1 every day and deal with the administration and paperwork. Perhaps it was a celtic tiger thing?

Millem

oP I worked in a call centre Doing market research while in college. If you were mon-fri day time staff the shift was 9-1 or 2-5 or 9-5 (if you wanted). If you were evening staff the shifts were 5-9 mon-fri, 10-2, 2-6 Saturday and 11-3, 4-7 on Sunday. For mon-fri staff you had to commit to 20 hours but could do more. For evening weekend staff you had to commit to 12 hours. But could do more.

I actually loved the job and would work loads during my summer
Maybe a call centre type job would suit?