Manager here: seriously, just take your PTO.
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.
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.
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.
Really? Really though? Because unless I’m a part owner with a substantial stake, fuck all the way off with that boot licking nonsense. Capital is not your friend. They are not your family. A small business is at best like a cute little bear cub, that will maul you to death without a moment’s remorse when it is bigger.
Jesus, you must be a JOY to work with.
If there’s a new product launch and you’re part of the small team building it… Just don’t schedule your PTO on launch week. Schedule it a week or 2 later when the biggest fires have been put out. Don’t fuck off when your team needs you the most. Use any other time for your PTO.
Now if there’s always a fire burning and it never ends… That is an organizational failure and you should spend part of your PTO looking for a new job.
Our org has a response division with a couple of teams on rotation. So long as you give them notice, you can take whatever you like off whenever you like - as the meme says, it’s an organisational problem to manage, not the employee. The only exception is Christmas where the period from say the 21st to the 3rd January, where it’s always massively oversubscribed so any PTO requests get put into a hat and drawn in September.
they contacted me during my vacation to beg me to work
Whereas that is bollocks, I would absolutely negotiate terms and see what they’d offer first! Might be a nice little earner if you didn’t have plans after all.
If you haven’t hired enough people to cover vacations and unexpected absences, you’ve hired poorly.
My department has been complaining to the big boss that we need more people. People have been retiring for years with barely one new hire per two empty positions. And now… I am in long term sick leave (protected) and shit is coming dooooown. Not enough people to cover all the projects. Multiple projects put on hold for the time being, others being roughly merged. People are pissed.
Lol. That’s what happens when those in charge chronically chase short-term profit over long-term sustainability.
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
It’s just left up to the employers. My employer gives me 4 weeks paid vacation, with sick time being additional to that and they gave never given me a hard time for taking time off even last minute.
We have a mixture. We have laws mandate minimum to vacation time, that the employer must respect the preferred dates for the free time as stated by its employees and only may deny or cancel vacation if the company would take major damage. And major as in: we have to let people go or even close major.
If the employer cancels your vacation, he must compensate you in full for all financial losses due to bookings for example.
In addition, paid time off and working hours are if course also benefits that could be used to attract employees
30 days vacation/ year , to 38 hour week, working from wherever I want, even in some pool in some hotel, and of course, paid sick leave. That is my current luxury.
And don’t forget: about 10 work free holidays per year ;)
And in this system, it is common courtesy to make effort to make sure your team has as few problems as possible from your absence. Of course it is also common courtesy that you are not contact for anything work related during your vacation time.
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
And in this system, it is common courtesy to make effort to make sure your team has as few problems as possible from your absence. Of course it is also common courtesy that you are not contact for anything work related during your vacation time.
All of this is possible in North America, but you need a union job.
My day-job is a unionionized Managed Services gig subsidiary of a larger company. The rest of the company fits a stereotype we see in the deLoittes and IBM Pro Servs of the world, but the union contract gives us a sane bit of breathing room:
- 9x9 ‘compressed’ time so you get one day off each week regardless
- statutory holidays are sacred
- OT for weekend work, but it quickly goes double-time so it’s rare; and holidays are 2.5x quickly
- standby time is paid. Call-outs are paid.
- mandated remote work capability. It’s in the union contract, guys, so we can Work From Home Office or Work From HQ as best suits us
The combo of compressed time, stats and careful placement of my 21 vacation days this year will give me 7 carefully-placed weeks off; it’s not contiguous, but it’s really great.
Can you explain 9x9 to me? That’s confusing. 24x7, 8x5 yeah. But you can’t mean that notation? Or did the US finally change to a 10 day week?
9 working hours, 9 days. you hit 80 hours in nine days, so the tenth day you get off. basically an extra day off every other week
Oh, ok. Well, we have 40 hour weeks per law, and a maximum working time of 10hours per day, so we can do the same l, and my employer is fine with it.
Thanks!
This is exactly what seems to be missing in the US: courtesy.
A system that gives everyone entitled leave means better employees and less downtime due to leave (surprise surprise, courtesy leads to coordination).
Shockingly this leads to people caring about their team mates, and things aren’t zero sum anymore.
if my compensation includes paid time off, I am taking it. my notifications are not requests when the date is weeks or months out. it is informational only.
i do not and never have accepted blackout day etc.
i’m honest with this during the hiring process and it’s, honestly, worked out just fine. especially if you frame it as a part of forward thinking communication and the manager is trying to pretend they know what they are doing.
If communicated and part of the deal, great. I personally think that an employment benefits both parties. And with the mentioned curtisyz that works well.
For example, I leave early for appointments, in the last weeks we had some troubles, so dinner for the hole family was on the employer, a while week of takeouts.
So, if my employer tells me that my vacation colides with a project, I am certain that he checked every possibility, and we try to find solutions, like interruptijg the vacation for a day and taking part in meetings from my hotel room.
And if I can not trust my employer enough, then I move on. I am in the lucky position that the stuff I do, most people can’t.
This is exactly it. In my country most employers act in good faith. Employees return that favour.
You’ll get dickbags everywhere, but the system ensures people’s incentives are aligned.
“If my compensation includes paid time off”
The “If” is exactly the problem in America. Most countries with mandatory vacation specifically incentivise employees to use it all (little to no carry over, no payout at the end of year).
The entire purpose is that you use it all and are refreshed and more invested in your job.
You’d get looked at funny if you declared you planned on using your PTO, that’s like saying you plan on taking a lunch break EVERY DAY. It’s just expected
In the Netherlands we have laws in place to ensure what is called “good employership” and “good employeeship”. It’s basically the minimum of what you should expect from each other in matters of courtesy. Good employership as a minimum states an employer should be thoroughly, not abuse his powers as an employer, substantiate big decisions regarding employees, live up to expectations, treat all employees equal and provide good insurance.
Good employeeship is seen as being at work at agreed upon times (this includes taking PTO), doing suitable work, being honest, loyalty to a certain degree like not starting a company without consultation and “stealing” work from the employer, and descretion/secrecy regarding company sensitive information.
It’s all very general, and most of the time further explained either in additional laws or in a “CAO”, a collective working conditions agreement which is reviewed periodically with the unions (about 70-75% of employees have such an agreement).
oh in america management requests you plan them early then ignores reality anyway.
My previous employer in the US was pretty liberal with their time off policy. I would just submit a request, and my manager would approve or not approve. 100% of the time when they didn’t approve, it was because the email had gotten lost in their in box, so I just pestered them about it. It was assumed that employees would check with project managers of projects they were on to make sure their vacations wouldn’t cause problems for the projects - which basically just meant that I would tell my PMs that I was planning to take X days off about a month from now, and they would say “thanks for letting me know, I’ll work that into the project schedule!”
That is how I expect it at every company! Great!
you can pressure your employees with your vacation as leverage
Most places start asking for vacation requests a month or two out before schools do theirs. The US definitely keeps a tighter leash on vacation time than Europe. General US sick-time policy is an abomination.
In my industry, the standard is “unlimited” PTO/Sick for salary. You don’t have a limit of what you can take, but it has to be OK’d by your manager. They expect you to take at least 4 weeks.
But if you leave, or they let you go, they don’t have to pay you for time accrued.
Let me guess - they only approve when it’s a good time, and somehow it’s seldom a good time?
No we’re kind of a unicorn. They’re really good about it.
Couple months ma/pa ternity leave
When I moved, I took most of six weeks off.
I work like hell hour wise normally tho so it’s not sunshine and roses.
Most places start asking for vacation requests a month or two out before schools do theirs.
Sorry, I’m confused. What does this mean? Do schools in other countries not make their annual schedules before the school year begins? Or do “most places” you reference only allow you to ask for vacation during a certain calendar month? Or am I way off with both of those guesses?
Most places I’ve worked ask for people to request vacation by a minimum of one month before said-vacation occurs. Where I live, schools have their entire calendar (including holidays and extended breaks) planned by August. So if somebody wanted to request time off for winter or spring break, they’d probably have plenty of time to coordinate. Does it work differently where you live?
Most salary US businesses realize there is a need for coordinated school vacation schedules.
Every place I’ve worked has managers starting to ask when people are going to take vacation around March or so for the June/July season so that they can try to talk people into moving vacations around for coverage.
Also, if you have children you have priority during school breaks for paied leaves.
This surprises me actually, it seems to have a built-in discrimination from the outset.
I’ve got little PhobosAnomalies at home, and my jobs over the years have taken me all over the place so school holidays haven’t been a priority for me. That said, I wouldn’t personally consider my need to have a week or two off in the school holidays or summer holidays as a priority, more just the same importance of everyone else. After all, having little’uns is mostly a choice (or sometimes, the choice isn’t even available 😢) so it seems like a world of employment law hurt to grant the parents a higher level of priority than others.
That said, I ain’t in Germany so it’s a moot point really.
Yes, no. We have strict school attendece laws (and no homeschooling btw), so you can’t just do some vacation sometimes else this year.
Also, the kids have a right to free time and vacation.
And: traveling outside school breaks is far more convenient anyways… no kids at the pool
It’s not actually a rule or law, just what people are usually doing anyway.
If people have the choice to take their holiday on a school break or not, then most take it not on school breaks. Everywhere you go at that time is packed with people.
But taking it during a school break when you don’t need to, when at the same time your colleague can only take it during that time if they want to spend time with their family - well then it is just basic human decency to let them have that timeslot.
Ah, thanks for the clarification.
I understand though, you make great points. There’s a big rumble of discontent in the UK at the moment as resorts proper take the piss during the school holidays, just to take advantage of families wanting to head off somewhere in the alotted times. There’s more than a handful of folk who just pull their kids out of school during term time - whether it’s a good or bad idea comes down to subjective opinion, but saving four figures on going a week or two earlier is quite a convincing argument!
Back on topic: I’m just looking at it from an angle different to my own is all, I’d be pretty pissed off that I’d have my leave request deprioritised for the sole reason that I hadn’t rawdogged a girl more than four years and nine months prior!
Everywhere i have worked so far (office work) the holiday planning was made just by communicating with your colleagues. You just find a compromise that works for everybody. (Although there is a mentality of “first come, first serve”. If you really need a holiday at a specific time, then better state it early, so the others can plan around it.) The official holiday request afterwards is just a formality, because everything is already planned through and the boss has no reason to decline it.
I am sure there are workplaces where it is handled differently, but that is my personal experience as an office worker.
I was so lucky in the past. Now I am working directly under higher management. Dude, things change up here … First of all: no team. Only multiple managers with projects, timelines and the need of me for those projects.
But, as mentioned, the common base stays the same.
I’ll stay far away from management. :)
In my 24 years in the workforce, I ran into such a situation once. And I moved my vacation 3 days and everything was fine. It is not very common. I just mentioned it because I think that it illustrates some back thought on the whole concept very well: employee and their families are important.
Another thing: legally an employer can only deny vacations if your absence would mean major damage for the company.
And if already approved absences are canceled, the company have to compensate you for flights and other bookings. In full
Awesome. Thanks for helping me see your viewpoint - it’s likely a very minor difference in cultural expectations. It’s super cool to see how our bros (other siblings descriptors are available) from the continent work around things.
I’ve worked for a number of organisations in my time too, and one common theme - very much like yours - is that protections against pre-booked time off are pretty strong. Whether it’s being paid double-time; having three times your cancelled leave days refunded for each day you were recalled; or generally just giving you a bonus payment - it’s gotta be pretty fuckin’ wild for someone to be instructed back to work from pre-booked leave.
As you have alluded to though, communication is key 😊
it is with ‘skilled’ labor
sadly this pool keeps getting smaller and amaller
I don’t see why this pool should logically get smaller. In the other hand though, the USA avoids the way, other countries are handling job training , like the devil water.
No, skilled labor gets more important from day to day. But it costs more. So let’s hire people that will settle for less, and kick them out if they reach there limit.
In most countries, you have a multi year on the job training + school before you consideres a skilled worker in this job. I for example carry the title of a “Journeyman of Electronics and Communication”. I am not working in this field anymore, but usually, most people stay with that they learned.
Long ramble short: no the pool of skilled jobs is shrinking, capitalism is expanding
mostly because that skilled labor pool has been primarily in tech the last 2 decades in the US and tech bro billionaires are currently doing their best to fuck all these workers over for profits
sadly much of the industry will fallow the FAANG corps lead with pay/benefits
If your business isn’t sustainable when I visit family over the holidays, your business isn’t sustainable.
Maximize the disruption so they know what’ll happen of they fire you.
Then demand a raise.
Managers are wierdly cranky when it’s time to manage.
what in the world is PTO? best guess from context is holidays. but why would anyone make it a 3 letter acronym? i am sure any 3 letter acronym has at least 3 different meanings in different contexts…
but if PTO actually is holidays, yes take them. don’t let some third world country grifters, like you find them often in the usa, redefine words and take away basic things - just because they call it slightly different.
I guess?
PTO can usually just be used anytime as long as you give notice and get it approved. That doesn’t match with the American definition of ‘holidays’ since those are specific calendar dates, but I think British English uses the term interchangeably with vacation?
It’s not always an acronym- a lot of people will just say ‘vacation time.’
But yeah it’s basically so that you have one pool for vacation time and sick time that’s paid. A lot of places expect you to take unpaid leave if you’re sick- or just fuckin work anyways- because unchecked capitalism.
Companies are rolling vacation time and sick time into one block called “Paid Time Off” make themselves look better.
That’s horrifying.
Paid Time Off.
so yes, holidays. if not specifically unpaid leave, all holidays should be paid. sick is not time off anyway. it is recovering, so company resources are used appropriately: not making others sick and being 100% as soon as possible (instead of a zombie at work).
thanks for the response!
in the US, “holiday” means something different from “paid time off”. a holiday is something like christmas, easter, labor day, independence day, that sort of thing. it’s like a widely recognized specific special day. also for a lot of workers they don’t even get holidays off of work.
“vacation” is what we use to describe taking time off of work here, and “paid time off” is specifically for describing how the time off is arranged with one’s employer.
all pedantic, but yeah, “holiday” means something a lot different here
“vacation” is what we use to describe taking time off of work here, and “paid time off” is specifically for describing how the time off is arranged with one’s employer.
This is an important note - PTO is for individualized, arranged time off. It could be used for a week, a single day, or even for just a few hours (in some cases.) It could be used to give yourself a random day off here or there, if you want to. It doesn’t have to be a vacation or a holiday (in the American sense), just a random (though usually pre-requested) day where you feel like staying inside in pajamas, marathoning movies all day, and getting paid for it. (AKA a mental health day.)
It’s also important (and sad) to note that not all jobs offer PTO. Ditto for sick leave and parental leave. The US is straight-up backwards…
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.
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 I am the whole team, does the last bit still apply?
Typically you still have a manager that may not be on your team directly but they may manage you. I was an IT team of one at one point but the lead programmer to the company was the manager of my department " "
Sounds like a job I had once. Left that job after not even a year. Was not worth it for me especially since I was still early in career and was very obviously in over my head with little proper direction/leadership.
Well for me it was actually one of those jobs that helped me grow in my career. It was my first system administration job. And more important than that it was a Linux system administrator job so I learned a ton and grew a ton. It was one of the few jobs that I stayed at for as long as I did. The only reason I left was when they denied my raise to a decent pay rate. The next job I stepped into was the manager of a network operations center so it helped me grow all the way to that point.
Or ask for a raise.
nah. at some point, no amount of additional money can make up for the stress caused by shitty employer behavior around using an earned and agreed upon vacation benefit.
My job literally forces me to take all my leave by end of FY unless I have a very good reason.
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.
What beer company?
A local one, in Baltimore. Won’t get more specific to avoid doxxing myself and others.
Ladies and gentlemen, behold the cowardice that allows shit like this to persist in your country
Its not cowardice to avoid sharing Personal Information on the internet. There’s a real possibility to be doxxed just by sharing which place you worked at, and were fired for what reason. Not everyone is comfortable doing that.
Oh no! Your job! 😒 it’s almost as if you don’t realize you already have nothing to lose.
Maybe, being doxxed is the bigger issue here. Perhaps, take a read in OPSEC and learn how digital fingerprinting and doxxing work.
🤣 yes, I’m sure this white dude in Baltimore who didn’t bother taking any action to fight back against the shitheads who fired him for taking a vacation from his craft beer job is involved in some very serious action requiring OPSEC.
I swear to god as soon as I’m proven wrong I’ll eat an entire tree on video and then delete my account.
also it’s free to contact the local labor bureau or eeoe if you’re fired for taking a vacation, they’ll even help you with lawyers, mediators etc
Damn, what did your union say?
What’s a union? /s
If it collapses without you, then maybe it should be your company.
This would be a case a law student would be able to win you in Germany, not that companies here don’t try it here anyway.
Is there an ending to that story? If I was in that situation, I would have ignored it all and then came back the day I said I’d come back and act like everything was normal, make up something about how my phone got broken or stolen or something.
At the very least I hope you tried to get unemployment or some such!
The ending was pretty underwhelming. I wasn’t employed long enough to get unemployment, and haven’t been able to get another job since. Now back at school pursuing a new degree.
Now back at school pursuing a new degree.
Careful with this one. Racking up even more debt generally does not make your life easier.
Good thing I’m not in debt then.
Always a good way to live!
That sounds like cut and dry wrongful termination. You should have sued, if not for rightful compensation then to make sure that they think again before they pull the same shit with other employees.
