If your business is demanding a lot of your attention, how do you get away from that to take a break to enjoy the peninsula or wherever you want to get away to?
Demanding careers can be stressful, and if you don’t take time to relax every so often, you will get burnt out and make silly mistakes. You may think your business will suffer if you take time off, but actually it is more likely to suffer if you don’t get some time away.
So, how do you make time to get a vacation and get away from the business you own for a while? Here are some suggestions that may help.
Train a Replacement
If your business needs to continue operating while you take e break, then you will have to find someone who can take over for you while you are gone. Make sure it is someone you trust and someone who can handle doing most of the tasks you are used to taking care of yourself. You can train them leading up to your vacation, so that by the time you are ready to take time off, they are ready to take over.
If you keep the goal of vacation in mind, you will be able to focus on training your temporary replacement properly and ensuring they have all the tools they need to handle things in your absence.
Keep in mind that one person does not have to handle all of your duties while you are gone. You can delegate tasks to multiple people so that no one is carrying too much of the workload. Figure out who can do each of the tasks best and assign each duty appropriately so that you have less to worry about.
Try to Avoid Business Calls
You should do everything in your power to keep work separate from your vacation. If possible, take absolutely no business calls and respond to no business emails for the duration of your time away. If you feel like you have to do some of those things, though, then you can at least limit yourself. For instance, you can set aside 30 minutes a day to answer calls and emails and deal with business matters, and then pick one day a week to completely block all of that and enjoy your time off. Make sure your business partners know about the time you have set aside so that they can schedule their calls and questions for that period. You may need to turn off your phone at other times so that you are not interrupted and so that you can fully enjoy your vacation.
Plan in Advance
If you are going to make this vacation work, then you need to set up plans for it well in advance and over-plan as well. Figure out what your business needs to survive while you are gone and plan for the entire length of your absence. Make preparations a long time before your vacation date arrives so that when you get to that date, you are completely ready to back off and leave the business alone.
You should have contingency plans set up and detailed as well. If there is a water leak or a supply shortage in your absence, how will your staff handle that? Be prepared for anything and everything that you can think of. Take stock of what has happened over the last year and how different issues were handled, and then figure out a plan for how to handle them while you are gone.
Also, consider your at-home needs, like cleaning, taking care of pets, and lawn care. Will these things need to be done in your absence? Maybe you could hire a cleaning service with low prices, a pet-sitter, or a landscaper to deal with these things before, after, or during your vacation.
Make Breaks a Part of Your Business Culture
Many business cultures have lengthy hours built into their mindset. They have this idea that work, work, work is the only way to be successful. What happens is that a lot of young entrepreneurs burn themselves out early on and quit the business world in a depressed and tired state. If you don’t want that to happen to you, then you need to build a culture of taking time off. Talk to your staff about how important it is to relax and de-stress and how taking vacations is expected. Talk to your business friends and peers about how vacations are vital to having a healthy work life. By promoting balance in your business culture, you will help yourself to have a mindset that is healthier and that allows for you to take time off without feeling guilty.
Budget Your Trip
You may be worried about how much the vacation will cost you and how you will afford that if you are not working for that period. What helps is to budget out your trip in detail. Figure out ahead of time how much money you can spend on accommodations, food, travel, and shopping. If you budget out each aspect of your trip, that will take a lot of the stress out of the process for you and make you feel more at ease about it all. Instead of asking yourself “How will I pay for all this?” you will be able to ask, “What can I do to make the most of my time?”.
You should budget based on what funds you have to work with. If you don’t go overboard in your spending, then you won’t have to come out of vacation feeling stressed about money. If you plan for the vacation well in advance, then you can be saving enough money to make the time enjoyable.
Final Thoughts on Taking a Vacation
We hope these ideas help you to have an enjoyable, stress-free vacation. Just because you have a busy job or you manage a business, that does not mean you should have to forget about taking vacations. Everybody needs a break, and especially those who work really hard.
