Having great employee benefits is a matter of pride for any organization, but what happens when employees are reluctant to use them? Increasing PTO participation may sound like a counterproductive strategy at first, but encouraging employees to use their paid time off can leave you with a much happier and more productive workforce. Encouraging loud vacationing trends is a great way to motivate workers while also ensuring that they feel supported by their organization.
Taking time off is treated as taboo, but increasing PTO participation can be very crucial to improving the health of the organization overall.
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How to Increase PTO Participation Among Employees? A Quick Guide for HR
Across the borders of organizations and industries, it has been common for employees to hesitate to use the benefits available to them. Many workplace cultures look down on workers who go on vacations or cash in on the paid privileges that their job offers. In many cases, employees face a self-imposed sense of guilt over using their employee benefits, especially when it comes to taking a break from work.
In a 2024 Harris Poll survey, 47% of employees said they felt guilty about taking time off, while 60% said they struggled to fully disconnect from work even when they did take a break. Unsurprisingly, 78% of respondents claimed they didn’t even use the paid time off available to them.
Over 76% of employees wished the culture at work placed a greater emphasis on taking breaks and utilizing their PTO days, which means that they currently don’t believe their company culture truly supports their freedom to take breaks. Many employees also hesitate to use their PTO days because vacations are expensive, making it easier for them to cash out on those days instead.
We can blame hustle culture trends for instilling such a sense of fear over relaxing and stepping away from work, but it isn’t the only reason for it. Lately, with the number of layoffs and shifting regulations at work, employees are particularly scared of being accused of taking their jobs too lightly. Many remain suspicious of PTO policies, particularly those that claim to be unlimited.
Why Should You Encourage Employees to Use PTO Days?
Conversations around the legitimacy and importance of burnout have died down in 2025, but that does not mean employees are no longer tired and overworked. Employees who are pushed to their limits at work rarely walk away unscathed, and the lack of breaks to rejuvenate leaves them more exhausted than ever before.
Not only does this numb their creativity and reasoning, but it also allows frustrations and resentments to grow. Employees begin to work passively with disinterest, allowing their performance to suffer as a result. The quiet vacationing trend has shown us that many workers who still need that break just take it on their own terms quietly. This doesn’t allow them to disconnect properly, and it also causes work to suffer as a result.
Encouraging employees to use PTO days and reinventing PTO policies allows for a more honest relationship between the employer and employees. This way, the organization can be better prepared for an employee’s time away, and the employee can also disconnect from work comfortably. A relationship based on trust and respect is always worth the effort.
How to Encourage PTO Use Among Employees
A loud vacationing trend is always preferable to a quiet vacationing one. Employees return to work feeling refreshed and raring to go, and employers can welcome them back to the job without complications. Increasing PTO participation among employees is beneficial for everyone, even if that does mean that employees are briefly away from their desks.
Just telling employees to go on vacation, however, is not good enough. Companies like Olipop have made efforts to actively encourage employees to go on vacation to avoid burnout, and taking a page out of their book is easier than you might think.
- Plan out the PTO policy with care to ensure employees understand the terms and how they can make use of it
- Set up an easy system to request time off and allow employees to track their own PTO usage so they know what time is available to them
- Send reminders to employees to use the PTO days when they need
- Create a culture that encourages a healthy work-life balance and supports practices like disconnecting from work after hours
- Teach managers to lead by example, so employees are not as fearful about requesting time off
- Provide additional PTO days for long-term employees and limit restrictions on when or how employees are allowed to use them
- Tailor other benefits around travel and wellness so employees can afford to go on vacations more easily
Benefits Are Only Beneficial When Utilized
Encouraging the increase of PTO participation isn’t just a way of showcasing interest in the employee’s well-being, but also a way of extending an olive branch to smooth out areas of conflict with them.
To reinvent PTO policies is no easy task, considering the dominant negative attitudes and culture built around them. However, organizations that promote paid time off may find themselves to be leaders of a happy and healthy workforce in the long run.
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