USPS checking in here. Our PTO is pretty generous with vacation days and sick leave, but if you actually use it, management does everything it can to try and scare you into not using it again. As a new employee, getting called into the office for "bad attendence" is pretty scary. As a seasoned employee, I call in sick if I slept wrong and my neck hurts.
Lol, huh sounds like Target. As a team lead I had to coach my team members for attendance regardless of the reason. If they had 5 hours of sick pay for example, but were scheduled 8 hours, I had to flag them for the 3 hours that weren't covered by their sick pay.
Wages in the US could be worth the bullshit but our government this year cut hundreds of millions of dollars from unemployment insurance. It should be expanded so more people can move out of the labor pool for a time which would stabilize wages. But everyone got tricked into blaming immigrants for their living conditions again and people are still scratching their heads about why things aren't getting better for them.
PTO is such a stupid concept and I can’t believe that US based employees are falling for this.
I am in Europe and I have 30 paid vacation days, around 2 weeks of paid holidays and on top unlimited paid (!) sick days.
And we need to take the vacation days as HR will send you a message if you don’t take your vacations regularly and only a couple of days can be taken over to the next year.
And if you get sick often and are no longer in a probation period, getting fired is really really rare. They would have to offer you a high severance pay, so that you agree to leave. Just firing you would immediately be nullified by the courts and they would have to back pay you every cent you missing after getting fired and you would have to be reinstated into your job.
Companies are moving to “unlimited” PTO, they’re doing this not because they care about their employees but if you accrue PTO they have to pay you for any unused when you leave, but if you have “unlimited” they do not. They will fire your ass if they think you’re using too much of the “unlimited” PTO.
Conversely, lift up companies that do the opposite. The barometer is if they are willing to pay the ~$10K to sponsor EB-2 (green card) and the ungodly amount of time it takes from managers to go through that process in order to support the person they are sponsoring. Like if you are going to sponsor someone, their green card application becomes a part-time job for you. The only people willing to do that are people who actually care.
When PTO is taken at my office, there is a sheet to be signed a few weeks later and everyone always makes sure to check and remind people to tend their PTO as they approach their limits, is just the right thing to do.
One of the first things I told my boss when we were shooting the shit was that I am a "certified leave user." I've known and know people in the government who have hundreds of leave hours saved up, even brushing up against the use-or-lose limit. That ain't me. I like to keep a week of leave on hand in case I suddenly need it, but otherwise if I get more than two weeks saved up I'm gonna start using it.
I'm actually sort of thankful our 'use or lose limit' is only 30 hours over our annual allotted vacay time. It forces me to take all my leave pretty regularly - a long weekend every month at the very least.
Yeah, most countries you can't just NOT do these things.
If your boss pressures you into not taking a lunch break, or work weekends, or deny you your yearly month of vacation, they'll be in serious trouble with the department of labor of said country.
I think this is a better answer. I used to work for a company that would only give you 4 hours PTO per pay period, that’s 13 days a year, if you got sick and had to be out for a week, oh well, too bad, now you had a week less of vacation.
When you are ready and able to get a new job or a promotion, negotiate better PTO. 🙂 You can always ask for an extra week or 2. HR will do their best to accommodate or meet in the middle. If they can't, the worst they can say is "no."
I was like this and then got fucked over a couple times and hit burnout in my late 30s. I am now at a point where I give no shits. I WFH and will go golfing during weekdays and hang out with my kids at 4pm. Im performing my tasks so fire me I don’t care.
A long time ago, when I was getting started in IT, I worked at a super toxic hella successful hosting company where the most senior engineers went to lunch, every day, without fail, at the same time every day.
I was a hard charging recently out of the military guy who packed my lunch of carrot sticks, sammich and yoghurt and said "Nah man, I'll just eat at my desk and get a little extra work done". Finally, after 180 days, one of the seniors cornered me and said "Look, dude, you should go to lunch. We build this network 24x7. We do on call, we work weekends, we pull 24 hour days to turn up new DCs. You need to stop sitting at your desk doing work for an hour a day at lunch, because it's not about the food and it's not about "building a team". We take lunch because that's OUR hour, every day, and if you let them take that from you, you'll let them take anything else in the name of "what the business needs". Come to lunch, eat the burrito, tip your goddamn server, go to Best Buy or the gun store next to the taqueria and browse. Work will still be there but maybe you've got a full belly and a DVD box set of The Shield or a Glock and you were AWAY FROM YOUR CUBE for an hour. That's what's important, the time away from work."
Now that I am (ostensibly) a "leader", lunch is mandatory for my teams. I don't need your frustrated extra 5 hours of work a week, I need people who are happy and want to stay in the job.
After your 1st burnout you will start to seek out ways to disconnect. 20s is a good time to hustle and put in a little extra. You are young and have the energy. But give it a couple more years and you will start to see how important boundaries are, not just in your personal life.
The realistic answer is you need to work your way into a company/position that allows you to disconnect.
Like for most of my jobs I would rather take a 2 minute phone call on my time off to solve a problem because if I wait it will get worse and be a 3 hour ordeal when I get in
Got Outlook, Teams, Slack on your personal phone? Get rid of that shit unless you're paid to be on call and corporate pays your phone bill. Honestly, disconnecting from the information flow when you aren't present and being paid is the best step after what's listed in the OP.
I’m 28 and my advice would be to constantly remember that “work” doesn’t think about you. In other words, they will squeeze out all they can out of you so it’s literally not worth losing sleep over. The work will get done, but at the end of the day it should be a means to an end to enjoy your free time.
I told my boss I don’t check work email on weekends so I can feel refreshed for the next week, but if it’s important he can call me. Making them take that extra step instead of stream of consciousness shooting emails made a huge difference. Now I rarely have to connect with work on my own time.
I run my own small business, it took me a couple of years to learn this skill, especially after having a new born and remembering how my father was almost never present through my childhood, i will not make that same mistake.
Facts. Even though I don't LOVE my job one thing I do appreciate is they have generous PTO and you can call out and just say "I need a mental health day" and there are generally no questions asked.
This is why I come to work with that same energy, I could quit at anytime! There will be no notice and I don't care if it means shit doesn't get done on time.
Somewhere, there’s a manager pitching some shitty policy saying “employees can quit at anytime, don’t given anything beyond what we are required to do”
We had a leader during an awards ceremony praising this team who had to work nights and weekends for almost 6 months. She said all of us should do it. I hate these people. They sit around talking high level strategy or tech and deciding the direction for us to go. They are never the ones who have to actually implement the plan.
Took it today as a sick day. They fucked me on my birthday weekend. I asked weeks in advance for today for my kids chorus concert and they ignored it. So I took it anyways. My family is the only reason I still work there anyways so I need to have time with them to remind myself of that.
I’m at a point where I don’t have anything going on. Once I graduate, just guarantee me four hours of free time. 1 to eat, 1 to gym, and 2 for the games
AI/robots will never be consumers. They will never pay back the investment in building them because they can never buy what they make... I mean they can for a bit... That is why it's a bubble. It's a financial ouroboros.
If you train a worker to do a job that makes a thing, that person, or someone they pay for another good or service might buy the thing you paid to train that person to make. With far less sunk costs than building a data centre.
No AI ever will do that.
Capitalism needs mass consumption to pay for the investments in AI and automation and the math is being done by the same people who should have gone to prison for life over 2008.
And a good company will understand the benefits of happy employees. They might find that people will do stuff extra when they feel valued. But part of that is making sure that they understand they have their time off
I went very screwy with a company many years ago that did not value my free time and would routinely ask for extra time without compensating for it
Would be great if this is how things actually worked, but there WILL be multiple people that are going to be going 120% and will be the ones to advance. Is what it is.
In my experience, it is rarely the hardest workers that advance. They're kept doing the drudgery at the bottom, because no one knows how to do that work at that volume. A few squeak through and go up. But it's mostly the ass kissers who love the sound of their own voice at meetings that keep climbing.
My job just switched from an accruing PTO to an “Unlimited PTO” and a bunch of people got pissed.
I understand if they are bad because they specifically didn’t take some days to save up and have 40hours roll over to the next year to take a large chunk off.
But it’s silly that the mindset of some are “they do this so psychologically people feel weird taking too much and end up taking less.
I’m like… bro if you know that’s the game, than use that knowledge and take as much as you can
I work through everyone else's lunch hour to go home early.
No one said WHEN I had to take my lunch breaks. My availability is set in my calendar, strictly. I go home to eat a late lunch/early dinner. Everyone else can fck right off or come at me, *bro.
I got the policies at the ready. 🧐🧐🧐
Your local employment law might require your employer to compel you to take a lunch brake within a certain portion of the day. I think where I am, for an 8 hour shift it has to be between hours 3 and 6.
As a man who spent 40+ years in the IT grind, this is 100% true. Companies don’t care about you. They will destroy relationships, your health, and when all is said and done, kick you to the curb without so much as a thank you.
Refute to work through lunch, breaks and long hours. Take your PTO and relax. Because when you are 70+ years old, you will have regrets.
100%! You may feel like an asset to your company (and you likely are), BUT YOU ARE REPLACEABLE! Project Managers are your best buddy when they need you to work nights and weekends as they punch in at 8 and out at 5. I've made the mistake of cancelling a vacation due to a project deadline shift. Never again. I cancelled my vacation with my wife and kids, worked a 65+ hour week to keep the team and client happy. Just to have the owner review the deliverables and decide he wanted to change a bunch of items. We got additional fee to redesign, but the project ended up getting extended by weeks and I could have taken my vacation as planned. You have to create boundaries and maintain them. Once you voluntarily step over your own boundaries, management will try to exploit it.
Laughs in self-employed small farmer. The only PTO I have is on the back of the tractor.
I would choose my lifestyle over a corporate hellscape any day, even if it means foregoing lunch breaks, evenings, weekends, holidays, and PTO. The work I do is good for me, good for my friends and neighbors, and good for the planet. The work you do is good for some shareholder that you'll never meet.
Bank your PTO andb then use it as you need it. Why? The option year for my current contract wasn't exercised. I was given 2 weeks to find a new position within the company or I'd be laid off next week. Luckily I got one today, but I've been burning PTO for a couple weeks and I'll have to burn a few more while waiting on some things to clear.
You'd be shocked. There are a lot of people who make their jobs their whole life, they don't know what to do without being at their jobs. Their only friends are work friends. My whole department is like this and I find it disturbing lol. They all think I'm lazy because I only work 8 hour days and don't do weekends
I quit a job over this. Boss sent me an email after hours on Friday saying he wanted something by Saturday (wtf). I actually stay off work email after hours so I didn't see that at all. He gave me grief for it and I responded with my resignation.
cool but i made good use of that vacation back payout supporting myself when i got laid off and couldn't find a job forever because certain fuckwads are destroying the country
and "unlimited PTO" is a scam. Track your hours and take 4 weeks a year. Studies show that unlimited PTO results in people taking LESS time. Don't let that be you.
Damn, I needed to hear this. Did 14.5 hours yesterday, hips and upper legs killing me from sitting. I’m cruising toward a 65 hour week this week, full of stress feeling like I’m on an island. My wife is out of town so I’m watching little man now, finally took a few hours to spend one on one time with him and it was exactly what I needed. Someone from work called after hour 12 today and told me a client wanted to talk to me, I told them too bad, I’m off. Felt so, so good.
Sounds like a typical Millennial or Zoomer attitude to me. You didn’t “agree” to anything. Your employer graciously deigned to accept you in exchange for money to keep you off the street. It’s not an equal partnership. Don’t like it? Withdraw your labour and hope you find an alternative, but you don’t get to impose conditions. Your employer is entitled to your soul - it’s up to you to accept that fact or leave.
I once had a boss who took a week off. He had booked his PTO months in advance. Even though he has a one year old son at home…guess what? He came back to work after 3 days. I’m sure you guys can imagine how he would act whenever we wanted to take PTO or called in sick.
If we were sick in the morning he’d beg us to come in even if only for a few hours. I once felt sick but not sick enough to go home and he profusely thanked me for coming in. I once called off and he was passive aggressive with me the next day. He took call outs personally because he would never let anything come between him and the office so he’d give us attitude even though we rarely called off (1-2x a year). PTO had to be requested as far in advance as possible and he’d still get stressed over it. Sorry you hate your family, but some of us want to spend time with ours.
Remember, especially if an employer pays you minimum wage.
That does not mean 24-7 slave at their whim.
Just because they pay you like shit, does not entitle them to treating you like so.
I DoNt KnOw WhO nEeDs To HeAr tHis…. But people need to stop with the unnecessary social media meme speak that opens or closes their posts. Just fucking say what you want to say and move on… I SaId WhAt I sAiD
I know it’s not always an option for people, but join a union. Seriously if anyone is looking for a future, with full benefits, pension, medical, and a whole list of things to help you, look up your locals in your area. It has changed my life, I’m 34, I joined at 32. It’s never too late.
I gave 4 years of my life to a startup. I worked 60-80 hours a week the entire time. I definately missed out on a lot of things. I don't regret it because it got me to a position where we are comfortable in life but I am sad that I lost out on time with some special individuals in my life.
My idiot teammate is rolling over five days for next year, which is fine, but also not using another five before they expire at the end of the calendar year. I don’t get it at all, I use all of mine plus my sick days for regular doctor or dentist appontments.
This goes double if you are hourly. I'm salary and I get I sign up for sometimes working some overtime or at odd hours but seriously don't sell your soul. you have to find a good balance.
Especially if you work in retail! I used to be a grocery store supervisor and my store manager would get PISSED anytime people used their PTO. She was such an evil witch.
On the contrary my cousin was just made redundant with his entire team of 7 and cashed out 51.44 days of annual leave after being employed for four and a half years which is literally 16k for "free" and he already has another role with a sister company so he just gets to keep it
Gosh, I remember when I thought this.
I suppose this is the last bit of innocence to go, after Santa, the Easter Bunny, free and fair elections, and the internet being a "democratizing force"... the illusions of childhood just seem to slip away.
I usually save by pto for child emergencies, but don't hesitate to use it when necessary. I always take my full break and lunch. I also refuse to talk about work on my breaks. If I need more time to finish my work, I'll cl9ck some ot before skipping a break.
I never understood people who make their job their entire personality, sacrificing their personal free time and well being to a multi million dollar company that doesn't give a flying fuck about them to begin with, if you are working in the trenches under 10 steps of corporate ladder then why the fuck would you sacrifice your life for the job?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a lazy worker by any means, I'm very good at what I do and I do it well. I've gotten multiple raises and I am the youngest shift manager in the company's history since 1967. But outside of my working hours I don't give a flying fuck about my workplace.
I work for the money, not the people or the corporate. I work so I can provide for my family, I work so I can give my self and my family a great life. Work isn't your life. It's not supposed to be one. And to me it never will be one. Life is short, don't waste it to a corporate shithole.
I have a friend who seasonally works at a car shop, changing people's winter tires. He tells me there's often no time to have lunch breaks, and since he works on a zero hour contract, if he does take lunch breaks, there's a chance that the shop just doesn't assign him any working hours.
To be honest, when im tired i rest, but when im not i dont mind doing a bit extra outside of hours. And I work clients who I want to do well so that is a motivation as well. And i like my boss so I want her to succeed also.
You already sell your soul the second you trade in your life for their profit, where they can shit and piss and spit on you with each and every paycheck. They do it to thousands and millions and billions. Each human life shat on every single day. All your energy is theirs. You get to rest and recuperate - that’s about it. You are theirs. It’s no longer your life
If I weren’t disabled feeling like death every waking second of my life withering away I’d be a vagabond. Fuck that noise
There are days where I get no work, so if I'm asked to work over my lunch break (like I did today), I'll willingly do so.
My manager discourages our team from doing absurd hours, he will get penalised if I work longer than 10 and I make a critical mistake, but that seems a foreign concept if you're in the US.
Bruh - it’s hard to find an environment that actually supports this. You got some of these micro-aggressive managers who say they support this but look down on you when you do want to take your breaks etc. Kudos to people that have those healthy work environments.. you’re really winning lol
Especially take your lunch break, and really do take a break and get away from the screen/whatever you do. It's a really important part of the day to give your mind a break.
My brother used his PTO 1 time in the 3 years he's worked at his job and it was only because he couldn't get a ride through a blizzard. He is dedicated to his job
- self care isn't selfish even though it feels like it sometimes
- taking breaks before you burn out completely is way easier than trying to recover after
- saying no to things that drain you is actually really hard but necessary
- boundaries with family are the worst to set but also the most important ones
I spent so long thinking i had to help everyone else first before taking care of myself.. then wondered why i was always exhausted and resentful. Peace is something you have to actively protect, not just hope for. Still working on it but at least i know that now
Americans, mostly, are the ones who need to hear this.
Europeans/Brits generally have a very firm line of "don't contact me about work when I'm not in work" while every American I've ever met has been like "I'm out of office on the two days of holiday I get per year, but if you need anything at all, please call me on ______ or email me on _______ or just turn up at my house and slap me in the face for not being in work. All hail the corporate overlords"
I'm exaggerating obviously, but you get the picture. You guys need to respect your own time more
Take your full paternity leave also. I know so many dudes who don't take all their days, "because I wasn't the birth-parent, so I can get back to work sooner."
Buddy, you'll never have those days back with your kid. Ever.
996 is the new movement in the world of AI. If you want the job that pays over six figures you will need to be willing to sacrifice more to get it. That is where I suspect we are headed.
Christmas parties at the actual place you work is straight up bullshit.Id rather have the “bonus”.
Boss drive a high end sports car and haven’t had a significant pay bump in abit?Time to go.
Red flags on interviews~
You are told we’re like a family here.We have all seen how families treat each other.
Inspirational posters in the break room are an attempt to distract from a depressing workplace.
Supervisor being an absolute dick about clocking in late but no issue with clocking in early?Time to go.
If you’re reading this and are a recent college graduate this piece of advice is for you:The CEO doesn’t care if do you extra work and isn’t loyal to you.Dont wait around looking for recognition be loyal to yourself and your savings as well.You owe yourself the best life possible so be loyal to yourself.
My company doesn’t give you PTO or sick time. They also demand that if you call off you must provide a doctors note.. working people under 40 hrs so they don’t qualify for sick time
Sick time!! Use it or lose it, I was that team player at my old job for 15 years, never called out unless I was dying while others just broke a nail, I filled every hat except the clinical side and of course manager, did something stupid with hippa ( long story) around Covid time, got let go, had over 800 hours of sick time, lost it all
And call out, and name and shame companies that punish employees for living their life
USPS checking in here. Our PTO is pretty generous with vacation days and sick leave, but if you actually use it, management does everything it can to try and scare you into not using it again. As a new employee, getting called into the office for "bad attendence" is pretty scary. As a seasoned employee, I call in sick if I slept wrong and my neck hurts.
Lol, huh sounds like Target. As a team lead I had to coach my team members for attendance regardless of the reason. If they had 5 hours of sick pay for example, but were scheduled 8 hours, I had to flag them for the 3 hours that weren't covered by their sick pay.
What is "pretty generous" by US standards?
With sick leave and vacation days, about six weeks.
The US calls this generous, in Australia we call this the minimum.
Wages in the US could be worth the bullshit but our government this year cut hundreds of millions of dollars from unemployment insurance. It should be expanded so more people can move out of the labor pool for a time which would stabilize wages. But everyone got tricked into blaming immigrants for their living conditions again and people are still scratching their heads about why things aren't getting better for them.
PTO is such a stupid concept and I can’t believe that US based employees are falling for this. I am in Europe and I have 30 paid vacation days, around 2 weeks of paid holidays and on top unlimited paid (!) sick days. And we need to take the vacation days as HR will send you a message if you don’t take your vacations regularly and only a couple of days can be taken over to the next year. And if you get sick often and are no longer in a probation period, getting fired is really really rare. They would have to offer you a high severance pay, so that you agree to leave. Just firing you would immediately be nullified by the courts and they would have to back pay you every cent you missing after getting fired and you would have to be reinstated into your job.
Companies are moving to “unlimited” PTO, they’re doing this not because they care about their employees but if you accrue PTO they have to pay you for any unused when you leave, but if you have “unlimited” they do not. They will fire your ass if they think you’re using too much of the “unlimited” PTO.
Conversely, lift up companies that do the opposite. The barometer is if they are willing to pay the ~$10K to sponsor EB-2 (green card) and the ungodly amount of time it takes from managers to go through that process in order to support the person they are sponsoring. Like if you are going to sponsor someone, their green card application becomes a part-time job for you. The only people willing to do that are people who actually care.
American companies. In USA by law, companies doesn’t need to give you vacation time. Google it.
100%
I am a manager and I tell my team “not taking your vacation is like returning a paycheck. That’s just dumb”.
When PTO is taken at my office, there is a sheet to be signed a few weeks later and everyone always makes sure to check and remind people to tend their PTO as they approach their limits, is just the right thing to do.
Wait, do your vacation days expire or something?
my boss wants to go to lunch together, hang out after work and weekends.
I've been slowly trying to explain to him why I dont want to do that but he still trys to push me
Is there a good way to tell them?
Work to live, don't live to work is my motto.
I agree, You don't owe your job your peace
One of the first things I told my boss when we were shooting the shit was that I am a "certified leave user." I've known and know people in the government who have hundreds of leave hours saved up, even brushing up against the use-or-lose limit. That ain't me. I like to keep a week of leave on hand in case I suddenly need it, but otherwise if I get more than two weeks saved up I'm gonna start using it.
He was fine with that, he's a cool guy.
I'm actually sort of thankful our 'use or lose limit' is only 30 hours over our annual allotted vacay time. It forces me to take all my leave pretty regularly - a long weekend every month at the very least.
Too bad this whole pesky “food and shelter” thing is being held for ransom unless I’m constantly employed
“Land of the Free”
Yeah, most countries you can't just NOT do these things.
If your boss pressures you into not taking a lunch break, or work weekends, or deny you your yearly month of vacation, they'll be in serious trouble with the department of labor of said country.
Free to drive yourself into the ground in others' pursuit of profits
And the home of the previously brave
What if you barely get any PTO
Make sure to take every single moment of it you’re allowed.
Look for jobs with better benefits
I think this is a better answer. I used to work for a company that would only give you 4 hours PTO per pay period, that’s 13 days a year, if you got sick and had to be out for a week, oh well, too bad, now you had a week less of vacation.
That's no guarantee and it doesn't help that the White House cut $400 million from unemployment insurance earlier this year.
When you are ready and able to get a new job or a promotion, negotiate better PTO. 🙂 You can always ask for an extra week or 2. HR will do their best to accommodate or meet in the middle. If they can't, the worst they can say is "no."
Always ask and learn to negotiate!
Learning to disconnect from work is one of the hardest but most rewarding adulting skills.
29-year-old, working in the corporate world. I don’t know how to do this. I think about work all the time.
I was like this and then got fucked over a couple times and hit burnout in my late 30s. I am now at a point where I give no shits. I WFH and will go golfing during weekdays and hang out with my kids at 4pm. Im performing my tasks so fire me I don’t care.
Same but 33. I’m exhausted all the time
A long time ago, when I was getting started in IT, I worked at a super toxic hella successful hosting company where the most senior engineers went to lunch, every day, without fail, at the same time every day.
I was a hard charging recently out of the military guy who packed my lunch of carrot sticks, sammich and yoghurt and said "Nah man, I'll just eat at my desk and get a little extra work done". Finally, after 180 days, one of the seniors cornered me and said "Look, dude, you should go to lunch. We build this network 24x7. We do on call, we work weekends, we pull 24 hour days to turn up new DCs. You need to stop sitting at your desk doing work for an hour a day at lunch, because it's not about the food and it's not about "building a team". We take lunch because that's OUR hour, every day, and if you let them take that from you, you'll let them take anything else in the name of "what the business needs". Come to lunch, eat the burrito, tip your goddamn server, go to Best Buy or the gun store next to the taqueria and browse. Work will still be there but maybe you've got a full belly and a DVD box set of The Shield or a Glock and you were AWAY FROM YOUR CUBE for an hour. That's what's important, the time away from work."
Now that I am (ostensibly) a "leader", lunch is mandatory for my teams. I don't need your frustrated extra 5 hours of work a week, I need people who are happy and want to stay in the job.
After your 1st burnout you will start to seek out ways to disconnect. 20s is a good time to hustle and put in a little extra. You are young and have the energy. But give it a couple more years and you will start to see how important boundaries are, not just in your personal life.
The realistic answer is you need to work your way into a company/position that allows you to disconnect.
Like for most of my jobs I would rather take a 2 minute phone call on my time off to solve a problem because if I wait it will get worse and be a 3 hour ordeal when I get in
I’m not sure what you mean by this, I’m sorry.
Got Outlook, Teams, Slack on your personal phone? Get rid of that shit unless you're paid to be on call and corporate pays your phone bill. Honestly, disconnecting from the information flow when you aren't present and being paid is the best step after what's listed in the OP.
I’m 28 and my advice would be to constantly remember that “work” doesn’t think about you. In other words, they will squeeze out all they can out of you so it’s literally not worth losing sleep over. The work will get done, but at the end of the day it should be a means to an end to enjoy your free time.
I told my boss I don’t check work email on weekends so I can feel refreshed for the next week, but if it’s important he can call me. Making them take that extra step instead of stream of consciousness shooting emails made a huge difference. Now I rarely have to connect with work on my own time.
I've said for years, "Nobody, on their deathbed has ever said, 'I wish I would have worked more while I was alive.'"
I run my own small business, it took me a couple of years to learn this skill, especially after having a new born and remembering how my father was almost never present through my childhood, i will not make that same mistake.
Facts. Even though I don't LOVE my job one thing I do appreciate is they have generous PTO and you can call out and just say "I need a mental health day" and there are generally no questions asked.
People who don’t value their own time will never value yours. End of story.
I’m sorry but we’re going to have to let you go. We don’t like honest people. Pack your stuff and get out
Also keep in mind that businesses will fire you at anytime. Do not give them anything beyond what you are required to do
I literally just do the minimum needed to get the work done. I wish I would've known this at a younger age.
This is why I come to work with that same energy, I could quit at anytime! There will be no notice and I don't care if it means shit doesn't get done on time.
Somewhere, there’s a manager pitching some shitty policy saying “employees can quit at anytime, don’t given anything beyond what we are required to do”
Yet when employers changed it from “9 to 5” to an “8 to 5” schedule no one batted an eye and just started working an extra hour every day.
👍
Shut up and get back to work!
I'm on break
I didn't realize till today I had 151 hours of PTO.
Well it’s time to disappear for a month.
Work culture really makes you feel guilty for resting. This helps.
It is me. I needed to hear this! 😁
That’s for the people who live in those right to work states.
We had a leader during an awards ceremony praising this team who had to work nights and weekends for almost 6 months. She said all of us should do it. I hate these people. They sit around talking high level strategy or tech and deciding the direction for us to go. They are never the ones who have to actually implement the plan.
Took it today as a sick day. They fucked me on my birthday weekend. I asked weeks in advance for today for my kids chorus concert and they ignored it. So I took it anyways. My family is the only reason I still work there anyways so I need to have time with them to remind myself of that.
Fuck my boss and her self centered idiocy.
I’m at a point where I don’t have anything going on. Once I graduate, just guarantee me four hours of free time. 1 to eat, 1 to gym, and 2 for the games
Depends on your pay and ambition
This mentality is what brought about the AI replacement boom lol
That's a funny way to spell bubble.
AI/robots will never be consumers. They will never pay back the investment in building them because they can never buy what they make... I mean they can for a bit... That is why it's a bubble. It's a financial ouroboros.
If you train a worker to do a job that makes a thing, that person, or someone they pay for another good or service might buy the thing you paid to train that person to make. With far less sunk costs than building a data centre.
No AI ever will do that.
Capitalism needs mass consumption to pay for the investments in AI and automation and the math is being done by the same people who should have gone to prison for life over 2008.
Yep. Work should be something we do to improve lives and if we are only working instead of living then what's the point?
What do I do if they deny my PTO?
I agree.
You quickly learn how much people don't give a fuck about you no matter how hard you work.
And a good company will understand the benefits of happy employees. They might find that people will do stuff extra when they feel valued. But part of that is making sure that they understand they have their time off
I went very screwy with a company many years ago that did not value my free time and would routinely ask for extra time without compensating for it
lol that’s a good one
Would be great if this is how things actually worked, but there WILL be multiple people that are going to be going 120% and will be the ones to advance. Is what it is.
More like they'll give a solid 80%, but they're buddies with the boss and advance because of that lol
In my experience, it is rarely the hardest workers that advance. They're kept doing the drudgery at the bottom, because no one knows how to do that work at that volume. A few squeak through and go up. But it's mostly the ass kissers who love the sound of their own voice at meetings that keep climbing.
Who’s gonna do the work that won’t stop when I take vacation? Coming back to work from vacation is why most Americans don’t take vacation 😂😂
Plus none of my coworkers can get anything done on their own. So if I take a day off, I've got 4 days of backlog to deal with.
Amen to that. I spent 40 years in corporate America and learned that early on
My job just switched from an accruing PTO to an “Unlimited PTO” and a bunch of people got pissed. I understand if they are bad because they specifically didn’t take some days to save up and have 40hours roll over to the next year to take a large chunk off.
But it’s silly that the mindset of some are “they do this so psychologically people feel weird taking too much and end up taking less.
I’m like… bro if you know that’s the game, than use that knowledge and take as much as you can
HR here.
I 1,000,000,000% agree and I have to remind my employees of this on the daily. You signed a contract agreeing to XYZ. DO THR XYZ!!!!!
I work through everyone else's lunch hour to go home early. No one said WHEN I had to take my lunch breaks. My availability is set in my calendar, strictly. I go home to eat a late lunch/early dinner. Everyone else can fck right off or come at me, *bro. I got the policies at the ready. 🧐🧐🧐
Your local employment law might require your employer to compel you to take a lunch brake within a certain portion of the day. I think where I am, for an 8 hour shift it has to be between hours 3 and 6.
As a man who spent 40+ years in the IT grind, this is 100% true. Companies don’t care about you. They will destroy relationships, your health, and when all is said and done, kick you to the curb without so much as a thank you.
Refute to work through lunch, breaks and long hours. Take your PTO and relax. Because when you are 70+ years old, you will have regrets.
I work to live, I don't live to work
Preach it, my lunch break is sacred office territory
100%! You may feel like an asset to your company (and you likely are), BUT YOU ARE REPLACEABLE! Project Managers are your best buddy when they need you to work nights and weekends as they punch in at 8 and out at 5. I've made the mistake of cancelling a vacation due to a project deadline shift. Never again. I cancelled my vacation with my wife and kids, worked a 65+ hour week to keep the team and client happy. Just to have the owner review the deliverables and decide he wanted to change a bunch of items. We got additional fee to redesign, but the project ended up getting extended by weeks and I could have taken my vacation as planned. You have to create boundaries and maintain them. Once you voluntarily step over your own boundaries, management will try to exploit it.
Laughs in self-employed small farmer. The only PTO I have is on the back of the tractor.
I would choose my lifestyle over a corporate hellscape any day, even if it means foregoing lunch breaks, evenings, weekends, holidays, and PTO. The work I do is good for me, good for my friends and neighbors, and good for the planet. The work you do is good for some shareholder that you'll never meet.
💯💜
THIS HIT ME HARD.
We spend 40 to 60 hours a week(construction) with these people. Hell no I'm not afraid to takea day off
check the fine print on the contract, it's there
Bank your PTO andb then use it as you need it. Why? The option year for my current contract wasn't exercised. I was given 2 weeks to find a new position within the company or I'd be laid off next week. Luckily I got one today, but I've been burning PTO for a couple weeks and I'll have to burn a few more while waiting on some things to clear.
Bank your PTO.
Staples treats its regular employees well, I enjoy working for them.
I kind of need to hear this to be honest. I always feel guilty and anxious calling off at all or using pto.
Wait, who wouldn't take paid vacation?
You'd be shocked. There are a lot of people who make their jobs their whole life, they don't know what to do without being at their jobs. Their only friends are work friends. My whole department is like this and I find it disturbing lol. They all think I'm lazy because I only work 8 hour days and don't do weekends
Okay but when I take my legally mandated unpaid lunch break everyone yells at me
Lunch is unpaid. I’ll leave yearly instead.
What if we don’t get lunch breaks? In fact my current employer doesn’t allow for any breaks whatsoever.
Sounds pretty illegal
It’s not just about your peace. Don’t start setting unrealistic expectations for your coworkers to meet. Bosses are greedy.
As a dad of 3, Without my OT we don’t pay the bills. Just reality.
Didn't used to be, I hate how times have gotten
I quit a job over this. Boss sent me an email after hours on Friday saying he wanted something by Saturday (wtf). I actually stay off work email after hours so I didn't see that at all. He gave me grief for it and I responded with my resignation.
Unless you're in health care, then you don't matter 😕
cool but i made good use of that vacation back payout supporting myself when i got laid off and couldn't find a job forever because certain fuckwads are destroying the country
and "unlimited PTO" is a scam. Track your hours and take 4 weeks a year. Studies show that unlimited PTO results in people taking LESS time. Don't let that be you.
Damn, I needed to hear this. Did 14.5 hours yesterday, hips and upper legs killing me from sitting. I’m cruising toward a 65 hour week this week, full of stress feeling like I’m on an island. My wife is out of town so I’m watching little man now, finally took a few hours to spend one on one time with him and it was exactly what I needed. Someone from work called after hour 12 today and told me a client wanted to talk to me, I told them too bad, I’m off. Felt so, so good.
This
I took PTO to get a haircut and see Kill Bill: TWBA today! I was the only one in the theater, it was great!
Fucking facts
"A break not taken is a break lost forever"
What's the point? You just have to do that work when you get back. I don't need to fall behind anymore quickly than I already am.
Depends, if your salary is below living wage, sure.
If company pays you six figure and you work from home , then work harder.
What job does that though?
Sounds like a typical Millennial or Zoomer attitude to me. You didn’t “agree” to anything. Your employer graciously deigned to accept you in exchange for money to keep you off the street. It’s not an equal partnership. Don’t like it? Withdraw your labour and hope you find an alternative, but you don’t get to impose conditions. Your employer is entitled to your soul - it’s up to you to accept that fact or leave.
Bait
I once had a boss who took a week off. He had booked his PTO months in advance. Even though he has a one year old son at home…guess what? He came back to work after 3 days. I’m sure you guys can imagine how he would act whenever we wanted to take PTO or called in sick.
If we were sick in the morning he’d beg us to come in even if only for a few hours. I once felt sick but not sick enough to go home and he profusely thanked me for coming in. I once called off and he was passive aggressive with me the next day. He took call outs personally because he would never let anything come between him and the office so he’d give us attitude even though we rarely called off (1-2x a year). PTO had to be requested as far in advance as possible and he’d still get stressed over it. Sorry you hate your family, but some of us want to spend time with ours.
Remember, especially if an employer pays you minimum wage.
That does not mean 24-7 slave at their whim.
Just because they pay you like shit, does not entitle them to treating you like so.
💯
Big Law
I DoNt KnOw WhO nEeDs To HeAr tHis…. But people need to stop with the unnecessary social media meme speak that opens or closes their posts. Just fucking say what you want to say and move on… I SaId WhAt I sAiD
I needed that, thank you.
As a business owner, please dont
If you want to get paid less, lose out on promotions, and be despised by your co-workers... Then go for it
I really needed this, right now. Im sick, and going into work because of pressure.
I dont want to work past 5pm anymore, its not worth it.
I only found out last year that we have a "floating holiday". All these years I've never used it, nobody told me, they don't exactly advertise it.
And you are not special, everyone is replaceable.
But it's sad that companies can't be held accountable for not holding up their end if the deal.
Yes, but a lot of people are still pushing the toxic office culture onto you. Look at the politicians that push the "back to the office" crap.
You are never going to get to the end of work (until you retire), so take your breaks.
I know it’s not always an option for people, but join a union. Seriously if anyone is looking for a future, with full benefits, pension, medical, and a whole list of things to help you, look up your locals in your area. It has changed my life, I’m 34, I joined at 32. It’s never too late.
I needed to hear this today. I’m burnt out right now
I gave 4 years of my life to a startup. I worked 60-80 hours a week the entire time. I definately missed out on a lot of things. I don't regret it because it got me to a position where we are comfortable in life but I am sad that I lost out on time with some special individuals in my life.
FACTS! some people are so hard to themselves, like come on, we are all human and we all deserve rest.
My idiot teammate is rolling over five days for next year, which is fine, but also not using another five before they expire at the end of the calendar year. I don’t get it at all, I use all of mine plus my sick days for regular doctor or dentist appontments.
I feel guilty asking time off but when my hip and back start hurting, the f*cks fly out of me
Evidently Felicia either doesn’t work in sales or she’s very bad at it.
Or incredible at it.
This goes double if you are hourly. I'm salary and I get I sign up for sometimes working some overtime or at odd hours but seriously don't sell your soul. you have to find a good balance.
But more importantly, you freaks that aren't already doing all of this are making it seem normal, and thus making things worse for the rest of us.
Especially if you work in retail! I used to be a grocery store supervisor and my store manager would get PISSED anytime people used their PTO. She was such an evil witch.
It breaks my heart to see people so integrated into a system that absolutely sucks their soul dry.
Most of the time, they don't even know that they're stuck in a permanent loop.
They're just going through the motions, one day at a time.
I was just told today that I actually get lunch breaks after someone early on told me I didn't. I've been working there for over two years now.
On the contrary my cousin was just made redundant with his entire team of 7 and cashed out 51.44 days of annual leave after being employed for four and a half years which is literally 16k for "free" and he already has another role with a sister company so he just gets to keep it
Have been to many job interviews lately. 10 hour days,6 days a week at a lot of them. No thanks,did that when I was younger and it's not worth it.
I needed to see this a few years ago. I lost out on so much PTO.
Probably no one needs to hear this.
I've been downvoted for saying that calling in only 4 times in 8 years isn't the flex they thought it was.
Better yet, migrate to a country that actually values that sort of thing. The US ain’t it, and never will be.
Gosh, I remember when I thought this.
I suppose this is the last bit of innocence to go, after Santa, the Easter Bunny, free and fair elections, and the internet being a "democratizing force"... the illusions of childhood just seem to slip away.
I usually save by pto for child emergencies, but don't hesitate to use it when necessary. I always take my full break and lunch. I also refuse to talk about work on my breaks. If I need more time to finish my work, I'll cl9ck some ot before skipping a break.
*cries in hotel management *
Also, you will exist without a family that clearly hates you.
Fly my pretties and walk the earth like you own it.
I never understood people who make their job their entire personality, sacrificing their personal free time and well being to a multi million dollar company that doesn't give a flying fuck about them to begin with, if you are working in the trenches under 10 steps of corporate ladder then why the fuck would you sacrifice your life for the job?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a lazy worker by any means, I'm very good at what I do and I do it well. I've gotten multiple raises and I am the youngest shift manager in the company's history since 1967. But outside of my working hours I don't give a flying fuck about my workplace.
I work for the money, not the people or the corporate. I work so I can provide for my family, I work so I can give my self and my family a great life. Work isn't your life. It's not supposed to be one. And to me it never will be one. Life is short, don't waste it to a corporate shithole.
Me, I need to hear this.
And your sick days
I have a friend who seasonally works at a car shop, changing people's winter tires. He tells me there's often no time to have lunch breaks, and since he works on a zero hour contract, if he does take lunch breaks, there's a chance that the shop just doesn't assign him any working hours.
I have worked hourly or piecework my entire life, with few exceptions. I don't answer my phone once I'm clocked out. No boss has ever pursued it.
Alternatively you can pack that all in by starting your own business!
It is genuinely worth it though. If you’re good at it. Which you probably aren’t.
She is right 💯
Meanwhile in a developed country the manager comes and tell us we have to take our vacation, even when it's difficult to spend it all.
To be honest, when im tired i rest, but when im not i dont mind doing a bit extra outside of hours. And I work clients who I want to do well so that is a motivation as well. And i like my boss so I want her to succeed also.
Heck, if you are in a good position. Just resign from work!
Unfortutely this is america you are a slave to the system
I haven't had a job with paid time off or vacation in my entire life and I'm nearing 30. I don't know if I'll ever get a good enough job for myself.
You already sell your soul the second you trade in your life for their profit, where they can shit and piss and spit on you with each and every paycheck. They do it to thousands and millions and billions. Each human life shat on every single day. All your energy is theirs. You get to rest and recuperate - that’s about it. You are theirs. It’s no longer your life
If I weren’t disabled feeling like death every waking second of my life withering away I’d be a vagabond. Fuck that noise
Unless you are a teacher apparently. I have parents mad right now that I had surgery so I could do my job in less/no pain.
You work to ensure living. You don't live to work! PTO is practically YOUR time to LIVE! Why would you not take it?
😂
Even better if your boss tells you to do these things.
Then they fire you for the h1b that will do that.
I rarely take lunches and breaks working 13+ hr days.
But I get paid two extra hours for doing so.
That's why you need a union.
Absolutely this. But I do compromise.
There are days where I get no work, so if I'm asked to work over my lunch break (like I did today), I'll willingly do so.
My manager discourages our team from doing absurd hours, he will get penalised if I work longer than 10 and I make a critical mistake, but that seems a foreign concept if you're in the US.
Bruh - it’s hard to find an environment that actually supports this. You got some of these micro-aggressive managers who say they support this but look down on you when you do want to take your breaks etc. Kudos to people that have those healthy work environments.. you’re really winning lol
What if I can't afford it though and my family relies on it to keep our heads just above the water. What then because I'd honestly love and answer
Especially take your lunch break, and really do take a break and get away from the screen/whatever you do. It's a really important part of the day to give your mind a break.
My brother used his PTO 1 time in the 3 years he's worked at his job and it was only because he couldn't get a ride through a blizzard. He is dedicated to his job
THIS IS A FAKE SUBREDDIT. ALL THE POSTS HERE ARE FROM BOTS
And here I am sitting on the toilet at 4:49am contemplating working Saturday.
- self care isn't selfish even though it feels like it sometimes
- taking breaks before you burn out completely is way easier than trying to recover after
- saying no to things that drain you is actually really hard but necessary
- boundaries with family are the worst to set but also the most important ones
I spent so long thinking i had to help everyone else first before taking care of myself.. then wondered why i was always exhausted and resentful. Peace is something you have to actively protect, not just hope for. Still working on it but at least i know that now
It's a business contract. You are to sell your time under specified conditions and laws. It's crazy that expecting more has become the norm for many
Americans, mostly, are the ones who need to hear this.
Europeans/Brits generally have a very firm line of "don't contact me about work when I'm not in work" while every American I've ever met has been like "I'm out of office on the two days of holiday I get per year, but if you need anything at all, please call me on ______ or email me on _______ or just turn up at my house and slap me in the face for not being in work. All hail the corporate overlords"
I'm exaggerating obviously, but you get the picture. You guys need to respect your own time more
It took me too long to learn this
Take your full paternity leave also. I know so many dudes who don't take all their days, "because I wasn't the birth-parent, so I can get back to work sooner."
Buddy, you'll never have those days back with your kid. Ever.
996 is the new movement in the world of AI. If you want the job that pays over six figures you will need to be willing to sacrifice more to get it. That is where I suspect we are headed.
Lunch break here exists to prepare the next 1.5 hours of work to write stuff down and make a planning :(
Workplace red flags and work rules:
Never give your boss your personal phone number.
Do not respond to emails after work hours.
At work we are not friends we are workers.
Christmas parties at the actual place you work is straight up bullshit.Id rather have the “bonus”.
Boss drive a high end sports car and haven’t had a significant pay bump in abit?Time to go.
Red flags on interviews~
You are told we’re like a family here.We have all seen how families treat each other.
Inspirational posters in the break room are an attempt to distract from a depressing workplace.
Supervisor being an absolute dick about clocking in late but no issue with clocking in early?Time to go.
If you’re reading this and are a recent college graduate this piece of advice is for you:The CEO doesn’t care if do you extra work and isn’t loyal to you.Dont wait around looking for recognition be loyal to yourself and your savings as well.You owe yourself the best life possible so be loyal to yourself.
My company doesn’t give you PTO or sick time. They also demand that if you call off you must provide a doctors note.. working people under 40 hrs so they don’t qualify for sick time
gentle reminder that you are not a machine, you are a human that deserves rest and calm days too
What if your job doesn’t give you PTO ?
Also, if you’re doing it because you feel you’re important and things fall apart when you don’t do things, realize that:
Sick time!! Use it or lose it, I was that team player at my old job for 15 years, never called out unless I was dying while others just broke a nail, I filled every hat except the clinical side and of course manager, did something stupid with hippa ( long story) around Covid time, got let go, had over 800 hours of sick time, lost it all
My job docks bonus when we use sick time
i'm trying tiny routines, they actually help me relax
Absolutely
life is short, take vacations and get those zzzs's