Too many off days...

Today, in Malaysia will be another Monday which is not going to be a working day. Not in every states in Malaysia but nearly in every one of them. As the federal government have decided Thaipusam is a holiday for federal territory, it can be considered that Malaysia close down for this event. Thaipusam is a religious ceremony which is widely taut as the ultimate 'to see' things for those who would like to see how Hindus in Malaysia put themselves through pain to achieve a religious vigor.

Anyway, the issue here is not about the event which made headlines all around the world. The issue here is about too many day off from work. Another long weekend as Thaipusam fell on a Monday. Even if the working class wouldn't feel the Monday blues, I bet they will feel the Monday blues on the Tuesday they came back to work. And feel even worse when with this too many holidays their workload becomes more and more as they have to push the time to finish their work which sometimes more than their working hour. If they are clerks and they do some overtime, of course they will get paid for that time spent. If they are executives, rarely there are any overtime paid by their employers.

Most lawyers have deadline when they took up the job. They have to file certain documents within a certain timeframe. They have to go to court if the state that they work in is on holiday but the state where the court is located is not declaring that day as a public holiday. Those who don't go also have their own deadline. Filing of certain documents in the land office to ensure that the particular registration is within time and their client will not incur any additional cost. For those who are called 'corporate lawyer' who lives in the upper echelon of lawyerdom (as in lawyer kingdom), their time will be more at the mercy of their client who will want them to be at their beck and call as they are being paid in hundreds of thousands and sometimes in millions according to the complicity of the issue at hand. 

Back to this long holidays and long weekends issue. There are too many of them and it actually is killing the productivity of the workers. They of course are glad of the time off but the same rule applies. They need to see through all the work that had been entrusted to them without fail. I have a few good employees who do their work without considering the time of the day. They would come up to the office, work late, take the job home (if permissible) and even do all this on holidays. If not for them, I don't think there would be a proper working office in my legal firm.