The IELTS Reading section tests how well you understand a passage, locate specific details, and recognise ideas that have been reworded. In this article, we will explain the IELTS passage: The Job Sharing Reading Answers.
The Job Sharing reading passage looks at how two people can split the responsibility of one full-time job between them. It covers who typically takes up Job Sharing, how companies like British Telecom and National Westminster Bank have responded to it, and what makes a job-share partnership work well. The passage has 6 sections and covers 16 questions, numbered 13 to 28.
This set uses four question types: Matching Headings, Note Completion, Yes/No/Not Given, and one Multiple Choice question. Matching Headings checks whether you've understood the main idea of a section, Note Completion checks whether you can pick out the exact word the passage uses, and Yes/No/Not Given checks whether you can tell a stated claim apart from something left unsaid.
Answering this passage well comes down to a few specific skills: scanning for keywords, spotting paraphrased ideas, locating exact answer positions in the text, and telling apart the writer's actual claims from assumptions. This page walks through each question with its answer and explanation, so your Job Sharing reading answer for every single question is backed by the actual passage.
Job Sharing IELTS Reading Passage
If you're searching for the IELTS Reading passage Job Sharing answers, you're in the right place, this is a text you read closely before answering questions on it. Job Sharing is one such passage from the IELTS exam, built around a workplace topic, so the words stay simple even when the details get specific.
Here's what each section covers before the full passage.
Section A: What Job Sharing means, and how it's different from regular part-time work
Section B: How Job Sharing differs from work sharing
Section C: Who usually takes up Job Sharing? Mostly women returning after having kids
Section D: Companies like British Telecom and National Westminster Bank use Job Sharing to keep good staff
Section E: Senior, high-pressure roles are being shared successfully too
Section F: What actually makes a job-share partnership work
One thing helps before you even start reading. Read the questions first. Then read the passage. Then go back to the questions.
That way, you already know what to hunt for: names, age groups, specific numbers, instead of treating every line the same. Once you've read the passage once, the answers are usually easier to spot.
Job Sharing IELTS Reading Passage
Section A: Job sharing refers to a situation in which two people divide the responsibility of one full-time job. The two people willingly act as part-time workers, with enough hours between them to fulfill the duties of a full-time worker. If they each work half the job, for example, they each receive 50 per cent of the job's wages, its holidays, and its other benefits. Of course, some job sharers take a smaller or larger share of the responsibilities of the position, receiving a lesser or greater share of the benefits. Job sharing differs from conventional part-time work in that it is mainly (although not exclusively) occurring in the more highly skilled and professional areas, which entail higher levels of responsibility and employee commitment. Until recently, these characteristics were not generally seen as compatible with anything less than full-time employment. Thus, the demands of Job Sharing are reciprocated by better pay and conditions and, ideally, more satisfaction than conventional part-time work.
Section B: Job sharing should not be confused with the term work sharing, which pertains to increasing the number of jobs by reducing the number of hours of each existing job, thus offering more positions to the growing number of unemployed people. Job sharing, by contrast, is not designed to address unemployment problems; its focus, rather, is to provide well-paid work for skilled workers and professionals who want more free time for other pursuits.
Section C: As would be expected, women comprise the bulk of job sharers. A survey carried out in 1988 by Britain's Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) revealed that 78 percent of the shares were female, the majority of whom were between the ages of 20 and 40 years of age. Subsequent studies have come up with similar results. Many of these women were re-entering the job market after having had children, but they chose not to seek part-time work because it would have meant reduced wages and lower status. Job sharing also offered an acceptable transition back into full-time work after a long absence.
Section D: Although Job Sharing is still seen as too radical by many companies, those that have chosen to experiment with it include large businesses with conservative reputations. One of Britain's major banks, the National Westminster Bank, for example, offers a limited number of shared positions intended to give long-serving employees a break from full-time work. British Telecom, meanwhile, maintains 25 shared posts because, according to its personnel department, 'some of the job sharers might otherwise have left the company and we are now able to retain them.' Two wide-ranging surveys carried out in the country in 1989 revealed the proportion of large and medium-sized private-sector businesses that allow Job Sharing to be between 16 and 25 per cent. Some 78 percent of job sharers, however, work in public-sector jobs.
Section E: The types of jobs that are shared vary, but include positions that involve responsibility for many subordinates. Research into shared senior management positions suggests that even such high-pressure work can be shared between two people with little adjustment, provided the personalities and temperaments of the sharers are not vastly different from one another. A 1991 study of employees working under supervisory positions shared by two people, showed that those who prefer such a situation do so for several reasons. Most prevalent were those who felt there was less bias in the evaluation of their work because having two assessments provided a greater degree of fairness.
Section F: The necessity of close cooperation and collaboration when sharing a job with another person makes the actual work quite different from conventional one-position jobs. However, to ensure a greater chance that the partnership will succeed, each person needs to know the strengths, weaknesses, and preferences of his or her partner before applying for a position. Moreover, there must be an equitable allocation of both routine tasks and interesting ones. In sum, for a position to be job-shared well, the two individuals must be well-matched and must treat each other as equals.
These Job Sharing reading answers IELTS test-takers need to cover 16 questions in total, numbered 13 to 28. Five are Matching Headings, five are Note Completion, five are Yes/No/Not Given, and one is Multiple Choice. Most marks get lost not because the passage is hard, but because students misread what the question format actually wants.
Every answer below comes with the exact question, its section, and why that answer is correct.
Questions 13–17 Matching Headings Answers and Explanations
For these Job Sharing reading answers, choose the correct heading for Sections A, C, D, E, and F from this list. There are more headings than sections, so you won't use all of them.
i. Characteristics of job sharers ii. Employer acceptance of Job Sharing iii. Sharing work vs. sharing jobs iv. Rejection of Job Sharing by industry v. Definition of Job Sharing vi. Finding a job share partner vii. Ingredients of successful Job Sharing viii. Creating employment through Job Sharing ix. Women sharing work x. Job sharers as bosses
Q: 13. Which heading fits Section A?
Answer: v, Definition of Job Sharing
Explanation: The very first line of Section A tells you what Job Sharing is, two people dividing the responsibility of one full-time job between them. Everything else in this section builds on that definition, pay split, benefits split, how it differs from part-time work, so the heading has to cover the definition itself, not any one detail that follows it.
Q: 14. Which heading fits Section C?
Answer: i, Characteristics of job sharers
Explanation: Section C isn't about a company or a policy; it's about the people who actually job share. It gives you their gender, their age bracket, and their reason for choosing it, mostly women between 20 and 40 coming back to work after having children. Since all of that is describing a group of people, characteristics is the only heading that covers it fully.
Q: 15. Which heading fits Section D?
Answer: ii, Employer acceptance of Job Sharing
Explanation: This section names actual companies, National Westminster Bank and British Telecom, and explains their reasons for allowing Job Sharing. It even gives survey numbers on how many businesses permit it. Since the whole section is built around employers deciding to accept or experiment with Job Sharing, this heading fits better than one about rejection or industry-wide creation of jobs.
Q: 16. Which heading fits Section E?
Answer: x, Job sharers as bosses
Explanation: Up to this point, the passage has talked about regular staff positions. Section E specifically shifts to senior management roles being shared and mentions that personality match matters more at this level. Because the section narrows down to people in supervisory or boss positions, the general heading about Job Sharing won't do; it has to be the one naming bosses specifically.
Q: 17. Which heading fits Section F?
Answer: vii, Ingredients of a successful Job Sharing
Explanation: Section F reads almost like a checklist: know your partner's strengths and weaknesses before applying, split both boring and interesting tasks fairly, and treat each other as equals. Each of those points is a condition for the arrangement to succeed, which is exactly what ingredients means here, the individual pieces that make something work.
Questions 18–22 Note Completion Answers and Explanations
Complete the notes below using one or two words from Section A.
Common Job Sharing areas: highly skilled, (18) __________ Job sharing requires a greater degree of (19) __________ and (20) __________ Benefits of Job Sharing over part-time work: (21) __________, better conditions, (22) __________
Q: 18
Answer: professional
Explanation: Section A states that Job Sharing mainly occurs in highly skilled and professional areas. The note already gives you highly skilled, so the missing word pairing with it has to be professional, taken directly from the same phrase.
Q: 19
Answer: responsibility
Explanation: The passage says these roles entail higher levels of responsibility and employee commitment. The note structure asks for two separate qualities, and responsibility is the first one listed in that exact sentence.
Q: 20
Answer: employee commitment
Explanation: This continues straight from the same sentence as question 19. After responsibility, the passage names employee commitment as the second quality these roles demand, so that becomes the second blank.
Q: 21
Answer: better pay
Explanation: The passage explains that job sharers get something back for taking on more demanding roles, better pay and conditions, along with more satisfaction than regular part-time work offers. Since the note already lists better conditions, the first blank has to be better pay, its matching pair from the same sentence.
Q: 22
Answer: more satisfaction
Explanation: Still the same sentence, this is the third benefit mentioned, sitting right after better pay and conditions. It closes out the list of three advantages Job Sharing has over ordinary part-time work.
Questions 23–27 Yes/No/Not Given Answers and Explanations
Getting this Job Sharing reading answer right means checking whether these statements agree with the writer's claims in the passage.
Q: 23. The majority of male job sharers are between 20 and 40 years of age.
Answer: NOT GIVEN
Explanation: The 20 to 40 age range does appear in the passage, but it's attached to female job sharers specifically, since the text says women make up the bulk of this group. There's no mention anywhere of male job sharers as their own category, so you can't confirm or deny anything about their age.
Q: 24. Job sharers have no intention of later resuming full-time work.
Answer: NO
Explanation: The passage directly says Job Sharing offers an acceptable transition back into full-time work after a long absence. That's the opposite of having no intention to return, so this statement contradicts what's written rather than matching it.
Q: 25. Employers may allow Job Sharing to keep or attract good workers.
Answer: YES
Explanation: British Telecom's own personnel department is quoted as saying some job sharers might otherwise have left the company, and Job Sharing let them retain those employees. That's a direct, stated reason for allowing Job Sharing, which is exactly what this statement claims.
Q: 26. Fewer job sharers are employed in the private sector than in the public sector.
Answer: YES
Explanation: The passage gives two separate figures here: only 16 to 25 percent of large and medium private-sector businesses allow Job Sharing, while 78 percent of job sharers actually work public-sector jobs. Put those numbers together, and the statement checks out.
Q: 27. Most employees prefer to work under a shared supervisory position.
Answer: NOT GIVEN
Explanation: The passage says shared senior roles can work well with little adjustment, and that employees under shared supervisors reported fairer evaluations. But liking the fairness of it isn't the same as saying most employees actually prefer this setup over a single boss. Preference itself is never stated.
Question 28 Multiple Choice Answer and Explanation
Q: 28. What is the main aim of the writer of 'Job Sharing'? A. To encourage employers to allow more Job Sharing B. To introduce the reader to the concept of Job Sharing C. To advise people who wish to try Job Sharing D. To discuss the implications of Job Sharing for the industry
Answer: B, To introduce the reader to the concept of Job Sharing
Explanation: The passage opens with a plain definition of Job Sharing before moving through who does it, which companies allow it, and what makes it succeed. At no point does it push readers toward trying Job Sharing themselves, or argue that more employers should adopt it, or debate its wider effect on industry. It reads like a straightforward explainer for someone who's never encountered the term, which matches option B and rules out the other three.
How to Solve the Job Sharing IELTS Reading Passage
Solving the Job Sharing IELTS reading answers well starts with the workplace terms themselves, Job Sharing, work sharing, and part-time employment. None of it needs specialist knowledge. You just need to notice how each section builds on the last one.
Most students don't lose marks because this passage is confusing. They lose marks because they skim past company names and numbers too fast, especially around Section D, where British Telecom and National Westminster Bank come up.
Identify Workplace Keywords and Paraphrases
Terms like Job Sharing, full-time, part-time, and employer come up again and again, but they don't always mean the exact question is right there.
See "Job Sharing" in a question? That alone won't narrow it down since the word appears throughout the whole passage
Company names like British Telecom or National Westminster Bank are more useful; they only show up once, in Section D
Numbers and percentages, like 78 percent or 16 to 25 percent, also point straight to one specific line
Questions often swap the passage's wording for something simpler. "Job sharing" might become "splitting one role between two people." Same idea, different words.
Distinguish Between Benefits and Challenges
This passage moves between what Job Sharing offers and what makes it harder to manage. Mixing the two up is where a lot of wrong answers come from.
Better pay, more satisfaction, and staff retention are all framed as benefits
Needing a well-matched partner, fair task division, and adjusting to shared responsibility are framed as requirements, not perks
Check what each example is actually proving before picking an answer, a company retaining staff supports one point, while a study on senior roles supports a different one entirely
Confirm Answers From Context
Spotting one matching word in the passage isn't enough on its own. The full sentence around it decides whether a statement is true, false, or simply not addressed at all.
Read a line or two before and after the word you found
Check whether the sentence actually states what the question claims, or just sounds close to it
If the passage never directly says something, even if it feels implied, the answer is usually Not Given rather than Yes or No
Looking for more IELTS Reading practice? Read these answer guides to practise different passage topics and question types:
A lot of marks slip away from Job Sharing reading answers for reasons that have nothing to do with understanding the passage. Small habits, like picking an answer too fast or ignoring a word limit, quietly cost more points than the actual reading difficulty does.
✗ Common Mistake
✓ What to Do Instead
Confusing Job Sharing with work sharing, or mixing up Section C's female job sharers with Section E's senior roles
Slow down and note which group or arrangement a question is actually about. Job sharing and work sharing serve different purposes, and the characteristics of everyday job sharers don't apply to job sharers in management
Picking an answer just because one word matches the question
Read the full sentence the word sits in. A matching word can point to the wrong section entirely if the surrounding meaning doesn't line up
Searching only for the exact wording used in the question
Look for the same idea stated differently. "Keep good staff" in a question might appear as "otherwise have left the company" in the passage
Ignoring the word limit on Note Completion answers
Check the instructions above the question first. "One or two words" means exactly that, adding a third word marks the answer wrong, even if the content is correct
Assuming something is true because it feels implied
If the passage never directly states it, even when it seems obvious, the safer answer is usually Not Given rather than Yes or No
Go back through your answers once before submitting, especially in Sections D and E, where company examples and senior-role details sit close together and get mixed up easily.
Conclusion
The Job Sharing reading answers IELTS candidates need all trace back to one skill: reading each question type correctly before scanning the passage for words. That's what separates a strong score from a guessing game.
Matching Headings needs the overall point of a section, not one small detail buried inside it. Yes/No/Not Given needs the same discipline: check what the passage actually states, not what feels like a fair guess. That's exactly why the question on male job sharers comes back as Not Given, since that group never gets mentioned at all.
A few things matter most here:
Knowing which question type you're on before you start scanning
Using company names, numbers, and section letters as scanning clues
Catching paraphrased wording instead of hunting for exact matches
Reading the full sentence around a keyword, not just the keyword itself
Sticking to word limits exactly as instructed
Checking each answer against the passage once more before moving on
If you're prepping for this passage or similar ones, try these next:
Practise a few more Matching Headings and Yes/No/Not Given passages
Base every answer on what's written in the text, not outside assumptions
Time yourself while solving; it builds both speed and accuracy
Go back over any wrong answer and work out exactly where it went off track, not just what the right one was
What is the Job Sharing IELTS reading passage about?
The passage explains how two people can divide one full-time job between them. It covers who usually takes up Job Sharing, how companies like British Telecom respond to it, and what makes a job-share partnership succeed.
How many questions are there in the Job Sharing IELTS reading answers?
There are 16 questions in total, numbered 13 to 28. They're split into Matching Headings, Note Completion, Yes/No/Not Given, and one Multiple Choice question at the end.
Where can I find accurate Job Sharing reading answers?
This page has the full Job Sharing reading answers with explanations for every question, along with the section each answer comes from, so you can check your work against the actual passage.
What question types appear in this IELTS reading passage Job Sharing answers set?
Four types show up here, Matching Headings for Questions 13 to 17, Note Completion for 18 to 22, Yes/No/Not Given for 23 to 27, and Multiple Choice for Question 28.
Why does Question 23 come back Not Given in the Job Sharing reading answer key?
The passage gives an age range of 20 to 40, but only for female job sharers. Male job sharers are never mentioned as a separate group, so nothing about their age can be confirmed or denied.
How is Job Sharing different from work sharing in this passage?
Work sharing is about creating more jobs by cutting hours on existing ones, mainly to reduce unemployment. Job sharing is different, it's meant for skilled professionals who want fewer hours without giving up pay or status.
Which companies are mentioned in the Job Sharing reading passage?
British Telecom and National Westminster Bank both appear in Section D. Both use Job Sharing to retain experienced staff who might otherwise have left.
Do I need any background knowledge to solve the Job Sharing IELTS reading answers?
No. The passage uses plain workplace language, nothing technical or specialised. You just need to read carefully and follow how each section connects to the next.
What's the most common mistake students make with Job Sharing reading answers IELTS questions?
Picking an answer because one word matches the question, without reading the full sentence around it. This often leads to Yes/No/Not Given errors, since the meaning can shift even when a keyword lines up.
How strict is the word limit in the Note Completion questions?
Very strict. Questions 18 to 22 ask for one or two words directly from Section A, so adding an extra word or paraphrasing the answer marks it wrong, even if the meaning is correct.
Can I rely on memory instead of checking the passage for Job Sharing reading answers?
No. Every answer here is tied to a specific line in the passage. Relying on memory or assumptions usually leads to picking Yes or No when the correct answer is actually Not Given.
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