Take that holiday - or suffer

By JULIE MIDDLETON

In an ideal world, you would slope off on a three or four-week holiday somewhere exotic, with the goodwill of your boss, and would return refreshed, relaxed and raring to make the company another million dollars.

In reality, life these days has to fit around work. Many of us are snatching a few days away from the office here and there, a break preceded by frantic catch-up work to cover the impending absence and followed by more of the same on our return.

And weekends? They're often busier than weekdays, and that's just when work isn't encroaching.

Financial woes, his-and-hers careers and family commitments might preclude lengthy holidays away from home, and then there are the twin curses of e-mail and mobile phones, which can make getting away from it all something of a mission.

Waikato University psychology professor Michael O'Driscoll says there are no formal statistics, "but my personal belief is that probably people are taking less of the lengthy break and taking shorter breaks, two or three days here and there."

That's not enough, he says: after two days, the body is still recovering from the fast pace of the working week and your mind may still be dwelling on what you have left behind, and what might be going on in your absence.

The necessary psychological withdrawal from the work environment which precedes the slide into real relaxation is not complete.

"The evidence seems to suggest that people benefit from having at least a couple of weeks," he says. "It seems to be the minimum time to make it worthwhile."

Says Associate Professor Anne-Marie Feyer, director of the New Zealand Environmental and Occupational Research Centre: "There's lots of evidence to suggest that ... people are working longer hours. As a population we're running revved up too high.

"Work is seeping into the weekend and our regular time off, but also into our episodic time-off - our annual leave.

"The whole notion of rest, recuperation and recreation - they are not the same at all, but we need all three - is that people come back to work completely revived."

She has noticed a trend for companies to impose limits on how much annual leave workers can accumulate, but says that is not a bad thing.

"I used to think that the reason companies made rules about leave was so workers couldn't carry it over, so people wouldn't take three months off," she says. "And there is an element of that.

"But [now, companies] realise that people have to be encouraged to take their leave."

Some people feel pressure to be seen at work, to be perceived as dedicated. And in a climate in which jobs are no longer for life, and rationalisation is not a new line in philosophy, some workers feel that a company which doesn't notice their absence might make it permanent.

But the impact of too much work and not enough play is a loss of form. "Creativity declines," says O'Driscoll. And it's no secret that when workers are overstressed, quality suffers, absenteeism and turnover soar.

The extreme end of the scale is burnout, says O'Driscoll. Though incorrectly used by many to describe a couple of tiring weeks, it's a recognised and extreme form of stress characterised by a "traumatic" feeling of emotional exhaustion, psychological withdrawal and an inability to focus on anything.

"People feel they have no ability to control what's happening," he says. "Cognitive functioning can go downhill. The ability to concentrate and make decisions are all affected. Physical health and relationships can suffer."

A Cornell University study found that about 10 per cent of people working at least 50 hours a week report conflict at home. Extend the work hours to 60 or more and the reports of conflict reach 30 per cent.

Longer hours and job insecurity have also been linked to health problems. The World Health Organisation predicts that in 20 years, stress will account for half of the world's 10 biggest medical problems.

The key to the perfect holiday is breaking routines, at home as well as work.

"You have to get away from home," says O'Driscoll, "but it doesn't need to be far."

He suggests day trips or special treats: "To totally relax, you need to focus on recreation."

And no, you don't need a cellphone and laptop: "You're reinforcing the connection between home and work, and enabling your work life to impinge upon your recreation. You need to get away from it - you can't be thinking about work."

And what about the common gripe that you always come down with a minor illness in the first few days of a holiday?

"There's not a lot of evidence for or against," says O'Driscoll, "but I have heard that one."

He won't discount the possibility that early holiday illness may well be the body's response to a sudden break from frenetic, adrenaline-charged days: "The body's catching up."

However, we'll soon have better access to statistics on how New Zealanders balance work and time off as Feyer's centre, based at the Auckland and Dunedin medical schools, launches the baseline New Zealand Working Life Project.

Aimed at dissecting the relationships between Kiwis' working and non-working lives, it hopes to have identified by 2002 what patterns exist and how they compare with overseas examples.

One sector which has had to realign to reflect changing trends in executive careers is tourism, says Simon Milne, Auckland University of Technology professor of tourism.

There are "more dual-income working families, and more single-parent families, which makes it more difficult to get away, and reduces some of the ability to take two or three-week extended stays," he says.

The traditional all-inclusive, two-week packages somewhere warm have become more flexible, breaking into five, eight or nine days, and allowing various options to be bundled together, he says.

Weekend getaways have also soared in popularity, and workers with plenty of money but little time have also fuelled a growth in green tourism and a dramatic rise in luxury spa-type resorts, he says.

If all the above hasn't convinced you that a holiday is required right now, Milne says that the Pacific Islands, traditionally New Zealanders' mid-winter destination, are even better value this year than usual.

Following last year's coup, Fiji tourism operators have engaged in heavy discounting to lure tourists back, and other islands such as the Cooks have followed suit.

Sand, surf and sun - you might not be able to write it off on expenses, but it's worth viewing your holidays as an essential part of a strong career development strategy.