System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException (0x80040154): Retrieving the COM class factory for component with CLSID {20A80B2B-6D69-40B7-A66A-D63C60B4878C} failed due to the following error: 80040154. at MediaNet.BAL.article.TidyBody(String strBody)Harrah's Entertainment Inc.
Las Vegas

Early on in this job, I found it hard to take a real vacation. I couldn’t turn off the stimulus that comes with the business. Ostensibly, I was on vacation. But I was constantly reading e-mail, checking voice mail, talking to my secretary, and getting regular FedEx deliveries at our summer home. That style of vacation is a losing proposition. If you’re getting sucked into the daily information glut back at the ofÞce, you can’t be a decent participant in a family outing.

But I thought that I could. Then one day, my wife made a shrewd observation. Without seeing me use the computer or the phone, she could tell whether I had been working — simply by interacting with me.

Since then, I’ve drastically cut back on the amount of communication that I have with the ofÞce when I’m on vacation. I haven’t gone cold turkey, but I have set some limits. I also make sure that my employees understand that they can reach me, but communication should be kept to an absolute minimum. Most important, before I go on vacation, I ask myself, “What does my family need from me on this trip?” It may just be hanging around for enough sustained time that a teenager might actually tell me what’s going on in her life.

The reality is that families of people like me make a lot of sacriÞces. SelÞshly, I’d like to say that vacations are all about me, because I work really hard for them. But vacations are also about the other people in my family.

Gary Loveman joined Harrah’s Entertainment as chief operating officer in 1998 and became president three years later.