Time out
Many companies are exploring an increasingly attractive benefit for employees: paid and unpaid sabbaticals
In his 26 years in sales for Xerox, Steven Mueller of New Fairfield, Conn., has had some exciting moments. But perhaps the most memorable took place last summer. Mueller was one of nine Xerox employees chosen for the company's Social Service Leave, a paid sabbatical allowing employees to work for up to a year with nonprofit agencies. Mueller spent much of his sabbatical at Green Chimneys Children's Services in Brewster, N.Y., a residential program for troubled children, working with a group of 8-to-12-year-old boys on the facility's 166-acre farm. One project: restoring a dilapidated 1941 Ford tractor. After three months of toil, the tractor started. "I'll never forget the screams and yells of these kids," says Mueller. "We kept thinking we'd never get it running. I gained a tremendous sense of satisfaction and purpose."
Once confined to academia, sabbatical programs have waxed and waned over the years. During the 1990s, about 10 percent of companies had formal sabbatical programs. By 2000, 18 percent of companies offered unpaid sabbaticals and 4 percent provided paid time off, according to the Society for Human Resource Management. Then came the recession, and sabbatical rates dipped--but now they're back to the 2000 level. As baby boomers retire and the competition to attract and retain talent heats up, companies are looking more closely at the powerful retention benefits of extended time off. "Employers are finding that employees are more engaged, more productive, and more loyal when they come back from sabbaticals," says Rose Stanley, practice leader of compensation and benefits for World at Work, an association for compensation professionals.
Invigorating. Whether sabbaticals last for a month or a year, they differ from extended vacations in their restorative emphasis. "It's a purposeful, planned experience meant to help you reflect and rest and make changes in your life," says Mary Lou Quinlan, author of Time Off for Good Behavior.
Perhaps the most purposeful of sabbaticals are community-service programs, where employees are paid to work for nonprofit agencies. Since 1991, American Express has lent more than 200 employees to charity. And last year, Xerox reinstated its leave plan. Established in 1971, the program had been suspended from 2001 to 2003 during the company's difficult turnaround years. To be chosen, Mueller filled out an application describing the project and his long history with charitable causes, which a committee of Xerox peers reviewed. "I'd always been involved in some kind of volunteer work, but I wanted to take it to a new level," he says. For the previous four years, he'd had a demanding job as sales manager that left him little time for anything but work and family. The leave let him recommit to volunteerism and spend more time with his wife and two young daughters. When Mueller returned to Xerox last month, he took a sales job with less management responsibility that would allow him more time for volunteering.
Companies offering time off for good deeds aren't entirely altruistic. "They gain a lot of goodwill and their employees gain new skill sets," says Stanley. Among those: more sophisticated management techniques. "When they go into the nonprofit world, they're not there as employees and they have no real authority," says Joseph Cahalan, vice president of communications and social responsibility for Xerox. "They have to get things done through motivation and persuasion. It makes them more effective managers when they come back."
advertisement
