Job Sharing Policy and Procedure - September 2020

4. Key Principles

All posts within the Council will be open to job sharing unless the Director/Head of Service in conjunction with the Assistant Chief Executive (People Management) or nominated representative considers that there are exceptional circumstances that make a particular post unsuitable to job share,

Posts should not be excluded from consideration solely on the basis of status, level, or managerial/supervisory responsibility.

Job sharers will be afforded parity of treatment with full-time employees. They will be considered in the same way as full-time employees for all employment purposes i.e. recruitment, promotion, performance reviews, grievance, discipline, etc.

Employees who elect to job share should be aware that it may not be possible for them to resume full-time work in their current post, and if they wish to work full time in future they will need to apply for any vacant full time post in line with normal recruitment and selection procedures. Successful requests to job share will result in a permanent variation of contract.

Failure to fully consider an application for job share from a female employee returning from maternity leave may amount to unlawful indirect discrimination on the grounds of sex, unless the treatment can be justified on objective grounds. Advice must be sought from the HR Team prior to consideration of the request and confirmation of the outcome.

It is the shared responsibility of the individual job sharers, with the support of his/her line manager, to ensure the job share principle works effectively and efficiently.