How To Ensure Summer Vacations Don’t Slow Down Your Firm’s Progress
Summer vacations are a lot of fun; however, if you do not properly plan ahead for either your own or your employees’ absences, they can also be a recipe for disaster.
This is because they can grind your productivity rates to a halt, while also filling your inboxes with messages from concerned clients. It could also mean that important deadlines are missed, especially if cases haven’t been passed on to remaining employees or discussed in enough detail.
With that in mind, here are some top tips for ensuring that summer vacations don’t slow down your firm’s progress.
Require employees to book time off in advance. Encouraging employees to request time off as far in advance as possible is key to ensuring your firm runs smoothly in their absence. This way, you can make sure that there’s never more than one or two employees away from their desks at any given time.
Encourage them to hand over their work. Before signing off for their vacation, ensure your employees have handed over some of their work to colleagues. This means that they won’t have a million and one things to do when they return, and that no important deadlines will be missed due to negligence. However, try to divide this work equally among their team or department, as opposed to expecting someone to essentially double their workload overnight. This would otherwise be a case of burnout waiting to happen.
Make sure your team isn’t clocking in while away. While having an employee send a quick message here and there while on vacation may not seem like a major issue (and it’s something that 35% of people do), it’s setting unrealistic standards for the entire team. They’ve earned that time off, and it shouldn’t be spent trying to access case documents while sitting by the pool. In fact, this could even be a security issue. As such, you should encourage your team to genuinely clock out while they are away.
This means that they will be ready to hit the ground running when they return, as they are properly refreshed and rejuvenated. This will make it much easier for them to catch up on anything they may have missed.
Outsource. Outsourcing is another great way to ensure your business runs smoothly at any time of year. This is because it means that crucial tasks will continue to be carried out, no matter where you or your employees may be in the world, ensuring that your firm continues to thrive.
For example, handing over your financial tasks to FinOp Group means that everything from payroll management to tax planning is taken care of on your behalf. This means that you can truly relax and unwind on your holiday, as opposed to feeling as though you need to keep checking your bank account.
If you want to find out more about our services or how we can help your firm to thrive, please do not hesitate to get in touch today. We look forward to hearing from you.
