azepine00

nothing stops you from doing this meeting from hotel on the beach, campsite or RV and then exploring smth new... you can rent a place anywhere your want and experience completely different lifestyle without worrying about your paycheck - it's an amazing once in a lifetime opportunity IMHO...

GadgetFreak

i answered that way because I don’t think business travel will return to what it was before. It has continued and will increase, but I don’t think it will ever be the same again.

i think this is a really useful way to phrase the question.

Good point. People were doing this before the pandemic. More people ar doing it now.

Redhead

I've been WFH with various levels of travel for 14 years. I love it. The idea of having to get dressed up to go into an office when I'm on the phone or text anyways just stresses me out. Being able to work barefoot in shorts and a t-shirt actually makes me mre productive because I am comfortable. I save money on gas, lunches, clothes, etc. I love having zero commute, being able to have lunch with family (my daughter this year since school is virtual, but my parents live with me and I enjoy our lunch breaks), being able to be here for workers, contractors, repair people, etc is incredibly handy, being able to fold laundry while on a conference call, etc. I'm actually more productive at home than in the office since I can work when I am at my best and take a quick break to restart when I need to. I would like to eventually get back to some biz travel but if it falls from pre-covid 25% to 10%, I'll be happier.

azepine00

before the pandemic in most places wfh had to be requested and it was usually limited to a few days a week.. there was always a perception of not beeing a team player and perhaps missing on opportunities if you were not present in person at least part time.. now all this nonsense is gone - just go and take advantage of true remote work options..
on a related note long term house rentals in california mountains, tahoe, coastline etc are very expensive and near impossible to get now

Gig103

I'm getting to that point too DTWflyer. I can't even use my personal computer after hours b/c the "home office" is just "work" now in my head. I am shopping for a laptop in fact so I can sit on the couch upstairs and still have something more powerful than a phone.

gruimed

...if you don't have kids

azepine00

most if not all kids are remote too here in CA...

Emma1420

Where I live most kids are in school at least part of the time. We will see how long that lasts.

SSF556

I have done 5 flying business trips since the beginning of June. It is refreshing walking through the Atlanta airport all by myself. Having the seat open beside me is awesome. These are both selfish though.

The Atlanta airport being dead is not sustainable. Empty seats on an airplane is not sustainable. Empty hotels is not sustainable. [mod edit]

GadgetFreak

Before the pandemic I had almost all of the people working with us on site. Most need to be on site, they do stuff with specialized equipment. But not all. Even before the pandemic I have had one person who works for me, doing computational analysis, working from home. They worked on site for about 10 years then got married and wanted to move out of town. So they asked me if it would be possible to keep working with our group remotely. I said let’s give it a try because they were such a valuable employee. That was 15 years ago and they still work with us as a very valuable employee.

It obviously depends on the person and the job. Everyone isn’t going to stop traveling and work at home. But the pandemic is happening at a time when technology, everything from broadband to computers is changing a lot. There may be a vaccine early next year or there may not be one in 5 years. I would guess much better treatments and tests are actually more likely in the short to medium term than a vaccine. This has been big enough to change things permanently. Especially when it’s happening with changes in technology and growing concern over climate change.

rubey419

To echo above, I also am going insane WFH all the time. But I’m rather extroverted and am more energized in-person. Just feels so benign having zoom calls and not working in the war room together and it really drains me (much less I’m not tied down atm and loved the alt-travel lifestyle/perks).

I do wonder if we’ll ever get back to pre-Covid habits. For those who had to travel most weeks, I don’t see that being the status quo moving forward, at least for my field where hospital clients are very cost-conscious. Honestly contemplating my exit to industry now.


Just out of curiosity who would be the folks back to flying part time or regularly right now? I do have a friend in tech implementation who has to fly as a SME, but in my world of healthcare consulting everyone is grounded until further notice. Which makes sense since there’s no reason for us to be adding additional risk to the hospitals right now.

Hipplewm

For some, it has never stopped.....maybe slowed

$30K in airline spend and over 130 nights in a hotel so far this year.....

For those wondering what I do:
I keep your lights on......

GadgetFreak

I think people like field service engineers and certainly some sales jobs. I’m certainly not. I just know some people are traveling. Hospitals are very sensitive to this. Cancer centers, for instance, were some of the very first to ban travel.

Duck1981

My company is a Big4 consultancy firm, and we won't have significant business travel before autumn 2021.

And even then on much reduced levels compared to the last 3 years. MS Teams simply works - and we have travelled a lot before.

the810

It seems to be resuming in my area, most people I know that used to do business travel on a regular basis are now back on the road. The obvious factor that delays full resumption are various border restriction that make some trips (e.g. intercontinental) impossible. Luckily I'm currently in a place that has very liberal border policy, so at least returning from the trip is easy & smooth. Another issue is that the willingness to travel is even lower than it used to be due to various restrictions and measures that are in place in travel and hospitality industries - in other words, travel sucks right now and no one's rushing to take a plane in current "war" conditions. Much more thought is given to whether the particular trip is really useful. I certainly feel that business travel is picking up much faster in locations which are back to business as usual, while online solutions are being preferred for places where many restrictions are still in place.

Finally, some of business travel will never return. I'm definitely not in the crowd that claims that everything can be done via Zoom - personal contact is important and business travel will continue to grow to facilitate it. However, over last couple of years I've heard many people complain about being forced to do pointless trips just because someone's in the management is conservative and insists on doing business the same way he did 25 years ago. This pandemic proved that some meetings can be easily done without flying an employee across Europe just to attend an hour long consultation with his boss.