Business Trips are Still Necessary in This Age
Some people think that business trips are no longer essential and are a waste of time and money. There are various ways to contact people around the world without leaving your office. Whether you are going to speak with offshore employees or pitch ideas to potential investors, you can do so through online communication. Therefore, it makes no sense to allocate a huge portion of your budget on business trips. Only the upper management will enjoy doing it because of the chance to go to different places. Before you further vilify business trips, you need to understand that it also has benefits.
Investors will know how much you wanted the investment
For you to go all the way to where the investor is shows that you are passionate about getting that amount. You will not put effort if you think you can do without the said investment. Besides, you are asking them to invest in your company. It does not hurt if you will invest a few dollars to see these investors in person.
Pitching can happen outside the meeting room
You also think that you can pitch to potential investors online and there is no need to see them in person. The thing is that making them say yes is possible outside of your pitch. Your interaction with them during the break and your personality as a business owner will also be taken into consideration. Online communication does not give you that opportunity.
You need to attract employees to work hard
Yes, business trips usually benefit those in the upper management. Although it seem like they are lucky to have the chance to travel, the truth is that they worked hard to be on that post. If you remove business trips, you are also discouraging them from working hard to take a higher post in the company. If there are no perks apart from salary bump, it will not be attractive enough. Top employees might decide to jump to other companies where they think they can receive more benefits from taking a higher post.
Conversations can happen outside the workplace
The office seems to be toxic at times. It is the same place you see each day. You do not feel inspired when you sit on your desk the entire day doing the same job expected of you. If given the chance to go out and work on other tasks, you might get inspiration. For employees in the marketing field, getting such inspiration could go a long way in benefitting the company.
Yes, business trips can sometimes be abused and might be unnecessary under certain conditions. However, you cannot completely do away with something that can also boost the business. They key is to find out which trips make sense and why they are crucial to your success. By then, you cannot say that the trips are useless. Your employees will also not feel that way.
Photo Attribution:
1st and featured image from https://www.carlsonwagonlit.com/content/dam/vision/hero/business-traveler-care-520.jpg
2nd image from https://caretag.com.au/ndis/how-to-attract-and-retain-hard-working-talent-for-your-dsp/
