WR Cage

This more than anything else is best advice for the OP. Interview the company extensively about their travel policy and procedures. Interview multiple people independantly (eg one at a time and not so they are all in the same room) and compare their stories about travel policy compliance.

Finally research the companies travel policy through online forums. Example google Siemans Tavel Policy and you can see how Siemans is both loved and hated by their travel based employees.

tfly212

Although I would agree that having all of that information would be really useful, I would suggest caution in how you seek that information. As a hiring manager, I would probably not take it too kindly if a potential new hire grilled me about miles, meal caps, flying business, etc while I am deciding whether or not to hire them. If you have a friend that works there, or can get it off the internet, great...I just wouldn't make that part of my interview process, especially since the OP mentioned that he is young so this is likely a more junior role.

WR Cage

On the girlfriend situation. Ask yourself if she is wife material. If she is not potentially wife material, then discount everything stated above concerning girlfriend. Now I am not advocating breaking up with her; but if you don't see yourself getting married to this person, perhaps your work should take the priority.

If you think the girlfriend is wife material, then ask yourself what is stopping you from proposing right now. Perhaps the answer is time based (e.g. you both are too young, or the relationship is too new), if so then I would talk to your girlfriend about traveling and her longterm expectations. Basically try and get her temperature on expectations of a fiancee and husband. Her expectations of "boyfriend" might be okay with travelling 3-5 days per week, but "fiancee/husband" could be radically different. Radically different is okay if you both don't see the situation transitioning in the next two years, but if she is thinking of engagement in 6mths to 1 year, then you would have to re-evaluate the travel job.

One final thought. If your girlfriend is potential wife material, you might want to think about how she interacts with her family (example attendance at family functions, frequency of family get togethers, location of her immediate family). Boyfriends are typically excluded from MANDATORY attendance at family functions. Fiance and husbands do not enjoy this rule relaxation. If your girlfriend with wife potential has a lot of family function requirements, your travelling job will be a source of friction betwen you and your GF/GF-family.

WChou

As others have said, it depends. Not going to rehash a lot of what has been said. One other wild card is scheduling and predictability. It's not as bad when you know where you will be weeks or months in advance. Life can be scheduled around the travel.

My new job was expected to be 5 - 10% travel but lately it has been much more at 80%+. The company travel policy is good and I have lots of flexibility but the unpredictability can be stressful. I have had to hop on a plane with less than 6 hours notice. Recently I had to jump on a plane, work an emergency, jump on a plane to the next emergency, work a much as I could, fly home, attend event, head straight to the airport after the event, and fly to fight the next fire. A few others are already near burnout and asking to be reassigned. I am okay now but ask me in 6 months and the answer will probably be different.

WR Cage

I appreciate the viewpoint and feedback.

Counterpoint. If the hiring manager gets squirrelly over details of the company's travel policy and procedures when the job requirements state 60% plus travel requirement; I would treat the pushback as a huge red flag***. Disclaimer, I would probably be very tactful and ask open ended questions rather than directed/leadinhg questions. For example: I would ask: what is your conmpany's process for booking air travel and what are the restrictions about booking air travel. I would not ask: do I get to book my own travel in business class.

*** Its a red flag because the squirrelly hiring manager has just disclosed that travel policy is an impediment to their direct reports employee engagement.

brendog

I might be lucky that my wife is understanding, or, more likely, she's used to me being gone 2-3 weeks a month, as we started dating when I was already travelling heavily. Unless I'm gone for 3 or more straight weeks in a row, she doesn't really complain. She's generally ready to murder me if I'm home for an entire week, as I get fidgety and bored after 2-3 days. Were I not married, I would have given up on having a home and traveled 24x7x365.

Insofar as travel being tiring or stressful, I don't see how. If you're used to it (I'm going on 15 years of fairly heavy travel), it is fairly de rigeur. The only time I get tired is when I go to the mothership and I have to sit in an office for 10 hours straight. Biz travel is, however, not glamorous for the vast majority of us. My recent travel has been to such lovely places as TOL, RFD, BNA (Actually good), SNA, and DEN. Between Happy Cow, Yelp, and a couple of brewery/brew pub/beer finder apps, I get by.

YMMV, however, and you might prefer to rot away in a cube/office with mind-numbing commutes twice a day.

ctbarron

One bit of advice that I haven't see so far. Find out what happens to your travel with promotions, latteral moves, etc. within the company. At some companies the answer is nothing, at others it may vary a lot.

pragakhan

As a hiring manager, isn't your travel policy just that, policy? Wouldn't it be simple enough to hand over the policy in written form?

We have a employee manual and we have an employee travel manual that details everything I stated.

Just curious, it seems strange to be weird'ed out by someone asking about the travel policy when that is a huge aspect of their job.

Who would want to walk into a job and not know ahead of time, "Surprise! Our TM doesn't travel ever, so you'll be flying 2 different airlines with 5 connections to get 1500 miles"... Like that hasn't ever happened to anyone here

pittpanther

Wait until you have a formal offer, then query about the travel policy. Asking at that point shouldn't be considered problematic by the company.

Why bother going down that road until it's necessary? Worst case is you find out the travel policy is terrible, so you decline the offer.

LADesignGirl

I recently took a job that requires 75-80% travel during the month, and as others have said, it has it's perks and problems. One thing I wish I had known when I started is that often times I am at a location for 1 day - fly in PM, work the next day/night, fly out AM. It takes away a lot of the fun of going to great places if you never get the chance to see more than the hotel bar on your off time, not to mention traveling that much to many different places can get pretty lonely.

Another thing to find out is how different the time zones you will be in are from your work base. My coworkers are spread across the country and it often translates into phone calls and emails that urgently need response in the wee hours.

Griping about my situation aside, traveling for work can be a fantastic way to rack up miles and hotel nights. In the 2ish months I've been at my job, I made Gold with AA and have several K of miles with other airlines. Actually, that is what led me to FT in the first place

Glad you have the option between two jobs that fit your needs, and hope you enjoy your choice to the fullest!

AA_EXP09

I would still try and do what keeps her happy. After all, that's what you've already done most of the time, so if you do that 5 days, why not 6?
Then again, it's really difficult to work, keep yourself happy, and keep everyone else happy at the same time. (Especially given my hobby of online resell which I have to be in a certain place to get the items and ship them on time.)
I like traveling but when you go to the same major cities over and over again you will see one thing they have in common. Regardless, the miles are really useful as flying F really allows you to relax.

AA_EXP09

At times we want that to happen to us.
We have a choice of either booking travel ourselves or having the TM book it for us. Most pick the first option for the reason you stated.
Besides, that's a 2500 mile itinerary once including 500 mile minimums

pittpanther

Yes, this is a problem if you're flying to multiple cities during a single week. Your "work day" stretches from wake up time until arrival at the next hotel - easily a 14-16 hour day. If that's the type of travel you're doing, you will never have any time to experience anything positive about traveling to other cities.

rankourabu

sounds like your job will require a lot of flying. I dont know how much travel you'll actually do in the places you go to.

wmz

I just graduated from college and started a job as a consultant. I fly out Monday mornings and come back Thursday/Friday. I'm definitely enjoying it so far, and I don't think the travel really impacts my schedule that much. Monday mornings are awful, but aside from that, days are pretty normal. I find time to work out 3 times a week in the hotel gym. See if your company has a health/fitness expense policy. Getting meals expensed is also a huge plus. I have a girlfriend, but it's long distance right now, so it's actually beneficial for me to travel, since I can choose to visit her instead of flying back home on the weekends. You also rack up tons of points and miles. I'm raking in ~5500-6000 Starpoints/week right now because of the Better By the Night triple points.