Holidays are good for workers and companies alike • Hacker News Board

Re: Holidays are good for workers and companies alike

#71

Post by mistersquid » Sat, Aug 10, 2019, 4:23 PM UTC

bambataa wrote: post #51

Something I’ve always wondered about corporate America: on Apple rumour sites and so on it’s often breathlessly reported that all staff leave has been cancelled for whatever dates. What happens if eg you’d promised to take your kids to Disneyland and had everything booked? Do you just have to lose the booking deposit and let down your kids? Why do people put up with that?

> […] on Apple rumour sites and so on it’s often breathlessly reported that all staff leave has been cancelled for whatever dates.

You’re asking for details on protocol to a rumored policy, which begs the question of whether this rumor can be substantiated.

In my experience with the company in question, no such policy exists.

Re: Holidays are good for workers and companies alike

#72

Post by fancyfish » Sat, Aug 10, 2019, 6:42 PM UTC

ghaff wrote: post #40

standardUser wrote: post #2

Thankfully, the trend seems to be towards a much greater tolerance of vacation time and an increased willingness to actually take vacation. I credit the millennials for this new attitude, as their clout in the workplace gradually supplants the tedious boomer philosophy that time off of any kind is something to be avoided at all costs. And the author makes a good point that giving workers time off can reveal things ab…

My understanding is that, at least historically, in finance there was some mandated time off based on the idea that if an individual were doing something sketchy, forcing them out of the office and offline for a couple of weeks might flush it out.

Yeah it still exists and is called "block leave." While on block leave, you also have to stay signed out of all email and computer systems or the leave becomes invalidated.

There's also "garden leave" for several months after leaving a job, where you're paid but can't work for a competitor/new job. Somehow it's supposed to prevent you sharing IP but I'm not sure it's effective at all, outside of being a long paid vacation.

Re: Holidays are good for workers and companies alike

#73

Post by Vinnl » Sun, Aug 11, 2019, 10:56 AM UTC

glitchcrab wrote: post #3

standardUser wrote: post #2

Thankfully, the trend seems to be towards a much greater tolerance of vacation time and an increased willingness to actually take vacation. I credit the millennials for this new attitude, as their clout in the workplace gradually supplants the tedious boomer philosophy that time off of any kind is something to be avoided at all costs. And the author makes a good point that giving workers time off can reveal things ab…

My company gives us unlimited time off - provided your team isn't going to be left with too few people then you just stick it in the calendar. It's incredibly liberating not having to plan your holidays to ensure you stay within X days, not having to request approval etc.

Is that paid time off?

Re: Holidays are good for workers and companies alike

#74

Post by cylinder » Mon, Aug 12, 2019, 7:20 AM UTC

slyall wrote: post #21

alkonaut wrote: post #4

Just shutting down for a month like many companies in parts of Europe is great. Means you don’t even have “time off work”, it means work doesn’t exist because no one else works either. You return after (at least) a month to an empty inbox.

In Australia/New Zealand if you are in the tech industry most employers will have a brown-out/embargo over the Christmas and New Year period. About 80% of staff will be off for those two weeks (6 days leave equals three weekends and two M-F weeks away). What happens is the Telcos declare a brown-out/embargo [1] (in 2018 it was from 20 Dec to 7 January). The companies the next level up will follow (because they won't…

This is called forced leave (shutdown period) and it's certainly not restricted to tech. The whole country seems to shutdown for two weeks, which I like, but I hate the concept of forced leave. Not everyone wants to take off during Christmas/New Years and the practice is prejudicial to those who do not celebrate Christmas and don't care about taking time off during this period of time. Mainly, the flights become super expensive so I'd rather save my leave.