We’re all going on a jolly holiday – or are we?

It’s that time of year again where the ads on TV and social media are all geared towards us booking that week or two in the sun, carefree gambolling on the beach, getting misty eyed over a Santorini sunset, and the words “Pimms”, and “G&T” are chucked around like confetti.

Holidays are a double-edged sword for freelancers and business owners – the financial pressure of incurring the extra costs of a holiday across a period you’re not earning because of the holiday itself can make you not want to bother. There’s also that creeping sense of doom that the only person you’re burdening with the ‘catch-up’ of your time off is YOU, so how can you relax on those blessed few days you’re supposed to be unwinding?

If freelancers and business owners in general face this double-edged sword, holidays can be a precision-crafted Swiss multi-tool for neurodivergent professionals.

On top of the pressures of money and work backing up over your break, there’s the added extra sauce of:

Logistics

Travel, accommodation, currency, insurance, day-trip planning, packing – a nightmare for those of us with spiky profiles and executive functioning challenges.

Energy Management

Heading into a holiday period, already burned out, wanting to pack everything in while there, not miss anything, create memories, etc. It all feels a bit like ENFORCED FUN.

Dysregulation

Changes in food, temperature, time zones, location, etc., can be incredibly difficult to absorb, and if you are a parent, chances are, you might have neurodivergent kids and be balancing their needs too!

Assimilation

It may take you longer to switch from one ‘zone’ (i.e. work) to another (i.e. holiday). The wholesale switch of lifestyle that comes with a holiday can be a dizzying, disorientating thing.

So, how can working with one of the talented team of Online Business Managers at Sycamore help you to achieve a holiday where all of the above are minor inconveniences, and you feel properly able to step away from the laptop?

We’ve got you!

Support from an Online Business Manager (OBM) who gets how your brain works can be a game-changer for taking time off, and that’s exactly what we do at Sycamore.

Just Ask!

We know that separating personal and professional life doesn’t work. If the stress of planning a holiday is impacting on your productivity, it will impact your work. Let us dig out some travel insurance quotes, let us come up with a solid packing list to you’ve got all your meds and a first aid kit. Don’t ever consider that anything is out of bounds (within reason!) for you to ask for support with.

We’re here!

If you feel like auto-replies are too impersonal, or that you’ll be overwhelmed and miss things in a bulging inbox on your return, we can be on the end of your emails with a personal holding message, we can triage tasks and priorities as they come in and present them to you already filtered when you’re ready to work again. Having an OBM on board means that no one feels unanswered when you are (deservedly) taking time away. You can trust us to be the public face of your business while you stuff your face at the breakfast buffet.

We work at your pace!

We’ll work with you to establish when you’re ready to stop work pre-holiday and come back to it post-holiday. We know that holidays themselves can take some recovery and reassimilation. We’ll ease you into it gently by already having taken care of anything pressing or urgent.

We’ll maintain your boundaries!

Having us on board means you can properly shut the laptop and trust that nothing bad will happen to your business. We also understand that sometimes, you really feel that you can’t turn your back on work. We’ll talk to you about how you want to receive work updates or questions while you’re on holiday in a way that allows you to ‘switch off’ the rest of the time.

We promise that Sycamore can help you achieve the utopian vision of an idyllic holiday where you frolic across the sand dunes with a pina colada, the word ‘work’ barely gracing your lips!

* Other utopian visions of holidays are available. We can help you achieve those too.

If you’re a neurodivergent freelancer, entrepreneur, or small business owner, Sycamore OBM is here to help you take a real break. No inbox dread, no burnout, just better boundaries and tailored support.