Why Your Next Holiday Could Be the Most Profitable Move You Make
If your business only works when you’re there, it isn’t a business; it’s a job with overheads.
Industry Leaders design companies that run without them. Technicians hold them together with duct tape and late nights.
A real test? Take a proper break. Not to escape; to expose. Time away surfaces the weak joints, lazy standards, and single-point-of-failure decisions that are costing you profit and valuation.
Below is the six-step Holiday Profit Playbook to turn time off into a stronger, more valuable company.
1) Book the break & then add a “diagnostic day”
Tell the team you’re back one day later than your actual return. Use that silent day to pull data, review jobs, invoices, client comms, and KPIs. No meetings, no catch-ups; just a clean post-mortem.
2) Sort what broke into three buckets
1. Mistakes (not Right/Wrong): Training and clarity gap, not “bad people”.
2. Bottlenecks (Waiting on you): Decisions stalled because everyone thinks you must approve everything.
3. Stalled Projects (Owner-dependent): Initiatives that went nowhere because you’re the lead.
3) Eliminate mistakes with teachable standards
Document the right answer once; make it the standard forever.
• Write the “next time, do this” step-by-step. Video a process if required.
• Store it where everyone can find it. A process library.
• Coach to it. Test it. Sign it off.
Mistakes die when the right way becomes the only way.
4) Kill bottlenecks by setting decision rights
Be explicit: What decisions do you own, and which decisions must the role own?
Create a one-pager per role: “Decide/Recommend/Inform.” If a decision waits on you and doesn’t affect the brand, risk, legal, or cash, then allow it to leave your desk permanently.
5) Reassign the work you should never have owned
Split stalled projects into:
• A - Strategic, long-horizon (yours): brand, pricing model, market position, senior hires.
• B - Operational, repeatable (not yours): onboarding checklists, site QA, routine supplier reviews.
Keep A. Delegate B, with a deadline, definition of done, and weekly green/red check.
6) Empower the frontline (maybe with a dollar figure?)
Give every team member clear authority to fix customer challenge on the spot (e.g., up to $100 without approval; set the number that suits your margins). The rule: Act first, make it right, document it.
Speed + ownership beats apology discounts and Google reviews you can’t erase.
The Before-you-Go “exposure plan”
A. Nominate a ‘Holiday Captain’ and a backup to make decisions whilst you are gone.
B. Provide a decision tree: what they decide, what they escalate, and when (time windows, not “ASAP”).
C. Make default decisions for common issues: deliveries late, scope creep, wet-weather delays.
D. Meeting cadence: hold a daily 5–7-minute huddle to keep aligned and remove roadblocks.
E. Client communication: proactive connect with clients, setting expectations and letting them know who to contact.
Your aim isn’t zero issues; it’s visible issues you can fix permanently.
What to measure while you’re out
Potentially track the following:
• Job margin & variance
• Client response times
• Rework issues
• Cash in vs. out
• Client feedback
If any metric slides, don’t blame your team. Upgrade your processes.
Finally - Build the book while you build the business
Your systems/procedures manual isn’t “nice to have”; it’s your valuation lever. Every fix above becomes a living Operating Procedure: simple, searchable, and enforced. If you want help turning this into a tight, mistake-proof playbook, PROTRADE United can walk you through it.
So, take the holiday. Use it to test your operation. Come back, identify the learnings, and remove yourself as the bottleneck. Do this and you won’t just return relaxed. You’ll return owning a more profitable, more valuable company.
Written by Jon Mailer
CEO of PROTRADE United
Author of ‘Not Just a Tradie’
