As large parts of the UK workforce log back on during the final days of December, growing attention is being paid to how employers handle the period between Christmas Day and New Year, when businesses remain open but workloads often fall sharply.
For many employees, particularly in hybrid and office-based roles, the end-of-year slowdown creates a strange contradiction. Staff are expected to be available, responsive and visible yet are frequently left without meaningful work, clear priorities or guidance on how the period should be used.
Workplace specialists are now warning that leaving employees in this limbo risks disengagement, quiet stress and performative productivity, and are calling on employers to set clearer expectations for what working during this period should actually involve.
Calls for clearer employer signalling during ‘Twixmas’
Josh Peacock, co-founder of SalaryGuide, a UK platform that provides pay benchmarking and employment insights, said organisations needed to be more intentional about how they managed the Christmas to New Year window, often referred to as Twixmas.
He said many employers underestimated how uncertainty affected staff behaviour during quieter weeks, particularly when teams were partially staffed and managers were on leave. Employees, he said, were often unsure whether they were expected to coast, catch up, plan ahead or simply remain visible.
Peacock said employers should be explicit about priorities and acceptable output levels, rather than allowing staff to guess. He said the absence of clear signals frequently led to anxiety and low-value activity rather than genuine productivity.
“Managing a packed inbox can feel like a job in itself,” he said, adding that many employees defaulted to administrative busywork during the festive slowdown simply to feel useful.
He said that while such tasks could be valuable, they should be framed deliberately rather than left as an unspoken coping mechanism for uncertainty.
Low workloads expose performative productivity
The Christmas to New Year period has long been associated with reduced activity across many sectors, particularly professional services, finance and corporate functions. But as remote and hybrid working have become more entrenched, expectations around availability have remained blurred.
Employees report being logged on for full working days despite receiving few emails, attending fewer meetings and having limited decision-making authority while senior colleagues are away. Workplace observers say this dynamic encourages staff to prioritise visibility over value.
Peacock said the problem was not downtime itself, but how it was handled. He said organisations that treated the period as an awkward continuation of normal work often created more frustration than those that openly acknowledged it as a low-intensity phase.
He said staff who understood that the week was intended for light tasks, housekeeping or planning were less likely to feel guilty about slower pace and more likely to return in January refreshed rather than resentful.
Opportunity to review processes and workloads
The seasonal slowdown can also surface inefficiencies that are masked during busier months. Peacock said employees responsible for recurring weekly, monthly or quarterly tasks often found the quieter period was the only time they could properly examine whether those processes still made sense.
“With fewer interruptions, you can examine your processes from start to finish and pinpoint where automation, simplification, or delegation could make a meaningful difference,” he said.
He said organisations that encouraged staff to document improvements during this period were more likely to benefit from lasting efficiency gains, rather than losing momentum once January workloads resumed.
From an employer perspective, this raised questions about whether Twixmas should be treated as wasted time or as a structured opportunity to improve how work was done throughout the year.
Digital overload and cognitive load
Another recurring issue during the Christmas to New Year period is digital overload. Peacock said many employees accumulated tools, platforms and browser extensions over the course of the year, often without reassessing whether they were still useful.
He said the quieter window allowed staff to review digital setups, remove unused tools and adjust notifications, reducing cognitive load ahead of the new year. He said even modest digital decluttering could have a noticeable impact on focus once normal work intensity returned.
He added that this kind of housekeeping work was rarely prioritised during the year, yet could meaningfully improve day-to-day productivity when supported by employers rather than treated as peripheral.
Learning, planning and realistic expectations
Peacock also said some employees were using the period to refresh core skills or plan development goals, particularly in roles where learning was often sidelined by immediate delivery pressures.
Rather than enrolling in formal courses, he said many opted for short form learning such as articles, videos or podcasts relevant to their role. He said tools such as Google NotebookLM, a learning assistant, were being explored by some workers as a way to organise learning materials and revisit key information during quieter periods.
He stressed that such activity should be seen as legitimate use of working time when workloads were low, rather than something employees felt they needed to hide or justify.
What employers should take from the Twixmas slowdown
The debate around working between Christmas and New Year is less about squeezing productivity from a quiet week and more about how expectations are communicated, workplace specialists say.
They have repeatedly warned that ambiguity around availability and output can undermine wellbeing, particularly at the end of an already demanding year. Clear guidance on priorities, response times and acceptable pace can help staff use the period constructively, whether that means light administrative work, planning for the year ahead or genuine downtime.
As hybrid working continues to blur the boundary between being present and being productive, the final working days of the year are increasingly seen as a test of whether organisations trust employees to manage their time sensibly, or rely on visibility as a proxy for value.
