At I.B.M., a Vacation Anytime, or Maybe None
By KEN BELSON
Published: August 31, 2007
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Some workplace experts say such continued blurring of the boundaries between work and play can overtax employees and lead to health problems, particularly at companies where there is an expectation that everyone is always on call.
“If leadership never takes time off, people will be skeptical whether they can,” said Kim Stattner of Hewitt Associates, a human resources consultant. “There is the potential for a domino effect.”
Frances Schneider, who retired from an I.B.M. sales division last year, after 34 years, said one thing never changed; there was not one year in which she took all her allotted time off.
“It wasn’t seven days a week, but people ended up putting in longer hours because of all the flexibility, without really thinking about it,” Ms. Schneider said. “Although you had this wonderful freedom to take days when you want, you really couldn’t. I.B.M. tends to be a group of workaholics.”
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(1) Leadership turns an expense (i.e., someone has to pay for the time not producing widgets) into a “benefit”. If you’re “entitled” to three weeks vacation but can not take it, then do you really have such a benefit?
(2) If a company’s leadership announce that vacations were being cut from three to two, then all manner of strife would break out. There are the Federal Labor Standards Act and innumerable state laws, and maybe even local diktats. SO in essence, the company is getting unpaid labor.
(3) White collar workers are so scared for “their jobs” that they can’t object. The team players that don’t go along with the gag, will be let go for “poor performance”. In the world of knowledge workers, standards of good and bad are very subjective.
(4) Leadership may be learning that people can drive themselves harder than any slave master’s overseer. At that point, there is very little difference between being in one’s own business and working for the man. The only difference may be in the individual’s perception of being on a big team and their self confidence in their abilities.
(5) What about fraud? There are banks with policies that mandate vacations. Some even specify end of quarter time periods. So that the “loyal employee who never takes a vacation” can’t cover an ongoing fraud.
Interesting how things silently change. Is our own productivity used to our detriment?
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Reinke Faces Life 