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Around this time last year, we gave our employees the benefit of unlimited holidays. Some people thought we were crazy—the concept is still practically unheard of in Lithuania. Some were very cautious, pointing to data showing that people with unlimited holidays actually end up taking less time off.
And in the beginning, we were cautious too. So we decided to introduce the benefit for a one-year trial period starting January 2020. Since we’re now over 12 months on, we wanted to share our findings with the world (hint: we’re ready to do it all over again).
Less is definitely not more
One of our initial goals with launching this great benefit was to actually increase the time off that our employees take. And the theory that people take less time off with an unlimited holiday allowance? Well, we found this to be not true.
We believe in work flexibility—whether an employee wants to take a couple of days for a long weekend, or a month-long break once a year, they should be able to do so. We trust our Transfernauts to decide how much time they want to rest, recharge and restore. And we encourage more employees to take time off instead of ‘saving-up’ paid holidays for that special vacation.
Internal data showed that instead of taking most of their time off in summer (especially in August—this seems to be the hottest month for holidays), our employees chose more consistent holidays throughout the year. The percentage of employees on leave increased month by month with the only exception being March and April. This was likely due to Covid-19 and the nationwide lockdowns many people found themselves in.
More days off = a better recharge
We encourage employees to make their own mind up about how and when they want to rest. Not having to worry about remaining holiday balances allows people to have a better work-life balance. Oh, and more energy to spend on important personal things.
Not only did more people take time off, but they also took more days off. Just for a rest. And this key finding was noticed in every single department within the company. In some cases, some employees even took twice the holiday compared to last year!
Checking in with our people
When it comes to additional perks we’ve introduced, we’re always listening to our Transfernauts. We feel that they’re the best people to say which benefits are valuable and which are not. So after launching our unlimited holiday policy, we asked our people to share their thoughts. And the outcome was better than we expected.
87% of all employees evaluated this benefit very positively. They said that the vacation policy allows them to take enough time to recharge. A similar amount of employees said that they feel supported in arranging time off work when they need to. Finally, almost 90% of employees agreed that they’re supported in making use of flexible working arrangements.
The numbers speak for themselves. Flexibility has always been something we’ve valued. And we’re extremely happy to see that our employees care about the same thing. So… that’s it then. We’ve agreed to continue the Unlimited Holiday benefit for everyone in 2021. We’ll keep you posted, but we imagine it’ll be another roaring success. Just watch this space.
