It’s Christmas – so that out-of-office message means what it says

And yet, I know what’s coming…

The emails will start arriving….

“Just a quick one before you log off.”

“Can we squeeze this in before Christmas?”

“It won’t take long.”

The closer we get to switching off, the harder it can feel to actually do it – because December brings a familiar pattern in many workplaces.

Working days quietly stretch longer. There’s an unspoken sense that everyone should just push through. Lunch breaks disappear. Evenings become working time. All of it is driven by a collective determination to clear the decks so Christmas can begin properly. It’s easy to treat the final rush as end-of-term tiredness. Everyone is ready for a break, after all. But December pressure is rarely just about workload. It often comes with a full diary of Christmas lunches, socialising, Christmas parties and end-of-year socials, fitted in around already full days.

The result is longer hours and fewer natural pauses. Over time, that combination can become wearing. I’ve seen it contribute to anxiety, burnout and longer-term health issues and, in some cases, to conditions that may fall within the legal definition of a disability – festive timing notwithstanding.

From an employment law perspective, stress isn’t measured by how committed someone looks late on Christmas Eve. It’s about what pressure was foreseeable, how it was managed, and whether support was realistically available. Good intentions don’t override those responsibilities, and seasonal goodwill doesn’t offer an exemption.

Few phrases create more tension at this time of year than this: “Just before you log off…”.

Last-minute requests can cause real problems when expectations around availability are unclear, when senior managers continue emailing into the evening, or when people don’t feel quite able to say no. Even well-meant requests can send a clear message about what is really expected. If something truly cannot wait until January, that may be unavoidable. But if it can wait, it usually should.

Managing Christmas Eve well doesn’t require cancelling deadlines or abandoning standards. It does require being deliberate. For me, that means being clear about what genuinely needs to be finished, modelling reasonable boundaries by logging off when I say I will, acknowledging pressure rather than pretending it isn’t there, and planning December workloads based on reality rather than hope! It also means remembering that stress isn’t a seasonal inconvenience. It’s a predictable risk.

Christmas Eve is not the day for heroics. It’s the day for sensible decisions, realistic expectations, and logging off when you said you would.

The work will still be there in January. And so will the inbox.

I hope you’re able to log off peacefully, enjoy the break ahead, and return in the new year rested, rather than relieved. And if Santa is keeping score, I suspect that sensible boundaries count as “nice” rather than “naughty”!

Simon Allison is a Partner and Head of Employment at Blackadders