With Christmas and New Year’s Day falling on Tuesdays in 2012-13, employers’ year-end holiday calendars will be much kinder to workers than in the previous two years, according to Bloomberg BNA’s survey of employers’ year-end holiday plans.
Almost three-fifths of the surveyed employers (58 percent) have scheduled at least three paid days off for the 2012-13 holiday season, compared with about two out of five establishments responding for 2011-12 (42 percent) and 2010-11 (36 percent), when the national holidays fell on the weekend. The survey also suggests some recovery in holiday gifts, bonuses, and party-giving from levels observed around the end of the recession.
Holiday celebrations are on the slate at roughly three out of four surveyed establishments (74 percent), somewhat improved from 2009, when 67 percent sponsored any late-year festivities. Company-wide events are planned by more than half of the responding employers(55 percent), virtually unchanged from a year ago (56 percent) and up a bit from 2009 (50 percent).
A long Christmas weekend is on tap for many U.S. workers this year. Just over half of responding employers (51 percent) have slated Monday, Dec. 24 as a paid day off.
Manufacturers’ holiday schedules remain decidedly more generous than those of nonmanufacturing firms and nonbusiness establishments. The vast majority of surveyed manufacturing firms (85 percent) will grant three or more paid days off during the upcoming holiday season, compared with barely half of both nonmanufacturing companies (52 percent) and nonbusiness organizations (51 percent), such as hospitals, schools, and government agencies.
Workers in small shops stand a better chance of an extra day off than their colleagues in bigger organizations. Nearly two-thirds of companies with fewer than 1,000 employees (65 percent) have scheduled three or more paid days off during the 2012-13 holiday season; less than half of larger employers (48 percent) will be so generous.
Charitable activities remain a holiday tradition among a majority of U.S. employers. More than three out of five establishments (63 percent) will sponsor charitable endeavors around year’s end; most of those firms will participate in multiple programs and activities.
Toy and food collections remain the predominant forms of employer-sponsored charity. Forty percent of all responding employers will sponsor toy collections for needy children; food collections and distribution follow closely behind, at 37 percent. Clothing drives are planned by one in five surveyed employers, and nearly as many (16 percent) will sponsor money collections.
For a Christmas Love Story, go to: http://coachingtip.blogs.com/so_baby_boomer/2005/12/christmas_love_.html
As my holiday gift to you and your friends on Dec. 10 & 11 only at Amazon.com, I am giving the new ebook “Ask the Coach” to download on your smartphone, eReader, tablet or computer. Please note that “Ask the Coach” is a reference book; like a dictionary or any other similar resource book that is not meant to be read cover to cover. Readers would normally look up a question of interest in the Table of Contents and then proceed to read that self-coaching answer in the book.
The insights in this book are meant to help you develop the leadership skills necessary to become the master of yourself so you will be ready, willing and able to lead others. Self leadership happens through self-learning and self-coaching.