Unlimited holdiay from work

Judgeneo

Judgeneo

Judgeneo

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Out of Coventry
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-29356627

Branson has offered up his personal staff unlimited leave from work, they can take as much leave as they want, but the emphasis on providing cover shifts from the business, to the individual taking the leave.

I've had a very stressful few days at work this week as I have only been at work for 2 days per project for the last couple of weeks (illness and leave). I expect that if my policy changed to unlimited leave, I'd be taking a lot less big gaps, but I'd leave the office a lot earlier some days instead - I'm not sure if thats a good thing or not.

Would you be for, or against this being implemented in your workplace?
 
I like the idea of it, although it doesn't state if the leave is paid or not.

I'm self employed, so my leave is unpaid, and as such I take it when I feel the time's right and usually between contracts, although if my other half was self-employed as well, I think I'd be likely to take longer periods off. As things are, we go by her five weeks a year which is micro-managed by her boss and requires an application a year (!) in advance.
 
The Virgin engineers that have supposed to be fixing the high utilisation in my area have been on holiday for 6 months.

Thanks Branson :mad:
 
This is something the MD of my work floated a while back, kind of hoping we get something similar.

Sounds like it would work, assuming no one takes advantage.
 
Flexitime seems to work just fine for myself and my colleagues, will be interesting to see how this pans out.

However
He added that there was no need to ask for approval, nor say when they planned to return, the assumption being that the absence would not damage the firm.
Click to expand...
One of the most common things I see is people still working on holiday, checking emails, even responding to emails, and I think this kind of system would only make this worse - eg "do I have to return tomorrow or will this project be ok?".

People have real difficulty actually taking a break from work, partly because of technology, and partly because I think it's become part of the working culture to expect it (certainly to a certain level).
 
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Despite having a work issued phone, I find disabling the work email account and judicious use of the iOS Do Not Disturb feature works wonders in ensuring that work doesn't disturb my holiday.
 
I can't see how this is going to work...
"What you replacement me? I was only on hoilday for 5 years as I went travelling around the world twice!"

We can't even work flexitime at my place, well flextime is on offer but its the very unflexible; with a core hours 10-4 and then I'm answering calls and emails; remoted in. So what I tend to do is be in the office 8 till 4; and claim a day back each month in lieu.

Flexitime time is only really there to help the employer rather than the employee.
 
Only rolled out for 170 of his personal staff.........

I can see some issues with this on a larger scale. I also think it is a bit of a cop out by a company to palm off responsibility of managing resources to its employees. Branson gets the image of being a cool employer and none of the responsibility really. That gets palmed off onto employees who now have to find someone to cover their workload before they can go on holiday, creating an environment where I imagine it will become more difficult to take time off work because the employee will be judged on their results rather than, potentially, poor resourcing by the company. What about if you are in the department with only a few people that are capable of doing your job? When can you realistically go on holiday? When you have worked 16hrs a day for 2 months straight to get ahead in a project? Thats a cop out.

That said, with smaller companies and the right type of employees I can see this possibly working.
 
If you can take as long as you want off as long as your job is done then whoever it is who's job it is to make Branson look like a complete **** will effectively never have to go in to work ever again.
 
Sounds like a great idea but as per usual the devil is in the detail, and also depends on your colleagues playing the game too.
I'm on fixed hours and don't get flexitime as my team and I provide a "front line" service and therefore we cover certain hours. We would need to do a lot of planning to cover our hours so pleasing yourself in the morning wouldn't really work for us.
Sure it will work for some though.
 
I actually look at this the opposite way. I used to work 10 hours a day any 5 days in the week. Even after 10 hour shifts on my feet, I would always be capable of working more.

In this situation, if people around me were wanting their shifts covered, I'd see it as win win for me, extra money! Plus I could still take my regular 5 weeks throughout the year, it was always enough.
 
I don't think these 170 people will actually take any holiday, and I reckon that is, in part, the idea of what he's said. If you think you have time to not be working, then you've not got enough work (at least, this is what I think Branson thinks).

Anyway, thanks Branson :mad:
 
Just not workable in practice, IMO. This kind of approach might work for senior, project-based, and/or trusted staff who won't abuse it, but even then, if someone takes 40 days holiday surely they just didn't have enough work to do in the first place?

I'd much rather see a business introduce more flexible working arrangements; hours, WFH, etc. and leave holiday to be booked the usual way.
 
Seems a bit risky. What if you take a long break, and the company decides they didn't actually miss you that much? Redundancy no thx.
 
I would love this, I constantly run out of things to do of a day.

Either I have something to do and I just get on and do it well before the deadline, or I create an application to do it for me, or I'm waiting on some slow person to finish their bit or get back to me.

I could take loads of holiday if I was given leave to. We get flexitime in my place but it's rare that I work over the bare minimum hours in a day, I get a few minutes build up but not a lot.
 
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I know some people who struggle to take their annual leave. /I don't get that. If you work hard (which most people do) why wouldn't you want a break?
 
I thought this wasnt all his staff?

Virgin Group employs more than 50,000 people around the world and operates in more than 50 countries


This unlmiited holiday is for 170 of his personal staff by the looks?
 
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