Hi, ladies, how are we doing today? Hi, I'm doing well.
Awesome, awesome. Today we've got Victoria Right and Ellie Bright joining us little DT chat to discuss the importance of PTO and vacation time versus sick time. Ladies, I know, you know, so many different companies out there have different policies, procedures, PTO vacation, different leaves, what are your thoughts on really how to manage taking vacation time? If your vacation is the same as sick time? Or, you know, do you actually walk through your illness? So you can actually take a vacation?
Yeah, you know, I think, for me, first and foremost, I think every company should be setting them separately.
Yeah.
I think no one can control when they're going to get sick, you can control it to a certain extent, like when you're going to need PTO, right? But there are still companies that kind of just lump it all together. Usually, my point of view as an HR person is trying to understand, hey, if we're lumping it all together, the bank should be bigger, right?
Yeah.
Like we the fact that somebody's gonna be sick unexpectedly, especially in the COVID world, like you can't control your exposure, or, you know, if you've got kids and they've got germs, it's, you can't put a number on it. Right?
Absolutely.
So you know, I think as much as I, for myself sometimes have worked through illnesses, when I probably shouldn't have, I never recommend that. I think you're not going to produce your best work, you're going to prolong your illness, it's not going to do anything good for your mental health. So I always recommend speaking to your manager, and saying, Listen, I'm not feeling well, I'm gonna, you know, take the day, take half whatever it is, I'm gonna go to the doctor,
do whatever you need to do. And, you know, if you also want to balance that with your vacation time, I think it's just making that conscious effort to speak to your manager and say, like, listen, I genuinely am not feeling well. I also have a trip coming up, that's been planned for whatever, at the end of next month, whatever it is. And I think if your managers are giving you pushback on that, that's when you can kind of
escalate those things. Because any company that really understands sick policy, and the reason behind PTO, and sick time, and all of that together, shouldn't be able to make allowances, there are things that come up that nobody can preserve. So I don't want anyone out there working because they feel like they can't do anything else. If they if they use up the time. I think it really has to be kind of an opportunity to manage upward, in a way as well.
Yeah, absolutely. Ellie, what do you think?
Yeah, it's interesting. And I totally agree. And I think they're, I think they should be separate. I think you should have the I mean, maybe if, you know, by the end of the year, or you, you know, have three sick days left, obviously, we can kind of transfer that over to PTO, as opposed to sick time. But I do
think it is interesting. There are certain industries and certain jobs where sick time and vacation time are, yes, obviously the benefit, but it's sometimes hard when your commission or anything, like their bonus is attached to your performance and how I think in a lot of like sales jobs, or even in recruiting or account management or anything like that, it's hard when you take three days off, and your
business falls behind. And then therefore you can't make money and sometimes people I know I felt this way I know former co workers have felt the way where it's hard to stop and say I need to take time because there are so many other people that are looking at you being like this work needs to get done. I think it's interesting in those types of jobs, knowing that your output directly affects the money that you make, and so it's hard to step back and take that
time for yourself. Just kind of an interesting different aspect to that. I think a lot of people struggle with that. But yeah, again, I feel the same way it's it's okay to take sick time it's okay to take mental health days and take care of yourself but yeah, it's definitely an interesting twist when it's so correlated to you know, the potential money that you can make.
Yeah, and I also agreed to it's difficult if sick time and PTO/vacation time are all one because you know, as a as a mom with two kids, my kids get sick - Guess who's home?
Yeah.
This one is, you know, guess who needs to you know, take that time. So it's hard. And I have to say to, you know, kids, even in the school systems, they have kids are getting sick more nowadays after COVID. Individuals are getting sick more. And, you know, it's you can't determine how many sick days you're going to need, right? But it is equally as important to take those sick days and take care of yourself. However, PTO and vacation time, you need that too, you know.
Yeah.
Because that's also a form of of self care. It's a form of being able to take a mental health day and take that vacation so that you
can come back regenerated. So I feel that it's tough out there for when we're just talking about this topic, because you're right Ellie too, you know, taking time off, depending on what your role is, if your role is heavily dependent on commission, you do fall back, there's lots of competition out there so that if you're not in the office working, people will go elsewhere, people will get hired, the days do go on, right?
So it's almost like it's hard, because you need to take your sick time, you should be taking your vacation and PTO time. And it's how do you how do you break? How do you break through that so that you aren't working through your sick time, or you aren't working through being sick? And you can take care of that, but also go on that vacation? Right?
Yeah, I think companies really need to evaluate their infrastructure, just from a headcount perspective in that way. If somebody has a one person team, and a one person operation, and nobody else is trained to, at least at a very basic level, kind of do their their back end admin for them, right?
Yup.
And they and something happens to them, that doesn't just disrupt that person, it disrupts the entire business, right? And that's not that person's fault that the department is not staffed more. So it's also making sure like, hey, if I am sick unexpectedly, or I do have a vacation plan, like who actually is going to be able to at least answer emails in my absence? Or since the basic level of a customer call
for me, right? So you, the business has have to think about these things at a larger level, which again, I think, for me is another reason why you can't put them all in one book, right? Like they have to be two very separate things. Or, if you're going to do it, make it unlimited, so that people don't feel like they're running out of something.
Yep.
You have to plan. Because even if it takes like, Hey, I know I have a trip. At the end of the month, I'm going to spend a couple of days the week before sitting down with somebody who works adjacent.
And prepping - yup.
Just kind of giving them the rundown of like, here's a list of things that I need your help with, I don't need you to do my job for me, but like, can you just spot check these things? Right?
Yup.
I think having a system like that is so important. I think also the world that we're looking in, and the world we're living in, sorry, based on what you said, Tara, being a parent, just being a human gets lifework balance.
Yeah.
It's that true flexibility to work from anywhere whenever you need to. So if your kid is sick, if you're going to a doctor's appointment for something like if I'm going to be out for an hour, two hours, I should be able to come home and finish the backend admin of my job if I want to, and I can.
Yeah.
At the day without somebody feeling like, that's a sin, and I can't do that.
Or you're stealing a PTO day.
Right - exactly.
You're trying to write, you know, trying to cut one off or something, you know? (laughs)
Right, right. Exactly. And if I have to go get an oil change, like I've worked from the dealership before.
Yup!
Emails, while I'm waiting, I've got nothing else to do. I'm waiting for my car, right?
Yeah.
We need to be able to have an infrastructure as a business that can account for all of those different things. So if you are going to limit it for whatever reason, there is a way around it. And I think even the same thing when you look at from a federal and state government level of just FMLA right?
Yup.
There are different regulations around very unexpected FMLA. And what is the proper procedure with going in for that? If we can understand that that can be unexpected. We need to understand that getting sick is unexpected, caring for a sick child, a sick partner. Parent - anything.
Yeah. So it's about designing the infrastructure, but as the employee not being afraid, and it's really hard, but I think just being honest with your manager and your co workers and saying like, my life outside of this is maybe in shambles right now and like, I'm gonna lean on you heavily, right? You've got a good team that can support you through that.
Yeah.
I mean, anybody should, right. But being able to lean on other people is so important.
100% I could not agree more with you. Go ahead, Ellie.
Yeah. And I'm gonna say, I think, you know, this environment has certainly changed since COVID, too, with work from home, you know, someone, I you can maybe hear it in my nose, but I was sick last week. And I was thinking to myself, I'm like, Well, I'm, I'm sitting at home, like, I'm on my couch, like, why can't I pick up my laptop and do some things, you know? But I do think there's a difference between, you know, hey, I'm actively trying to get
better. And hey, I'm still trying to give 50% to getting better and 50% to my job. And, you know, I could give 100% to the couch,
(laughs) and then the next day feel 100% Better, you know, so I think it, we have to kind of get rid of this, like, work guilt or like corporate guilt that we have that we like, Oh, our corporations or our our companies something because the likelihood of the world still continuing to turn if you take a
sick day is pretty good. So like you said, just being able to have that humanity and relationship with your team and with your management to say, I need this time, I'm going to take it, I will make sure that everything is in place so that things will go smoothly in my absence. I think that's the only way that you know, it will be successful, like you said, having that infrastructure in place to make sure that everyone is taken care of when you have to step out.
I think too what's really important, is while you're interviewing, make sure to ask questions like that. Because if somebody starts at a brand new job, and month two, they get sick, but then they're having the work guilt and trying to work through it and then get even more sick, like, they're not going to have that that trust.
Yeah.
Or that comfort, to maybe say to their hiring manager or their boss and say, Listen, you know, I need to take a couple of days. And I think that that's important to put out there to candidate interviewing is to make sure you ask those questions, especially Victoria, if it's a one person team. If you're interviewing to be the main
Yeah. person all in on this team for this team, in this role, what does happen when in your absence? How does the team or the company around you continue in, you know, in their business days, if you want to take PTO, if you want to take a vacation? And then if you have to take your sick days you know? I think it's there's also the case of the the needs and wants, right?
And it's understanding that but interviewing, it should start from before you even start to work with a company because that's so important as a as a human to know that you will be 100% supported no matter what. Yeah, more and more companies are actually listing it on their job descriptions, unlimited PTO, or like this amount of sick time, this amount of vacation time, right? Because it's beyond just a perk and benefit now.
Yeah.
It actually is a necessity that people need. I have a family member who has a very severe illness where staring at a computer screen for too long actually will trigger a migraine, making her unable to work. So you can't have this well, oh, push through it all of the time. Because there's there's times she can and that makes it worse, right?
Yeah.
So you have to really think about it. And I think, you know, companies need to take a step back self reflect.
Totally.
To build that in order to support their people effectively. And that creates a more engaged workforce. If I don't know that I can step away and no one's going to the world will not end the sky will not fall, the world keeps turning as Ellie said, like, I'm more excited to then come back to work and be like, Wow, thank you so much for letting me do that.
Yeah. Awesome.
Talk about employee experience. It's like, you want people that want to work for you, but know that they can take off you know? I think that's the awesome thing about the success of a flexible PTO. It's like you know that you get your work done and you can take off and you know, you're more likely to get that done knowing that you have the flexibility to take care of yourself and your
family. So I am a big advocate of that mostly because, you know, I would like to spend Fridays in the summer on the beach.
(laughs)
But, you know, I think it's, it's just good to know that you are trusted as an employee to get what you need to get done. And that just furthers that level of trust.
Yeah, I think sometimes people forget you're hiring an adult.
Right? (laughs)
You're not hiring a toddle - We're all adults. You have to ask and verify that I'm 18 years of age to come and work for you. And I've got my work authorization, right? Let me be an adult, let me make it and you know, take a disciplinary measure if you need to, when somebody has proven that they need one, but I mean I think the days of really micromanaging things that should not be micromanaged are behind
And what one thing we'll kind of wrap up with is us. something that somebody said to me, I want to say just probably about a year ago, it's not work life balance anymore. It's just life balance.
Yeah.
Because we are living and working all within the same realm of life. There's no separation anymore. So if we can all really continue to start looking at working from home and just balancing life in general. I think that that really pulls together more supportive cultures, as well as making sure you just stay open with communication with your team, with your colleagues, with your boss with just everybody. Whether you're the employee or the employer.
Absolutely.
Love it.
Awesome. Ladies, thank you for joining us on this DT chat today. Have a great day. Okay.
Thank you too.