Anniversary
Hey, I just noticed that Saturday was the 4th anniversary of my starting at Macromedia. Cool beans. That means I'm now officially eligible for my sabbatical. Now I just need to sit down and figure out when I'm taking it.
2 Responses to “Anniversary”
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heather w
Sabbatical — cool!! how much time can you take? I am envious! I’m planning to give myself a 7+ month sabbatical in a couple of years, but it will almost certainly involve quitting my job to do so, a somewhat frightening prospect, mostly due to the cost of health insurance (though quitting may actually be the right thing for me to do by that time anyway).
As an employee in higher ed, I find it annoying that extended leave — even unpaid — is generally only available to employees classed as “faculty.” Of course, I find the entire American vacation system disgusting at best and terrifying at worst; that so many people get only a week or two off a year =if= they get any at all, AND that so many are unable or unwilling to take even that much time off from work.
Heather, who dreams of a 20-hr work week and 8 weeks vacation.
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Jed
I’m always a little embarrassed to talk about the sabbatical thing with people outside the tech industry, ’cause it’s a ridiculously good deal: six weeks of paid vacation every four years. That was standard in the computer industry (at least in Silicon Valley) for a while, but I think is becoming less common, as companies tighten their belts. And some bigwig (maybe Larry Ellison?) noted that his company doesn’t give sabbaticals because they too often result in people leaving—he hired a lot of his top employees when they were on sabbatical from elsewhere.
In terms of making one’s own sabbaticals, Jane Hawkins told me during my Clarion time that she had saved up money for a while and taken a year off work to write; that was what inspired my Wanderjahr a while back. Sadly, I ended up not doing much writing during that time, which probably says something about my dedication to writing. But I did have fun. And although clearly it’s not something everyone can do, I think something similar (a month off work, or three, or seven) is something a lot of people can probably do if they have an understanding employer, or a reasonably good job market for their skills. (Both big ifs, I know.) I certainly always encourage people to try that sort of thing if they can—taking a break from work can be a wonderful experience.
