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Several Yahoos confided their frustration to me when the company sent an all-hands memo this week, forcing all employees to take the Christmas-to-New-Year week off, either unpaid or using their allotted vacation days.

One employee was insulted that Yahoo implied employees should be thankful. Another said, "It's one of the top 10 worst signs for the health of a company. Not to mention that I have no excuse to avoid family events now."

The internal memo follows.

> Yahoos,
>
>
>
> This holiday season we will be closing Yahoo! offices in the US during
> the week of December 25 through December 31, 2006. This makes good
> business sense and is common practice for many media and technology
> companies during what is traditionally a quiet work week. The
> expectation is that nearly all US Yahoos will participate in the office
> closure by utilizing their vacation time, personal floaters, or taking
> unpaid time off. This will allow many US Yahoos to enjoy guilt-free
> time-off while helping Yahoo! reduce unused vacation time. Business
> critical exceptions will be made for Yahoos whose SVP determines their
> ongoing availability to work is essential to sustaining operations. In
> addition, Yahoos for whom this change causes significant personal
> hardship are encouraged to speak with their managers regarding possible
> solutions.
>
>
>
> Beginning in late October, Yahoo!'s online vacation tracking tool, My
> Time: http://backyard.yahoo.com/resources/fin/payroll/mytime/index.html,
> will automatically default to personal floaters and/or vacation for
> December 26-29. Yahoos who do not have enough accrued vacation or
> personal floaters left will be allowed to borrow up to five days from
> next year's vacation accrual. Select Yahoos who are required by
> management to work must actively change the default setting. Non-exempt
> (hourly) Yahoos will continue to report vacation time and personal
> floaters via Kronos. Specific instructions on process issues will be
> provided when the My Time tool is available for that period.
>
>
>
> Taking a little time-off during a work week when so many of our partners
> and advertisers are also closed is the prudent thing for Yahoo! to do.
> Please contact your manager or human resources business partner for
> additional information and please enjoy the time off!
>
>
>
> Libby