Employee sabbaticals can reduce turnover

By Karen Dybis
Detroit News

Lawyer Carole Chiamp once worked 70-hour weeks, had a staff of eight people and wondered what else she could do with her life.

So she took a sabbatical to attend the Culinary Institute of America, where she learned to make chicken stock, mix the perfect hollandaise sauce and butcher her own meat. Today, Chiamp spends 30 hours on the law and two nights a week volunteering at the ritzy Opus One restaurant in Detroit.

"I use the same skills as a lawyer as I do in the kitchen —only now I'm reading recipes and researching ideas for lunch specials," Chiamp said. "It makes me feel very happy."

Sabbaticals aren't just for college professors anymore. These days, a growing number of companies are giving their workers paid time off to volunteer, travel or reconnect with family in an effort to keep staffers happy and reduce turnover.

Nationally, sabbatical rates are rising. In the 1990s, about 10 percent of companies had sabbatical programs, increasing to a high of 18 percent in 2000, according to the Society for Human Resource Management.

That percentage fell during the recent recession but ticked back up in 2004, the HR group found.

Employees say time away from the office combats burnout. They also return with new skills and a fresh perspective.

"In terms of work, there's nothing I couldn't tackle at this point," said Carol Germain, a senior manager for research informatics for Pfizer Inc. in Ann Arbor, Mich. Germain went to Kenya as a global research fellow to help advance research efforts in HIV and AIDS.

"Pfizer paid my salary and travel expenses, which was the only way to make this dream come true," Germain said.

Although unpaid sabbaticals are the most common, some businesses maintain an employee's salary and benefits for months.

For example, workers get a monthlong sabbatical after five years at Diversified Property Services, a Southfield, Mich., company that provides corporate relocation and facilities management service.