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Would senior engineers be interested in working reduced hours or part time?

102 points by curiousresearch ↗ HN
I work for a tech company and we're trying to see if there is interest from senior engineers who want to work part time. Now that we're a remote first company, we want to know if there are engineers who are at a point in their career where they no longer want to work full time, but are still interested in working reduced hours or part time. Specifically, we're not so much looking for contractors/freelancers to work on specific projects, but for an experienced senior engineer (previously worked for different start ups, or at a larger top tech company) to join a team and essentially be a guru or advisor to the team.

What are peoples thoughts on this idea? Is this type of thing something that you've seen at other companies, or would be of interest to see at a company?

126 comments

[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 209 ms ] thread
NickBusey
I think you would find very many people interested. You should maybe put up some contact information.
lawn
YES

/End thread

jdan
Definitely. I'm not even that senior and I'm interested.
thenanyu
Yes, 4 day work weeks are amazing. So is ending your day at 2pm.
seanmcdirmid
The problem for me is that there seems to be a lot of overhead in getting to do productive work (ramping up, accumulating knowledge and experience to be productive in solving a problem). It might make more sense for part time to mean 6 months a year vs. 3 days a week, but that has its own drawback.

I'm not really sure how to reduce time in work without falling off a cliff given that problems at the senior level tend to require so much focus.

6510
It should mean 3/5 the effort on average over a year. That could be 5 hour days, 3 days per week or some 48 hour weeks then take a few weeks off afterwards.

You get much greater value out of the employee.

[deleted]
(comment deleted)
jstx1
For the same total pay - yes.

For less pay - no.

holoduke
I work 4 hours a day since 2017. Of course this is a huge privilege. I could not imagine how I could combine kids, friends and hobbies with a 8 hour work day.
dataflow
Sorry if this is a dumb question but would your friends not still be working 8h/day? How would having 4h/day help see your friends? Did all of you manage to cut it down to 4h/day?!
iso1631
Kids leave school at 8am, get back at 3pm

A traditional job would be

7am - up, breakfast

8am - leave home

9am - get into office

5pm - leave office

6pm - get home, see kids

7pm - make + eat dinner

8pm - chores (washing, gardening, etc)

9pm - hobbies / friends start

11pm - bed

a 4 hour day

7am - up, breakfast

8am - start work

12pm - stop work, chores

1pm - hobbies start

3pm - kids back

5pm - cook/eat dinner

6pm - hobbies / friends start

11pm bed

dataflow
Wow cool! Thanks for sharing.
em-bee
why is the parent post being downvoted? it nicely states a motivation for working parttime and directly answers the question posted.
toomuchtodo
Have you tried listing reqs on https://4dayweek.io?

Speaking as an infosec practitioner, we’ve built functions with this model where we have infosec folks as subject matter experts (architecture, appsec, IAM) providing guidance on a 4 day work week. Great perk versus comp and benefits alone, and usually attractive to talent at later stages in life who are optimizing for QoL versus total comp.

armagon
This sounds amazing. I had no idea such a site existed. Thank you.
armagon
Let me strengthen what I just said.

I've been passively looking for a job. Job hunting is a slog for me, and I'm not interested.

But seeing this list, I've suddenly perked up. This is exciting.

philmcp
Thanks for the shoutout :)
toomuchtodo
Every darn time I can I’m going to lean on resources that helps normalize and champion a 4 day work week. As such, always happy to share your project when the context permits.
corn_dog
Yes. 4 day week, 3 months on - one month off, all kinds of things seem possible. What do you mean by senior?
alexfromapex
I would love to work 4 or even 3 days per week if I could still get health care with such low hours.
deepsquirrelnet
I’m considering quitting engineering altogether due to chronic burnout. I suspect I’m not the only one. I would love a part time position that gives me recovery time, and I would happily take the reduced pay that comes with it.
jrib
Do you know what you'll be doing instead?
deepsquirrelnet
Quite honestly, if I had figured it out, I would probably already be doing it. Technician type work has a certain appeal to me, but it’s intimidating to be two feet into a career, supporting dependents and trying to decide with certainty what is a better option.

I wish I had more insights to offer, because I personally know quite a few people struggling with burnout as well. Their solutions and mine so far have been just to switch jobs and hope to find a more favorable environment.

gdfgjhs
I have thought about it, but I think working 4 hours a day probably would cause similar low-level but constant anxiety about deadlines, bugs, etc.

I rather work a few months and then take a month off.

cowvin
Yep, I'm planning to try for some sort of semi-retirement before retiring completely. If there are such positions, I would be interested at that point.
glonq
I'm a development/engineering manager now, so I don't do real work anymore ;)

...but yeah I'm at a point in my career where I value work/life balance more than money. Would definitely consider less pay for fewer hours per week and fewer weeks per year.

emerged
I’m already part time as a senior engineer. But I make full time pay. If your intention is to pay less than full time salary, I’d imagine many of your target engineers are in my position and wouldn’t want the pay cut.
snarf21
I don't think it is the pay cut for most people. A lot of engineers would take 80% pay for a 4 day work week without losing benefits and insurance.
anyfactor
I came across a few people on the internet who had convinced their employers to hire them as contractors when they started to realize their work could be done on a part time capacity.

Interestingly, they all worked in the insurance industry.

disambiguation
> we're not so much looking for contractors/freelancers to work on specific projects, but for an experienced senior engineer .. to join a team and essentially be a guru or advisor to the team.

So, a consultant?

speed_spread
Consultants in technical work are quite often cannon fodder, this is not the case here.
ryanchants
Yes, I would love to work 4 days a week, 3 days would be even better.
hurnhu
I'm looking for something to replace my side job?

16hrs a week after 630est.

hurnhu
Codethrower@gmail.com
ok_dad
I would work part-time, but what cuts to my benefits would that entail? I already work ~20 hours per week in a job that gives me full-time benefits and pay, and I get every single goal done that I am required to achieve here. Why should the old-school butts-in-seats agenda have anything to do with my work output? I provide the same value for my company right now that I would if they cut my "hours" to half, so why would I agree to a pay cut in that case?

I know that I am very privileged to be able to work as I do in my career, and I've worked in warehouses, janitorial duties, etc. so I know how hard it can be to do those kinds of jobs where there isn't the ability to get the same job done in less hours; although I do have to say if you told a warehouse worker at the warehouse I worked at "get X number of pulls done, safely, then go home and I'll pay you for the day anyways" I would imagine they could be working for ~4 hours a day as well (there's a lot of down-time at some of those jobs, due to the fact there is no reason to be quicker). Only on the manufacturing floor where I worked do I think you'd really have to work the full 8-10 hours to get the number of units built, but in that case there was definitely room for process improvement.

gisborne
I would be very interested. How can I get in touch?
colinmhayes
I do think the biggest obstacle to part time work in the US is that health care is tied to employment. Health insurance can easily cost $20k+ a year for a family, and it'll be hard for employees to stomach the salary cut they might have to take to make the numbers work.
Jtsummers
You can still get health insurance while working part-time, it's just not required by law. Put it into your contract, someone going for a role like this poster seems interested in would be able to negotiate that into their contract if it wasn't there from the start.
leetcrew
maybe, maybe not. it's pretty common to find households where one partner has a job with a good salary and the other has a job with good benefits. cutting salary by more than proration while offering great benefits could be an attractive combo for households with this strategy.
dv_dt
If one is actually serious in bringing senior engineers in house under part time work hours, why would one make assumptions to limit the scope of who would find it acceptable conditions to come in under?

In the US one could offer comp for health insurance equivalent partial value, or go the other way and carry full health insurance with the part time salary reducing. Or maybe this whole situation favors a setup in nations w/ universal healthcare.

eatonphil
I'd be interested. phil@multiprocess.io
euph0ria
Yes, I would like to work 3/5 days and would take the corresponding pay cut
arbol
I negotiated one of my previous roles to 3 days a week after I told them I was leaving. I managed about 5 months of this setup but the disconnect between myself and other employees was obvious. The lack of face to face time means that you need to work on small isolated projects to remain productive. Otherwise it's difficult to keep up to date with the various moving parts in the product.
euph0ria
Thanks for sharing your experience