At this year’s Business Travel Show a panel moderated by BBT editor Paul revel discussed the importance of having a health and wellbeing programme in your travel policy.
The panel outlined the damage stress-related travel can have on a person’s health and can cause illnesses such as high cholesterol levels, IBS, muscle pains and deregulated sugar levels that can lead to type two diabetes.
So we have provided pointers to ease the stress and tension levels of your road warriors:
Communicate with disengaged travellers
Complaints about the travel experience are legion. Complaints about travel policy, however, appear to be few and far between. This means managers don't find out about the small gripes affecting travellers – communicate with the traveller, ask them what’s bothering them and don’t wait for the complaint to come to your door.
Same policies for every traveller
Problems can arise if you have different rules for different levels of seniority, particularly if you have several people travelling to a conference. If half the group is travelling in business class and the others have to fly economy, there’s bound to be a certain amount of upset. So by and large, you should have the same rules for everyone.
Examine the policy
Travel buyers agree that simply enforcing policy is not the answer: if travellers are complaining about specific aspects of the regime on a regular basis, they probably have a point.
Provide information
A recent study by the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA) among over 500 US business travellers revealed that their biggest headaches are brought on by weather-induced travel disruption, departure delays, aircraft ‘incidents’ such as mechanical problems, and missed onward connections.
So try and provide as much real-time information to your traveller to decrease those stress levels that have hit dangerous levels after a delayed early-morning flight.
Address safety concerns
A poll by the GBTA found 36 per cent have niggling doubts about their airline’s safety record, and 35 per cent have reservations about the safety of their ground transportation and more than one-third (34 per cent) have concerns about who they should call if problems arise – reduce those worries by addressing and checking if your travellers have any safety concerns.
What are your top tips? Tell us about them on our forum or LinkedIn group
Read an article on the importance of employee wellbeing