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Comment by maest | Hacker News Reader

The novelty here is that (almost) the entire company is getting time off, but it doesn't justify why. The closest thing to a reason is

> Since everyone is off at the same time, that means workers aren't inundated by emails, meeting notes and project requests piling up in their absence.

Which seems weak, at best.

Also, it's not clear if this week consumes days out of the PTO allowance. If it does, then it's basically the company telling you when to take your time off, which is a worse deal than having the flexibility of taking PTO whenever.

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They aren't the first to be doing this, just the largest so far. I'm aware of a few companies that have done this multiple times over the past year, with similar lines of thought.

I'm not sure why you think justification is required or why it needs to be strong. They are humans, getting some time off, it's as simple as that.

Seems like they have no discipline. In the org I worked mailing or otherwise contacting someone while on holiday was one of the biggest sins. Both ways contact was forbidden. That was really good for recharging as you could switch your mind completely.

great way to recognize bottlenecks in processes too

Exactly, training the employee going under a bus scenario.

That doesn't stop the stuff that goes to multiple people, and work in general piling up.

"To all users of $service, we're deprecating it, please migrate."

"New HR policy"

"[ACTION REQUIRED] Fill out this form if you want to continue to use service X"

"Meeting notes: Global team meeting on Friday"

"All-hands next week - please attend"

You had to log out from email and ideally leave work phone and laptop in the office. You were also given about a week to catch up with stuff. It was pretty good.

Why does that seem weak? One of the annoying things about taking time off is coming back and having to catch up on what you missed. Without that issue, your time off will be less stressful, and you will be less likely to try and check in on what's going on at work.

Everyone? Hmm... that‘s going to be a fascinating week if a bug appears on Monday morning and nobody is in the office to first detect it and second fix it.

So, no, many people will still be at work just because a plattform requires work to stay online.

Oh, the devs and ops backbenchers in Bangalore will still be on...

Because it’s easier than telling people individually to take time off if they need it, because doing so often results in being more stressed because the work piled up and you missed important things when you were away.

You work piles off while people take time off, then it suggests that management is sabotaging peoples vacancies. For most people and situations, whether or piles up or is organizational choice.

> being more stressed because the work piled up

that sounds like a badly managed workplace.

Sure, could be. My main point was just that it’s simpler to give everyone a week off together than come up with some rotation of coverage and make sure nobody falls behind.

Most workplaces are badly managed in my experience.

Maybe the company wants to remind them how unnecessary they are. Not just individually, but also as a group.

Yeah, that must be it. Crush the remainder of morale during the pandemic just as a power exercise.

I'm all for being critical of corporate decisions, but this is going a bit far, isn't it?

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