Psychologist Thijs Launspach is a stress expert and author of the book Fucking pressure. He marvels at modern work and offers tips each week for more happiness and less stress in your work. Weekly, he writes a column for this news site. Today: work on vacation
For many, it is a question that recurs every year: what do you do with your work messages during the vacations? Friend David sighs. He just got a notification on his phone and for a moment he was not at the vacation home in Savoy, but back at the office in Groningen. A colleague sent a question about a project. Despite being clearly stated that vacationing team members could ignore the email, it had still ended up in David’s head.
It presents a dilemma, he explains. He thinks his work is important and also fun. While he celebrates vacation, work continues at the start-up where he works. So of the ongoing projects, he likes to stay informed. He does not like to leave his workmates out in the cold. If he neglects in his feelings, he may even feel guilty. On the other hand, he is on vacation precisely to clear his head and recharge – and that is difficult with all those mails, notifications and updates. If you really want to unwind on vacation, it is also necessary to simply forget about your work sometimes.
Closing yourself off from work is complicated anno 2020 anyway. In fact, work may appear on your phone screen all the time
-Thijs Launspach-
Complicated
Closing yourself off from work is complicated anno 2020 anyway. In fact, work may appear on your phone screen all the time. Not only from your email, but also from the team’s WhatsApp group, from the internal messaging app and from what’s happening on the server. By default, all these signals are simply áán, so they appear on your main screen in no time. So you can be faced with work at any time, even if your feet are in the pool.
Sure, you might consider carrying a work mobile in addition to your personal device, which you can then turn off outside of work hours, but who wants to have to deal with two devices all the time? On top of that, the 9-to-5 mentality is out of the question. Can you afford not to hear from you when the unwritten rule is to respond quickly to things – even if it’s the weekend or you’re on vacation?
David resolves to turn off notifications from all non-relevant channels from now on so he won’t be paged for every little thing. His email and work app may be latent, but they don’t need to interrupt his vacation day with their beeping every time. He pours himself a glass of Chardonnay, sits down in his easy chair and then grabs his phone anyway. Well, maybe that one email then.
Thijs Launspach is a psychologist and stress expert. He wrote the books Fokking Busy (2018), Working with Millennials (2019) and Work Can Go Out Too (2020) on the subject.
Source Article : Algemeen Dagblad August 3, 2019
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