Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Working Conversations podcast, where we talk all things leadership, business, communication, and trends in organizational life. I'm your host, Dr. Janel Anderson.

Today we're diving into a topic that is crucial for our well being, but often overlooked or underappreciated. Taking a vacation. Yes, you heard that right. Actually stepping away from work or a break. In today's episode, we're going to cover why vacations are essential, how to truly disconnect while you're away, some emerging trends in how people are taking time off, and the benefits of vacation planning well in advance. So let's dive in.

We live in a culture that values productivity and work ethic, often at the expense of rest and relaxation. But the reality is that taking time off isn't just a nice to have, it's a necessity for both mental and physical well being. Research shows that vacations can significantly reduce stress, lower the risk of heart disease, and improve sleep quality.

When you take a break, you allow your brain to reset and your body to rejuvenate. If you haven't planned your next vacation yet, now is the time. This episode is jam packed with reasons to get away, as well as the latest trends in taking a break from work, including the increasing number of people taking sabbaticals.

Now, the benefits of vacation don't stop with mental and physical health. Employers also gain when their employees return from vacation refreshed and reinvigorated. And I can attest to that. I was just on vacation for five days. Now. It wasn't a full week. It was three days of school break Wednesday through Friday, and then a Saturday and Sunday. And I was fortunate enough to be together with my brothers, my nephews, all my children, significant others of the kids, my mom. And just to get away and completely unplug and be in a completely different space with other people was just a gift. And I am absolutely coming back refreshed and reinvigorated, even though we played very hard.

And I'll mention a few of the things that we did to play hard as we go along today. But a study by the American Psychological association found that employees who take vacations are more productive and exhibit higher job satisfaction levels upon their return. Yes, that's right. When you come back, you feel better and you're excited to get back to work. I'm definitely in that, in that category myself. The cognitive boost that you get from resting is not just a short term hit. It can have lasting efforts. It can have lasting effects on your creativity, your decision making skills, and your overall job performance.

But despite all the benefits, there are still people who think I can't possibly leave the office. Everything will fall apart if I'm gone. It's the idea that the world, or at least your slice of it, can't run without you. Picture a product owner at Ford who believes that not a single Ford F 150 will roll off the assembly line if he steps away for a week. Well, let's debunk that notion right now and right here.

No single person, no matter how skilled, is so integral to an entire organization that it will come to a halt in their absence. It's a misconception fueled by perfectionism and a lack of trust in our coworkers abilities and our own self importance. In reality, systems are designed to withstand someone being out of the office or someone, you know, permanently being out of the office if they resign.

Systems are designed to keep running without that person, and teams are built to be resilient. So let go of the notion that the Ford F 150 assembly line will stop in its tracks if you leave the building. Now, if you truly feel like everything will collapse without you, that is a signal that you might need to do a better job of empowering others or cross training with your team, or simply trusting more and maybe getting out of your own way, that you are not the most important person in the organization, or at least not so critical that the organization can't run without you. And it's not that you should skip your vacation.

Now, let's not overlook the power of anticipating a vacation and this vacation, this five day vacation I took with my extended family. We've been planning this since mid summer, looking for just the right Airbnb that met all of our requirements. And as our group size changed, the Airbnb reservation had to change along with it. And it was. Even though it was somewhat of a burden of time, it was also exciting to plan and think about everybody who was coming. And it was. Yeah, it was absolutely exciting.

Now, research in the field of psychology has shown that just simply planning a vacation can boost your mood and increase your happiness levels. In fact, some studies suggest that the act of planning a trip can provide as much joyous as actually taking the trip itself.

I mean, imagine this. Imagine if you're going somewhere like Hawaii and you've not been to Hawaii before and you're planning the trip and you're getting excited about going and you're dreaming and scheming of all the fun things that you're going to do while you're there and what the weather will be like and so forth. I mean, that in itself is worth it just to plan the vacation.

Now, of course, if you weren't going to actually take the vacation, I don't think the anticipation of taking a non trip would really work as well. But when you truly are taking a trip, the anticipation can provide as much joy as taking the trip itself. Now think about it. Having something to look forward to, like a vacation, really does lift your spirits because you are in positive anticipation of something in the future. Even when you're dealing with the day to day stresses of work now, anticipating an upcoming break can also make you more productive.

Knowing that you have time off coming up can encourage you to work more efficiently and tie up all those loose ends, making the vacation itself more enjoyable because you've set yourself up for a less stressful time away from the office. Now, I know in my own life when I have time scheduled to be away from the office, I am so super duper, uber productive before I go away. That last push in the last day or two right before the vacation is priceless in terms of getting things done.

And I remember that being the case when I worked in a corporate job as well. So it gives you this mental and emotional checkpoint, something to work for at this particular point in time that you can finally let go and recharge. And again, most of us tend to be incredibly productive right before vacation. So this is especially important during busy periods because when you have that scheduled break coming up, it can help you pace yourself and it can help you manage meeting those incredible deadlines without the risk of burnout.

Because you know you have a vacation coming up. Now, it's one thing to book a vacation, but it's another thing to actually unhook when you get on the vacation and stop working. And the truth is, many people don't. A study by Glassdoor found that 54% of us employees admit to working on their vacation time. I would almost guess it'd be higher than that. But if you think about people who are in, especially the office jobs, these are probably the ones who are still working on their vacation time. That means checking emails, joining occasional calls, even working on projects when they're supposedly out of the office. Now, why do we do this? Well, for some people, it's the fear of falling behind and returning to a mountain of work after their blissful vacation.

And for others, it's a certain sense of duty to remain indispensable on the job. But here's the kicker. By staying connected to work while you're supposed to be off, you're not getting the restorative benefits of a vacation. It's like going to the gym, but never actually working out. You might feel like you're doing something, but you're not getting the intended benefits. Now, you can also do specific things while you're on vacation that completely take your mind off of your work. And I'll give you two examples from my recent vacation.

One is we were ziplining across a beautiful forested area in northern Minnesota where the fall colors were just beautiful. The oranges and reds and yellows of the trees against the stark contrast of some beautiful green pine trees just made for such a vivid backdrop. And of course, ziplining. I'm not thinking about answering an email to somebody if I'm ziplining. I'm a little bit worried for my life. I mean, although this was a very safe place and our harnesses were excellent and the staff and the training and everything was top notch, but at the same time, you can't be thinking about anything else except making it from one point to the other on the zip line.

Another thing I did was go on my paddleboard on this lake that our Airbnb property was situated on, right at sunset, and it was just absolutely gorgeous. Paddling across this small lake, watching the sunset in the west and watching the colors in the sky change from different shades of grayish blue and orange to vibrant orange as the sun got closer and closer to setting.

It was a cloudy, partly cloudy day, so there was lots of different shades of gray and blue and purple and orange as the sunset. There was no moment at which I thought about work while I was out on that paddle. So when you put yourself in situations, whether they be incredibly relaxing, like my paddleboard experience, or incredibly energizing and active, like my zip line experience, you mitigate the risk of actually doing work or thinking about work while you're on vacation.

Now, there's data also that backs this up. So let's look at the data for a moment. According to a study by the American Psychological association, employees who don't disconnect while on vacation report higher levels of stress and lower satisfaction when they return to work. And of course, that makes sense, because the whole point of a vacation is to give your mind a break, to step away from the daily grind and experience something different. So how do you unhook? Well, first, set expectations before you leave.

Let your team know that you'll be unreachable, and depending on your role in the organization, that might be unreachable completely. Or it might be unreachable except for absolute emergencies, and then delegate all of your tasks to someone who can cover for you while you're gone. I also recommend that you delete email apps from your mobile devices while you're away. That way you can still use your mobile device for calling and texting and anything related to your vacation, but you're not looking at your work email now.

I also recommend setting it out of office for while you're out. An email that automatically goes to people who are trying to reach you that reads something like I'm currently on vacation and I won't be reading my emails. If your matter is urgent, please contact and then whoever your backup person is. Otherwise, I'll get back to you when I return on said date and set an expectation for when you'll be back.

Don't let them know the exact date that you will be back from your vacation. Sometimes reentry into your regular life and getting caught up on your inbox can take a couple days, so I recommend saying I'll get back to you upon my return, approximately, and then give them a date that you think you'll be able to respond to your emails. So that might be one or two business days after you're back from your vacation. Now I know what some of you might be thinking. It's late October. As this episode drops, the holidays are fast approaching and you haven't even thought about taking time off. Well, I want to encourage you to get on that, not only for the holidays, but for your upcoming 2025 vacation time. If you haven't made plans for taking some time off around the holidays yet, now is a critical time for you to do that.

Waiting until the last minute could mean that you miss out on the dates that you most want to be off from work or book travel arrangements for those of you who are going to be traveling during the holidays near the end of the calendar year, and those travel costs can get exorbitant the longer you wait to book. So don't let the busyness of the end of the year rush prevent you from prioritizing your time away over the holiday season here at the end of 2024.

And some of you might also be on a system that requires you to take any paid time off during the calendar year. So if your PTO resets on January 1, you right now should be logging in even as you're listening to this, even though I don't encourage multitasking, but even as you're listening to this, you should be logging into your PTO HR system and find out how many hours of PTO you have left and getting those scheduled. Now, while you're at it, start thinking about 2025. Yes, even now, in late October or early November, whenever you're listening to this, it is not too early to consider scheduling your time off for spring break or next summer's vacation. Looking at dates well in advance not only ensures that you get the time off that you want, but it also allows you to recap the mental health benefits of anticipation that we just talked about. Now, with dates on the calendar, you can start looking forward to that beach getaway, that hiking adventure, or even a staycation with family and friends.

It's about being proactive and treating your future self to a well deserved break. Now, if you have children in school like me, it's very important that you be looking at those school breaks so that you can schedule that time off. Now that might be a week long spring break, as our school district does almost always the first week of April. But again, I'm always checking that and logging into my calendar the minute the school calendar for the upcoming year comes out. But checking that against my calendar are putting that in, reserving those dates so that I don't accidentally book some business during that time because we want to have that vacation time together as a family. I also look for those one off dates when there's teacher workshops or other things where my kids don't have school.

And I try to make sure I've got some flexibility built into my work time that day so that we can do something. And maybe it's not like a true vacation, but we can actually do something fun locally, whether that's go to an amusement park or go bowling or if it's wintertime here in Minnesota, go ice skating outside or a slightest down a hill or downhill skiing or something like that. So get those dates in your calendar again. It gives you the chance to plan. It also gives you that chance to have the positive anticipation and reap those benefits as well. Now vacation keeps changing and keeps evolving, and the trends in corporate folks taking vacation. Now, it's worth taking a look at some of the trends in vacation time. So vacation time has been evolving, particularly as work dynamics shift and as younger generations enter the workforce.

For example, I talked about taking a workcation back in episode 48, the idea that you are basically working a full work week, but doing so in a new location and exploring your surrounding in your off hours, with or without your boss's permission. And I do recommend that you do that with your boss's permission. By the way, another trend making waves that I've discussed before here on the podcast is the idea of unlimited paid time off. I covered this in greater detail back in episode 104 when I talked about people potentially abusing a paid time off policy. So check that out if you haven't already, but here's some new data on unlimited paid time off, or PTO first, on the surface, unlimited PTO sounds like a dream come true. You can take as much time off as you need whenever you need it. But here's the catch. Data shows that employees at companies with unlimited PTO often take less vacation time than those with traditional leave policies.

Now these, of course, aren't the people who are abusing it. This is just like everyone else. The general population of organizations that have unlimited PTO, according to a recent study by namely, employees with unlimited PTO took an average of 13 days off per year. So that's about two and a half weeks compared to 15 days for employees at companies with a capped leave. So that's about three weeks. Now, the reasons for this are complex. Some employees feel a pressure to appear committed to their jobs and therefore taking too much time off is a big no no. Others aren't sure what constitutes too much time off when there are no formal guidelines.

And that leads to decision paralysis and erring towards being conservative with taking how much time off that you are actually taking. And it's funny because the very freedom that unlimited PTO offers can really backfire, creating this culture where people feel that taking time off is frowned upon, even if it isn't explicitly stated to be a bad thing. Now, another trend that's on the rise is the growing popularity of sabbaticals, especially among Gen Z workers.

According to data from Gusto, the percentage of salaried workers on sabbatical has doubled since 2019, with 6.7% of workers taking an extended leave in 2024. In early 2024, in fact, their data was specifically for the month of January for workers aged 22 to 26, that number was even higher at 8%. Now, this uptick is partly driven by a shift in mindset that is post pandemic. People are much more focused on work life balance, and they're willing to take extended to prevent burnout. 

Now, one quick thing to mention about this study from Gusto. Gusto is a payroll processor that typically processes payroll for small to mid sized companies. Now, I use Gusto myself to pay my staff, and data from companies like ADP and paychecks that run payroll for large companies may tell a very different story. But I was not able to get my hands on that specific data. Just the data from gusto, which again, caters to small and mid sized businesses. Now, overall, though, sabbaticals are not just for academia or for senior level employees. And the idea isn't necessarily a new one, but it also isn't one that's very widely adopted. Although, as we can see from the data earlier this year from Gusto, it is on the uptick.

Now, one of my good friends from undergrad, who was a finance major and then immediately got his MBA after undergrad, he worked his way up quickly in investment banking, and by the time he was 27, he was totally burned out. His name is Steve, and he was completely exhausted. And he had banked a decent amount of cash in the bank as a single professional with no kids, no mortgage, and, you know, no, not a lot of overhead. Living in Boston, taking public transportation, didn't even have a car. So he financed his own 18 month sabbatical, only re entering the workforce when he felt like he was good and ready, and then he jumped right back in. And now he is a senior banking official at one of the largest banks in the United States. So, taking a sabbatical again, it isn't new, but it can really, really reap tremendous benefits.

Now, as Gen Z becomes a larger share of the workforce, they are normalizing the idea of taking extended time away, sometimes for travel, sometimes for their own personal development, and sometimes just for a mental reset.

Industries like professional services and technology are seeing the most growth in this area, with 7.4% and 9.3% of workers, respectively, taking sabbaticals so far in 2024. While the strong labor market has supported this trend, economic conditions certainly will play a role in whether it continues. If the economy slows down, sabbatical rates might dip, but they're unlikely to return to pre pandemic levels given the significant cultural shift towards prioritizing mental health and well being. Overdose working ourselves to death.

So there you have it. Why taking a vacation matters the importance of actually disconnecting when you do take a vacation. How trends in vacation are evolving, including sabbaticals. So whether it's an annual getaway, a spontaneous long weekend, or even a full blown sabbatical, taking time off is an investment in your well being and ultimately, in your career. So the next time that you're hesitating to hit the submit button on your PTO request, remember this the world will keep turning.

Your work will still be there when you get back, and you might just find that stepping away gives you the fresh perspective that you need to make your next big change.

Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of the Working Conversations podcast. If you found this episode helpful, please consider sharing it with a friend, subscribing and following me on social media. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Are you planning a vacation soon? Have you ever taken a sabbatical? Please let me know.

Remember, my friend, the future of work is not only about technology, it's about the values we uphold, the communities we build, and the sustainable growth that we strive for. We need to keep exploring, keep innovating, and keep envisioning the remarkable possibilities that lie ahead. Until next time, my friends, be well.