Accenture Careers Blog

On her LinkedIn® blog, Ellyn Shook, Chief HR Officer at Accenture, recently pointed to research that links employee downtime with employee well-being and workplace productivity. "When the brain takes a prolonged rest, creativity goes up – enabling fresh ideas, better and faster problem solving and, ultimately, increased efficiency and productivity," Ellyn said.

Even if it is good for you and your company, giving yourself permission to truly unplug seems harder than ever in today's fast-paced, hyper-competitive, globally-connected work world. The statistics Ellyn provides confirm the sorry story: 4 in 10 of us in the U.S. don't use all of our vacation days, which equates to 429 million unused days per year.

How can you break the cycle in your work life? Visit Ellyn's blog for three great pieces of advice, and share some ideas .