Earlier this month we posted an infographic titled, “Why you need a vacation,” that went wildly viral throughout the Boston innovation scene. It spoke, among other things, to the productivity gains achieved by taking time away from your job. But with our highly connected world, regardless if you’re trying to be all Zen on the beach, it actually can be challenging to truly abstain from work.
As a follow up, and with all that wonderful sun here in the city this past weekend, we wanted to share this recent post on Web Strategist that provides five steps to truly taking a vacation amidst all our connected devices. The post was authored by Jeremiah Owyang who is a partner at research consultancy Altimeter Group in San Francisco and was previously an analyst at Forrester Research, which is based here in Boston:
- “Take a Vacation. Really. Take one.” Owyang suggests if budgets are tight to at least take a ‘staycation.’
- “Properly Plan To Leave Woes Behind.” Owyang suggests to plan to have people covering your tasks so you don’t have to carry around any concerns or hanging strings with you while vacationing. He also suggests giving customers, partners and otherwise a full month’s heads up that you’ll be away.
- “Unplug, Even Forcibly If Needed.” Owyang suggests vacationing where there is in fact no Internet to quell your urges to connect. If that is not doable he suggests letting your batteries run dry and leaving devices in a hotel safe.
- “Use Your ‘Idea Freezer’.” For those of us with ideas constantly churning, sometimes it’s hard to take a mental vacation — regardless if you are physically on one. To circumvent this, Owyang suggests jotting ideas down on a paper, quickly, setting them aside into what he calls the ‘idea freezer,’ and then moving on to other thoughts. You can then “thaw out” those ideas another time.
- “Do a Counter Cycle.” The final tip Owyang leaves readers with is to do something that is the complete opposite of your normal daily routine.
What tips would you add to the list? Let us know in the comments!
