Hit ‘DELETE’ for a happy holiday
A friend once remarked that the worst week of the year came immediately after returning from their summer holiday. The week before can be just as bad. Research suggests that the typical Brit takes several days to properly relax and enjoy a break - a phenomenon described as the roadrunner effect after the antics of the Warner Brothers cartoon character. We’ve stopped, but we keep on running.
We all work hard. We deserve our holidays. Readers will be familiar with the proverb, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” Taking a break is essential for both mind and body. It’s a vital opportunity to unwind. So why do we find going on holiday so stressful? And what can be done about it?
COVID19 notwithstanding, for most people, in most parts of the world, this point in history is one of the best times ever to be alive. That said, the “always-on” culture that is a dispiriting feature of the 21st Century workplace can be very testing. Additionally, the explosion in home working, brought about by the pandemic, has blurred the boundary between work, rest and play even further.
During my senior management career, I travelled a lot. An awful lot. So much so that I was once presented with a ‘Clown sized carbon footprint award’ by bemused colleagues. Life moved at a rapid pace, with seven day working, sometimes living out of a suitcase. Former colleagues have since remarked that this made me challenging to deal with at times.
Happily, I’ve moved on, but looking back on that lively period in my career, I recall making a point of switching off completely when I took my annual summer holiday. I adopted a similar stance at Christmas and New Year. Here’s how.
To start with - before hitting the beach - I always worked to create the conditions for a tolerable return to the office. The process depended on two essential ingredients. First, I trusted my team and made a point of telling them this regularly. Second, I made sure that my boss understood this too.
Trust is the cornerstone of effective leadership. Building a culture of trust takes time. People need frequent reminders, especially those less enlightened colleagues who have difficulty with delegation and communication.
A good starting point is the often-overlooked automated out of office email reply. Over the years, I developed a particular format for my ‘on holiday’ response. It went something like this:
“Thanks for your email. I’m on leave and off the grid.
Like you, I get many emails, and since I’m on holiday, I won’t be reading them. I won’t be replying to an email sent between 13 August and 1 September, so if your message is important, you should contact me again when I get back from the beach.
Alternatively, if your email is really important, please call my colleague Chris via the direct line number below. Chris has full authority to act on my behalf during my absence.”
Chris (not her real name) was a junior manager during my final years as a director with the Institution of Chemical Engineers. I always ensured that she was fully briefed when I was away from base and trusted her absolutely. If she made the wrong call – which was exceedingly rare – I took responsibility. That’s what bosses are for; that’s why they get paid more!
Throughout my career, I’ve hired quite a lot of people like Chris. I saw it as my responsibility to grow their CVs, and trust was an essential ingredient in this process. It’s been a real pleasure to watch many of them go on to bigger and better things.
Another tactic that I adopted before every summer holiday was to completely delete all outstanding items from my email inbox just before turning on my out of office message – I did the same on Christmas Eve. This often caused raised eyebrows, but let’s be honest here. If you are one of those people with hundreds of months-old unread email messages mixed in with several hundred more that you’ve read but never quite gotten around to dealing with, it’s time to come clean - literally.
You’re never going to deal with it. It simply can’t have been that important. Had it been, someone would surely have chased you by now; in fact, they probably did that already, and as for those intolerable ‘cover your arse’ emails that were copied to the entire planet, well, frankly, life is just too short!
So, with the holiday season upon us, spend a day or two tidying up critical loose ends and moving the important stuff to a bring forward folder for attention upon your return. Then, open your inbox, hit CTRL-A to highlight everything, mark all items as ‘read’, take a deep breath, and delete the lot.
Turn on your out of office message, say farewell to your trusted team and hit the beach.
And finally, having put these foundations in place before reaching for the Factor-50 – another piece of advice. Holiday means holiday. Don’t take work with you; ditch the tech, leave your work mobile and laptop at home and resist the temptation to check your emails…
Make sure you remind your team members to do the same when signing off their leave requests.
I never regretted it; you won’t either.
Happy holidays