Take labour out of the Labour Day statutory holiday

Labour Day comes once a year. Whether or not you spell it with a “u”, it means the same thing: Labour Day is a statutory holiday. Unless you work in front-line services (like a hospital), the first Monday in September is a day off.

If you’ve been a leader in the nonprofit sector for a while, you may need a little refresher. “Holiday” means a day when you don’t work. “Statutory” holiday, which Labour day is, means taking a holiday is not a suggestion. It’s the law.

It doesn’t matter if you left something at the office, or if you want to get one thing done while it’s quiet; you don’t go to work. You don’t work from home. Or from the car, a tent, a coffee shop, or any other place that isn’t your office. It’s a day of rest. 

On a holiday, you can do anything you want — except work. 

Leaders show others the way 

You need a break, and you probably need to make an effort to get it. Canada is one of the lowest-ranking countries when it comes to paid time off. It’s not the USA, but it’s pretty bad. (Here’s a source, and here’s another, and here’s a third one.) 

“Time off” doesn’t have to mean me-days or spa treatments or other wellness clichés. Time off work is time for important things, like sleeping, and eating, and spending time with your family. It’s about getting groceries or making muffins or tackling that pile of laundry in the corner.

Rest is about spending time with friends and people who don’t need you to produce, perform, or generate anything. Rest is about spending time in nature or the big city, running a marathon or reading a book. 

Taking time to experience a holiday day isn’t lazy or indulgent. It’s not less important than work, less respectable. Keeping yourself and your family alive and healthy, appreciating your time on this planet, that’s pretty important stuff. 

Life in Canada and the USA doesn’t often embrace work breaks, even though they are essential for health, well-being, and impact. Let’s change that.

It might help to remember that basking in your day off work is a political statement. 

People fought for Labour Day (with good reason)

When 10,000 workers marched on Queen’s Park, Ontario in 1872 to demand more humane hours, 24 people went to jail. Many of the protest leaders lost their jobs. The political action was successful, despite the human cost. And in the years that followed, people threw an annual festival to celebrate the victory. 

It’s only now, a century later, that you and I get to fully enjoy the protections they won for us. So, when we unplug for the day, we honour the efforts of thousands of people who fought for protections we take for granted. 

How to take the day off

In a culture that celebrates work and views stress as a badge of honour, it can be difficult to build an organization that knows how to take breaks. 

Things you can do to prepare for a proper day off:

1. Keep the workload manageable. It’s not a day off if everyone has to do 8 extra hours of work this week to prepare. 
2. Remind your team that it’s a holiday. We all forget what day it is sometimes, so make sure folks know that a long weekend is coming up and that they have the day off. 
3. Don’t feel compelled to share your plans — or ask about others’. It’s completely fine to have no plans for the long weekend. Labour Day isn’t a competition to see who can vacation the best or cram in the most home renos. Water-cooler chit chat doesn’t need to pry into socio-economic status or family situation; some people may use the weekend to take care of personal matters, and prefer not to talk about it at work.
4. Don’t assign work on Friday. If people truly have the long weekend off, that task you wanted done can be assigned on Tuesday morning. If you really want to set the tone, make Friday a meeting-free day. 

And when the big day comes…

1. Don’t check your email. Try to step away from your computer or any physical object/ space that is a big part of your work day. 
2. If you’ve been feeling run down, spend your time doing something that feels truly restful to you — something that engages a different part of your mind and your heart and your body. If you can do it with people you love, people who brighten your day, all the better. 
3. Take a moment to remember the efforts that secured reasonable hours of work, weekends, paid time off, and statutory holidays. These protections and social norms were borne out of effort and courage.

Labour Day is a reminder that sometimes people do win their campaigns for a better life. And sometimes those wins stay with us for centuries. On Tuesday, when you’re back at work, you can use their success as inspiration for your own effort. 

That’s worth celebrating. 

Need a tool to help?

To respect time on versus off, if you absolutely have to send a message after hours, use a scheduling tool. You can write your message in the evening or on the weekend, then schedule it for delivery during normal business hours. 

Google, Apple, Microsoft, and Slack all include scheduling options you can consider using before hitting that send button.