The Great Unplug: The Electrical Contractor’s Guide To Taking A Holiday

Ever feel like you quit a 9-5 gig working for someone else, so you can work 24/7 for yourself instead?

Welcome to the life of running your own show. While the ability to work from anywhere is a big win, it can also be a big loss. Taking a proper holiday can feel like an impossible task, so you inevitably pack the laptop along with your budgie smugglers and accept the juggle of emails and invoices alongside pina coladas and pools.

But here’s the thing, if you want to keep living the life, taking actual time off is crucial for both your health and the long-term sustainability of your trade.

It’s always good to get insight from people in adjacent industries, so we recently spoke to Matt Little, Co-owner of Damien McEvoy Plumbing, to see how sparkies can down tools without their business coming to a grinding halt.

Here’s his step-by-step guide to taking the kind of holiday where you can actually unplug.

Audit your daily habits

Taking a proper holiday starts weeks before you set sail / take off / press play on the road trip tunes. Most owner/operators assume that finding someone to answer the phone while they’re away is enough, but true coverage goes much deeper. You need to identify which parts of the business genuinely require your expertise, and which are simply routines you’ve fallen into.

“Start by writing down every task that still comes to you,” says Matt. “I did this years ago and it was honestly a bit uncomfortable. Looking through the list, I found that maybe 20 per cent of the things on my desk actually needed my judgement. Everything else was just a habit.”

So get your list and ask yourself: does this require a licensed electrician’s sign-off, or is it an admin task that can be automated, scheduled, or handed over? From there, freedom awaits.

Nominate one clear point of contact

Instead of dividing responsibilities across multiple people or leaving clients guessing, choose a single point of contact while you’re away. This could be an apprentice, your go-to subbie, or a stellar admin assistant. But remember, you must give them the authority to act without waiting for your approval on every minor detail.

“I prefer having one clear point of contact instead of sending questions to five different people,” Matt says. “Give them permission to make decisions up to a set amount, like $500, without needing to check with you first.”

Setting a clear financial threshold empowers your holiday hero to handle unexpected expenses, like a late material delivery or urgent site repair. It also means small issues don’t escalate into client emergencies while you’re offline – phew!

Streamline communications and meeting time

If you manage a small team or employ apprentices, checking in constantly is draining – for you and the crew. And, in fact, stepping away from every single operational detail often uncovers unnecessary tasks that can be trimmed back.

“We looked at meetings that were only there to keep me updated,” Matt says. “Once we gave people clear ownership of specific tasks, we cut our standing meeting time by roughly 40 per cent. That gave everyone more time to get the work done instead of spending so much time reporting on it.”

By trusting your team or contractors with set outcomes, rather than calling for constant updates, you build a workplace culture that runs smoothly whether you’re on site or lying in a hammock.

Get processes out of your head

A major bottleneck for owner/operators is all the crucial business knowledge that lives entirely in their heads. We’re talking about client preferences, site access codes and supplier order details – to name just a few.

“Write all that stuff down and put it somewhere the team can easily find,” Matt says. “It was much easier once those key processes were out of my head and in a shared document. It doesn’t need to be anything fancy, a simple shared doc works fine.”

Creating simple, accessible cheat sheets for common tasks allows someone else to pick up the slack without needing to call you every time a routine query pops up. That means more surf time for you, and less stress-filled calls for them.

Run a three-day test drive

Before booking a two-week trip, test your ‘holiday mode’ setup. This highlights cracks in your system while you’re still on hand to fix them.

“I’d recommend a three-day test run,” Matt says. “Turn off your phone notifications and see what breaks. When I did this, something usually came up, but that was a good thing – because I could fix it before leaving for a longer break.”

Use this time to refine your handovers, update your documentation, and build confidence in your team’s ability to keep things moving. They’ll nail it, if you’ve taken the time to arm them properly.

Put the phone away

The technical setup is only half the battle. The final hurdle is psychological: learning to stop checking in.

“The hardest part isn’t setting up the systems,” Matt says. “It’s not checking in every few hours. I’ve caught myself doing it – and forced myself to put the phone away. If your team can’t run for three days without you, I’d fix that first before trying to take a longer break.”

Setting up a solid system gives you the freedom to step away completely. By auditing your tasks, setting clear decision thresholds, and testing your processes in advance, you can step off the job site knowing your business is in safe hands – and return refreshed, ready for the next job.

“Taking a real break only became possible once I stopped being the person every decision ran through,” Matt adds. “That’s something I’ve learned from experience and would be my number one lesson for owner/operators seeking some much-deserved time out.”

Frequently asked questions about taking a holiday

What electrical contractors should remember

Taking a genuine break as an owner/operator is not just about finding somebody to answer the phone. It requires working out which tasks truly need your judgement, giving another person clear authority, reducing unnecessary reporting, and getting important business knowledge out of your head and into an accessible format.

Test the arrangement before taking a longer trip and fix whatever goes wrong while you’re still available.

Then comes the hardest part: trust the system you’ve created and put the phone away. As Matt’s experience shows, taking a real break became possible once he stopped being the person every decision ran through.