Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning.
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is that a working vacation beats working on vacation.
Speaker 1: While getting stuck doing unplanned work on vacation is no
Speaker 1: one's idea of a good time. Proactively planning a trip
Speaker 1: where you plan to work remotely can allow you to
Speaker 1: travel more and have more adventures even without a lot
Speaker 1: of paid time off. In my life, there is a
Speaker 1: lot of gray area between working and not working. Even
Speaker 1: when I am on vacation, I often do a little
Speaker 1: work here and there to keep my business running. However,
Speaker 1: the fact that I am willing to do some work
Speaker 1: on vacation means I am willing to spend far more
Speaker 1: time traveling than I otherwise would. Most years, I take
Speaker 1: the equivalent of six weeks or so away. Sometimes it's
Speaker 1: even more. Because I see this gray area, I am
Speaker 1: a bit less fundamentalist than a lot of work life
Speaker 1: balance experts about the idea that no one should be
Speaker 1: working on vacation. For some people, if you are working,
Speaker 1: it is not a vacation. And yes, if someone is
Speaker 1: forcing you to work during time, you are officially supposed
Speaker 1: to be off. That is a problem. But what if
Speaker 1: you use the ability to work remotely to take more
Speaker 1: time away, or you do vacation like things even if
Speaker 1: you are not officially on vacation. Here's what I mean.
Speaker 1: Let's say you get fifteen days of PTO and you
Speaker 1: use most of these for real, no working vacations. But
Speaker 1: maybe your family wants to spend two weeks at the
Speaker 1: beach over the summer. Rather than burn ten of your
Speaker 1: PTO days to make that happen, you take two days
Speaker 1: as PTO and work a general workday remotely. On the others,
Speaker 1: you can probably control some of your schedule and make
Speaker 1: these days lighter. If they are in summer, they are
Speaker 1: probably lighter anyway. You could have breakfast with your family,
Speaker 1: maybe lunch too. You could knock off around four pm
Speaker 1: to go play on the beach with the family and
Speaker 1: enjoy the sunset and ice cream. Then you'd take Friday,
Speaker 1: Saturday Sunday completely off to have some more concentrated leisure.
Speaker 1: Or here's an idea, you might take let's say Wednesdays
Speaker 1: as your PTO days instead of Fridays. Summer Fridays are
Speaker 1: often low key anyway, so you might be able to
Speaker 1: be on the beach by mid afternoon. In this scenario,
Speaker 1: yes you are working, but it is a working vacation.
Speaker 1: You'll spend many hours per week on leisure activities and
Speaker 1: enjoying family time and the beach, but you are preserved
Speaker 1: having your PTO time for other things. You get two
Speaker 1: more weeks away than you would likely take. I think
Speaker 1: that's worth having a little bit of gray area between
Speaker 1: work and life. Now, obviously, this only works if you
Speaker 1: can guarantee you'll be able to work remotely. Nothing would
Speaker 1: ruin a working vacation like having to go back to
Speaker 1: a faraway office. If you are traveling with family and
Speaker 1: have young kids, you will need to have someone else
Speaker 1: available to watch the kids during your working hours. It
Speaker 1: also really helps if you have some control over your time,
Speaker 1: so you can confine work to core hours rather than
Speaker 1: suddenly getting an urgent eight pm call while you were
Speaker 1: in line at the ice cream parlor. But I imagine
Speaker 1: for many people who are listening to before Breakfast, a
Speaker 1: true working vacation might be possible. While working on vacation
Speaker 1: gets a bad reputation, a working vacation can make a
Speaker 1: lot of adventures and family time possible, it might be
Speaker 1: worth giving it a shot. In the meantime, this is Laura.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening, and here's to making the most of
Speaker 1: our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've
Speaker 1: got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach me at
Speaker 1: Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast is a
Speaker 1: production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia, please visit
Speaker 1: the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.