When you travel for business, it’s inevitable your personal lifestyle will be affected in some way or other. Many business travellers are aware that their jobs often come at a cost to their extracurricular activities and family life. Achieving the nirvana of work life balance is a hotly debated topic.
Is it actually possible? Or is it an urban myth?
As a business traveller, how do you make sure you don’t miss out on the important things in life?
We’ve put together our top five tips on how to balance your personal and business responsibilities:
1. Establish a routine
This isn’t always easy to do but if you have the opportunity, it’s worth adopting. Whether it’s choosing the same hotel if you regularly travel to a destination, or perhaps it’s a fitness routine you carry out daily before setting off on your travels, routine is a great way to achieve a level of stability. It could be something you do daily, weekly, or less frequent. Speak to your travel bookers or travel management company to see what they can do to help you maintain a set standard.
2. Ask for help
Don’t be afraid to ask for help. This doesn’t necessarily need to involve professional services. With technology and the advancements in AI, there are many online tools that can help you balance your work and personal tasks. We recently compiled a selection of travel apps that we found useful for business travellers and there are other products such as smart watches and trackers that are worth looking at too. When it comes to booking travel itself, this is where travel management companies can show their real value, vastly cutting down time spent searching and booking trips as we provide total trip management solutions, freeing up your time to get on with other tasks.
3. Plan ahead
If you are spending half a day on the train or a few hours in the air, why not use that time to catch up on work or tasks you’ve not had time for at home. Planning isn’t just about making the most of your journey, but can also mean outlining an itinerary to tackle both personal and business objectives. For example, moving meetings to a central location and planning several appointments in a single day to avoid an extra night out of town and potentially save money. Or perhaps planning travel an hour later to avoid peak fares and enabling you to do the school run. All of these things can make for a more positive business travel experience.
4. Schedule personal time
This may come across as impersonal and perhaps a slightly odd way to approach keeping in touch. However many psychologists have advised scheduling set times to speak to loved ones and sticking to them have proved effective in minimising stress on the road. If a date night, family event or fun activity has been added to your calendar, it gives you something to work towards and look forward to. Making a conscious effort to set time aside for these activities can also help to improve productivity over time, as it takes you away from those moments where you might be over-stretching yourself.
5. Plan in down time
We’ve said this time and time again, but in the fast paced world of modern day living, taking time out to relax is essential. Personal wellbeing is something we should all be mindful of. Stress is currently the most popular factor that throws off a travellers cycle of work and rest. By keeping an eye on your overall health, it can help to improve your everyday capabilities. A little relaxation can go a long way.
