What are you doing for Christmas, the holidays or the silly season? It doesn’t matter what you call the December break – it needs to be discussed….
Should forced December leave be a thing of the past?
Is a rethink of the annual leave policy long overdue? As workforces become more culturally diverse and geographically spread, is there the same importance or significance of the Christmas holiday?
In most companies, if a new joiner starts in November or December and is not employed in a business support role, their leave balance goes straight into the red or is unpaid to cover the seasonal closure.
That’s not an incentive to join before the new year.
Get ahead of your competitors
The early bird catches the worm…or in this instance, the best candidate.
Encourage candidates to join your company by offering a choice. Give new starters flexibility. Not forcing them to take leave could differentiate yours-elves (get it) and lock in candidates one or two months earlier than your competitors, beating the Jan/ Feb scramble.
Be creative, make your leave policy a key differentiator.
Furthermore, with the tough year many people have had, being able to start earning 4-5 weeks sooner is the best celebration they and their families could hope for.
More productive – quicker
From the candidate’s perspective, if they have no plans, it could be the perfect time to wade through all the policies, onboarding/ training materials and videos with no distractions, and not eat into their precious leave entitlement. From a business perspective, new starters are up to speed and more productive come the beginning of January.
Now, I’m not suggesting everyone should work over this period either, BUT if your business can support these operating hours and a new starter is happy only taking the statutory public Holidays and using their leave when they want to (and when it’s accrued), shouldn’t there be the opportunity to do so?
There is still time to recruit and have new starters join this side of the New Year. So get in touch to discuss how we can help you build your capability, ready for the year ahead.
