I get it, you probably hold yourself to quite a high standard and don't think that you need to take a day off or view taking time off as a weakness. But sometimes it's very beneficial to your physical and mental health to have some time out of work.
Now I'm not saying that you should take advantage of the system and have weeks off left, right and centre. I'm saying take the time off that you feel will benefit your health and make you feel better in yourself.
According to shrm.org research consistently showed that, in the US, taking holiday benefitted workers' mental health, lowered stress and improved productivity. It was also pointed out by this study that the majority of workers don't take advantage of their place of work's paid holiday scheme. I've done it myself! In my old retail job my manager was giving me random days off that equated to around two weeks of untaken holiday from the last year. I guess I've always felt that taking time off showed my weakness and that people would judge me for it, which is all of course total rubbish! Another part of this study claimed that a lot of workers said their companies didn't provide an awful lot of information on taking holiday time, something that I found to be true in my old job. In the three years I worked for the company I never knew the correct system to book holiday. I believe this to be the reason why I rarely booked any.
So why did the study show that a clear majority of bosses agreed that time off is beneficial to their employees for a number of reasons? It seems that this is an area that businesses need to work on, considering that 68% of employees reported that, because their companies encouraged taking holiday, they were overall much happier with their job compared to those who had vacation time actively discouraged by their work.
So what do you think? We'd love to hear from you!
Have a wonderful bank holiday!
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