Why do we now live in a culture where people feel unable to take a day, a week, or god forbid, a few weeks off work?

What is so hard about not turning up for work, and instead tuning into some R&R?

We Australians are supposedly so bad at taking holidays that we’ve accumulated a staggering123 million days of annual leave which is equal to $33 billion in wages.

Tourism Australia are so concerned they launched the ‘No Leave, No Life’ campaign with the tag line ‘Win the Work/Life Battle’.

The campaign includes a dedicated website www.noleavenolife.com with holiday ideas for employees, and a toolkit for employers.

The message for employees is that taking leave can deliver incredible benefits such as “feeling refreshed, the chance to reconnect with family and friends, and being better placed to cope with the pressures of day-to-day life.”

And the message for employers is find ways to “cover for people on leave and manage the increased workload before and after leave.”

Now, the Harvard Business Review has reported an experiment by Perlow & Porter conducted with Boston Consulting Group in the US which forced consultants to take time off. The goal was to break the ‘we have to work 24/7 mentality’.

The results?

Higher job satisfaction

Greater likelihood that they could imagine a long-term career at the firm

Higher satisfaction with work/life balance

More open communication

Increased learning and development

A better product delivered to the client

I hope you’re all booking your Xmas holidays.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 6th, 2009 at 10:40 pm and is filed under Wellbeing, Work Life Balance. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.