5 Useful Reasons Why You Should Give Your Developers Vacations
by Octavio Jacobo
I remember being at the computer lab learning how to code when I was young, after a good 40 mins with zero progress on the subject I realized something: I was tired. Not every mistake is made because of a lack of knowledge, sometimes we just don’t have enough concentration left to realize we are doing something wrong.
For a developer, there’s nothing more frightening than hearing; “I need this by yesterday”. And I’m going to guess that you don’t like hearing those words either, regardless of your job title. You turn on the coffee machine, blast some of your favorite tunes full volume and start going at it with the best you’ve got, and two days later with minimal sleep you start wishing the day had 30 hours.
If you’re a business owner or manager who rules with an iron fist, you may be thinking; “No, I’m paying you to get this done, right here and right now”, and you’re 100% right. But there’s a lot more involved if you want employees who give back 100% effort getting things out the front door…
Let’s talk about giving your employees some vacation time, from an employee’s point of view.
1. He’s dead, Jim
You can beat a dead horse all you want, you won’t get any more race out of it. The truth is, it will become harder and harder to achieve a task if your team is already spent. Productivity will go down at the same rate as happiness and creativity when they are overworked. Solving even the simpler problems will take longer, and the solutions may not be optimal — which will lead to unfavorable outcomes.
I honestly believe this is the number one cause of workplace problems: having a team angry at each other because everything and anything is a problem, and moody because of long work hours without rest — especially when overtime is required to meet a deadline. If this can’t be avoided, and most of the time it can’t, just be sure to remember that these are your people, and give them some time off to recover. Taking a step back and re-focusing efforts on things that matter is always the right choice. Feeling well rested and going back to work fresh and revitalized can go long way.
2. Health & Happiness
By giving your employees some well deserved vacation time, you can show that you appreciate his/her efforts and have decided to reward them (sharing a bit of happiness with us common folk!). Giving them time to spend with family and friends, taking care of pets, or just to get that crackling sound in the car fixed, is a good way to reward anyone.
Also, you may want to let an employee regain their energy after noticing health or emotional problems; most people can’t focus when their morale is low, and that ‘bad mood’ can spread amongst your team. That bulging vein on my forehead is not there because of happiness.
3. Motivation
A motivated worker is a working worker, they are highly productive and creativity flows like water within them. When the morale is high and people can smile at the workplace, you can bet stuff is going to get done in a good way. Offering vacations can be a huge incentive to get those missing tasks in place and the incentive of a few days at the beach can be a powerful tool when it comes to getting the work done.
4. Loyalty
From time to time there is going to be that one project, that one customer, or that one week when the only way to get the work done is to ask your employees to work extra hours. It’s more likely for an employee to bring 110% effort if they know it won’t be a regular occurrence. You don’t need to offer a day off after a night shift, or to have them expect 3 vacation days after 3 days of hard work — nothing like that — no señor.
What I mean is, if you need your team to pull a coffee fueled all-nighter, they will be more willing once they know that their efforts are noticed and valued. And this is one of the strongest bonds you can create in an employer-employee relationship. Trust and value need to be earned and appreciated on both sides if you want a golden team.
5. It’s a strategy
Nope, I haven’t lost my mind, if that’s what you’re thinking. Offering vacation days to your employees can be an opportunity for both parties. On one side, your employee can gain trust in the company and take a break knowing that somebody else can take their place in the interim. And at the same time, you can evaluate their attitude before and after they had some time off.
Think of it as a test; if after those days they are eager to be back at their place at work, and willing to take on challenges knowing that they have a job to do — congrats, you have a great employee. On the other hand, well you get the picture, the hammer knows what to do when nails are out of place.
About Me:
My name is Octavio but everybody calls me Miyagi (yeah like in the movie), I live at Morelia Michoacán, México, and I’m 30 years old. I’m a developer at Buckets.co in charge of the mobile app for iOS. I’ve started working with this amazing team about 4 months ago.
I’m lucky enough to have had a very good experience working with these guys, the kind of feeling you get when everybody involved is an expert at what they do. I like video games and I think that has helped me to connect with my co-workers too — fun times!
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