Give Your Team #TimeOffToVote

Stephen Straus
KUNGFU.AI
Published in
2 min readOct 19, 2020

Election day is right around the corner and, regardless of your politics, we should all exercise our right to vote. Elections have consequences and voting lets us tell our government what we want it to do. Voting is a right generations of Americans struggled to win, and people in other countries still fight for. Voting is an important, meaningful way to back the issues you care about and the representatives you think can best effect the changes you want to see. If nothing else, voting is a license to justifiably complain, and your grievances carry more weight as a voter trying to hold your candidates accountable for promises they made.

Yet the percentage of people who vote in the United States is notoriously low. What can be done to improve the situation? KUNGFU.AI is trying to make a difference. We’re encouraging everyone on our team to vote, including taking time off to do so. We’re even holding a company virtual lunch on election day to celebrate our right to vote.

If you run a company, commit to giving time off to vote. Here are some ideas on what to do (or what to ask of the person who runs your company):

  • Close for the day
  • Give a partial day off: give a half day off or shorten office hours
  • Offer flexible leave: work from home or create a no-meetings day

Let’s start a movement — encourage others to do the same:

  • Make what you do public by adding your name to this list
  • Post on social media under #timeoff2vote with a link to electionday.org — and get your influencer friends to do the same
  • Add a link to this blog post in your email signature
  • Create things like stickers, posters and coasters and not only use them but share them, including online for others to use, as well
  • Talk it up IRL!

Lead on this issue and give #timeoff2vote every election day!

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Stephen Straus
KUNGFU.AI

Stephen Straus, co-founder and Managing Director of KUNGFU.AI, is an Austin-based serial tech and social entrepreneur and former venture capitalist.