Business travel might sound exotic, but those of us on the inside know the reality – that often it’s an unglamorous exercise in meetings and phone calls, with no opportunity to actually experience the place you’re visiting. This is an annoying enough truth in itself but when added to the fact that business travel is often just difficult, it becomes even more so. This is no vacation – there’s a timetable to keep to, goals to meet, people to impress, and deals to seal. On top of that all the usual practicalities f travel such as booking tickets and accommodation still exist – and let’s face it, those are irritating when they’re for a holiday, never mind for a work trip that doesn’t even promise any relaxation.
So what can be done to alleviate some of these difficulties and make business travel easier to handle? We’ve got a few great ideas for you to try out.
Say no to last-minute changes
Going on a business trip takes a lot of organization, and adding last-minute meetings or presentations to the agenda isn’t fair on you – you won’t have time to prepare properly and it will add a huge amount of stress. You should politely but firmly point out that the original timetable is the one you had prepared for and will be sticking with.
Keep the timetable minimal
Although you have a million things to do, you won’t be able to act effectively if you fill every second of each day of your trip with meetings/ you won’t be able to give 100% in any of them and you’ll come away drained and probably no more informed than you were before – make sure to give yourself a break.
Improve remote communication
One of the reasons that business travel is necessary is to communicate with international or long-distance teams – when actually if you implement effective remote communication, this isn’t necessary at all. By familiarising your team with a versatile and user-friendly communication platform. Most of these travel meetings will be able to be done over video call or email.
Project management
Similarly to the point above, you can also cut out the need to travel long distances to manage projects, teams, or assignments by using assignment management software which will centralize and simplify the company’s distribution of projects
So there we have it, if you’ve been finding global business travel difficult lately, here are a few top tips to help you get going again.