Hi, I’m Jane Downes, Founder, Part-Time.ie.
I’m a chartered accountant and have worked using my qualifications for the last 20 years. For the past ten years I have worked part-time. I was offered a redundancy from a multi-national in 2006 and very luckily for me I was offered a part-time job at exactly the same time so although I had planned to take a break, I never did.
The huge benefit of part-time work in my view is that you keep your foot in the door. I think that is very attractive to employers but more importantly it maintains your own confidence. Survey after survey conducted about women returning to work lists confidence as their number one obstacle. As I searched for a new job last year, I got countless calls about full-time positions which I didn’t consider as I was not ready to commit to full-time but it was good to know I was being considered. Part-time on the other hand was a bigger challenge to find! Which leads me nicely onto Part-Time.ie.
Up to now part time work could be advertised using local papers, word of mouth, company web-sites, full-time job boards, agencies amongst others. I trawled all of these, changed my LinkedIn profile, reached out to as many as I could and yet I struggled to find part-time work in my sector.
Based in the Portershed in Galway city, at Part-time.ie we strive to make the part-time market more fluid so people can make choices that suit them at any given time. I don’t think it serves anybody to stay in one job too long as I believe most people are at their best and contribute most in the first two to three years in a role.
Our vision is that Part-time.ie becomes the go-to space for all part-time employment.
We hope you like it!