Even Europeans can’t help working while on vacation
Though stereotypes may suggest Europeans are better than Americans at drawing a line between work and leisure, a new study from Lastminute.com reveals that even they have trouble cutting ties with the office during a vacation. In fact, more than seven out of 10 of Spanish survey respondents said they have been contacted by a co-worker during their vacation and have worked two hours per week on average despite being officially on a break.
The survey found that 72.3% of Spaniards and 68.6% of Italians have received a work call while attempting to take time off, while 54.2% of French respondents said they have been bothered while on vacation due to a work-related emergency.
And 70% of the time, the call was made to their personal line rather than a professional one.
The British emerged as the least likely to mix work and relaxation, as “only” 42.4% of UK respondents have been bothered by a co-worker while on holiday.
holida workCertain bosses have no qualms about contacting their vacationing employees, and this seems to be particularly true for Spaniards (65%) and Italians (61.6%) While the majority of French workers have been spared the experience of a call from their boss during their paid leave, a non-negligible 38.7% of them have not been so fortunate.
Across the board, more than half of workers regard these professional calls as a nuisance. This is the case for 59.7% of French respondents, 58.2% of Britons and 53.5% of Germans.
The annoyance is often compounded by the feeling that the call is unimportant or even useless, an opinion shared by 47.14% of French employees, 61.2% of Spaniards and 53.2% of Germans.
Conducted for Lastminute.com by OnePoll, the study is based on a sample population of 6,500 employed adults throughout Europe, who were surveyed online during the period of August 7-14, 2014 (2,000 in the UK, 1,000 in France, 1,000 in Germany, 1,000 in Italy, 1,000 in Spain and 500 in Ireland).
Source: Free Malaysia Today
Published: 25 Aug 2014
