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Taking Off

I am one of those who do not provide any personal details in my OOO message. I am out between these dates and these people will cover for me during that time. I have been receipt of messages ranging from second honeymoon at Tahiti, 15 year old dog's emergency arthritis surgery, vacationing in Mallorca and Ibiza with family and multiple doctors' appointments through the day. 

Not sure any of these message were particularly useful or actionable for me. The last one got me quite concerned because the person sending it was in his early 30s. It it not culturally acceptable to ask if all is well unless they offer to share - which in this instance they did not. Everything appeared normal before and after that day. The person who took off to Tahiti (more power to her and her marriage), was not performing at her job for a long time while managing up and around brilliantly. No one was delighted that now she would be gone for a couple of weeks without any coverage plan.

I am not sure if any of these folks were justifying their time off - those messages are sad to read and I see a fair share of those as well - sick children, sudden disruption of child-care coverage, aging parent taken ill, bereavement and so on. But there are things that people need to do - flooded basement needing immediate attention, power outage from a storm, totaled car and such. These are all valid reasons but the fact the person is detailing it out signals a low-trust environment. A person needs time off to do what they need to do - there is no need to explain oneself. 

“‘on PTO’ conveys ‘I’m fully off work, using a company benefit.’”

“In contrast to terms like ‘sick day’ or ‘on vacation,’ it keeps the reason for the employee’s absence private—recipients don’t get to speculate about how often Jimothy is traveling or whether Pamantha has an unusual number of medical issues,” she said. “Not to mention, at workplaces with pooled time off for both categories, vacation vs. sick leave might not be a meaningful distinction anyway.”

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