23-08-2007
Is your business in the holiday doldrums?
Here's how to put the wind back in your sales ...
A bit of down time in the form of a few weeks holiday is essential for everyone – no matter whether a small business owner or an employee or in what type of industry you work.
Even for people who are really dedicated to their work, there is much to be said for having some
time away to recharge the batteries, go travelling with the family or pursue other interests.
However for a small, or even medium sized,business owner, managing leave requirements can be quite a juggle and the larger your workforce, the more of an issue it can be. This is why most find it easier not to go away at all.
In order to ensure you are able to take some leave yourself, and prepare for your employees
absence, put together a comprehensive plan at the beginning of the year. It will become an invaluable tool, especially as your business grows.
One of the first things to do is to realise how much time in total your business will miss out on due to annual leave.
For example, if all employees take their entire four weeks annual leave in a year, a business with 10 employees has to allow for the fact that for 40 weeks of the year – 75 per cent of the time – someone will be on annual leave and the team will be short one member.
If you have a team of 13 employees or more, a staff member will be away for the equivalent of 52 weeks of the year.
That effectively means that if the workload of the business requires 13 employees “on deck”, you need to be employing at least 14 staff to cover the gaps created by people being on leave.
And this is at a time when people are entitled to four weeks annual leave. In the next couple of years the national annual leave allowance is expected to increase to 4.8 weeks (24 days) in 2008 and to 5.6 weeks (28 days) from April 2009.
All this to consider, even before you factor in staff absences due to illness, long service leave or maternity leave!
Managing the leave of key or senior personnel presents further considerations. If they manage a team of people or have an unsupported role such as finance director, who will take on the work while they are away? Who will deal with key clients or customers in their absence? Do others in the business have the skills and expertise to take on some or all of their role?
That is why planning holidays is so important for small to medium size businesses and their owners.
As a business owner it is likely that if you never plan a holiday then you will never take it, so when putting plans in place to manage all the annual leave requirements, make sure you book time off for yourself.
The best way to manage staff leave is to consider leave requirements at the beginning of every year.
The first step is to ask approximately when everyone would liketo take holidays and put together a preliminary plan. This will most likely change, but it at least gives everyone the chance to request the time they want.
Careful management may be needed at this stage if several people want time off at the same time of the year, such as during the mid-year summer holidays or during the Christmas / New Year period.
You will also have to consider the needs of the business and may need to stipulate that there are certain times of the year when leave can’t be taken. As an example, if you have a retail business, it may be that staff are asked not to take leave from late November through to late December to deal with the busiest time of the year in the lead-up to Christmas.
Alternatively, some businesses give people with children the first chance to request leave during school holidays so they can spend time with their family, although this can sometimes create friction and needs to be handled carefully.
As part of the planning process, you should also be consider how people’s work loads will be managed while they are away. Some people are reluctant to take holidays because of the extra work it causes before and after they go so measures need to be put in place to manage this.
Think about how the workload could be shared among other staff, or even consider using temps or contractors to assist while employees are away. While this will cost a bit more you may find that it is worth it to ensure that the business runs smoothly, workloads are managed and deadlines met.
If you are a small company you could consider training staff in skills that could be used to cover at least one other person in the business. It never hurts to have multi-skilled staff with you as your business grows.
There are some excellent tools now available to help manage and plan staff leave. This can range from the basic wall mounted staff leave planner to sophisticated software programs which allow staff to electronically request leave, track the number of leave days a staff member has left or even ensure staff in the same departments aren’t on leave at the same time.
However you choose to manage your staff leave requirements, the key is to ensure forward planning so that employees’ dream holidays don’t become nightmares for you.
Put yourself and your business at ease. Your business may slow down over the holidays but at least you can make sure you're covered if the worst happens.
Compare business insurance quotes, then decide on the best cover for your business and buy it instantly!