211–220 of 424 posts
"Century of the Self" is a great documentary on how the American population has been socially engineered by corporations.
Part 1: http://www.archive.org/details/AdaCurtisCenturyoftheSelf_0 Part 2: http://www.archive.org/details/AdamCurtisCenturyoftheSelfPar... Part 3: http://www.archive.org/details/AdamCurtisCenturyoftheSelfPar... Part 4: http://www.archive.org/details/AdamCurtisCenturyoftheSelfPar...
If the US had the culture of taking off August, it would be far easier to take off 3 weeks since everyone in your company would be doing it. Logistically however I don't really understand how taking August off works in Europe. Where does everyone go? Doesn't it get super crowded?
The roads are packed so you'll usually see a traffic report with them interviewing people taking a picnic on the side of the road, complete with wine and cheese of course. Also, its part of the draw. When there is a known crowd coming most of the hotels and restaurants pull out all the stops: foods, drinks, live entertainment. A lot of these seaside towns can be quite sleepy during the winter so its sort of a big deal.
And, quite a few of my colleagues have family that moved south for the warmer weather, some just head out to visit family.
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This is the norm in the UK, companies close over the holidays and there are mandatory holidays that go with that. Being clear about this with new (and especially young) employees is a good idea as to people straight out of college, it's not obvious. But there's certainly nothing dodgy about it.
Not at any UK company I've worked at (1 corporation, 1 retailer, 1 startup).
For me that is no brainier, but unfortunately, very few hi-tech companies actually understand that. So you have high-rate of "burn outs" which cause all kind problems (bugs, bad design decisions, etc.). The management mantra is still: The beatings will continue until morale improves.
Also, I was surprised how it is very hard to find a hi-tech company offering something like unpaid sabbatical leave or fulltime sabbatical replacement position (i.e., programmer working in sales for one or two months). Some banks and hedge funds do that.
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That can’t be true. Bavarian schools, for example, have a five-week summer vacation this year and additionally eight weeks of vacation spread over the whole year (one week in spring and autumn, two weeks for Easter, Pentecost and Christmas). There are also quite a few state and federal holidays but, as you can see, vacations are already clustered around those holidays. I think there are maybe two or three additional…
I'm pretty sure German universities suck in comparision to all Anglophone universities when it comes to free time, and I know it's true for Irish and British ones. You get three months off for the summer (normally June, July and August), a month off over Christmas (though in some universities it may only be three weeks, and you may have to prepare for exams), and various other time off. Also that summer time is free…
Very simply, this country was founded by people with the Protestant Work Ethic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protestant_work_ethic and it has become a part of our national identity.
I live in the more protestant part of Germany, Hamburg. People here get the same vacation (the company I work for has 28 days paid vacation for its employees). The only difference is that we have a few days less public holidays than in the catholic regions.
If the US had the culture of taking off August, it would be far easier to take off 3 weeks since everyone in your company would be doing it. Logistically however I don't really understand how taking August off works in Europe. Where does everyone go? Doesn't it get super crowded?
These are the average numbers, for sure there's someone with less/more vacation.
America doesn't do vacation because of a mistaken understanding of the meaning of the word "productivity". As long as you have management consultants who specialize in the single metric of productivity (i.e. number of dollars of profit vs. number of dollars spent on people making the profit), you will have miserable people.
American corporate culture seems to live by the motto "Don't think - measure!"
To those without a good understanding of statistics, numbers and graphs are a mystical, magical way to easily improve just about anything.
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It's a death spiral. Work harder / longer - shift to extreme right-wing politics - slowly lose status as the "greatest nation in the world" - grit your teeth and work even harder / longer...
Left wing/right wing is a ridiculous argument. How much vacation do they get in North Korean factories?
now a joke story as it is told in Russia.
at one company people worked their asses off very hard, came earlier, left later, sometimes worked until 9 or 10 to meet goals in the plan. and suddenly one man started to appear at 9, leave an 6 and didn't appear on Saturday and Sunday when the deadline was near. colleagues started to look at him with blame, and finally told him, who the fuck you think you are? why you so relaxed when we are tearing our asses? - oh, sorry guys, its a real shame, - he replied, - but i am on a vacation