Your boss just approved a long overdue vacation. T-minus 3 weeks until you’re sipping a Mai Tai on Waikiki Beach in Hawaii! It. Can’t. Come. Soon. Enough.
Below are 5 simple steps to help ensure that your vacation is undisturbed by work stuff.
- Block out your vacation time on your calendar, making sure it displays as “busy” or “away” for others. This will prevent colleagues from sending you invites or expecting you to be available during that time.
- Create a second appointment in your calendar for your vacation, and invite your boss, your team, the receptionist, and anyone else who is impacted by your schedule. Make sure that it displays as “free” or “available” for them so that you don’t accidentally mark their calendars as busy for your time away. This will help them remember that you’re away and feel informed about your schedule.
- Cancel or reschedule any meetings that you are hosting during that time. If you have other people’s meetings on your calendar, reach out to them as soon as possible about your vacation plans so they aren’t left wondering why you stood them up.
- Review your tasks and identify the ones that will need coverage. If something is due or an event is planned for while you’re away, develop a plan of who can cover for you. Make sure that you intend to reciprocate any favors when your colleagues take vacation. (Also, it doesn’t hurt to bring back a souvenir for anyone who went out of their way to cover for you.)
- Last but certainly not least, don’t forget to put on your out of office assistant! While some people (ahem, me) save this for the day before vacation, you can actually set your out of office message to go off in the future. Doing this as soon as your vacation is approved will prevent you from forgetting to do it when you're racing the clock to finish your assignments on your last day in the office.
Tell us how you prepare for your time off in the comments below.