28 ms·

Good. We're taking all of July off at my company. Why? Because covid was an incredibly hard period for all of us and we as humans need a break. Somehow we all j

by asim 5y ago

Good. We're taking all of July off at my company. Why? Because covid was an incredibly hard period for all of us and we as humans need a break. Somehow we all just seem to expect things to keep going like nothing changed. We all just seem to be expected to gloss over the pains of isolation, potential death and stress of work and life with no separation or boundaries. We made a conscious decision at my place of work to actually acknowledge the difficulties we've all been through and we're just going to take July off, because what else are we going to do? Ignore it? No. We won't do that. I'd advise everyone to try take as much time off as possible this year. If it's available to you, take an extended break. The mental, physical and psychological damage of covid is something we really can't ignore.

fatjokes 5y ago
Company-wide month off sounds amazing. Would you be willing to name it (would be great PR for them). If not, would you give a sense of geography, industry and size?
- keehun 5y ago
  Based on his profile, seems like he is CEO/Founder of his place of work: > I'm Asim Aslam. The Founder CEO of Micro Services, Inc., creator of the open source cloud platform Micro and a technologist by training.
- jedimastert 5y ago
  Took a look at their bio, then website, they appear to be "The Founder CEO of Micro Services, Inc."
- dnate 5y ago
  Size of 9 employees according to linkedin
- Jommi 5y ago
  this happens at every company in most nordic countries. You take 1-2 months of every summer.
silicon2401 5y ago
This is a very subjective statement. The pandemic has been bar none the best period of my life. Increased physical and social distance from other people, no need to emote in public thanks to masks, no need to commute, greater accommodation for non-social options like self-checkouts. My physical and mental health have skyrocketed, and as a result I feel like I've been on vacation for a year and half, despite only taking about 3 days of vacation the entire time and starting a new and more intense job. Those of you who have found the slightly over a year duration of the pandemic difficult have gotten a sample of how miserable pre-pandemic life was for those of us who are more introverted or misanthropic.
- shmel 5y ago
  I keep hearing this over and over. I get it, some people are fairly introverted, some really enjoy WFH. But what stopped you from distancing from people and using self-checkouts before the pandemic? If you hate people, fine, just go home straight after work, you aren't obligated to hang out with anyone. It is not like the government would fine you for coming home before 11pm, right?
  - geerlingguy 5y ago
    Not speaking to the other points, but I did notice many stores completely reconfigured the checkouts in my area; before the pandemic there were few very tiny self checkout stalls, and there was always a long line of people with just a few items. Now almost all the aisles are self-checkout and are friendlier to larger cart-fulls like I buy (having a few kids means there's no such thing as a quick trip with a hand basket anymore...).
  - zerkten 5y ago
    > But what stopped you from distancing from people and using self-checkouts before the pandemic? This was not uniformly accepted behaviour. Yes, some people could find roles and a situation where this was possible before, but most couldn't. Stores didn't really optimize for a self-check out experience. The social pressure in many organizations and communities to conform was high and there was no escape. If you you wanted to work at a tech company or startup you would have to accept open offices, happy hours, and other social requires to a great extent. It was not acceptable to skip many events and you had no option to switch your working environment in the office because the only option was open space. The pandemic has forced a change, most importantly, in a relatively uniform manner. I'm not making the argument that we should all accept this other extreme. Just as we return to normality we should consider the experiences of others, and try to make some reasonable adaptations.
ezxCKAz4W 5y ago
> Because covid was an incredibly hard period for all of us and we as humans need a break. While true and a good thing, i cannot simply take a step back, look at the whole picture and feel this feels a bit awakward. The op (guessing) is perhaps a lucky few that got to keep their jobs through the pandemic, spend more time with family and were baking breads and indulging in gardening etc. This while millions lost their jobs and health insurance, relied on govt assistance or pick a job like a cashier where you constantly met people during a pandemic, while day cares and achools were closed. And feels like we expect the rest of the world to move on like nothing else happened while feel like I need a month's break.
baud147258 5y ago
Maybe it's because I already got a lot of PTO (7 weeks a years, which is standard on this side of the Atlantic), but mandating time off for all the company seems a bit much over letting employee choose when they want to take some PTO
- disgruntledphd2 5y ago
  That is not standard in Europe. Speaking for Ireland and the UK, I believe that the standard is 4 weeks (20 days) plus public holidays. I would absolutely love it if this became standard, though ;)
- balfirevic 5y ago
  > 7 weeks a years, which is standard on this side of the Atlantic It's not, although it might be in your particular country.
dominotw 5y ago
> Because covid was an incredibly hard period for all of us Not really. Most of my family and friends did fine. Whole bunch of them changed to better jobs due to tech job boom, worked from home, started gardening projects, learnt tennis ect. It was more than awesome for whole bunch of ppl.
dandersh 5y ago
God I wished I worked there. Even without Covid this past year would have been tremendously hard on me. When I've talked to my manager about what I've been going through and explaining how it's impacted my performance I get the "Yea it's been a rough year for everyone" bit. Finally we reach a point where both the pandemic and everything else has settled down and I'm too burnt out and depressed to enjoy it.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
> Because covid was an incredibly hard period for all of us and we as humans need a break. Ok. Then let's give one to the essential workers who didn't get a break and had to risk their health going in to work every day, delivering food to the WFH crowd, dealing with anti-maskers, delivering packages to the WFH crowd, etc.
Taylor_OD 5y ago
Yeah I wish more companies would give an extra week of pto this year. Like I didn't leave my house for a year and a half and worked pretty much that whole time without a break while the world felt like it was falling apart. Can I an extra week to make up for that?
epage 5y ago
My company has been springkling extra days off throughout the year ("day for me") and its been great. As someone with a family, we've been mostly doing ok through the pandemic. The biggest stresser for us is the lack of babysitting / kid swaps for being able to get project or personal time in (e.g. my half bath remodel has sat untouched for 6 months now).
daybadone 5y ago
What would I do with time off? Thanks to questioning things and generally being a blunt person I no longer have anyone willing to speak to me outside of work colleagues who must do so for work. Family and partner all gone before covid. I've been here in a room by myself wfh doing nothing else, seeing noone, since marchc 2020 and there is now noone to see. Time off MEANS NOTHING now. No-one can give me back my life from 2019, and no-one who supportes the anti covid measures that stripped away everything else is likely to consider it a loss. I have nothing but work left. I also do not like my job and seriously struggle to focus for more than a minute as it's all so FUCKING MEANINGLESS.

by asim 5y ago

fatjokes 5y ago

Company-wide month off sounds amazing. Would you be willing to name it (would be great PR for them). If not, would you give a sense of geography, industry and size?

keehun 5y ago
Based on his profile, seems like he is CEO/Founder of his place of work: > I'm Asim Aslam. The Founder CEO of Micro Services, Inc., creator of the open source cloud platform Micro and a technologist by training.
jedimastert 5y ago
Took a look at their bio, then website, they appear to be "The Founder CEO of Micro Services, Inc."
dnate 5y ago
Size of 9 employees according to linkedin
Jommi 5y ago
this happens at every company in most nordic countries. You take 1-2 months of every summer.

silicon2401 5y ago

This is a very subjective statement. The pandemic has been bar none the best period of my life. Increased physical and social distance from other people, no need to emote in public thanks to masks, no need to commute, greater accommodation for non-social options like self-checkouts. My physical and mental health have skyrocketed, and as a result I feel like I've been on vacation for a year and half, despite only taking about 3 days of vacation the entire time and starting a new and more intense job. Those of you who have found the slightly over a year duration of the pandemic difficult have gotten a sample of how miserable pre-pandemic life was for those of us who are more introverted or misanthropic.

shmel 5y ago
I keep hearing this over and over. I get it, some people are fairly introverted, some really enjoy WFH. But what stopped you from distancing from people and using self-checkouts before the pandemic? If you hate people, fine, just go home straight after work, you aren't obligated to hang out with anyone. It is not like the government would fine you for coming home before 11pm, right?
- geerlingguy 5y ago
  Not speaking to the other points, but I did notice many stores completely reconfigured the checkouts in my area; before the pandemic there were few very tiny self checkout stalls, and there was always a long line of people with just a few items. Now almost all the aisles are self-checkout and are friendlier to larger cart-fulls like I buy (having a few kids means there's no such thing as a quick trip with a hand basket anymore...).
- zerkten 5y ago
  > But what stopped you from distancing from people and using self-checkouts before the pandemic? This was not uniformly accepted behaviour. Yes, some people could find roles and a situation where this was possible before, but most couldn't. Stores didn't really optimize for a self-check out experience. The social pressure in many organizations and communities to conform was high and there was no escape. If you you wanted to work at a tech company or startup you would have to accept open offices, happy hours, and other social requires to a great extent. It was not acceptable to skip many events and you had no option to switch your working environment in the office because the only option was open space. The pandemic has forced a change, most importantly, in a relatively uniform manner. I'm not making the argument that we should all accept this other extreme. Just as we return to normality we should consider the experiences of others, and try to make some reasonable adaptations.

ezxCKAz4W 5y ago

> Because covid was an incredibly hard period for all of us and we as humans need a break. While true and a good thing, i cannot simply take a step back, look at the whole picture and feel this feels a bit awakward. The op (guessing) is perhaps a lucky few that got to keep their jobs through the pandemic, spend more time with family and were baking breads and indulging in gardening etc. This while millions lost their jobs and health insurance, relied on govt assistance or pick a job like a cashier where you constantly met people during a pandemic, while day cares and achools were closed. And feels like we expect the rest of the world to move on like nothing else happened while feel like I need a month's break.

baud147258 5y ago

Maybe it's because I already got a lot of PTO (7 weeks a years, which is standard on this side of the Atlantic), but mandating time off for all the company seems a bit much over letting employee choose when they want to take some PTO

disgruntledphd2 5y ago
That is not standard in Europe. Speaking for Ireland and the UK, I believe that the standard is 4 weeks (20 days) plus public holidays. I would absolutely love it if this became standard, though ;)
balfirevic 5y ago
> 7 weeks a years, which is standard on this side of the Atlantic It's not, although it might be in your particular country.

dominotw 5y ago

> Because covid was an incredibly hard period for all of us Not really. Most of my family and friends did fine. Whole bunch of them changed to better jobs due to tech job boom, worked from home, started gardening projects, learnt tennis ect. It was more than awesome for whole bunch of ppl.

dandersh 5y ago

God I wished I worked there. Even without Covid this past year would have been tremendously hard on me. When I've talked to my manager about what I've been going through and explaining how it's impacted my performance I get the "Yea it's been a rough year for everyone" bit. Finally we reach a point where both the pandemic and everything else has settled down and I'm too burnt out and depressed to enjoy it.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago

> Because covid was an incredibly hard period for all of us and we as humans need a break. Ok. Then let's give one to the essential workers who didn't get a break and had to risk their health going in to work every day, delivering food to the WFH crowd, dealing with anti-maskers, delivering packages to the WFH crowd, etc.

Taylor_OD 5y ago

Yeah I wish more companies would give an extra week of pto this year. Like I didn't leave my house for a year and a half and worked pretty much that whole time without a break while the world felt like it was falling apart. Can I an extra week to make up for that?

epage 5y ago

My company has been springkling extra days off throughout the year ("day for me") and its been great. As someone with a family, we've been mostly doing ok through the pandemic. The biggest stresser for us is the lack of babysitting / kid swaps for being able to get project or personal time in (e.g. my half bath remodel has sat untouched for 6 months now).

daybadone 5y ago

What would I do with time off? Thanks to questioning things and generally being a blunt person I no longer have anyone willing to speak to me outside of work colleagues who must do so for work. Family and partner all gone before covid. I've been here in a room by myself wfh doing nothing else, seeing noone, since marchc 2020 and there is now noone to see. Time off MEANS NOTHING now. No-one can give me back my life from 2019, and no-one who supportes the anti covid measures that stripped away everything else is likely to consider it a loss. I have nothing but work left. I also do not like my job and seriously struggle to focus for more than a minute as it's all so FUCKING MEANINGLESS.