Enforced holiday — a dangling afternoon
I’m sitting here on enforced holiday, which is weird in itself. My company, along with hundreds of others in the UK and probably elsewhere, has a twisted holiday policy. There’s always an important project ongoing or upcoming that means that they’d rather you didn’t take your holiday at just that time, or not for so long, please. Which is fair enough, since we’re a disorganized sort of organization that hasn’t yet come to grips with the occasional absence of key people.
We’re better than we used to be, which is a good sign. No longer do you find directors and other higher-ups on leave for the whole of March. Why March? Because here it’s the end of the tax/financial/HR year. Why forced? Because company policy is use-it-or-lose it. Can’t get paid, can’t defer it, can’t carry it forward indefinitely and take a sabbatical after a gajillion years service. Gotta take it.
Which is why I’m at home today, or at least the afternoon. I had a half-day left over that somehow I hadn’t taken. And this is the last day of the year. So I’m on vacation. Unless I’d like to donate it to the company of course… nope.
Why can’t we get it together to let holidays be a normal part of working and project life, with no individual so necessary to the functioning of the whole that they can’t disappear for a week or a month? Why don’t we flex the benefit so that each employee can take or not take, get paid in lieu or store them up, as suits their temperament and stress level and distance from home?
Trust, maturity, and complexity, I suspect these are at the heart of this. Of course, enforced paid leave isn’t the worst of problems to have. But what have I done with the time?
Distressingly little. There’s this post, the work of minutes. There’s a more automated scraping of financial data to support my ISA investments. Not completely useless but not completely useful use of time. Good night all.