Americans and their attitude to their holiday allowance will never cease to amaze me.

Literally the only consideration I need to make on behalf of my employer is whether my days off will leave less than 75% of my department out. And as that never happens then I never have to think about it.

If you have holiday available to you, take it.

The Scrooge McDuck avatar lighting a cigar with a dollar note makes me think this was either satire to begin with, or the original poster has lost any and all contact with reality.

Pro Tip to youngesters just getting into corporate.

Don't let the company think they actually care about you. They don't. HR doesn't care. Executives doesn't. Nobody doesn't. You're the only person that cares about you.

Also, work is just a business transaction. They need your service. You need their money. Do make friends, but not at your expense.

If your company can't function without you, it's time for a pay rise.

I worked craft beer sales for a hot minute. Place was a disaster, so I was already looking for a new job anyway. Labor day rolls around, and I inform my bosses A MONTH OUT that I will be taking a week off at the end of August to go on vacation. They approve it, all is well, everything's great, I get back to work. The week I leave, I remind them that I'll be gone for a week, I won't be available for work things, and that I'll see them next week. They say cool, tell me to have a great time, and I clock out for the day.

9:01AM, the day I leave, I get a text. "Hey Dogiedog64, when are you coming back? We need to have a chat about some things." I don't bother responding, since I'm on vacation, and moreover, I'm driving on the highway. The day passes, I get where I'm going, but it's past work hours, and I want to enjoy my vacation. THE NEXT DAY, they call me. 9:01AM. I miss it, they leave a message and another text to the effect of "Call us back. It's important." I don't. I'm on vacation, they KNOW I'm on vacation, and it can wait.

6PM rolls around, and I get a text. "Dogiedog64, since you didn't call us back today, we're unfortunately going to have to let you go. Your performance wasn't cutting it and we've gotten numerous customer complaints about you." I know for a fact this was bullshit, as I had done the rounds before I left, and all my customers loved me and our beer, but hated our managers and distribution scheme.

Now, you may ask "what was the point of that story?" It's simple: companies will find a reason to fire you for nothing, no matter how well you lay out boundaries or plans, so don't bother treating them like they're special. I lost my job, but I did nothing wrong; I set clear boundaries and expectations, with ample documentation, notice, and approval, and they STILL fired my ass.

So yeah. Take your PTO. It's YOURS. Go on that vacation, leave your work life AT WORK, and have a good time. Your coworkers will be fine without you, and if the company collapses while you're gone, they deserved to collapse anyway. Life is simply too short to spend it all slaving away for a company that hates you.

As an immigrant, I thank the god and fates I didn't end up in America. This level of guilt tripping and toxicity is astounding.

Also stop using the acronym, because it's too easy to forget what those letters mean when just the acronym is being used. Call it "Paid Time Off".

Over here in Germany where everybody has at least 3 weeks paid time off (being ill does not count to this contingent btw), it is common that leaves are planned in the beginning of the year for larger vacations, so there are no collisions.

Also, if you have children you have priority during school breaks for paied leaves.

This concept could be copied by us employers also, I wonder why not? Maybe because this way you can pressure your employees with your vacation as leverage

I take the other members of the team into consideration. It does make sense since I work with them fives days a week, don't want to make shit harder for them, within reason.

If your business isn't sustainable when I visit family over the holidays, your business isn't sustainable.

I get both sides of this argument. Some businesses have certain periods where it's extremely busy followed by an ebb in work. Accountants for example may be balls-to-the-wall at year end, but that period doesn't justify hiring somebody who might otherwise have their thumb up their ass and nothing to do most of the rest of the year. I've also had IT jobs that resolved around projects in this way., and there are always a certain number of SME's that you kinda need at launch.

At the other side, I've known employers who basically ran the bare-minimum amount of staff for a team/project (or less and worked the rest to the bone) and getting them to sign off on holidays for any reasonable length of time was near impossible. Those are the types that would try to call you from the middle of open-heart-surgery if they could, and yeah anyone in this situations should be looking for a new job. The hard part being that getting the time to do proper job hunting was often also similarly difficult because of work, and bills still needed to be paid.

I think both stances need more nuance. Yeah - if your company doesn't hire someone that can fulfill your essential duties while you're gone, that's on them.

But when you do have someone who can cover your duties while you're gone, it makes sense that you can't all take off the same day. I work in municipal government for a small city, and my boss and I are each other's backups. We've worked together for years, and we haven't taken the same day off yet, but both take several weeks a year. Heck - tomorrow there's an annual conference we both should attend, and we alternate each year who goes because someone has to hold down the fort.

Tip for managers: anticipate how your staff taking PTO will impact your team and try as hard as possible to minimize any disruption. And realize that there are times when their PTO is going to be inconvenient and you're going to have to deal with that.

I remind my team about their vacation and floater days on a quarterly basis and all them to be used. All I ask for is time for me to pivot as needed and if you have ongoing projects that you reschedule planned meetings, document as you go, and ensure access is available to the rest of the team if needed.

I've had employees in the past who I've sat down and directly asked them to take time off (paid) because they were burning out and would otherwise push through it. I've even reminded some of available leaves of absence for situations in their personal lives.

If the business can't continue without any one person, then the business isn't sustainable as-is and that's not fair to anyone. Hire more people if it's coverage or train your people if there's skill gaps. Documentation of systems and processes is also crucial.

If your employer doesn't hire enough bodies to make sure the work gets done when people call in sick or take PTO, that's on them. Absenteeism can range between 3-5% on any given day, and can be industry dependent. This is something that should be factored into the amount of work that needs to get done per day on average when deciding on appropriate headcount. Companies that want to run skeleton crews because, "muh profits," can find out when they fuck around. I was always taught that when it comes to things critical for your survival, you should always have them in triplicate. This is why I have an E-bike, analog bike, and bus pass; if one stops working, I have backups. Employers should have this mindset with critical tasks and headcount.

I mean, there are jobs where the first posters advice is relevant. I’m a musician, and there are just rehearsals I cannot miss. When I am working with a high school, I cant take PTO during key production days or performances because I am the only person at the place that can do exactly what I do: that’s why they hired me.

I work on a business communication tool. You know those things you have in your phone that people send messages to and expect you to answer.

When I leave my computer, that's it, I'm done. I don't have the application on my phone. I didn't check email or messages after 5 or 6 and most days I work for a few hours before I check them.

On weekends, I turn off my computer.

I've been doing this for years now. No one notices, or if they do they are smart enough to not bring it up.

I came up in a world where we were the ones introducing Yahoo and AOL into the business world, I had a phone on my desk that was essential, and email was king. I rarely had a laptop and they were quite rare. When you left the office, it was expected that you were some for the day.

The grind culture over the last decade or so is insane. It is insane that people will give over half their time to a company that would show them the door in an instant.

Yes, you should do everything possible to set up your team and colleagues for success when you take your PTO, but that should never require a tether to the office.

If you want European pro tips:

1. While in internship, slap your employer with "Oh hi, by the way, THIS is my union" and if the response is anything other than "Okay, cool! I'll check their collective bargaining agreement for our next meeting" maybe start looking for next post, just saying.
2. If you are in internship or whatever, and your employer has not asked anything about union details or whatever until last week, yeah, you might as well start preparing for disappointment.

"timeless advice" motherfuckers when PTO stops existing 😯

If I am the whole team, does the last bit still apply?

If you haven't hired enough people to cover vacations and unexpected absences, you've hired poorly.

I am lucky to get the time I do (It's more than most people I know) but I recently too two full weeks off to spend with my wife for our 20th anniversary, it was amazing. After I got back to work I had hundreds of emails to catch up on and so much extra work that had piled up I started thinking about all the extra work I had taken on over the years to "cover down" for people and then realized that was the most consecutive time I've taken off in the past 9 years.

I think it's time for a change. Not a job change per-se, but time to start taking time for me, my family, and my health.

Take PTO Make sure your absence maximizes disruption that only you can fix Clean everything up right when you get back Job security!

Most people who get promoted in my company are taking holidays after being hired, are back from maternity/paternity leave, are taking lots of break, some don't even work the hours they should.

The key is just to be visible.

Those who work a lot silently are not visible because they think they will be noticed, and the management needs them to stay where they are to do the hard work.

Just take your leaves.

It does depend on the size of the company. If it's a small business, it may have no leeway occasionally, and you may need to time your PTO.

That being said, the last time I worked for a small business and they contacted me during my vacation to beg me to work, I quit directly after the vacation ended.

I mean, having a plan for the work you won't be there to do is normal, I tell my boss "I will be out on Friday, will you do x, and when I get back I will do Y".

And sure, would not request a day if the other two people in my department will both be out that same day.

This is in the flexible environment I work in, though. Don't need to take PTO for appointments, can come in late or leave early, can take a long lunch to go for a walk or run, nobody even blinks. I come in late sometimes because I needed to do gardening before work. I am flexible for them because they are flexible for me.

Ugh, soon...once things stop exploding in infascinating ways my coworkers aren't equipped to handle without leaving a bonfire for my return. Not their fault, I'm just the guy tasked with the oddball stuff that looks nothing like their day-to-day. Fine when things are the normal amount of on fire, less so when actively erupting and (recently) literally on fire.