
How we’re fixing “unlimited” vacation - bcaulfield
https://baremetrics.com/blog/unlimited-minimum-vacation
======
aynsof
He talks about how important it is for people not to feel judged for taking
more than the minimum amount of time off, then calls out a member of his team
by name:

"Tyler has taken over double what most of the rest of the team has at this
point."

But it's fine, because Tyler has a legitimate reason that we're assured no-one
is judging him for:

"Tyler got married and went on a honeymoon. Literally no one in the company is
mad that he did that."

What if my reason is because I just wanted to have some time away? Or because
I had some deeply personal reason that I don't feel comfortable advertising?
This system doesn't exactly scream 'psychological safety' to me.

~~~
andscoop
What do you view as alternatives? It seems to me like this is a huge
improvement on unlimited vacation, so you should add suggestions for
improvement rather than knocking it down.

~~~
paulddraper
> What do you view as alternatives?

Some sort of vacation budget system, where you can take a certain amount each
time period.

(Perhaps a certain amount could roll over from time period to time period.)

That manages expectations, and assuages anxieties about taking vacation. No
need to constantly question "Has Mary/Dave/I earned this?" Big culture win.

\---

Apologies for the snarkiness, but this ultimately seems like a self-imposed
problem.

~~~
clhodapp
Might it be better to force you to use any remaining vacation time at the end
of the year? That way, there shouldn't be any pressure to not use your
vacation time.

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Mc_Big_G
The trick of "unlimited" vacation is two-fold. Most people don't have the
balls to take what they deserve and when they quit or get fired, the company
doesn't have to pay them for the vacations days they earned since that number
doesn't exist.

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echlebek
The company I work for implemented what I think is a pretty novel solution.
Mandatory vacation.

Everyone gets 4 weeks PTO, and more can be awarded on a discretionary basis.

As the end of the year nears, if it becomes evident that an employee will not
be able to use all their vacation up by the end of the year, their system
access is revoked and they are forced to take vacation.

I don't think this policy has actually been tested, since everyone just
happily takes their time off. But it's a cute way of telling people that
you're serious about them taking time off.

~~~
jasonpeacock
Yes, I wish more companies took this approach. It can easily be planned for
and scheduled appropriately - you know how much time everyone has remaining.

And disabling system access is good - they should not be on "vacation" and
still responding to emails on their phone, etc.

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ljf
Man I love working somewhere with 29 days paid leave, plus bank Holidays, plus
the option to buy 5 more days, plus 3 days a year volunteering with the
charity of your choice. And then recently just made paternity leave the same
as maternity leave (6 months full pay followed but 6 months statutory pay).
Which is certainly good for the UK, but not unheard of - imagining working
with only 4 weeks leave a year :(

~~~
netim
Paternity leave is still 2 weeks but the recent changes mean you can curtail
the maternity leave (/pay) early and both parents can take what hasn't been
used as shared parental leave/shared parental pay.

i.e. by taking this option the mother (or primary adopter) will have to go
back earlier. I gather the take up isn't particular high (beyond a week or
two) although it's been very useful in my situation.

Statutory pay is also very low (£140/week) after the first 6 weeks, although
most professional jobs tend to offer better rates.

But your right - in general the attitude to leave seems a lot healthier in the
UK!

~~~
ljf
Yeah, lucky to work at a company that offer 6 months full pay for men and
women for sure, esp when you look at what Americans or even Canadians get.
Stat pay is hard to get by on, but hopefully gives many people the chance to
spend a little more time with their kids. I really like the fact that if a
couple worked at my company, between them they could have 2 whole years spent
with their child, or 1 year between them fully paid - think it would do so
much for dad's to have the option to have that time with their kids. They'd be
crazy not to take it. Sadly we'll not be having any more so I can't take
advantage of it, but am lucky enough to be able to currently support my
wife/family so she can look after the kids full time and head back to work
when we wants/is ready.

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unreal37
Interesting that this blog basically publicizes the vacation schedule and
dates for every employee in the company.

[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1EhvYITqDk-
vGzM9yy1uS...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1EhvYITqDk-
vGzM9yy1uSKE7pp9Whnu1VB7e5fjMqEkM/edit#gid=1840725625)

It looks like the average number of vacation days for an employee of
Baremetrics in 2017 was 36! 7 weeks per year average. Amazing yet... kinda
crazy.

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deegles
My solution to this is to have a fixed vacation time (like most companies),
but the following years vacation time is docked by the amount you _didn’t_
take, creating a strong incentive and justification to take all of your
vacation each year.

On top of that, a randomly selected day or week per year as mandatory vacation
(to build team resilience since any person might not be available).

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SheinhardtWigCo
I agree that “unlimited” vacation is often a trap so I appreciate the concept
of a minimum vacation policy, but isn’t it a security/privacy issue to
publicly disclose the exact dates that employees are on vacation? Is everyone
on the team OK with this information being public?

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kylehotchkiss
[http://blogs.wsj.com/atwork/2015/03/04/the-cost-of-unused-
va...](http://blogs.wsj.com/atwork/2015/03/04/the-cost-of-unused-vacation-
time-224-billion/)

Even with more structured PTO plans, Americans are not taking enough time off
work. People could use some more non-work related activities!

------
joezydeco
So when someone quits or is fired, how much earned but unused vacation time do
you pay back to the employee?

~~~
pertymcpert
In the US I don't think anyone earns vacation time, as there's no minimum?

~~~
cosmie
In traditional compensation plans, you get “X vacation days” as part of your
compensation plan[1]. It can be as low as 0 since there’s no legal requirement
for them, but if it’s more than 0 then thecompany also provides an earning
schedule. At some companies, they allocate all PTO at the beginning of the
year. At others, they allocate a prorated amount per pay period. For example,
say you have 12 PTO days and are paid twice monthly. You’ll “earn” 1 PTO day
per month, or half a day (4 hours) per pay period.

You can then either roll them over and stockpile them, or take them. A lot of
people take less vacation than they earn, and when they terminate employment
they have an accrued balance. The company is required in some jurisdictions to
convert this accrued/“earned” PTO time into their equivalent salary for that
amount of time and pay it out as a lump sum.

[1] Startups and other companies that advertise “unlimited” vacation are
different. Unlimited is really a euphamism for 0, but with an explicit
agreement to still let you take “unlimited” days off even without having any
days accrued. Since you don’t accrue any days, they don’t owe you for any when
you leave.

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pm24601
Evernote has gives $1000 for taking a vacation at least 5 days off.

Irregardless of vacation policy, the manager or CEO sets the tone about
work/life balance with vacation just being a part of the conversation.

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basdp
From your timesheet I see that there are more people taking more than 20 days
off, than not. This seems to contradict your premise..?

~~~
ricardobeat
The line numbers don't start at zero. The guy on the left has 9 days (spot
on), the rightmost 21.

By the way this post is from May 2016! I wonder how they are doing by now.

~~~
unreal37
You can see their vacation spreadsheet as it's public!

[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1EhvYITqDk-
vGzM9yy1uS...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1EhvYITqDk-
vGzM9yy1uSKE7pp9Whnu1VB7e5fjMqEkM/edit#gid=1840725625)

