Average Vacation Days/Year per Country
A whopping 26% of American workers take no
vacation at all. Disney highlights
the fact that we're a country of the vacation-deprived, in a clever
marketing campaign where
corporate drug execs thank the American public for working instead
of vacationing and driving up their sales of mood-modifying drugs
and in another, an undertaker let's us know that they'll be there to
support our families when we work ourselves into early graves.
Charming.
As much as you want to get away and decompress,
you know the business owner's truth: if
you're not at work, you can't bill and if you don't bill, you don't
eat. You've removed your most knowledgeable and productive employee
and dramatically cut your workforce.
Plan ahead for maximum relaxation with minimum checking in.
As soon as possible, commit the time and the money.
Let people know that you're planning a vacation. Timeshares
pre-commit you to a vacation at least once a year -- you’ve already
committed the money. My parents began their time-share ownership in
the early 1980’s and their annual vacations became the thing of
legend.
If your business is seasonal,
think ahead and plan your vacation for the downtime. One consultant takes long
vacations at Christmas and in July when business is historically
slow. Another tack is to plan your vacation when you know your
clients will be gone. How will you know? Ask them. They’ll happily
tell you all about when they’ll be lying on the beach in Aruba
(wouldn’t you)?
Combine business with pleasure.
Plan a vacation at the end of a business trip to save you airfare
and, perhaps, give you some leverage to negotiate a lower hotel
rate.
"I’m too important to my company
to take a vacation. If I’m not there, things fall apart.” You, my
friend, may have other problems. Your staff should be able to run
the core aspects of your business in your absence. The Marines, your
mayor, the head of your utility company and even the president of
United States takes vacations every year (note: more than one). If you don’t trust your
employees to cover for you – you may have a simple issue of
training. Write out procedures detailing your accountabilities and
have them shadow you. If you still feel uncomfortable you may have
the wrong people in place or may need help learning how to let go.
Be sure that you have written procedures and have trained
your employees how to follow them.
If a week-long vacation is out,
plan what fellow coach, Susan Levinson of
Leverage Your Power calls
a "Power Trip" – 2-3 day weekends scattered throughout the
year, some coupled with personal development. These can be just a rejuvenating as one week long get-away.
Right Before You Leave
Create project lists with key
details and expectations for the people who will be covering for
you.
Establish one point person
you’ll be in contact with and a system for contact. This could be
your attorney, CPA or a trusted friend or relative if you don’t have
staff. I suggest a brief call first thing in the morning before you
start your day so you can venture out with a free mind. Set
parameters and authority for your designee.
Let your clients, prospects,
vendors and suppliers know you’ll be gone and who to contact in your
absence.
Set up an away-message on your
email account. Many commercial email providers will let you create automatic-response messages,
a customized message you can use to let everyone who emails you know
that you're away along with any other key information you need to
communicate. These messages operate right from your email server and
don't require your computer to be on to run. Otherwise, email
applications such as AOL and Outlook, among others, will send
away-messages easily, but your computer must be on and the mail
application must be running.
Pre-plan for your re-entry. Keep
your calendar clear your first day back. You’ll need it to get
caught up.
While You’re Away
Check in once a day if you can’t
go cold-turkey. If you have to check your email while you’re gone
(yes, that’s me), schedule any non-critical email replies to go out
the day you get back. I violated my own system my last vacation and
sent a couple of responses while on vacation. Silly rabbit. Even
though I clearly stated that “I’m out and I’ll be back on xxx date”
at the top of my response, I still got several more “urgent” emails
requiring my immediate attention, none of which were critical. Not
one.
Upon Your Return
Take a day to sort and plan.
Pitch the junk mail, trades and newspapers – you probably won’t have
time to read them and they aren’t attractive lining your credenza.
Collect your voicemails and emails and do a little triage, figuring
out what needs your attention now, later, needs someone else to take
action and need never be seen again.
Create a message to say that
you’re back and when people can reach you.
Email your clients, vendors and
suppliers letting them know that you’re back.
Thank the people who made it
possible for you to be away.
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