The streaming supergiant Netflix, which stormed into a tight-knit industry and caused seismic shifts among long-held norms, has quite a bit to offer its employees.
Despite news last week that the company registered a stock plunge after noting a loss in subscribers, the company still remains a trailblazer in an industry that has long been resistant to change.
The perk that Netflix offers to anyone who assumes a full-time role at the company is (drum roll, please): unlimited vacation time.
You did read that correctly, yes. Now, go read it again, and remind yourself that this is true and that it’s everything you’ve ever wanted.
In fact, it makes even more sense to see why the streaming behemoth was listed among Forbes’ World’s Best Employers in 2021. Netflix’s so-called ‘No Vacation Policy’ gives employees the ability to choose when and the amount of time they will take off.
Naturally, however, the entertainment industry and its workers are accustomed to a work-life much different from the corporate-standard 9-to-5. Instead, entertainment industry workers have long been subject to long workdays and fleeting vacation time.
Netflix has decided that its approach will benefit its employees and free them from the sort of contracts (9-to-5 or required hours) that have become constant yet unfavorable.
Rather, the streaming giant has chosen to evaluate its employees’ jobs according to the work completed rather than the hours put in.
In the company’s Work-Life Philosophy, Netflix describes its commitment to “providing the resources that will alleviate distractions and allow you to do your best work.” It goes on to say that Netflix’s “vacation policy is ‘take a vacation’ and we actually do. Frankly, we intermix work and personal time quite a bit.”
However, the following tweet thread explains the possible pitfalls that Netflix’s “no vacation time” policy might carry, among which: employees may avoid taking vacation time out of fear.
As a creative, entertainment profession, it is natural for many of its creatives to need to intermix their personal lives and their work, and now Netflix provides the opportunity for that overlap to take place at the beach, in the mountains, or with a cold mojito out at sea.
Reasserting that “time away works differently at Netflix,” the company describes that the lack of a pre-established 9-to-5 workday also means that they don’t need to establish specific vacation policies.
However, that doesn’t mean that employees should take advantage of the company’s generous offer to take time away, nor does it mean that Netflix’s offices have a chronic absence problem.
Due to its abnormal structure as a streaming company, Netflix doesn’t ascribe to the normal entertainment schedule in which the new seasons of a show or a show’s premiere hit screens in the fall. Rather, Netflix’s flexibility allows for year-round ups and downs in business; therefore, employees must use their discretion when taking a vacation.
Naturally, though, Netflix’s vacation policy presents a forward-thinking aspect to a company defined by its rule-breaking invasion of an established, change-resistant industry. While it remains to be seen whether their revolutionary (if not widely requested and scientifically backed) change to vacation time will cause rifts among the corporate world, it is certain that their lead could begin to crack at the foundation of such norms.
For now, we might as well all send in our resumes to Netflix, yeah? No harm in that.
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