Working Remotely on Vacation

If you’re accustomed to working on vacation, you’re in good company. According to human resource consulting firm Robert Half, nearly 56 percent of workers connect with the office during a break. But there are ways to simplify working on the road, whether you’re trying to squeeze in a vacation around a busy schedule or are a high-flying digital nomad where working on the road is the norm. Need ideas? Here’s how to keep working and enjoy your vacation without the stress.

Strategize Your Work Time
Business waste is on the rise, but it’s not just about paper and over-spending. Research shows most salaried employees only do about three hours of real work each day. The rest of the time is spent on the “cult of overwork,” meetings or simply finding busy work to pass the time. Take back control over your vacation and strategize which tasks must be done to stay productive and efficient. That might mean checking your email only twice a day, skipping busy work that doesn’t make an impact and focusing on pure productivity. And remember you can also work from the airport, plane or car to focus on work while waiting for your real vacation to begin.

Turn Work Into an Experience
Sitting in a hotel room and staring out at a glorious beach, or worse, a parking lot is not a good motivator for a working vacation. Turn work into an experience by finding a popular café with fantastic food and coffee to work from and spend the first 20 minutes doing some people watching. A local co-working space offering daily access is also a fun way to see more of your destination and meet the locals. You can also look to local MeetUp groups for remote working groups who like to get together for a chat and hang-out during working hours.

Come with a Back-up
There’s nothing worse than realizing your lackluster wireless access means you can’t get any work done on vacation at all. Even the grandest hotels experience internet issues, not to mention exotic locations with dial-up service. Set out on vacation with a back-up in mind whether sourcing a local co-working space or researching your phone and data plan. T-Mobile offers attractive unlimited data and texting plans for reliable connectivity overseas, and/or a Skyroam Mobile Hotspot provides day passes to connect to local wireless on the go.

However you choose to structure your work day and stay connected, make sure to spend time unplugging, too. Once work is done, close your laptop, turn off your smartphone alerts and enter into vacation mode. You earned it.