From the October 2013 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine
By Brian P. Moran
Did you know 61 percent of employed Americans expect to have to do some work while on vacation? This reality is why so many of us approach taking time off from work with mixed emotions. You’d love to be part of the minority of people who just cut all ties with work while you’re out, but you know that just isn’t a reality. Or is it?
Below are a few essential tips for what you can do right now to make sure your next vacation is truly a time for rest and relaxation.
Picture the perfect vacation. Vision is the starting point of all high performance. It is the first place where you engage your thinking about what is possible for you. The more personally compelling your vision is, the more likely it is that you will act upon it. It is your personal vision that creates an emotional connection to the daily actions that need to take place in your business. Once you understand the link between your vision of the perfect vacation and your work, you can define exactly what you need to do to make that great vacation happen.
Create a pre-vacation work plan. Leading up to your vacation, it is a good idea to create a plan for each work week you have left. Your weekly plan encompasses your strategies and priorities, your long-term and short-term tasks, and your commitments in the context of time.
For example, as part of the first week of your pre-vacation plan you might set up a meeting with your boss, colleagues, and/or clients to a) inform them of your upcoming vacation and b) let them know what projects you’re going to prioritize. Then in the last week before vacation, block out time to inform your clients that you’ll be out of the office and whom they should contact while you’re out. This helps you focus on the elements of your plan that must happen each week in order to make that perfect vacation vision possible.
Resign yourself to being uncomfortable NOW so you can be comfortable LATER. The number-one thing you will have to sacrifice to be great, to achieve what you are capable of, and to execute your plans is your comfort. If your goal is to have a carefree vacation, commit to sacrificing your short-term comfort so that you can reach it. Take care of any tasks you’ve been avoiding now so that they can’t ruin your vacation and so that they aren’t on your mind when you’re trying to have a good time.
Make the most of performance time and down time. As you work toward your vacation, it will be very important that you not respond to the demands of the day reactively. You can keep control of your day through time-blocking. Block your day into three kinds of blocks—strategic blocks, buffer blocks, and breakout blocks. A strategic block is uninterrupted time that is scheduled into each week. During this block, you accept no phone calls, faxes, emails, visitors — no anything — you work on your business, not in it. Buffer blocks are designed to deal with all of the unplanned and low-value activities — like most email and voicemail — that arise throughout a typical day, while breakout blocks provide free time for you to use to rest and rejuvenate. Even before your vacation you need to schedule time to refresh and reinvigorate, so you can continue to engage with more focus and energy.
Isolate yourself from modern day distractions. When you’re focused on executing your pre-vacation plan, don’t let smartphones, social media, and the Internet distract you from your higher-value activities.
Some spontaneity is healthy, but if you are not purposeful with your time, you’ll get thrown off course. Allow yourself to get distracted by emails, social media, or the latest viral video while you’re working your pre-vacation plan, and before you know it, you’ll be on your vacation, stuck in your hotel room working on the project you didn’t finish. Learn to isolate yourself from distractions when there is important work to be done.
Your vacation time is precious. Don’t ruin it by giving your Smartphone all the attention. Set your vision. Make a plan. Stay the course.
About the Author: Brian P. Moran is the coauthor, along with Michael Lennington, of The 12 Week Year: Get More Done in 12 Weeks Than Others Do in 12 Months. He is also the founder and CEO of The Execution Company.
