Get the most from your holidays

Holidays aren't about lying on a foreign beach toasting your way to skin cancer or following your children around the Disneyverse. Nor are they about anything as wet as spending time with friends and family (say that and people will assume you were simply too broke to take a proper holiday, anyway). Nope, annual leave exists for one reason only: to make people who aren't currently taking it very, very jealous of those who are.

Having just been on holiday (Australia: sunny, plenty of wine, no unfortunate run-ins with dangerous wildlife) I am well-placed to offer my advice on how to maximise such annoyance:

1.Quash any feelings of guilt. Colleagues will use your absence to steal your most profitable clients, take the credit for your successful projects and swap their broken, crumb-filled computer equipment for your brand-new gear. Don't feel bad about making them wish they were on a yacht in the Adriatic while they do it.

2. Start early. Give people plenty of time to get used to the idea that you're going on holiday by keeping them in touch throughout the research and booking stages. Show them pictures of hotels with infinity pools; pretend you want their advice on whether a week at a Balinese spa would be more relaxing than a yoga retreat in the Canadian wilderness; ask them to recommend a local dive-training course so that you don't waste too much time learning the basics when you reach the Caribbean.

3. Prepare them for your absence. By the time you're a month away from your break, you can legitimately start most emails and conversations with the phrase "Of course, I will photographing wild baby elephants that week" before asking them to take on whatever nasty piece of work you can't be bothered finishing before you go.

4. Don't let them forget you while you're away. Getting the balance right here can be tricky. You want to make sure that workmates get to see as many photographs as possible of you having an obviously fabulous time somewhere that is exotic, glamorous or - at the very least - not the office; at the same time, you don't want them to get the impression that you're spending your entire holiday checking emails on your PDA. Sticking the best shots up on Facebook then texting an update to one or two talkative colleagues is a safe bet.

5. Keep up appearances. Getting back to work can be a relief after days or weeks spent in the company of loved ones and/or tour guides, but it's best not to let anyone else know that you feel this way. When people ask you if you enjoyed your holiday, say "yes, it was very refreshing" even if you spent the entire two weeks curled into a foetal position mainlining Imodium.

Picture: this is where I went on my holiday. It was very refreshing.