How to make sure your employees make the most of the festive break

The Christmas holiday period is usually the one time of year many employees get the time they need to relax, decompress and recalibrate for the year ahead. However, it doesn’t always end up that way. For many, the festive season can become a period of heightened stress and emotion, with family obligations, increased financial pressures and other factors.

This can be made much worse if an employee keeps checking in with their workplace. After all, no one can keep working all the time. Trying to do so, is likely to lead to poor mental health, poor productivity and, ultimately, burnout.

So, if you’re an employer or manager, what can you do to make sure your employees use the upcoming break properly and return to the workplace in 2025 recharged and energised? Read on to find out.

Benefits of taking a break from work

Everyone needs some time away from the office. Studies show taking time off and setting boundaries around work communication has powerful benefits for wellbeing and productivity, including:

• Prevent stress and burnout. Regular breaks help your mind and body recover from work pressures, keeping you energised and alert.
• Improved mental and physical health. Holidays lower stress, reduce the risk of heart attacks and strokes, and improve our sense of balance.
• Better sleep quality. Stepping away from work can help you sleep better and feel more refreshed.
• Increased happiness and connection. Time off gives you the opportunity to connect with friends and family (hopefully that’s a good thing), boosting your happiness.
• Expanded creativity. Distance from daily tasks has been shown to help you see things differently and sparks new ideas.
• Giving you new perspectives. Stepping back gives you clarity on workplace challenges, helping you approach them more effectively.
• Fostering joy and inspiration. If you’re lucky enough to travel to new places or do new activities on your break, it can fill you with energy and motivation.

Why most holidays don’t serve their ultimate purpose

Despite the many benefits workplace breaks bring, as many as 71% of Australians say they return to the office after a holiday without feeling refreshed. And the main cause for this? The blurring of work/life boundaries.

At a time when we should be switching off and letting our mind go to non-work matters, a lot of people still find themselves drawn back to the workplace.

In fact, as many as 40% of Australia employees continue checking their work emails, even when they’re on leave. A staggering 63% use their break to catch up on work they didn’t finish during the year.

Self-inflicted or cultural?

Often, of course, this holiday work is of an employee’s own choosing. We all know team members who can’t drop work even while they’re away from it. We might even be like that ourselves.

But frequently the extra work comes about as a result of workplace culture – or the feeling that we can’t stop working, even when we’re away from it.

But if your business has a culture where people keep working when they’re supposed to be taking a break, it’s probably doing you more harm than good.

That’s because it’s likely to be making staff less happy – a major contributing factor to burnout, and ultimately staff retention.

You need to close down properly (if you can)

One way to make sure staff do fully disconnect is to close the workplace down over Christmas.

Now, we know that not all businesses have that luxury (in retail and hospitality, for instance, it can be the busiest time of year).

But if you do have the opportunity to close down for a while, take it. Having a week or two where people know that there will be nothing happening and there is nothing whatsoever to check in for, could be the one chance people get to really clear their mind.

Besides, during the period between Christmas Day and New Years Day there are already three public holidays and two days of weekend. If you suspend your operations over that period, employees won’t need to eat into much of their annual leave to take a break.

For the record, Catalina Consultants will be closing down at 1pm on Christmas Eve and opening again at 8:30 on Wednesday 8 January 2025.

Don’t expect employees to check in

Next up, you need to allow employees to actually take a break.  That means, when they’re away from the office – whether that’s during close down or just while they’re on a regular break – please, leave them alone.

Don’t expect them to answer emails. Don’t check in with them. Give them some time to themselves.

The reality is – assuming you’re not performing life-saving surgery – there are very few workplace tasks that won’t be able to wait until they return from their break. And, if it really is that important to the functioning of your business, you should probably have someone else who can perform it anyway. (If you don’t you, may have a ‘key person’ issue, suggesting bigger problems within your organisation.)

Encourage people to take leave

One of the main downsides of holidays is when people don’t take them at all – or only take the minimum they have too.

Some workplaces have a culture of letting their employees build up masses of leave which never gets taken; others don’t really keep tabs on how much leave staff are accumulating. If yours is like this, it could be doing you more harm than good – both when it comes to workplace morale and the need to pay unexpected employee entitlements when someone leaves.

So if you haven’t already, you should be encouraging people to take time away from the office. That’s especially true if, at this time of year, you’re likely to see a downturn in work.

Check in post-break

Finally, making sure your employees take full advantage of time away from the office shouldn’t end when they go on leave.

When people come back to the workplace after this festive season, make sure you check in with them to ask how they feel after their breaks.

These informal conversations can help identify any lingering stressors or issues and provide an opportunity to re-align on goals and expectations for the year ahead.

To debrief effectively, you should:

• Ask about their experience: Encourage employees to share what went well during their break and if they were able to fully disconnect.
• Identify challenges: If someone mentions they struggled to switch off, explore how workplace policies or culture might be improved.
• Encourage reflection: Use this moment to ask employees what they’re looking forward to in the new year or how they’d like to grow professionally.
• Reinforce support: Remind your team about mental health resources, wellness programs or flexible working options that can support them year-round.

A well-conducted check-in shows employees you value their wellbeing, not just during the break, but every day. This simple step can strengthen workplace trust, foster open communication, and help employees feel more motivated and supported heading into 2025.

Other than that…

Remember, taking regular breaks is vital to employees staying engaged, energised and productive. So make sure it’s not just your employees who get some rest, but that you do too.

Get in touch today to start building a healthier workplace culture.