September means stress for French execs

According to a recent official statistic only one in twenty French executives takes his annual vacation in September. Most suits realise that this is above all the time they should be in the office — even though it is the period of the year when stress at work reaches its maximum intensity. 

Why so? Romain Jacoud, an expert on business life at the University of Paris-VII: “Partly it’s a throwback to school. Unlike in the U.K. or the U.S. the French still concentrate their holidays — longer than elsewhere, of course — across July and August. When the bell rings for la rentrée everyone feels apprehensive!”

And with reason. Across late spring and summer, argues Jacoud, there is a specific tendency to put off problems — then come September, in a real sense (as we note elsewhere in this issue) the start of a new year, the can of worms opens. It’s the time for sackings, restructuring, the announcement of new ideas. Everyone gets fired up again for business and telephone, fax and e-mail traffic mounts to terrifying levels. Result: stress. Eric Albert, a psychiatrist specialising in stress and anxiety, wrote recently that executives are particularly likely to turn up in his consulting room across September and October. “I get maybe a third more than during the rest of the year.” On top of work worries it’s also the peak period for the initiation of divorce proceedings.

Moral: if you’re doing business with the French try to leave them be in the autumn. By All Saints’ Day things are usually calmer. 

From Reporter 105 - Oct/Nov 2004

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