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Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

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Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#131

Post by afarrell »

sjs7007 wrote: post #82
noirbot wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure it's possible to have a system where this is easy, but giving HR more things to track to prove their value to the company does tend to make no incentive for them to make it trivial. I'm sure systems exist for that that we could buy, but we didn't, so we don't, so someone's got some ad-hoc something in some Oracle DB somewhere, and now taking vacation is an added hassle for my already overworked manager.

Then really it's a failure of management at your company, not the limited vacation system.

Yes, but HR is sadly considered a cost centre, so that failure of management is sadly quite common.

Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#132

Post by soneil »

jrockway wrote: post #109
labster wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My last job implemented an unlimited PTO policy. In 2020, I took about 7 days off, and worked at least 20 days on weekends. With the increased responsibilities, there just wasn’t any time that was good to leave… until I left for good. It was definitely a factor in my current burnout. The funny thing was before the VCs bought the company, I had two weeks but in practice could ask the CTO for as much time as I wanted.…

Yeah, if I ever start a company, mandatory vacation will be a thing. If you don't use up your 4 weeks of vacation before Thanksgiving, don't come to work for the rest of the year. Don't worry, there will still be work when you get back. Another thing I like are company holidays. When nobody is working, there is no email / code reviews / Slack to miss. That's a real vacation!

There's industries where mandatory vacations (or "Required Absence") are a thing - in finance it's not unusual to be required to take at least one two-week block each year. It helps reduce bus-factor (if you can't afford to lose this person for two weeks, he's a risk), and helps prevent embezzlement because most schemes require constant baby-sitting.

Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#133

Post by stuff4ben »

awsthro00945 wrote: post #118
stuff4ben wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't afford to take a day off, then that's on you my friend. The people on your team can take up your slack if you let them. I work for someone just like you. He hoards all of the meetings and knowledge and "power" (for lack of a better word). When he goes on PTO, things halt when they shouldn't. Me and others on my squad can pick up the slack. But gatekeeping and knowledge-hoarding prevent us from helping ou…

>If you can't afford to take a day off, then that's on you my friend. The people on your team can take up your slack if you let them. I work for someone just like you. He hoards all of the meetings and knowledge and "power" (for lack of a better word). Lmao. Nobody else on my team can take up slack because they have literally no space on their calendar. My team is currently at half of our target headcount. Every pers…

riiiighhhtt.... If it's that bad, you really should be looking elsewhere. But it's probably not that bad and you're just trying to save face for some HN karma. If you are that good you'd have no problem finding another job. But continue to play the victim here, no one really cares.

Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#134

Post by awsthro00945 »

stuff4ben wrote: post #133
awsthro00945 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If you can't afford to take a day off, then that's on you my friend. The people on your team can take up your slack if you let them. I work for someone just like you. He hoards all of the meetings and knowledge and "power" (for lack of a better word). Lmao. Nobody else on my team can take up slack because they have literally no space on their calendar. My team is currently at half of our target headcount. Every pers…

riiiighhhtt.... If it's that bad, you really should be looking elsewhere. But it's probably not that bad and you're just trying to save face for some HN karma. If you are that good you'd have no problem finding another job. But continue to play the victim here, no one really cares.

Save face? Are you under the impression that I have something to prove, or care about what you or HN thinks? This isn't reddit, I don't make comments with the intention of getting "upvotes" nor do I care how many I get. I posted a comment about vacation on a thread about vacation, trying to start up discussion. Then you came along and made a dumbass assumption about a situation you clearly have no insight or actual knowledge of, and something that does not at all contribute to the discussion at hand.

Go read my comment history and you'll see I'm not shy about the fact that I am looking for other jobs, but I'm waiting out until my RSUs vest before leaving my current place. In the mean time, take your negative comments and "karma whoring" attitude back to reddit, it's not welcome here.

Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#135

Post by nickjj »

dbs wrote: post #21

I would bet that flexible work hours are contributing for higher employee burnout.

I think this is a contributor, especially with working remote where folks are spanning many time zones.

A position I'm thinking about joining requires being available 9 hours between 9am-6pm EST (I live in EST) to ensure there's reasonable overlap between the west coast US and most European countries. They were really strict on these hours and at first I was against it because I thought what's the difference if I work 2 hours early one day and clock out early or decide to be unavailable for 3 hours in the afternoon (1h lunch break + the 2 hours).

But the more I think about it, the more I think it's a better system for everyone in the end when everyone has strict hours. I wouldn't want to be expected to review a PR at 7pm EST because someone else decided to start a bit later one day.

They have no problem for exceptions like leaving early for a doctor's appointment or picking someone up. The only rule here is you need to give a few days notice which is also reasonable because it lets your team members know you won't be around when you usually are. They don't need to know the details, only that you won't be around. They're also ok if you need to bail without notice because it's something important. Basically don't abuse the system and it's all good.

Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#136

Post by actually_a_dog »

noirbot wrote: post #68
dwaltrip wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why don’t they call it something else then? Maybe “Flexible PTO”? I really don’t like the “unlimited” part of the name. It feels confusing / misleading to me.

Probably because "unlimited" is the relevant part to the part of the company that cares - HR. If it was limited, it would need to be tracked. I get the objection to the fact that you can't literally take 200 days off or whatever, but that just feels like pedantry when at this point the colloquial meaning of "unlimited pto" is fairly clear.

That's actually a good point. Maybe it should really be called "take-what-you-need untracked PTO." That conveys the point that nobody in HR is going to keep track of how many days you take off, and that you're actually supposed to take those days. It's too awkward to spin well on the company's jobs page, though.

Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#137

Post by dnautics »

muterad_murilax wrote: post #115
karaterobot wrote: post #53

When I've been burned out or hated my job, I didn't take vacations, because the crushing realization that I'd have to return to work was almost worse than losing myself in the uninterrupted, repetitive, dead-eyed grind. While on vacation, I'd start thinking about the countdown to the end of the vacation. > Well, root out the real causes of burnout. I'll offer the definition that's made most sense to me. I didn't come…

"Burnout is caused by working hard at something for a long time and not having it pay off." That's the most work-centric definition of burnout I have ever seen.

You can work hard at a hobby, not have it pay off, and get burned out on that, too.

Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#138

Post by verve_rat »

nickjj wrote: post #129
verve_rat wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coming from a country where 4 weeks plus 11 (soon to be 12) public holidays is the legal minimum I really don't understand the US system.

When you say 4 weeks, do you mean 20 days off because there's typically 5 work days in a week or do you mean 30 days?

The legislation says 4 weeks. In practice that means if you work 5 days a week you get 20 days. If you work 3 days a week you get 12 days.

I have never heard of an employer that makes its employees only take whole weeks rather than a day here or there even though technically you are only entitled to "weeks" off.

Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#139

Post by strken »

actually_a_dog wrote: post #127
agumonkey wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People at the office joke about the fact that when bad weather ruins their vacations, they come back happier to work.

I hate to be "that guy," but I don't understand this joke. :/

The joke is the premise that happiness is relative, so being less happy on a bad vacation makes you more happy when you return to work. This is an ironic subversion of the expectation that happiness will put us in a good mood and unhappiness will put us in a bad mood.

Re: Vacation isn’t the answer to employee burnout

#140

Post by dnndev »

I think it depends how long the vacation? A month long vacation for me always helps when I find myself becoming overly negative.

Edit* Should add, a lot has to do with your attitude. Some things won’t change and fighting then just makes you look like a jerk in the office. Either come to peace with it or find another job. Of course after you have reasonably done what you think you can to make a difference.

Many jobs are brainless 9to5 collect a paycheck do bare minimum and this is ok for a lot of people, they find creativity and joy elsewhere.

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