WHO NEEDS A BREAK?

6 tips to help you step away from your desk and go on holiday

What a year! If you are running a business or a charity, chances are you have been doing everything you can in the last 12 months just to keep going. With the holiday green light at least flickering on, your first thought is probably, ‘how do I let go, even for a week or two?’

At the best of times, it can be a worry. You know every detail of how things run, you know which clients are likely to be on the phone and you know how to deal with them. What if there’s a sudden rush of enquiries? What happens if someone complains? What if there’s a fire, flood, famine while you are sunning yourself on the beach? (Hint: there won’t be.)

Here’s the important news: you can - and you should - take a break. 

Your worst-case scenarios are unlikely to happen and, frankly, if they do, you’ll deal with them. So let’s look at how to deal with the more realistic stuff. Here are six tips to help you take that holiday with a clear head:

1.    Trust your team

“Leading is about letting go, not holding on,” says Executive Coach, Bobbie Goheen. Think about your business from a broader perspective; there will always be times when you are not leading from the front, whether it’s holidays, illness or simply that you’re tied up in meetings for days on end. If you’ve chosen your team well, and nurtured them, these are the moments for them to shine. You being away is their development opportunity. Look around your team now and decide who’s going to be in charge while you are away. Then, let go!

2.    Plan a holding strategy

“A week is a long time in politics,” Prime Minister Harold Wilson once said, but two weeks in the life of any business or charity is really quite a short time. All you need is for things to tick over while you are away. Draw up a plan for who’s going to handle what, let clients know there may be a short delay in responding to them, sort out some outside help to keep things moving. 

Just having a plan so that you know the basics are covered is often enough for you to breathe again and convince yourself that you can go for that long-awaited break. 

3.    Organise around your holiday

We’ve all been there, that final day before we go on holiday. Your productivity is off the scale; emails fly in every direction, niggly but long-overdue jobs are completed, decisions that seemed impossible are suddenly made at lightning speed. If only we could bottle that and work the same way every day. What you are doing on that day is organising around your holiday, but if you start that process a week or two earlier, it’s both more effective and less stressful. 

Carve out two blank weeks in your diary. Move meetings to when you are back and feeling refreshed, hand over to others before your last day so you are around for questions, do all those niggly jobs, send those emails and make those decision over the month before you go away, rather than all in one 12-hour frenzy. And then, on the day before your holiday, deal with any loose ends calmly and efficiently, before turning on your Out of Office and leaving the building.

4.    Step away from operations

This goes back to leadership and delegation. To paraphrase Theodore Roosevelt “The best executive has sense enough to pick good people to do what she wants done, and the self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it.” It’s a longer-term strategy but it’s crucial to anyone who has ambition for their organisation to grow and succeed – and wants the occasional holiday. Just as you do with your children, at some point, you must step back and resist the urge to micro-manage. 

Operational stuff is easy to teach and easy to learn. With systems in place, such as ISO 9001, your business or charity can run smoothly without you being quite so hands-on. This allows you to look at the bigger picture, to work on your business rather than in your business and to make the strategic decisions that lead your business to success. 

What’s this got to do with holidays? Well, strategy doesn’t need daily input. If you take a fortnight off, things aren’t going to grind to a halt because someone forgot to take over strategy. And, if you are in the position to step back from the operational aspects of your business, it goes without saying that you have earned a holiday. So take it!

5.    Utilise technology

If you really can’t leave it all behind - and we know business life is never quite how you plan it to be - technology is your friend. Like never before, you can manage your organisation remotely. From near-universal Wi-Fi to Zoom and Teams (you’re on mute!), we are connected. Your phone is a mobile miracle that can help you be at work while you are lying on the beach. 

Here at EBM, we’ve been using this technology to help our clients for years, and we keep up to date with every new development. There’s almost nothing that can’t be done remotely these days so give us a call to find out how technology can help you to go on holiday while staying in touch with your business.

6.    Remove the worry of calls and enquiries

One of the things you can’t quite predict while you are away, is who is going to call you and what they are going to want. This is why a professional call-handling service can make a huge difference to your peace of mind. 

At EBM, mobile and landline call-handling is one of our most popular services. We have tested all the latest technologies and we tailor every aspect of the service to your needs. We work out decision trees with you, answer all your calls and enquiries in a friendly and professional manner, set up and monitor message services and provide real-time and consolidated reports.

It’s a lifeline to many of our clients, not just for holidays but simply to take one of the most pressing and time-consuming aspects of business life off their hands and allow them to organise their time more effectively. From tradespeople who can’t take calls up a ladder to CEOs who need a PA, it’s a great solution to a perennial problem. Give us a call and we could be set up in time for your holiday.

Enjoy your holiday…

Have we convinced you? Yes, you CAN go on holiday this summer. And what’s more, you deserve to go on holiday. It’s been a difficult year all round and some down-time is a must for your wellbeing. 

With a bit of planning and organisation, some faith in the power of delegation and a helping hand from technology, your holiday is officially on. Give us a call today and we’ll help to make it happen.