Taking Holidays – are they worth the effort?
This will be my last blog for about six or seven weeks as I’m off on a holiday in Europe next week for a little over five weeks. Naturally I can’t wait.
I didn’t raise this to make you envious, honest, but to explain my absence from the ether, and to justify all the emails I won’t be responding to, the meetings I won’t be attending and the phone calls I won’t be returning. And that takes me onto the point of this blog.
When we go on holiday we usually spend months preparing and planning – itineraries, travel and accommodation arrangements, what to pack, what to do when we’re there, how much money we’ll need, travel insurance, shots if we’re going somewhere exotic or undeveloped – the list goes on and on and as we get closer to the day of departure we turn our minds to planning for our absence from our place of employment. Clearing all the work that’s been piling up on our desks, arranging for colleagues to cover for us, finishing tasks, putting what we can on hold and trying to second guess anything that might unexpectedly crop up while we’re gallivanting around the countryside or planet.
Research around the effects of taking holidays has been undertaken a lot over the years and the outcomes are always the same – take a break, get sick, come back feeling worse than when you went on leave as you now have resentment to deal with as well. The recommendation is that employees should take at least one two week holiday each year (rather than using their leave up in a day here and a day there), so that you get at least one week of pleasure out of the two weeks taken. Many organisations will close over the Christmas period which enforces this strategy, and as much as some employees might grumble about having to take leave when they don’t want to it usually results in a fresher workforce in the new year when they return.
If your job is already pretty demanding and full-on preparing for a holiday, especially for a reasonably long period of time, will certainly tax you and will add stress to your already super-busy life. The reason you’re going on holiday is most likely because you are tired, run-down and in need of a break, so all the work involved in actually getting away will be adding to an already hectic schedule. If you work for a small business it will be even worse as there will be less people available to cover for you and fewer resources to enlist while you’re away.
Of course there is a positive side to this – you’ll find your productivity will lift (even if it’s temporary) and you’ll get rid of all those things you’ve been procrastinating about, so there’s always a silver lining.
Assuming you manage to survive on about half the sleep you normally get as you prepare for your holiday (which of course is never enough in the first place) and actually make it out of the office or wherever you earn your crust, there’s a really high chance that you’ll get sick as soon as you roll out your beach towel or step off the plane. The adrenalin you’ve been living on for months will recede as you slow down your frantic pace and your body will slip into its shut-down cycle in order for it to recharge its batteries and replenish your energy. You’ll likely spend the first week of your holiday with a dreadful cold, or some such other nasty, which will start to abate just as you board the plane or climb into your car for the journey home.
When you do get back to the workplace, unless you work on an assembly line or similar, chances are that there will be an even bigger pile of work and demands waiting for your attention than when you left.
One way to get around this is to take your Blackberry, iPhone or laptop on holiday and stay up-to-date by clearing emails and taking and returning calls throughout your break. Be warned though, the price of doing this can be very high – your holiday companion (partner, spouse, friend, family) will likely throw a wobbly, or worse, throw your phone or laptop into the nearest swimming pool, and of course you won’t have been able to have a break from whatever it was that was tiring you at work in the first place.
So there remains just one solution. Don’t have a holiday in the first place – it just isn’t worth it! Unless of course you can take an extended break and know you’re leaving your workplace commitments in good hands as I am. Thanks HRINZ National Office!
