Resuming Business Travel as the so-called Covid Pandemic Fizzles Out

Travel is like gun ownership in the USA

 Our CEO Stan convened a meeting of the senior management team this morning; on the agenda was the need to resume business travel. “We need to grease some palms, smooth out some rough edges and take a few of our clients to get drunk-otherwise I don’t see any way that we can convince anyone to purchase our new software, which, if you ask me, is as useless as tits on a bull”.

I texted Stan that some of the words he chooses are passe, but he ignored me. An HR lady who has been ignored better fix her antennas, or her goose is cooked. So I aligned myself and became less woke for the time being.

CEO Stan asked the team what are the major barriers facing renewed business travel; Stan asked me to write down the comments on the white board. When I was tasked with writing on the white-board, I was pretty sure than Stan was still taking revenge on the “bull issue”.

The list of difficulties was formidable: many borders are closed, plane schedules are erratic; some airports are closed; some hotels have closed down; daily covid tests are needed; some countries don’t recognize certain vaccines, buses and trains are petri dishes of infections and there is no health insurance for travellers. Comrade Carl told the story of a Bangalore based friend of his who went to the USA for a wedding and had to stay there for 9 months. Mister Herr Krebbs said that the cost of keeping a nerd abroad due to emergency regulation preventing travel “vud be enormous”.

I commented that “virtual travelling” is now in style, mentioning in passing that many Australians who  served in the Navy and speak French as well as  Greek have made this type of non-travel travel very popular. Stan told me that “Australia is so bloody remote that all that they think about is getting back to civilization”. Then Stan added, “Gloria, I want a travel policy out by tomorrow morning which encourages business travel”.

To say that I was shocked is incorrect. I am never shocked. Hoping to find an answer, I ran out to a bookstore to pickup the newest state-of-art HR cook book, “Organisationer I En Overgangstif-Handbog for Ledere”, which was written surprisingly in a foreign language. I was told that the English translation was forthcoming, as soon as business travel resumes.

Despondent but positive, I issued the following email:- “Business travel is akin to gun ownership or health care in the USA. It’s a private matter which needs to remain unregulated; nerds must align their travel needs with the interests of the client and the corporate. HR will set up a portal within 6 months to provide morale support. Shake a leg”.