I've implemented a "get it done" based vacation policy at my company. I.e., as long as my devs are getting the work done, I couldn't care less about their seat time, physical location, state of dress, etc. Hell, if you're on a beach in Cancun and only working a couple hours a day, that's cool, just make sure you get your code checked in and answer emails within a reasonable timeframe so we don't miss a deadline. And wear sunscreen. Developers and sunlight don't usually mix well.
With that said, if one of my guys did what this guy is advocating, I'd have little choice but to replace them. I have to be able to rely on my guys; I trust the hell out of them. Bailing for a month plus with little to no warning...that fractures our relationship of trust, and no relationship can succeed in that condition.
Good points, and wow, I didn't expect to find myself defending a four year old blog post today.
I'm not sure where you get the "little to no warning" bit from what I wrote. In the examples I cited, I gave about 2 months notice in both cases. The idea is certainly not to burn bridges or blackmail your employer. Just that it's OK to take the odd sabbatical.
I eventually migrated to consulting, where I could simply end a contract then disappear for the rest of the year. And from there, I migrated further to running my own product company, where you can disappear for 4 years straight as long as you have a laptop along.
Still, if I had a job today I wouldn't limit myself to 2 weeks vacation.
The two months notice part wasn't real clear in what you wrote; that definitely alters the context of the post.
And I agree 100%: two weeks vacation is just dumb. People have families, kids, friends...that stuff is more important than work; once work gets more important than those things life gets hollow.
Don't get me wrong, I love this kind of "get it done" policy, but it's not vacation if you work "a couple hours a day". Vacation is when you are able to really forget about work for a while.
That being said, I fully agree about the impossibly short warning time he's advocating. Six months sounds more like it.
I get that; that's why we define a "vacation" by the amount of time one of my guys is going dark. If you're going dark for two weeks, that's a vacation. If you're going to be scuba diving and only checking emails nightly, that's just reduced production capacity...just let me know so I can plan for it and please don't do it right before a deadline. :)
IMO this issue is indicative of the relationship between employee/employer. The tone of the OP is so "eff you, I'm outta here" that the relationship must already be dysfunctional; there's a lack of trust and respect and that's ultimately the employer's responsibility. Something is wrong with the company's culture.
I don't remember a vacation where I didn't "work" - willingly. I usually get bored and get the itch to write some code. I guess that happens when your work is the same as your hobby.
So I've got that you don't mind where or what your devs are doing so long as the tasks get completed, which is awesome, and that you can't do long vacations with no warning, which is reasonable.
What's your stance on long vacations with warning? One month's notice? Two?
I mentioned this in another response, but I believe this issue really has more to do with who you hire, how well you pay them, how you treat them, etc. It's more about the execution of philosophy, not the composition of and adherence to policy.
To be real candid we've not run into a situation yet where a developer was going off the grid for a bit over a week at a time. The devs we hire are really really talented and they go into withdrawal if they don't open an IDE for a couple of days. They're compulsive coders...I mean, I pay them to do what they do, but most of their motivation is internal. The common thread is that they all have a passion for development, and that shines through.
My belief is that hiring decisions are the most important ones I make, so I want to know the people I'm hiring and I want them to know me. This is going to sound cheesy and it's not one-size-fits-all, but it all comes down to cultivating relationships.
So I talk to devs via email that I've met on HN. Or on twitter. Or at <insert language here> user groups. Or via other devs. I'm interested in what they're working on...not just because I might want to hire them, but because development is interesting, right? That's why we all read HN. :) And developers rarely get to talk to people that "get" what they're doing outside of their work colleagues.
It's a great way to learn about new things. It's a great way to get questions answered when you bump up against an issue. It's a great way to help other devs when they hit a wall that you've maybe hit before. And it also a fantastic way to find guys you think might want to work with you and vice versa.
I know that sounds really kumbaya, and it probably doesn't scale or whatever. But I'm not trying to be a huge enterprise software company that has revenues in the gazillions. I'm just trying to be a small shop that does really amazing work and is a place where really good geeks love to work.
I'm ok with having a distributed team; in an ideal world we'd be able to get together physically more than we do. But if there's an amazing talent in Seattle or someplace else really far from where I live I'm not going to let geographic separation keep me from working with that person.
But...I definitely don't have it all figured out for sure...half the time I feel like that xckd strip where the guy freaks out as he's signing his mortgage loan because he still thinks about how cool it would be to be Batman.
I think this makes a really good point. What the blog post advocates is essentially blackmail.
There's a huge difference between planning for a month or two off with several months notice and simply walking in to your boss's office and telling them you'll be gone for a couple months, starting this Friday.
Also, why not simply bring this up when you're being hired. I regularly take a 4-5 week vacation once every two years or so to visit in-laws in another country. I tell my employers about this up front.
We were; in fact we just hired a developer that starts next week that I'm hyper-geeked up to have on board. The dude is so much smarter than I am. It's awesome.
That said, shoot me an email and we can get a dialogue going. I'm not sure when we'll hire again but we only hire those with whom I've established some type of relationship beyond a resume and cover letter. :)
With that said, if one of my guys did what this guy is advocating, I'd have little choice but to replace them. I have to be able to rely on my guys; I trust the hell out of them. Bailing for a month plus with little to no warning...that fractures our relationship of trust, and no relationship can succeed in that condition.