Comments on: Open Thread: Downtime in December?

By: Web Worker Daily » Archive Open Thread: What Are Your Holiday Break Plans? «

Fri, 21 Dec 2007 14:01:10 +0000

[...] December 21st, 2007 (6:01am) Anne Zelenka No Comments Gone are the days when we were in school and got two or more weeks off at holiday time to celebrate and recuperate. Some companies shut down for an entire week or more around Christmas — and their employees probably feel pretty lucky. If you’re a freelancer or an entrepreneur or just really busy at your job, you may not be able to take off more than a day or two. [...]

By: Guin White

Guin White — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 21:34:36 +0000

I agree with April. Downtime (whenever you find it) is a great time to improve your insight.

By: Euan W Semple

Euan W Semple — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 20:04:30 +0000

:-)

By: Anne Zelenka

Anne Zelenka — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 14:30:21 +0000

Euan – I know you weren’t making a grand pronouncement for everyone, but your comment was just too useful as a starting point to resist!

It’s a good reminder to freelancers (and those who might contemplate freelancing) of the benefits of working as an employee in an office setting.

By: Euan W Semple

Euan W Semple — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 08:36:38 +0000

I used the word corporate in the title of the post to indicate I was really talking about office workers and was remembering back to my time at the BBC where apart from people involved in playing stuff out the place could get very quiet over Christmas.

As a freelancer now myself I feel your pain guys!

By: Robert

Robert — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 07:31:36 +0000

Ah, this year I WILL be enjoying downtime in December (at least, it’s looking that way so far…)

As a freelancer, though, most years I have mad work in December as clients need someone to fill in for staffers who ARE taking it easy for December…

By: April Holle

April Holle — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 03:58:50 +0000

At my workplace we do see a slow down in Nov/Dec around the holidays, I think a lot of this is due to our clients being busy and budgets that are already used up for the year . After we roll out any holiday specific needs it’s general maintenance at that point and the status quo.

So we have a policy in the office, if you don’t have anything to work on at the moment, work on yourself. Hone your skills, read about the industry and learn something new. Since you can never know EVERYTHING there’s always something to do!

Our office environment is very viral as well, we openly share our new ideas and gathered information, so even those who are still working on billable materials can take a look at them later when they have their spare moment. This can be in the form of internal emails, links over social networks like our Facebook group, and our own blogs which we’re encouraged to keep. :)

By: Adam Benayoun

Adam Benayoun — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 23:15:08 +0000

Downtime in December?
I find this period of time more stressful than any other time.

We’re working harder than any other month.

We’ve just launched our private beta, so no sleep for us :)