Phew, finally! You let out a sigh of relief after knowing that your paid leave request has been approved by your boss. Aiming to enjoy the holiday to your heart’s content, you want to refresh your body and mind by getting away from everything related to work for a while. But, are you sure that none from work will call you during your long-awaited holiday?

It must be really getting on your nerves when you are sunbathing lazily on a beach, you hear your phone ringing and when you pick it up, it is your coworker saying, “Sorry to bother you on vacation, but can you open our recent report for a minute? I need your help to check on it,” or it is your boss demanding, “Can you call our client to inform the updated progress?” Oh come on, it is supposed to be your stress-free holiday.

While you want to stay as a good employee, you should care about yourself too. It is important to manage the work-life balance to stay healthy and wise. Putting away the job matters to get meaningful holiday is the right way to recharge yourself. However, you cannot switch off your phone as you think everybody can call you for urgent reasons. Stopping people at work from disturbing you during holiday should be done the right way. Follow the tips below:

See also: Addressing the Dilemma: Should You Tell Your Boss that You Are Not Happy at Work?

Make sure you have finished your workload

There will be higher chances of having your vacation ruined by coworkers’ calls and emails, if you still have a mountain of paperwork on your desk before taking absence from work. That being said, it is important to make sure you have no unfinished tasks before taking your annual leave. If you have certain daily tasks to take care, it is crucial to know who will handle it during your leave. Being a bit busier before your vacation time is much better than staying busy during the vacation.

Don’t hesitate to say ‘no’

Some employees force themselves to do the tasks during vacation for some reasons such as for the sake of being professional and loyalty to the company. The truth is, you do not need to boost up those feelings if you really want to make a quality time during holiday. You should be explicitly saying ‘no’ when your boss or coworkers contact you regarding any job-related matter. You can tell your boss, “I’m so sorry Mr. X, I cannot do it now as it is my time-off. I will do it when I come back to office, if you don’t mind. I will come back on Monday”.

Let people know beforehand

It is also a good idea to prepare a template that informs your employer, coworkers, or clients about your vacation. You can state that you don’t want to be disturbed during the holiday. You can put such sign on your table, app-accounts’ status, office’s chat group or directly send it to the person who doesn’t respect your holiday. However, you should use the right expression so they will not be offended when read it.

Get your working applications in silent mode

If you install some applications in your phone that are related to job matter such as email, WhatsApp group, as well as group chatting such as Slack or Skype, it will be better to turn these applications in silent mode. This way, you can forget about the work matters during your time-off. It is also a good idea to hide the notification for a while, but ensure that you can access it again when you comeback so you can re-track your pending tasks during the leave.

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