Vacation!! What’s Our Accountability?

Today is the first day of my vacation from work. WOW! I am actually excited, and I actually have plans to do other things besides working. I actually love my job and I love having my own business. I do both. I have a business as a career coach, blogger. And I work full time. I am busy 7 days a week, doing what I enjoy doing. If I hadn’t been talked into it, I probably wouldn’t be on vacation. But a friend of my, a coworker convinced me to go on vacation a few weeks ago and I finally agreed, but only because a retreat came up that I want to attend.

My vacation is not about running from the office though. I love working. It is almost 11:00 am EST, and I have been on the phone more than twice with the office. So am I really on vacation? That leads me to my post – Vacation!! Yay!! What’s our accountability? Is it ok to completely unplug from the office when you go on vacation? You tell me what you think. I think not! I believe that we are accountable for our work, our team, the organizational priorities, projects and anything else you want to add to the list even when you go on vacation.

Last week, some of my colleagues were on vacation and a few things popped up that should have been covered prior to them leaving. This is not about pointing the finger at them. I know them both and I know how focused they are on doing an excellent job when they are here, however they were on vacation. Big difference. What do we do when they are gone and things are popping up? Do we call? Do we figure out? Or do we ignore it?

If you are going to be successful working in an organization, I believe that what happens when you are on vacation can impact or erode the foundation of all of your hard work when you are working every day. In other words, if your department falls apart in your absence, that’s a problem. One of my calls this morning to the office was ensuring that one of my employees has an accountable person available to him in my absence. I missed it last week when I was finishing and attempting to get out of the office on Friday.

Your accountability to the office while on vacation in my humble opinion is as important when you are gone as it is when you are there working every day. Don’t let things slip through the cracks while your out of pocket and hope that everyone will welcome you back with open arms. Take time before leaving and look at every project you are responsible for. Look at your staff. What needs do they have? Who have you communicated your vacation plans? Are you available while you are out of the office? I may be on vacation this week, but I am still focused on the priorities of my job while I am out, and my business for that matter. I will have some fun this week. Even here at bizzia Careers. I will keep you posted on my progress this week as I vacation. I am going to do a series of post this week about Vacation! Stay tuned! Let me know your thoughts! If you think I should completely unplug and come up for air next week, scroll down and tell me about it! I look forward to an amazing week of rest, relaxation, fun and work!!

Image Credit: sxc.hu