Tessie’s Two Cents

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Work shouldn’t run your life

Dear Tessie,

Do I need to be more considerate of my boss’s personal life when I’m making decisions for myself? Hear me out… I decided to take off a week for vacation in the summer time when my kids are out of school. I agreed to certain dates and scheduling things a certain way so that the effects of my absence are minimized at work, but my boss has still been telling me about how now her plans have had to change for the summer. If I already did things to accommodate at work should I really have had to look at her personal schedule too?

Sincerely,

Just Need A Vacation

 

Dear Need A Vacation,

Our responsibilities at work are TO the job and work. While normal human decency is a nice way to live every part of your life, I don’t usually believe that folks would need to work on both convenience for your job and personal convenience for your boss.

Different company situations change the dynamic of these things, of course. Folks can’t be going and asking you to sacrifice for their small business, it’s not your dream. But maybe you work for a person that is also a good friend of yours. A smaller company might mean closer relationships between yourself and upper management. In some work environments, you have a close knit team that you work with, and that would change things as well.

Is your boss trying to make room to go to an important event? Will they be needing to cut short some other important obligation to accommodate your absence? Now why didn’t your boss point this out earlier on instead of after you had already made other decisions and discussed a timeline with them?

I don’t honestly believe that work should run your life. What’s the point of working so hard that you don’t live the life you’re trying to support? I do believe that we should be kind to one another, and work to help each other, but that we shouldn’t use that as an excuse to take advantage of one another, either.

I don’t think you’re being inconsiderate, dear. I think you worked to make decisions that were good for everyone involved, and that’s all that can be asked of you.