6 strategies to put your holidays to the test

Sondra Sutton Phung knows how hard it is to disconnect from work life. During a February trip to Disneyland, Phung, Ford Motor Company’s general manager of electric vehicle marketing, held a 5:30 a.m. conference call and checked emails after her nine-year-old daughter was put in the bed

“There’s stress in checking (email) and there’s stress in not checking (email),” says Phung. “When I checked, it was always after family time because you can’t live in the moment if you’re constantly checking email.”

Most American workers struggle to unplug. A 2021 survey found that nearly 31% of full-time employees worked weekends and holidays, and the compulsion to check email, voicemail, and Slack channels doesn’t just extend into the evening; it often takes over the holidays, too.

Two-thirds of workers “sometimes” checked email while on vacation, while more than 20% “always” monitored their work email, and that’s assuming workers take vacation. In 2022, only 30% of Americans with paid vacation time planned to use all of their time off.

“It’s often easier for people to justify work over leisure,” says Kaitlin Woolley, associate professor of marketing at Cornell University. “This … can make it especially difficult to break away from work during the holidays.”

Instead of planning a vacation just to spend your days working by the pool, try these six strategies to put your vacation to the test.

1. Plan to disconnect

Phung left her laptop at home, uploaded files to a shared cloud-based account, added vacation dates to her shared calendar, and set up an out-of-office auto-responder before boarding the plane to indicate your plans to disconnect (especially) during your vacation. These simple acts relieved stress and allowed Phung to feel good about being offline.

Before his last vacation, Bridgestone Americans CIO Taren Rodabaugh added vacation dates to his shared calendar, appointed staff to handle tasks in his absence, and reminded his team that he would be unavailable; the efforts allowed her to be completely disconnected.

“(Disconnecting) starts before you go on vacation,” says Rodabaugh. “You need to create a team and structure and set expectations.”

2. Turn off notifications

Rodabaugh knows he might want to use his phone for GPS or to take vacation photos. To avoid being constantly interrupted by emails, voicemails, and texts, turn off notifications. Research supports this idea, showing that reducing notifications can reduce the temptation to check your phone.

“After about a day, I don’t feel the need to look at (my phone),” says Rodabaugh. “The clarity you have … to reset your priorities happens when you disconnect.”

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3. Take drastic measures

Can’t resist checking email? Remove the app from your phone or leave it behind. Ron Rudzin, CEO of Saatva, often embarks on vacation adventures without his smartphone.

“In normal life, my phone is in my back pocket,” he says. “When I’m on vacation, it’s in another room.”

Rodabaugh has also been known to book trips so far away that cell service and Wi-Fi are non-existent.

4. Set yourself up for success

In the weeks leading up to vacation, Woolley suggests clearing out your to-do list and designating a point person (or two) who can help you with any pressing questions while you’re away.

Phung uses a group SharePoint account for document storage and assigns tasks to other team members to minimize the possibility of being disturbed.

5. Plan the plugin

For those times when it’s impossible to be completely disconnected, setting aside a block of time to work is a good solution. Rudzin took that approach during a monthlong trip to Florida last winter, allocating specific (and limited) hours to check in with his team and address any issues that arose. Outside of those hours, I was offline.

“It’s hard for me to disconnect; We’re an e-commerce company, so there’s action 24/7,” explains Rudzin. “You have to be very disciplined, (but) checking in helps me relax and enjoy myself of my vacation.”

6. Resist temptation

Disconnecting is essential to your health and well-being. The World Health Organization found that working long hours was linked to a higher risk of stroke and a higher risk of death from heart disease. Taking vacations has been linked to greater productivity and less burnout.

“Taking this time will reinvigorate you when you go back to work…” says Woolley. “Remember that your time off is helping to make you a better employee, and you’ll have much more energy to get back to the task at hand after your vacation.”

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com