This agency network smartly combined a public holiday with the weekend and gifted its employees a 6-days wellness leave

• Zoo Media, network that owns the digital agency FoxyMoron with 6 other agencies, gave its employees an off for six days!
• It was an effort to give its employees a break from relentless hard work and to spend some time with their family.

Zoo Media, earlier this month initiated a Wellness Break as a show of appreciation and gratitude for its employees’ relentless hard work over the past 5 months during the lockdown.

The network implemented the Wellness Break from 12th August to 14th August. The break was strategically combined with Janmashtami (being a bank holiday) on 11th August, effectively giving all the employees a 6-day break when combined with the weekend.

Speaking about the thought behind the initiative Pratik Gupta, Co-Founder Zoo Media and FoxyMoron said, “As an agency network, we're used to pressure and tight timelines. But the lockdown has been different; it's been a lot of change far too quickly and we've not been able to assess the mental health impact of it fully. When we realised that our people were hesitating to take leave, and the increased endless coordination between teams didn’t allow for clear bifurcation of work-time, housework-time and me-time and as jetting off for a quick weekend was no longer an option, we thought it best to mandate a break. We hoped that this break would help our people feel rejuvenated, refreshed and resume work full of gusto for the festive season that lies ahead.”

“The response to the Wellness Break has been resoundingly positive throughout the organisation. We informed our clients a month in advance and we’re grateful that they were extremely understanding of the same and yes the week leading up to the break was hectic, the hustle was worth it. It’s been a few days since we’ve resumed work and the mood is definitely upbeat,” said Suveer Bajaj, Co-Founder, Zoo Media & FoxyMoron.

Mangala Bhattacharjee, an Account Director at FoxyMoron, sharing her experience about the break said, “The Wellness Break was truly a blessing. It allowed me to detach from my phone completely and reconnect with my 3 yr old. We painted, we made origami, we spent every waking minute together. It was wonderful. This break was really welcome. The lockdown has been a difficult experience across industries. Granting a Wellness Break, is a good initiative and it would be great to see this implemented by many more companies.”