My goal is twofold - do as little work as possible, and accumulate as few Next Actions as possible, while in vacation.

Part of my approach to this is counterintuitive, though. I tend to take a fair number of calls on vacation, just because most people call my mobile and not my desk. I'd usually rather take the call and either answer their question, or tell them I'm on vacation and refer them elsewhere, or ask them to e-mail me their question so it's there when I return. I'm only handling the "easy stuff", so it's no big deal to answer a work call. People at my company are very cool about this - if I've tried to help them by taking the call on vacation, they don't mind waiting or trying to find someone else.

I set my desk phone outgoing message to say that I'm on vacation, so I don't check that VM box. Sometimes I even do this to my cell, but I'd still generally prefer to defer whatever's in the phone call to someone else, or to an e-mail that will be waiting for me when I return. If there's a VM on my cell, it bugs me till I check it, and then I'm stuck with the next action, not the person who called. (The goal is for the NA list to increase as little as possible while I'm out!).

The backlog can be tough, though. If you're lucky, a lot of the questions that come in during a vacation might find their way to someone else in your absence. Sometimes a proactive approach helps - a quick e-mail reply saying, "Hi, I just got back from vacation, and this looks pretty important. I'll get in touch with you as soon as I dig through my inbox." Or, start a message the same way, and ask them to set up a meeting.

Just some thoughts. There's no easy answer to this one!