It's Time to Take a Vacation

When you have a job, you earn a certain number of vacation days each year. In some companies, they even roll over year to year, so you can stockpile them as you wish.

But when you’re a Virtual Assistant working for yourself, how many vacation days do you “get” each year? 

The good news is that you get to decide.

The bad news, I’ve found, is that that same freedom can make things difficult. I can’t tell you how many vacations I’ve worked “just a little each day” to keep everyone happy and things on track.

But completely unplugging is important for your mental health and the quality of your work.

Here are some tips for taking days off:

1. Plan ahead. As VA’s, some of our work just lands in our inboxes unexpectedly. Other work is predictable. When you know you’re taking days off, make sure you handle your predictable work as far in advance as possible. That will reduce your stress and reinforce to your clients that you’re taking care of them, even though you’re taking some time off for yourself.
2. Don’t tell clients too far in advance. That might seem crazy, but I’ve found that if I tell my clients too early, they get confused about how long I’ll be gone and when I’m leaving. The result is that they stop sending me work. It’s mostly because they want to respect my vacation time, but it ends up slowing things down too much. Just let them know about a week before (unless you’re involved in a major project where you’re involved every day!).
3. Use out of office auto-responders. If you’re going to be gone for more than a day, use an auto-responder to let everyone who sends you an email know. Let them know when you’ll return and when they’ll hear from you.
4. Unplug. If you’re going to go to the expense and trouble of going away, GO AWAY! Soak in every minute and reset yourself. We all need this and you’ll be glad you did!

Practicing what I preach, I took Labor Day off, so you’re getting this on Tuesday instead of Monday. Plan those days off. You’ll be happy you did!

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A business workflow and productivity expert with 25 years of experience, RocketGirl Solutions Founder Belinda Wasser is hired by small businesses on a contract basis to act as their part-time, “business manager.”

In addition, she is the Founder of the VA Connection, a professional online community with the goal of educating and connecting independent virtual assistants around the world. Join her free online classroom here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/thevaconnection/