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Not only is it not the answer, vacation can actually be a contributor to burnout, IME. In my current role, taking PTO is a legitimate punishment. If I take a d

Not only is it not the answer, vacation can actually be a contributor to burnout, IME. In my current role, taking PTO is a legitimate punishment. If I take a day off, there is nobody else on my team who has capacity to pick up my work in my absence. When I return from PTO, not only do I now have double the amount of work to catch up on, but I also have 15 emails from angry managers upset that I didn't get to their request sooner. "you should just take some vacation" is often a convenient escape hatch for managers that want to seem like they're helping, but without actually putting any effort into solving the problems that make people want to escape from work in the first place.

dQw4w9WgXcQ 5y ago
Weird. If you're the king of the jungle then it doesn't matter what your managers or their emails or schedules say, now does it? Take your PTO and let the rabble do their rabbling, they can't fire you or else they'd be getting rid of by far the best man on their team and they wouldn't want that, right?
stuff4ben 5y ago
If you can't afford to take a day off, then that's on you my friend. The people on your team can take up your slack if you let them. I work for someone just like you. He hoards all of the meetings and knowledge and "power" (for lack of a better word). When he goes on PTO, things halt when they shouldn't. Me and others on my squad can pick up the slack. But gatekeeping and knowledge-hoarding prevent us from helping out. Not a big deal for me, but I'm sure my squad-lead will get burned out eventually. I have warned him about that in our 1:1's, but nothings changed...
- awsthro00945 5y ago
  >If you can't afford to take a day off, then that's on you my friend. The people on your team can take up your slack if you let them. I work for someone just like you. He hoards all of the meetings and knowledge and "power" (for lack of a better word). Lmao. Nobody else on my team can take up slack because they have literally no space on their calendar. My team is currently at half of our target headcount. Every person is currently working 60 hour weeks and is still behind. "If I let them"? "hoarding meetings"? Please, keep your assumptions about my workstyle to yourself. I literally beg my teammates and managers to join my meetings and share the load, but nobody has the time.
  - verve_rat 5y ago
    Stop killing yourself for someone else's profit. If your team is at 50% head count, then your team should be doing 50% (or less) of its expected work.
    - awsthro00945 5y ago
      We already are doing less than 50% of our expected work. That doesn't mean that the problems suddenly go away, and typically just makes things worse.
    - le-mark 5y ago
      Some people like being martyrs and enjoy their drama. Lack of head count? It’s a business problem, a management problem, not my problem.
  - stuff4ben 5y ago
    riiiighhhtt.... If it's that bad, you really should be looking elsewhere. But it's probably not that bad and you're just trying to save face for some HN karma. If you are that good you'd have no problem finding another job. But continue to play the victim here, no one really cares.
    - awsthro00945 5y ago
      Save face? Are you under the impression that I have something to prove, or care about what you or HN thinks? This isn't reddit, I don't make comments with the intention of getting "upvotes" nor do I care how many I get. I posted a comment about vacation on a thread about vacation, trying to start up discussion. Then you came along and made a dumbass assumption about a situation you clearly have no insight or actual knowledge of, and something that does not at all contribute to the discussion at hand. Go read my comment history and you'll see I'm not shy about the fact that I am looking for other jobs, but I'm waiting out until my RSUs vest before leaving my current place. In the mean time, take your negative comments and "karma whoring" attitude back to reddit, it's not welcome here.

dQw4w9WgXcQ 5y ago

Weird. If you're the king of the jungle then it doesn't matter what your managers or their emails or schedules say, now does it? Take your PTO and let the rabble do their rabbling, they can't fire you or else they'd be getting rid of by far the best man on their team and they wouldn't want that, right?

stuff4ben 5y ago

If you can't afford to take a day off, then that's on you my friend. The people on your team can take up your slack if you let them. I work for someone just like you. He hoards all of the meetings and knowledge and "power" (for lack of a better word). When he goes on PTO, things halt when they shouldn't. Me and others on my squad can pick up the slack. But gatekeeping and knowledge-hoarding prevent us from helping out. Not a big deal for me, but I'm sure my squad-lead will get burned out eventually. I have warned him about that in our 1:1's, but nothings changed...

awsthro00945 5y ago
>If you can't afford to take a day off, then that's on you my friend. The people on your team can take up your slack if you let them. I work for someone just like you. He hoards all of the meetings and knowledge and "power" (for lack of a better word). Lmao. Nobody else on my team can take up slack because they have literally no space on their calendar. My team is currently at half of our target headcount. Every person is currently working 60 hour weeks and is still behind. "If I let them"? "hoarding meetings"? Please, keep your assumptions about my workstyle to yourself. I literally beg my teammates and managers to join my meetings and share the load, but nobody has the time.
- verve_rat 5y ago
  Stop killing yourself for someone else's profit. If your team is at 50% head count, then your team should be doing 50% (or less) of its expected work.
  - awsthro00945 5y ago
    We already are doing less than 50% of our expected work. That doesn't mean that the problems suddenly go away, and typically just makes things worse.
  - le-mark 5y ago
    Some people like being martyrs and enjoy their drama. Lack of head count? It’s a business problem, a management problem, not my problem.
- stuff4ben 5y ago
  riiiighhhtt.... If it's that bad, you really should be looking elsewhere. But it's probably not that bad and you're just trying to save face for some HN karma. If you are that good you'd have no problem finding another job. But continue to play the victim here, no one really cares.
  - awsthro00945 5y ago
    Save face? Are you under the impression that I have something to prove, or care about what you or HN thinks? This isn't reddit, I don't make comments with the intention of getting "upvotes" nor do I care how many I get. I posted a comment about vacation on a thread about vacation, trying to start up discussion. Then you came along and made a dumbass assumption about a situation you clearly have no insight or actual knowledge of, and something that does not at all contribute to the discussion at hand. Go read my comment history and you'll see I'm not shy about the fact that I am looking for other jobs, but I'm waiting out until my RSUs vest before leaving my current place. In the mean time, take your negative comments and "karma whoring" attitude back to reddit, it's not welcome here.