“My work continues to pile up while I’m gone, so I’m more stressed if I force myself to take time away.”
This is often true whether or not you actually need the time away. I think this can sometimes be addressed at the team level, either by adjusting expectations about what will be achieved in a particular quarter or year, or by building extra capacity into the team so that everyone’s work can be covered by someone else when they’re away and no one comes back to a huge backlog.
I probably should have mentioned that I’m Head of Events at CEA, so I’m setting the expectations and ambition level. It is much easier for me to adjust work capacity for other teammates, but I’m choosing between doing some things myself or them not happening. It is true that I could decide to be less ambitious, but I don’t want to :)
I have been building lots of capacity on the team this year (maybe quadrupled FTEs on the Events Team?), but we’ve also added a Retreats Program and Community Events Portfolio, scaled EAG, etc. Hiring for the team has probably been the biggest thing to take my time this year, and it is often time-sensitive because people need to know whether they are a fit. Events are also time-sensitive: an event has a set date, so it comes whether you’re ready or not.
I think it would be sad if I decided to scale down EAG or host some number of fewer events or miss a hire because I think I’m supposed to take time off, even if I wasn’t finding it particularly restful. All that said, I’m taking time off this week to go visit my niece for her first birthday!
“My work continues to pile up while I’m gone, so I’m more stressed if I force myself to take time away.”
This is often true whether or not you actually need the time away. I think this can sometimes be addressed at the team level, either by adjusting expectations about what will be achieved in a particular quarter or year, or by building extra capacity into the team so that everyone’s work can be covered by someone else when they’re away and no one comes back to a huge backlog.
I probably should have mentioned that I’m Head of Events at CEA, so I’m setting the expectations and ambition level. It is much easier for me to adjust work capacity for other teammates, but I’m choosing between doing some things myself or them not happening. It is true that I could decide to be less ambitious, but I don’t want to :)
I have been building lots of capacity on the team this year (maybe quadrupled FTEs on the Events Team?), but we’ve also added a Retreats Program and Community Events Portfolio, scaled EAG, etc. Hiring for the team has probably been the biggest thing to take my time this year, and it is often time-sensitive because people need to know whether they are a fit. Events are also time-sensitive: an event has a set date, so it comes whether you’re ready or not.
I think it would be sad if I decided to scale down EAG or host some number of fewer events or miss a hire because I think I’m supposed to take time off, even if I wasn’t finding it particularly restful. All that said, I’m taking time off this week to go visit my niece for her first birthday!