How to Detach from the Office and Take a Vacation

Summer is finally here and with it, a great opportunity to take a break from work. Going on vacation isn’t just a luxury—it’s a much-needed time to recharge. But for a lot of us, detaching from work is difficult, especially if you’re an  Office Manager or in HR, where your coworkers rely on your support every day.

Luckily, there are best practices you can follow and software you can use to make sure your work is taken care of and your coworkers get what they need while you’re gone. 

Here are four best practices for organizing your work so you can take a stress-free vacation:

Set priorities

A great way to feel better about taking time off is to make a list of all the work you do. 

While this sounds like a daunting exercise, you’ll be able to let go of all the actions and details that are on your mind. To help account for everything, look to the technology you use. Read over your Trello board or go through your completed and upcoming tasks in Managed by Q's Employee Helpdesk. If you don’t use project management software, reference your email and calendar.

Once you have a list of the work that needs to be done, prioritize the items from most to least urgent. If you’re using Employee Helpdesk, you can assign actions to specific teammates and choose a priority level for each task. For example, if you want to make sure your company is reminded about a mandatory fire drill while you’re gone, set the priority level to high and add a reminder notification so your teammate doesn’t forget to alert everyone on Slack.

Stock up and schedule

The last thing you want to worry about on vacation is whether or not you ordered enough milk for the office. A week before your vacation begins, set time aside to work on tasks that can be completed in advance, such as ordering supplies. Look ahead at the company calendar and check in with your coworkers to see if there are any events coming up that will require anything out of the ordinary. Place orders with enough time for shipments to arrive before your vacation. If you’re worried that the office may run out of something while you’re gone, create a checklist of recurring/frequent supplies in Trello or Employee Helpdesk that your coworkers can reference. 

Create a resources guide

One of the biggest hurdles in detaching from work is how easy it is to check your email or get a Slack notification on your phone. It’s important to emphasize to your team that while you’re away, you won’t be answering any messages.

To further enforce this hard-to-follow rule, create a quick resources guide and share it with your coworkers. Include log-in/password information for shared accounts, a list of catering services that you use, and links to pertinent documents. The Managed by Q dashboard has a Vendor Management tool that allows you to collect and organize these details, like contact info and service provider preferences. 

While it may seem improbable that the office AC will break while you’re away, if it does, your coworkers have all the info they need to take care of the issue without interrupting your vacation.

Set your OOO

Last but not least, set your out of office reply! Your auto replies are your final defense against being bothered on vacation.  Draft an OOO that directs people to the teammate covering for you. Add your vacation dates to your personal and/or team calendar. Set your Slack status to the palm tree emoji and silence all notifications on your phone.

If you use Employee Helpdesk, your coworkers can still make requests while you’re gone. You can rest assured knowing that tasks that come through during your time off will either be assigned to your teammates or, if they can wait, saved in a queue for when you return.

Organizing your work and communicating your vacation schedule to your coworkers is the best way to help you detach and take a stress-free vacation from the office. To manage, delegate, and complete your work faster and more efficiently, try our Employee Helpdesk and Space Management tools.

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