Best Out-of-Office Memo

You know those "I'm out of the office" messages that people sometimes leave on voice mail and email to let people know how they can be reached if needed? Some of them go on forever. While I recognize some jobs (doctors, lawyers, editors) have little downtime and emergency situations do happen, more often than not I think the messages are merely because the person is afraid the company or job simply couldn't exist without them and they need the reassurance. Or, they just cannot unplug totally from their vocation. As hard as it is for me to understand, vacation and downtime isn't for everyone and some of those desperate messages reveal that.

I give my husband a very hard time about checking messages and work email on vacation...and it usually results in an argument during the vacation. As someone who rarely uses the phone in my downtime and refuses to check email or Facebook during downtime on weekends or holidays, (which sometimes baffles my family) this is hard for me to understand.

But I found two great cases of people who unplugged with humor and truly get that the world doesn't revolve around them:

One, Randy Pausch, who wrote about unplugging in his book The Last Lecture. (Which if you haven't read, is definitely worth your time. A top ten favorite of mine) For his honeymoon, he instructed students on his voicemail to call his parents and report the emergency while fully explaining why they should interrupt their son's honeymoon that he waited to take until his 40s, when he finally met the right woman , etc........that message should've put the students problems completely in perspective. No one called.

The other happened last week. I got an email bounceback from a very important person that read: "Thank you for your message. I will be out of the office 8/3-8/7. If you need to get a hold of me, you can send a written letter to PO Box (number), City, MN 55442."

I thought that was awesome--and I told him so. He said not everyone got it.

In this world of instant communication, sometimes it's good to just wait.