How to get your mind back to work after a long leave?

I personally need a few minutes of catching up with different people, especially from my team. It's usually 50% personal and then 50% professional in order to get up to date. Then I usually deep dive into emails and tasks for as long as I can keep concentrated and focussed. It doesn't always go according to plan, obviously, since you get unexpected new tasks constantly, but very often they relate to tasks on the list anyway :-) So in sum, I'd say it's about 40% talking to people (incl. teammates and bosses) and understand what's been happening while I was away, and 60% just deep diving into old tasks, missed chats and emails, and general performance of products under my scope and then my teammates'.

I'd re-read the framework and objectives of the company (general ones). Then try to recatch WIP work by reading the to-dos and backlog. Ask for updates, problems or news and just go with them! Good luck.

A company that I work for has an amazing flexible hybrid working model (we can work remotely and at an office). So after a long leave, I head straight to our office, chat with my colleagues about both work and other stuff, and it gets me in the rhythm quite fast. If I have to stay home, meetings are also great to get my mind back to work.

It depends if you go back to work you love or go back to work you hate.

Following this thread. I am taking a long-ish break and need all the tips to get back in track after!

I have just gone back to working full-time (commuting as well) a month ago after a 2-year break (with some smaller freelancing/WFH periods). Here's what I learnt so far: 1. Health over routines: in my attempt to keep up with established gym, daily cooking, house chores and other routines I was burning out every week and getting sick every weekend. Had to prioritize my health over everything, will build new routines back up as I get used to the full-time working schedule again. 2. Plan & prep: use the weekends to meal prep, plan fun stuff to look forward to next week, etc. - set yourself up to go Mon thru Fri with minimum stress. 3. Take it easy at work: at the beginning it was tough to focus for more than 30 min on anything and the office setting was getting to me too much - so I was taking breaks as needed in the lounge a lot more often. Building the productivity streaks up also takes time, not feeling guilty about it is important. Just my two cents :)

This obviously depends on whether you are able to or not. But whenever I get back from a trip I usually take some time to allow myself to get back into the swing of things (if my schedule allows). Also the night before I get back into I'll spend some time making myself a list of priorities for the day ahead.