• by Gary Leopold , Columnist, September 2, 2014

The amount of unused vacation time remains staggering and the latest survey results published by U.S. Travel have been well publicized. Americans are leaving over 429 million vacation days on the table and it’s depriving the U.S. economy of $160 billion in spending. 

It’s an issue that isn’t going away and it seems every year a new effort is made to reverse this growing crisis. The Travel Channel has run ads to address it. Expedia and others have conducted extensive research and launched awareness campaigns to drive home the importance of vacations. And perhaps in the most organized and concerted effort to date, U.S. Travel has begun a massive educational push to showcase the benefits of time off from work to mental and physical health, careers, relationships and even healthy aging.

As much as I hope this latest initiative will start to turn the table, I can’t help but wonder if it’s really going to make a dent and truly change behavior. The fact is that 96% of those workers surveyed by U.S. Travel readily acknowledge that they see the virtues of taking time off, yet 40% of workers still don’t use all their vacation time. Clearly there remains a disconnect and to place an emphasis on giving people more of what they already know isn’t likely to move the needle.

Rather than tout the virtues of vacations and getting away from work, perhaps we need to be more realistic and embrace the reality that work has become an even more dominant factor in our lives— be it fueled by economic realities, technological connection or other factors. 

Whether you believe in the “Work Martyr Complex” or not, the overriding reason people aren’t taking vacation is directly related to work. Forty percent worry about returning to a mountain of work. Thirty-five percent don’t take vacation because they believe no one else can do their job. And 20% don’t want to be seen to be replaceable.

The reality is that even those who do go on vacation have embraced work as an inevitable component of their time away from the office. TripAdvisor reports that 79% of Americans work while on vacation. Ninety-one percent check emails while on vacation at least daily and 85% respond to them. Most interesting, 37% of those surveyed don’t even view checking emails as work.

Today’s travelers are increasingly different than those of the past and so are their views on work and play and how to balance and accommodate both. Is the answer one or the other? Or is it increasingly and logically more of a careful blend of work connection and the pleasures of getting away.

Should we be highlighting how getting away lets you stay connected to work in ways that are more productive and beneficial and that can address the fears and anxieties that seem to prevent people from going away?

Should we be promoting how much clearer you can think when responding to emails, writing reports and solving problems while seated at a cozy café in Paris?

Or how productive you can be while poolside in the Caribbean?

Or how much more creative your ideas can be when they’re benefitting from the stimulation of another culture or the vivid hues of a colorful destination?

Perhaps, people would increasingly take all their vacation time if we created a more positive connotation on the idea of doing some work while you’re away, and rally around the possibility that small doses of work can actually be well accomplished without compromising your vacation. Not to mention how much less jarring the transition is when you return from vacation to the office and you don’t have to spend your first week back digging out.

Isn’t one of the great advantages of vacationing on the West Coast (for us East Coasters at least) the three-hour time difference that lets you put in a half day’s worth of work before 9 a.m. and then enjoy a full vacation day free of the stress related to missing work.

Clay Shirky famously said, “A revolution doesn’t happen when a society adopt new tools. It happens when society adopts new behaviors.”

Let’s acknowledge how these new behaviors are impacting the intersection of work and play and explore how we can speak a language that resonates with today’s travelers.

Let’s shift some of our research and marketing efforts to better illustrate how people can successfully have their cake and emails, too. 

Let’s demonstrate that workers don’t have to fear being away from work, because it is now not just possible, but acceptable for them to remain vital and active in the workplace even as they enjoy and explore the world away from the office. 

I hate the term Workcation, and the emphasis it places on work, but I do think we need a fresh approach that makes work an ally, and not an enemy, of vacations.