You've just completed Phase I of Job Share Academy where the focus was all about validating your job share and are entering Phase II to implement your job share! 

It may seem a little backward to learn how to sell your job share before you and your partner put pen to paper to draft the business case. 

The reason we start here is that although you might be passionate about your job share, you need to present it with confidence knowing that your plan is solid and your company will benefit in spades. 

It’s time to step into the job share “we” mentality. You and your partner will be acting as a team from this point forward. You’ll work through your plan to job share as you strategize who, how, and when to present. 

This is your preparation, your R&D time. And you’ve got some key pieces to put in place before you craft your stellar Job Share Proposal.

While the best way to begin Phase II work is with your #1 Ideal Partner Candidate (AKA your job share partner), you might find yourself still vetting candidates to find the Tina Fey to your Amy Poehler. 

That's OK. There is a difference between learning and doing. If you chose to job share in your current full-time position or to go on parental leave, come back in a job share as your Path in Module 2 — and you plan to job share at your current company — you can begin this work with or without a partner.

The benefit of doing it with your future job share partner is that you will step into your job share much earlier and gain momentum and confidence by strategizing your job share's approval together, which is harder to achieve solo.

If you do this work without a partner, we suggest bringing your partner in ASAP to share it, get their insights and input, especially on Step One: Team-Assessment of Aligned Answers for Your Manager’s FAQs.

Even if your company does not have a job share policy (few do) or formalized flexible work policies (most don't), there are likely flexible work arrangements negotiated on a person-by-person basis all around you. Perhaps even job sharing. 

Your key will be finding those examples and linking how well they work to your job share. The second strategy that will help you is finding ways that job sharing aligns with the values of your company (ie. collaboration, work-life balance, teamwork).

On another note, one of the most encouraging silver linings of the pandemic is overnight work from home. With over 40% of employees working remotely, most employers are finding managing flexible workers much easier than they ever imagined, even those who are stressed with the pandemic and a lack of reliable childcare. And a majority of employees, never want to return. 

However working remotely is NOT all flexible work practices and one of the downsides of this way of working (alone), is that often employees work MORE hours (from the pressure of the perceived perk they are getting), unable to power-up and power-down. However, the structure of job sharing means continuous 24/7 for employers while employees are able to rest, recharge, and return with better solution-driven results! 

Secondly, the pandemic has made employers much more open to innovative, new ways of working. And it's very possible they will see the value in job sharing if they can see HOW it relates to your company.

Sadly, job sharing and most flexible work practices have been negotiated individually which means many employees keep their arrangements on the DL, worried they might lose their flexible work practice if they draw attention to it. The rarer the practice, the more secretive they are likely to be. Only those who work directly with them experience the productivity and results benefit directly. And job sharing is among the rarest of flexible work practices. 

That means you really have to put on your sleuth hat and ask around. Talk to those who've been at your company for some time and who you trust to see if they know who is working flexibly and if there are any job sharers, past or present. Look to co-workers who seem to be that person others confide in. Sometimes, they have intel into the work-lives of co-workers others don't.

Do this with the confidence that it will be useful to your team and valuable to those who work with you, even. Should you be the first job share in your company, your success could mean many more job shares will follow! 

Don't be afraid to ask HR either. It may seem HR is a company front, but if you trust your HR professional, there are many who see themselves as the employee experience changemakers from within. They might be of great help to you, and at the very least, will have insights that can help you gain approval for your job share, and they could even turn out to be your job share champion! 

You might find yourself working for a manager who is risk-averse and completely unopen to flexible work practices. You are not alone, my friend.

In Lesson 3, you'll learn how to master Manager Mindset Moves. At the very least, this will help you understand how and when is the best way to approach job sharing with your manager. We all are capable of changing our mindset around limiting beliefs if presented with information that provides a solution to problems we have. THIS is what you are going to do with your job share.

Alternatively, make sure you are not letting your own limiting beliefs about what your manager and/or company are or are not open to, prevent you from confidently presenting your job share. 

Trust in the process, put in the pre-proposal work to know when and how to ask for your job share BEFORE  you craft your Job Share Proposal and Job Share Agreement and implement the Perfected Pitch. You will be 150% fully prepared to manifest your job share with your awesome partner!

In addition, Job Share Academy will teach you how to overcome objections and even boomerang a rejection.

If you still find yourself with a manager or company that is completely unwilling to consider your job share, it could be time to find a new department (with a new manager) or even a new company bring your talent to. Your might find your company's values do not align with yours and your next step is to decide WHERE you want to job share.

You can do hard things and you're ready for big moves! 

You might be wondering why much of the research in Job Share Academy comes The Job Share Project study? 

While job sharing itself has been around since the '70s and originated in the U.S. and U.K. around the same time, as you've learned, the practice itself has remained rare for a variety of reasons. 

They include lack of training (before Job Share Academy!), stigma against part-time working, bias against caregivers that left the practice gendered and parented and perceived complexity among others.

Because of job sharing's rarity (even though around 20% of companies say they offer some job sharing), there is less deep research on the practice.

While that is the case, decades of flexible work studies that include job sharing corroborate what virtually every case study and job share team worldwide tout, that job sharing is a valuable flexible work practice for productivity, recruiting, and retention.

In 2011, a group of innovative companies sponsored the job share specific study The Job Share Project that dove deep into specific areas most relevant to employers. That's why we include many statistics specifically from this study.