Are you taking time off this summer? Or do you find it too hard to clear your schedule for those days?
If so, you're far from alone (I'm guilty of this myself), but what message are you sending to the people who work with you?
In a new survey of more than 1,100 American workers released earlier this month, Harris Poll found that 78 percent do not take all their paid time off. Even when they do take days off, 87 percent of American workers said they check for emails from the boss, and 56 percent have taken work-related calls on vacation.
The issue, Harris Poll states, is that American workers in general are so connected to a "culture that glorifies being busy" that some fear taking time away will be detrimental to their career. Even worse, 49 percent of workers said they "get nervous" when asking bosses for time off. That's not a healthy statistic if you want to attract and retain workers. In fact, 76 percent of those people surveyed said they wished their workplace culture "placed a stronger emphasis on the value of taking regular breaks and utilizing paid time off."
Nearly half of the workers, 48 percent, said the amount of paid time off available was a top factor when considering a new job and 66 percent said time off made them more productive.
A lot of coverage of the survey was focused on one aspect of it — that workers will engage in "quiet vacationing" by hiding the fact that they're taking their earned time off. Rather than worry about catching a worker sneaking in an extra few hours at the beach, perhaps employers should do more to create a workplace culture where your employees don't feel they have to hide their days off.
