Unlimited vacation time: a nice perk no one expects you’ll use

Moving into the summer season, the idea of unlimited vacation time might be the ideal recruiting tool for some advisory firms.

But when it comes to actually taking that time off, it’s often the unwritten rules that matter most.

“Offering unlimited vacation time makes a statement that reflects our brand and culture, that says, we trust and empower our employees to do the right thing for themselves and their families,” said Steven Kaye, founder and CEO of AEPG Wealth Strategies, which manages $950 million and has 30 employees.

The Warren, N.J.-based advisory firm, which already touts flexible work hours, is in the process of expanding the current four-week annual vacation benefit to unlimited status.

“My guess is, with unlimited vacation days people will actually use less time off, not more because they will feel like there’s some judgment element, and anyone who abuses it is not a good fit for our firm,” Mr. Kaye said. “I’d just as soon give those people enough rope to hang themselves. So that new unlimited vacation policy will allow the cream to rise to the top.”

There are myriad reasons to introduce unlimited vacation policies, which first gained traction in the technology industry, where programmers are known to grind themselves to the point of burnout.

In other words, unlimited time off is usually only offered to employees who aren’t expected to take a lot of time off.

But still, it’s a nice benefit to have on the books.

“It absolutely helps us recruit and retain employees,” said Heather Robertson Fortner, chief compliance officer and chief operating officer at SignatureFD, an Atlanta-based firm with $2.6 billion under management.

“It’s one of those benefits, that people initially don’t understand how it’s possible,” she added.

Of course, it is possible because people tend to fall in line by usually limiting their time off to about four weeks a year, said Ms. Fortner, who estimated that’s how much time she takes off.

At SignatureFD, which has 72 employees, the vacation time is managed by the employees, who are responsible for making sure their jobs are covered when they’re away.

Ms. Fortner said when the unlimited vacation benefit was added several years ago, the company had to adapt the work-flow and CRM systems to help employees manage and cover for one another.

“What we found is that unlimited time off has helped the team learn to better manage their own schedules together as a team,” she said. “It’s important to be able to support each other and step in fluidly. In order to make this kind of vacation policy work, you have to rely on the team so much, and nobody wants to create that kind of ill will. If we did see somebody abusing the time-off policy, we would have that conversation with them early.”

The freedom associated with unlimited vacation time is part of the evolution of the gig economy and modern work-life balance, according to April Rudin, president and chief executive of The Rudin Group, a financial services marketing firm.

“Having unlimited vacation time really is in line with people not having to report into an office to do their jobs,” she said. “I see this increasing as a benefit, because you can’t really track somebody minute by minute, but if you track them on productivity, you will have more productive people. And just being in an office doesn’t make somebody more productive.”

As Mr. Kaye put it, even if employees aren’t expected to abuse the unlimited vacation policy, they do appreciate the freedom it introduces.

“People want to be treated like adults, without somebody looking over their shoulder,” he said. “We’re not worried about people working hard enough, because we know that’s already happening.”