Rolled out in 2007 along with a personal sabbatical program, General Mills’ “Innovation Sabbatical” is only offered to members of the company’s “Innovation, Technology and Quality” organization, which is comprised of employees in roles related to research and development, nutrition, quality and engineering. After 7 years of service, these employees may apply for an Innovation Sabbatical that is fully paid for up to 12 months. Expenses related to the sabbatical are also paid.

The following are highlights from a recent discussion about General Mills’ Innovation Sabbatical between yourSABBATICAL’s Elizabeth Pagano and Sandy Haddad, Manager of Flexibility & Inclusion at General Mills and the new overseer of the company’s sabbatical offerings. Haddad was on the HR committee that developed the program.

Q: Tell me a little more about the eligibility requirements for your Innovation Sabbatical.

A: We’re looking for people who have proven their strong performance and have deep experience at General Mills. It’s a reward. We have a steering committee that reviews all of the proposals that come in and makes the decision of who is approved to take an innovation sabbatical, based on how the applicants’ requests meet the criteria of the program.  The steering committee includes the most senior, influential leaders in the group, including the senior vice president who heads the Innovation Technology and Quality organization. Before rolling out the Innovation Sabbatical, we had those folks out in front of employees talking about the program, how it relates to our innovation strategy, and why we’re excited about it.

Q: Briefly, what is the process for applying?

A: We have an online form that can be filled out and turned in to anyone on the committee.

Q: How many have applied since the program’s inception in 2007?

A: Roughly 15.

Q: Is there a cap?

A: No. We are targeting about two per year.

Q: How many people have been on an Innovation Sabbatical so far, and what kinds of things did they do?

A: Five employees have taken Innovation Sabbaticals. They fall into two categories: one category is very science based around product development, coming up with new, proprietary opportunities and solutions around nutrition; the second category is more about organizational capabilities which are not specific to one product but will have implications across the company’s portfolio of brands and businesses. For example, one person really focused on using social media and networking to expand our innovation capabilities. He brought back a very robust understanding of the social media landscape, the potential, and how to leverage it internally and externally. While on sabbatical, he worked in another organization – not a competitor – that was also interested in learning more about social media…so he had a playground of sorts and also spent time benchmarking across a broad array of organizations. Another employee partnered with a higher education institution for his sabbatical. And another person worked with a small organization that General Mills is already partnering with to expand our contacts with leading-edge innovators; with this particular organization’s network we went from having a network of a handful to a network of more than 100 innovators around the world who we can tap into.

Q: What kinds of business outcomes have you observed from this program?

A: Culturally, it has really reinforced the commitment we have to people, innovation, and experimentation. We didn’t  want people to get stuck thinking “Well, what if my idea doesn’t work?” People needed to know that we want them to go way outside the box and that failure is a possibility but we won’t look at it as failure. From an individual stand point, the impact has been huge. Personal learning, confidence, and development have been evident. And these individuals were also able to build their external network more, which feeds right into innovation. Also, they’ve had unique opportunities to interact more frequently with the senior leadership of the organization..

Q: How is this program perceived within General Mills?

A: Very well. Those who’ve done it come back refreshed, energized, and are bringing back great innovation to General Mills. The biggest challenge was convincing people that we really mean it and to go for it. We said “Don’t let your own mental barriers stop you from going for it.”

Q: How is work coverage handled? Is there a specific process or does it depend on unit/team?

A: Many employees at General Mills have rotational assignments, and Innovation Sabbaticals are targeted to occur at the end of a rotation, when a different employee would be taking over the position either way.

Q: What are some of the expectations of an employee who is accepted for an Innovation Sabbatical?

A: Part of the application process – but it’s also up to the person’s manager – is to ensure that before leaving, the employee is clear on what the objectives are and how they’ll be evaluated. We do tie the sabbatical in to the employee’s performance rating and layout the expectation that when they come back, they’ll present what they learned  to people throughout the organization – not just in one presentation or paper. For example, the person who worked on social media while on sabbatical is still working on tying it back to the organization. He’s considered an internal consultant on social media.

Q: How do you think your sabbatical program(s) contributes to GMI’s “best company” status?

A: It’s rather unique to go out on a paid sabbatical. And since we’ve increased the duration from 6 to 12 months, it’s a generous and exciting program that complements all we’re doing around flexibility, while also promoting innovation… and that’s a company that I want to work for. We  truly trust and empower employees to experiment and dig deep into topics about which they are passionate. This benefits them from a development and satisfaction standpoint, and it has a tremendous benefit on our business.

yS: Why did you choose to do a volunteer sabbatical?

Joe: I had always dreamed of volunteering in the developing world.  Working in corporate America for five years was rewarding and challenging, but I wanted to use my skill set in a more altruistic manner while I had the means to do so.

My decision to volunteer wasn’t completely selfless though – I knew that by volunteering in Uganda I’d be exposed to an extremely resilient, talented and diverse cross-section of people.  I wanted to engulf myself in a categorically different culture, because as Andre Gide said, “One does not discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.”

yS: How has your sabbatical impacted you so far?

Joe: When I told people I was volunteering in Africa for 6 months a common response was, “You won’t be the same person when you come back.”

I was fine with that.  I am continually looking to evolve and grow as a person.

Little did I know how much of an impact my sabbatical would have on me – it’s more than I could have ever asked for: increased confidence, renewed mental calm and clarity, a greater understanding of life, a more global understanding of the world and a vast satisfaction knowing my work is helping people.

Joseph Quaderer, a director at Morgan Stanley, is on a 6-month sabbatical teaching Ugandan high school students the necessary skills to start and scale social enterprises – financially sustainable organizations that also address important social problems.

yS: How has your sabbatical impacted your career?

Joe: Furthering your career and volunteering abroad are no longer mutually exclusive concepts.  Having a stint as a volunteer on your resume at once differentiates you and also conveys to your potential employer that you are more than an empty suit.

I am using the skills I garnered in corporate America to teach Ugandan high school students how to start and scale socially responsible businesses. I have met other people using their professional competencies while volunteering – someone using his dancing background to spread AIDS awareness among the youth of Africa, someone else using her ceramics background to teach people vocational skills.  Volunteering allows people to strengthen their skills and to apply them in unorthodox scenarios that encourage creative thinking and problem solving.

Re-entry took “no more than a day or two” before being up to speed. His work coverage plan allowed for training and development. And he was far more rejuvenated than after his first sabbatical, seven years prior.

Doug and his wife in Hawaii.

Doug credits the success of his second sabbatical with lessons learned from his first. He shared with me his best practices:

1. Make it about succession planning. Start identifying what you do and who you can delegate to as early on as possible. “I started six months in advance,” he says. “The work coverage plan for my second sabbatical was more about succession planning. On my first sabbatical, I didn’t have that consciousness, but you can’t start too early thinking about those things. I’m now 55 and seven years away from retirement. You have to start implementing things well in advance of retirement to make sure it’s a smooth transition.”
2. Colleague partnering is critical. Introduce your colleagues to clients well in advance before leaving on sabbatical. It maintains continuity of service. “When you’re in your year of sabbatical, you really need to take the colleague partnering up to a different level,” Doug says.
3. Tell your clients and prospects that you’ll be taking a break. Promote the fact that you’ll be gone and that your firm supports it. “It’s an incredibly positive message – more so than I would have imagined.”
4. Use your work coverage plan to delegate to bring benefit to your company. “Once you have the list of things you do in your role, go through the list and determine what you can permanently delegate. Then ask yourself, ‘How can I best re-deploy my time for the benefit of the practice?’” Permanent delegation of tasks allowed Doug to do more client interfacing, business development activities and practice planning activities, bringing a higher value to the firm.
5. Earmark some unstructured time. Doug’s first sabbatical was 30 days of travel with only one day to unpack and get the house in order before going back to work. For his second sabbatical, he combined two weeks in Hawaii with two weeks of “staycation”, letting the days unfold and allowing for some quiet time. “I felt mentally and substantially better rested with having some time where I wasn’t dealing with airplanes, travel schedules and being on a schedule.”
6. Disconnect – really. To get the benefits out of a sabbatical – for yourself and for the development of staff – ensure that you fully disconnect. No calling in. No checking emails. “It’s good for you,” Doug says. “It’s at the core of the sabbatical.”

Because Doug did a lot of advance planning and knew what to expect, he experienced far less anxiety about leaving for sabbatical than he did before he took his first work break.

If a sabbatical is in your future, consider Doug’s tips for successful planning and preparation.

On the lengthy sabbaticals Sonny Rollins has taken from playing, he devoted himself to solitary practice, studied Zen meditation in Japan, and even withdrew to a monastery in India. From 1959 to 1961, he withdrew from playing live and spent 16 hours a day practicing by himself, outdoors, on Manhattan’s Williamsburg bridge.

If you think this example has little relation to those of us working in the “real world” of seemingly uncreative businesses, consider what parts of your job might benefit from new thinking, problem solving, product and service innovations, and discovery of better ways of leading, selling, and communicating.

Tim O'Connor, his wife Treesah, and Dean Dipak Jain from Kellogg

When Tim O’Connor left his job as SVP Marketing for a $5B company in Atlanta, he chose to first spend six months serving as the non-paid Executive Director leading the renovation and relaunch of the EthicMark® Award for Advertising, an international advertising award that recognizes outstanding marketing, advertising, and public relations campaigns and communications designed to uplift the human spirit and society. Tim was featured, along with yourSABBATICAL.com, on Oprah.com in a recent article about sabbaticals. Here, in his own words, is his perspective on how the sabbatical made a difference.

As a businessperson and a marketing professional I know that marketers, communicators, advertisers and the media have tremendous power to shape social attitudes, values and behaviors.  We not only can and do create demand and pull for our company’s products and services; but we also can and do shape how we see and act in the world, and view our ourselves and each other.  In plying our craft, we not only reflect society, but we also shape the very societies in which we work in.  And so we have a great responsibility in how we ply that craft.

The Award’s mission is to foster a transformative shift in the advertising field by demonstrating the power of media campaigns to further the public interest while furthering legitimate private interests.  The media has tremendous power to shape social attitudes and values, and therefore to serve as a tool to empower individuals and society to find solutions to the pressing social, political, and environmental challenges of our times.

Dr. Hazel Henderson, the progenitor of socially responsible investing globally, conceived EthicMark in 2004 and nurtured it in conversations with Rinaldo Brutoco the President of the World Business Academy, Dean Dipak Jain of the Kellogg School, noted author Deepak Chopra, Professors David Cooperrider and Ron Nahser and myself.  However the award was languishing and it needed full-time attention to help take it to its rightful place.  I realized that my leaving my then employer offered me a unique opportunity to use my time and talent and treasure and devote it full-time for an extended period leading EthicMark®.  You can learn more about EthicMark® at ethicmark.com

Highlights during the last year included creating an alliance with the World Business Academy to supervise the awards on an ongoing basis.  The Academy’s Fellows include some of the worlds leading figures who are rekindling the human spirit in business, including Warren Bennis, Deepak Chopra, David Cooperrider, Stephen Covey, Hazel Henderson, Gay Hendricks, Jean Houston, Barbara Marx Hubbard, Dean Dipak Jain, Jerry Jampolsky, Rosabeth Kanter, Amory Lovins, William McDonough, Greg Mortenson, Ron Nahser, Michael Ray, Dean N. Mohan Reddy, Lance Secretan, and Peter Senge.

We created an international jury of 30 marketing, media and academia professionals to vote on submissions, including Charles Firestone, Executive Director, The Aspen Institute; Joe Keefe, CEO, Pax World; Nancy Roof, Founder/Publisher, Kosmos Journal; and Simran Sethi, Host/Writer, Ethical Markets TV series and contributor of environmental segments to CNBC and the Oprah Winfrey Show.

We created a strategic alliances with the Global Forum for Business as an Agent of World Benefit, to confer the 2009 awards which took place in June.  The Global Forum, convened by Case Western Reserve University, the United Nations Global Compact, with its 4,000 corporations from around the world, and the Academy of Management, with its 19,000 business school professors from over 90 countries, was the perfect place to announce this year’s EthicMark Winners.

This year, EthicMark received several dozen nominations from six countries.  The nominations were narrowed down to a group of five finalists in the for-profit category and five finalists in the not-for-profit category which were voted upon by the jury.  Pantene, a division of Proctor & Gamble, won in the for-profit category for its ad, “Chrysalis” (Thailand).  CARE won in the not-for-profit category for its ad, “I Am Powerful” (USA).  The presentation of the Awards at the Global Forum opening night reception included speeches by the Mayor of Cleveland; the President of Case Western Reserve University; David Cooperrider, Founder of BAWB; and Gunter Pauli, Head of the Zero Emission Research Initiative.  It was my distinct pleasure and honor to then announce the EthicMark® winners.  You can find the finalist ads at http://bawbglobalforum.ning.com/page/ethic-mark-nominees-1.

It was a special evening.  But even more so it has been a special and deeply transformative time for me during this sabbatical while I helped lead EthicMark® to the next level.  I believe business can be a spiritual calling.  And I believe inside every businessman and woman is a voice and spark that longs to apply their talents in incredible, remarkable, amazing and marvelous ways and create a world that is better than the one they came into.  A world which many generations forward will be honored and proud to say that their ancestors contributed to making.  And I also believe business, the most powerful institution in our world, can find solutions to the pressing social, political, and environmental challenges of our times and turn them into legitimate value-creation opportunities for their companies.  So business can do well by doing good.  I believe I’ve been able to practice that first hand during my sabbatical.

I asked Tim what he learned from his six-month sabbatical. Here’s what he said:

I learned how to lead a start-up from essentially scratch.  I also learned how to raise funding, and candidly I think raising money for a not-for-profit is harder since the “return” is not financial but rather “out come based”.  And I learned how to lead a team of volunteers; and this is key and the biggest most tangible lesson learned.  Too often in business, regardless of what says about empowerment, there is the underlying current of money and fear as the motivator, especially in these uncertain economic times.  So managers tend to talk in terms like I need you to do this for me, that is not important this is, why are you doing that, if you do this you’ll earn this more money, here is where we stack rank your performance (with the implied message that those at the bottom will get cut), we “took out” one-hundred head count (as if people were bodies in a war) ….  And candidly I’ve done some of the previous in the past.

But with volunteers the levers of money and fear do not exist.  So you really can only lead, you can’t manage at all.  Words like please, thank you, I appreciate your help, how can I help you, what do you think we should do, let’s work together on this … are in the conversation.  Understanding what your team is passionate about and helping them achieve that, making the experience fun and enjoyable, and building a healthy culture within the team become paramount.  And I would say these are all things that would make a for-profit team excel too.  I had to transform my leadership approach into one of servant leadership.  Now I don’t pretend to be an expert at it.  But I do recognize a good thing and know that in my work in the for-profit world again, I need to apply these lessons learned.  And candidly it makes my experience as a leader more enjoyable and fulfilling too.  So I’ve found myself to be more collaborative, inquisitive, appreciative and effective.

We’ll be leading a “Next Big Thing” roundtable discussion – all about sabbaticals – at Working Mother’s WorkLife Congress in New York City, October 27-29. The conferences boasts an opportunity for attendees to “find out how our best companies for working mothers are STILL able to say ‘work’ and ‘life’ in the same sentence, and how doing so contributes to employee engagement, which means committed, productive employees who make growth and innovation possible even in today’s economy.”

Let us know if you’re going to be there.

Renowned for album covers, posters and his recent book of life lessons, designer Stefan Sagmeister invariably has a slightly different way of looking at things. He views sabbaticals as necessary to his work.

Every seven years, designer Sagmeister closes his New York studio for a yearlong sabbatical to rejuvenate and refresh their creative outlook. In this video, he explains the often overlooked value of time off and shows the innovative projects inspired by his time in Bali. Watch it. Watch it twice. He’s amazing.

And if you want to read more, here’s a recent post from The Sabbatical Mindset about TED and Sagmeister.

Not long before it was time to depart on her first sabbatical, Laura Smith, Managing Director, U.S. Human Resources, emailed her boss, Matthew Harrington, U.S. President and CEO of Edelman, a global public relations firm.

“I wrote that I wanted to take my sabbatical but that I knew there was a lot going on and that and it might not be a good time to go,” she says. “I said that I’d only take a ‘semi-sabbatical’”.

Harrington wrote back: “I don’t believe in semi-sabbaticals. We’re not doing life or death work. You deserve this sabbatical and should find a way to disconnect.”

Although Smith knew that her boss placed a high value on work-life balance, she recalls being “almost hurt” by his reply. “It felt as if he’d said, ‘We can operate without you, Laura, you’re not that important’, and I really had to take some time to get through the emotional reaction I was having.”

Smith’s boss had also told her that he felt it was important that the senior members of the Edelman team “set an example” and take their sabbatical when due one.

“I thought to myself, ‘If the Head of HR can’t disconnect, then what message am I sending people?’” Smith says. Edelman’s U.S. employees receive a paid sabbatical after 10 years of service and every five years after.

During Smith’s sabbatical – the month of July – she spent two and a half weeks at a beach house on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, a week in the mountains, and the rest of time at home with family. She did not check her BlackBerry. She did not go online. And she only received one “urgent call” from her firm that involved answering a quick question. “Being disconnected was hard for the first few days, but I was determined to prove that I could do it and set an example.”

The sabbatical experience made Smith realize that the powerful benefits of disconnecting are not just for the executive going away but also for those left behind at the office. “The impact that my team experienced was profound, and I didn’t realize it until I returned from sabbatical,” Smith says. “By going away, I sent the message that I trusted them to make decisions without me. The trust factor is a huge benefit for senior people who go on sabbatical. It says ‘I know you can do this, and whatever decisions you make, I’m going to stand by you’”.

By going on sabbatical, Smith stretched her team. “They knew that they had the opportunity to make some decisions themselves, as opposed to asking me what we should do. There were a few instances where they were tempted to call, but they didn’t. They talked it through as a team and solved problems together.”

When she mentioned to non-Edelman friends and acquaintances that she was on sabbatical, Smith realized the impact that having such a program has on Edelman’s brand as an employer. “I can’t tell you the number of people I encountered who said, ‘Oh my gosh, what company do you work for? Companies actually do that?’ It’s a huge statement about what kind of organization we are.”

Smith wanted each day of her sabbatical to feel as long as possible, so she rose early each day. She wrote a daily journal. She didn’t schedule anything. By the end of her break, she was ready to get back to work. “And that’s the way it should be,” she says.

Upon her return to Edelman, Smith sent an email to her colleagues and team that included the following statement: “Today is my first day back following a month-long sabbatical. I knew what a great benefit this is but experiencing it made a big difference. I feel renewed and so grateful to work at Edelman and with all of you.  THANK YOU to my colleagues for making this benefit possible and THANK YOU to my team for keeping all things under control and doing the great job they always do.”

After fully understanding the far-reaching benefits of her sabbatical, Smith believes Edelman’s sabbatical eligibility program should be reviewed and she plans to propose an enhancement  to her senior team and hopes to gain approval.

“It’s absolutely the right time to do it,” she says. “During this economy, there’s so much we want to do but can’t right now. But expanding our sabbatical offering wouldn’t cost so much, and the benefits – to individuals, their team, and their clients – are so worth it.”