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Having gone from limited PTO to unlimited really helped me realize that I'm a hoarder. When PTO is limited, I rarely take it, but when I had unlimited I was mu

Having gone from limited PTO to unlimited really helped me realize that I'm a hoarder. When PTO is limited, I rarely take it, but when I had unlimited I was much more liberal about actually using it. I went from average 1-2 weeks per year to 5-6, mostly by taking random days here and there, ducking out early to have a fun afternoon with the kiddo, etc.

RHSeeger 5y ago
I don't understand unlimited PTO. I mean, why not just take every Friday off, then? There is almost never a point at where where there's no work to be done; it's never going to be a case of "as long as you get your work done, you can take time off"... because there's no such thing as "done", just "prioritized".
- mattnewton 5y ago
  If you can be competitive with peers and get enough done to continue progressing in your career with every Friday off, why not? The limit for me has always been my own productivity (and availability for meetings), and I think at a certain role level it's a reasonable expectation that you be measured in outcomes and not time spent at desk.
- fatnoah 5y ago
  There are still expectations on the amount or level of work to be done. If you're meeting those and not blocking others, there's no reason one couldn't take more time off. It's certainly a tricky thing to sort out, though. As you noted, "abuse" is possible, but defining what constitutes abuse is nearly impossible.
TeMPOraL 5y ago
You call it "hoarder", I'd call it "low risk tolerance". I'm sort of the same. I never had unlimited PTO, but I tend to save my time off for cases where I actually need it. Saved my bacon a bunch of times, before I started working remotely, with teams/companies that don't mind me taking off half a day to run some important errands, as long as my total work hours add up to the correct number each month.
- MattGaiser 5y ago
  GP is the opposite. He figures out how to use all his allocated time when he didn't bother to before.

RHSeeger 5y ago

I don't understand unlimited PTO. I mean, why not just take every Friday off, then? There is almost never a point at where where there's no work to be done; it's never going to be a case of "as long as you get your work done, you can take time off"... because there's no such thing as "done", just "prioritized".

mattnewton 5y ago
If you can be competitive with peers and get enough done to continue progressing in your career with every Friday off, why not? The limit for me has always been my own productivity (and availability for meetings), and I think at a certain role level it's a reasonable expectation that you be measured in outcomes and not time spent at desk.
fatnoah 5y ago
There are still expectations on the amount or level of work to be done. If you're meeting those and not blocking others, there's no reason one couldn't take more time off. It's certainly a tricky thing to sort out, though. As you noted, "abuse" is possible, but defining what constitutes abuse is nearly impossible.

TeMPOraL 5y ago

You call it "hoarder", I'd call it "low risk tolerance". I'm sort of the same. I never had unlimited PTO, but I tend to save my time off for cases where I actually need it. Saved my bacon a bunch of times, before I started working remotely, with teams/companies that don't mind me taking off half a day to run some important errands, as long as my total work hours add up to the correct number each month.

MattGaiser 5y ago
GP is the opposite. He figures out how to use all his allocated time when he didn't bother to before.