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I'm middle aged, a Gen X'er. I've always taken time off, on my schedule. "I'm taking this Friday off." No reason the Boss needs to be aware of, I won't be in th

I'm middle aged, a Gen X'er. I've always taken time off, on my schedule. "I'm taking this Friday off." No reason the Boss needs to be aware of, I won't be in the office. I'm sensitive to the calendar and deadlines. "Sick. Not coming in today." This one should be obvious - is there some overriding concern that Boss wants to risk contaminating the entire office? I hope not... This whole "asking for permission" thing bugs me. Sure, there might need to be a conversation if something in my personal life comes up and me taking tomorrow off to deal with it would impact an important meeting or a deadline. But anything in advance, and especially well in advance, is me courteously informing Boss that I won't be available to the company on that day/week/whatever.

meej 7y ago
Another GenXer here. My first meeting with my team's manager at my first job out of college, he was very clear: you don't need to ask for time off, you tell us when you'll be out, and you don't need to tell anyone or take any PTO if it's going to be for less than two hours. More people need to hear this, it seems.
ticmasta 7y ago
I'm a middle aged manager with several brand-new grad hires. I try to be open, accommodating and flexible; it does not work. They are one of: 1. confused and frustrated without a (rather strict) set of baseline rules to guide them, 2. push to the boundaries of my flexibility to see how much they can get away with (not unlike my pre-teen kids) 3. Totally oblivious/naive about what is acceptable in the broader corporate-esque working world - Example: Will the company buy me a laptop [to attend a one day bootcamp]? I guess it makes me a crusty old fart, but I have no interest in advancing this style of work management and will be long gone before I'm forced to accept this new world
- delinka 7y ago
  I don't really want to have a debate about this on HN, but I do have some points of curiosity: What kinds of work are you hiring for? Are these young/newly minted CS grads looking for SW jobs? If they're new grads, they're gonna push boundaries - academia is so different from the workforce. The naivety I'm sure is just inexperience. Acting like a mentor instead of a Corporate Suit can rectify their expectations. P.S. On equipment purchases: my last three companies provided laptops as daily workstations (is this uncommon?) - they went home every night (yay business continuity policy), came to the office every morning. And traveled to conferences and bootcamps as needed. If your company is providing desktops, I think it comes down to whether this one-day bootcamp business is a personal enrichment exercise (at the employee's expense) or whether the company is compelling attendance. Obviously in the first case, the employee should be using their own hardware - in this case, maybe it's a bit entitled to expect a hardware purchase for the event.
ghaff 7y ago
I get that some types of teams have to coordinate coverage. But, yeah, I’ve always tried to be aware of what looked to be better and worse times over the next 6-12 months and just made time off plans accordingly. This is over the course of about 40 years.

meej 7y ago

Another GenXer here. My first meeting with my team's manager at my first job out of college, he was very clear: you don't need to ask for time off, you tell us when you'll be out, and you don't need to tell anyone or take any PTO if it's going to be for less than two hours. More people need to hear this, it seems.

ticmasta 7y ago

I'm a middle aged manager with several brand-new grad hires. I try to be open, accommodating and flexible; it does not work. They are one of: 1. confused and frustrated without a (rather strict) set of baseline rules to guide them, 2. push to the boundaries of my flexibility to see how much they can get away with (not unlike my pre-teen kids) 3. Totally oblivious/naive about what is acceptable in the broader corporate-esque working world - Example: Will the company buy me a laptop [to attend a one day bootcamp]? I guess it makes me a crusty old fart, but I have no interest in advancing this style of work management and will be long gone before I'm forced to accept this new world

delinka 7y ago
I don't really want to have a debate about this on HN, but I do have some points of curiosity: What kinds of work are you hiring for? Are these young/newly minted CS grads looking for SW jobs? If they're new grads, they're gonna push boundaries - academia is so different from the workforce. The naivety I'm sure is just inexperience. Acting like a mentor instead of a Corporate Suit can rectify their expectations. P.S. On equipment purchases: my last three companies provided laptops as daily workstations (is this uncommon?) - they went home every night (yay business continuity policy), came to the office every morning. And traveled to conferences and bootcamps as needed. If your company is providing desktops, I think it comes down to whether this one-day bootcamp business is a personal enrichment exercise (at the employee's expense) or whether the company is compelling attendance. Obviously in the first case, the employee should be using their own hardware - in this case, maybe it's a bit entitled to expect a hardware purchase for the event.

ghaff 7y ago

I get that some types of teams have to coordinate coverage. But, yeah, I’ve always tried to be aware of what looked to be better and worse times over the next 6-12 months and just made time off plans accordingly. This is over the course of about 40 years.