How to Travel with a Full-Time Job
I know many of you have asked if I have unlimited leave or if I am secretly retired. The answer is…I wish. I work full-time in the budget/financial world. My job is demanding with long hours.
But if you plan your leave correctly, you can still travel the world on 2 to 3 weeks of leave a year.
Here are a few tips how:
- Extend holiday leave with one or two days of annual leave. For example, if President’s Day is on Monday, take Friday and Tuesday off for a 5-day vacation.
- Utilize your weekends. By combining two weekends, you get a 9-day trip, but you are only using 5 days of annual leave.
- Determine if your company offers comp time. If so, take advantage of it!
- Take long vacations during slow times at work. Sadly, most employers have a grim outlook on taking long vacation, but if you can go during a slower season, the chances of your boss saying yes is much higher. For example, I always take my long vacations during October because the fiscal year ends on Sept 30.
- When you take time off work, the prep work to train and find coverage is exhausting. Start making your coverage plan as soon as possible. If you have it on-hand, it makes it easier to ensure everything is covered. Even though you are on vacation, you don’t want to have any single-point of failure due to your lack of preparation or else the next time you want to ask for vacation, your boss will say no.
Hopefully this helps you start to become a world-traveler, even with a full-time job.