Q. I have been at this small newspaper for about five months now. It’s about four hours away from anyone I know on the basic level, and 10 from my closest college friends. My family is 18 hours away (by car).
Knowing that we would probably have to take five furloughs per quarter, our editor requested we select all 20 furlough days and vacation days by the first of this year. I did. And I planned a nine-day trip to see my college buddies graduate in D.C. and to be around some people who I can be myself around. I’ve been planning everything around this trip. The time has been in since January. I’ve talked about the trip to my editor.
Just recently, we’re all told that no one can take off May 4 (which falls in that week vacation) because it’s primary election day.
The young, eager reporter in me says to just let the vacation go and be available to my publication. The young, lonely person in me says to take this up with our top editor (as my editor has suggested) and push for my vacation. What should I do? Wouldn’t it be a bad move as a cub reporter to gripe about not being able to take off when I want? But, what about the numerous sacrifices I’ve already made in the name of journalism? (I’m still eating those Ramen noodles I told you about my freshman year.)
Lonely Cub
A. How frustrating!
True story: When I was the news editor, no less, at the Detroit Free Press, I took a vacation during one of the national political conventions. I simply hadn’t bothered to check early in the year. My editor told me to plan future time off when I knew there would not be major, scheduled news. I felt dumb and became a better planner.
Your editor probably sees this situation in a similar light. But let’s play this out. You could explain: “You asked me to take unpaid days and then you asked me to schedule them months in advance to help with planning. I did that, the days were approved, and then I made plans to attend a graduation ceremony out of town. Now, we are blocking out days that would prevent that. I am trying to follow the rules for these furlough days, but the rules keep changing. I’d like to be able to keep my travel plans.”
You case is stronger if you have invested any money, say, in a plane ticket.
Your editor might still feel your priorities are out of line and could, I suppose, turn you down, so then you’re marginalized in the boss’ mind and you don’t get to take the trip when you want.
A second option is to just pick a different time. But I wouldn’t change without making a point this way: “So, I’ve decided to reschedule the dates the company had agreed on, but I need to make sure that we don’t change this again …”
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Coming Monday: Can moving to a smaller paper put a dent in your resume?
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