Dear Boss, Just Call the Snow Day

Dear Boss,

I’m writing because, as I’m sure you’ve heard, it’s supposed to snow tomorrow. Now, I know they didn’t train you for this part of the job when you were studying for your MBA, but the reality is that the responsibility of deciding whether or not we have to come into work tomorrow falls on your shoulders.

We understand that there are many factors that need to be weighed when considering whether to close the office for the day. But I’m writing on behalf of the group to say, just call the snow day. Please.

We know you. We know you’re the kind of person who is so devoted to your work that you’d walk barefoot through a bomb cyclone to make it into the office and work for 12 hours in cold, wet socks. But you’re not like most people. That’s why you’re the boss. Most of us just want to do our jobs and bring home paychecks for our families; we’re not super eager to risk life and limb to do it.

 I mean, don’t get me wrong. We are super passionate about our work. It’s just that we are super, super passionate about days off from work.

I mean, don’t get me wrong. We are super passionate about our work. It’s just that we are super, super passionate about days off from work.

I’ve put together a brief list of cons with regard to keeping the office open:

1. Childcare challenges (assuming schools are closed)
2. Potential for slip-and-fall accidents
3. Stoking of already-simmering resentments

If you’re concerned about how you’re going to spend your own day off, here are a few ideas:

1. Sit in your big, beautiful house beside your lovely, crackling fireplace enjoying hot cocoa and observing the natural beauty of the gently falling flakes outside your window.
2. Look up the account balances of your checking, savings, 401(k), IRA, individual stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. Try to calculate your net worth. Compare that to the average person, then lean back and take a long, satisfied sip of hot cocoa. Maybe add some of that nice cognac to it.
3. Heck, come in to the office and work for all we care, just don’t drag us along with you.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking you can shirk this responsibility with some passive-aggressive, noncommittal email that says something like, “I’ll leave it to each of you to determine what is safe and reasonable for yourself, taking into consideration your responsibilities to your clients and internal teams.”  Once again, I think I speak for all of us when I entreat you not to push this impossible Sophie’s Choice upon us. See the beauty of a snow day is the ability to stay home guilt-free. If we spend the day wondering what everyone else did, or how our manager’s might view our choice, it ruins the whole thing.

We know we’ve got commitments to partners and clients all over the country and beyond, snow or not. And we know that a day of lost work has real financial and workflow ramifications across the company.

On the flipside, I’d ask you to consider this: It’s going to snow! 

Sincerely yours,

Everyone