Your summer holiday is booked and paid for and you’re counting down the days until you can have a break.

But when it gets to it, you find yourself periodically checking in with your work emails, answering those ‘quick question’ texts and making notes for your return next week.

When you do return, you feel tired and mentally, you can’t get yourself motivated to get bits done.

Why?

Because you didn’t allow yourself to completely switch off from work mode for the duration of your time off.

I’m going to keep this super simple and quick for you. Hopefully, if you take the steps laid out for you, you’ll be able to reap the benefits, and won’t ever go back to compromising your time out.

Why it’s important to switch off?

• It’s vital to rest and rejuvenate, physically and mentally.
• It’s an act of self-care, honouring your boundaries and overall wellbeing.
• It improves the connection with loved ones that you’re spending time with.
• It increases creativity, motivation, and productivity all in time for your return.

It sets a precedent within your work environment.

How to Prepare for Your Summer Holiday.

I promised you five actionable ways you can gift yourself peace and full relaxation for your holiday this year:

• Find and arrange an alternative point of contact during your time out, this is a ‘just in case’ measure.
• Set your out of office: Include your return date and your alternative point of contact
• Brief your team, colleagues or clients of your time out of the office, including the fact that you will be unreachable. This is where you make it clear that you will be out of contact and let them know who else they can reach if needed.
• Ensure that where necessary, everyone has everything they need, and access to anything they need in your absence. If you need to include a list, schedule, tasks or deadlines to send out just before you leave, then do that too.
• Leave it all behind: It is unlikely your place of work will collapse in the week or two that you are off. So, with that in mind, leave behind the work laptop, delete the email app off your phone to stop any temptation and leave behind your work phone.

If you do manage these five steps, it’s incredibly unlikely that anyone will contact you unless it’s emergency. Even then you are not obligated to answer a call, if you do, you have two ways you can deal with it.

• You can be helpful if it’s a genuine emergency.
• You can let them know that this is not something you will be dealing with on holiday and direct them elsewhere, reminding them of the date you will be back.

If this is the first time you have implemented these boundaries, you might be met with some people pushing them, or not being used them. However, once this becomes your norm, and you are someone who respects other peoples time out of the business, you will find it happens less and less.

Remember, your holiday allowance, or paid time off is part of your reward and recognition package, it is written into your contract, and it is your entitlement.

You deserve to have uninterrupted time out of the business, and sometimes, you have to do some of the work to achieve that.

How to Prepare for Your Summer Holiday.
I promised you 5 actionable ways you can gift yourself peace and full relaxation for your holiday this year:

• Find and arrange an alternative point of contact during your time out, this is a ‘just in case’ measure.
• Set your out of office: Include your return date and your alternative point of contact
• Brief your team, colleagues or clients of your time out of the office, including the fact that you will be unreachable. This is where you make it clear that you will be out of contact, and let them know who else they can reach if needed.
• Ensure that where necessary, everyone has everything they need, and access to anything they need in your absence. If you need to include a list, schedule, tasks or deadlines to send out just before you leave, then do that too.
• Leave it all behind: It is unlikely your place of work will collapse in the week or two that you are off. So, with that in mind, leave behind the work laptop, delete the email app off your phone to stop any temptation and leave behind your work phone.

If you do manage these 5 steps, it’s incredibly unlikely that anyone will contact you unless it’s emergency. Even then you are not obligated to answer a call, if you do, you have two ways you can deal with it.

• You can be helpful if it’s a genuine emergency.
• You can let them know that this is not something you will be dealing with on holiday and direct them elsewhere, reminding them of the date you will be back.

If this is the first time you have implemented these boundaries, you might be met with some people pushing them, or not being used them. However, once this becomes your norm, and you are someone who respects other peoples time out of the business, you will find it happens less and less.

Remember, your holiday allowance, or paid time off is part of your reward and recognition package, it is written into your contract, and it is your entitlement.

You deserve to have uninterrupted time out of the business, and sometimes, you must to do some of the work to achieve that.

One last bonus tip; Where it’s possible, allocate some catch up time for your first day back. It could be an hour to go through emails, de-brief with whoever was covering some of your role or do some planning for your week ahead.