6 June, 2017

“Bleisure”: Buzzword or secret to employee retention?

Rearview shot of a businessman looking through a hotel room window and talking on a cellphone

In this guest opinion piece, Craig Fichtelberg, President of AmTrav Corporate Travel, has shared his insider tips on how businesses can boost employee engagement through “bleisure” while still meeting business goals.

Weary and tired, you board the red-eye flight home after a long day of meetings. In an effort to save your company the cost of a hotel room, you opted to fly in and out the same day.

You were on the first flight out this morning and now you are on the red-eye back. Your flight arrives home at 5:00 in the morning and you are expected to be back in the office in just a few short hours. While your company may have saved a few dollars on your hotel room, it comes at a definite cost.

The traveler will be less productive the next day and probably less inclined to travel when the next opportunity arises. It doesn’t have to be this way.

Companies can be more creative and flexible with their employee travel in ways that can keep costs down and keep travelers motivated.

Travel is generally one of the top three expense line items on most P&Ls and there is good reason for that: Most of those trips are to prospect for new business or solidify existing business relationships and both of these are directly proportional to the company’s bottom line.

The company needs to do what it can to control costs to continue to justify the travel spending, but they also need to keep their road warriors eager and excited to travel. Companies often take a very narrow-minded approach to their company travel policy and focus much more on cost savings than the well-being of their regular travelers.

In taking this narrow-minded approach, companies lose sight of the value the road warriors drive to the business. These are the people on the front lines often pitching to a new company or solidifying a relationship with an existing company.

They are the face of the company and as their network expands, so does their value to the organization. These road warriors understand your product and services, they know your customers and prospects and the longer they are with your company, the harder it will be to replace them if they decide to leave.

So what can you do to keep travel costs down while preventing these road warriors from burning out?

Consider providing additional personal travel days that these travelers can use to extend certain trips for leisure. Generally, the most expensive part of the trip is the airfare, and the company has already paid for that.

So instead of the traveler racing back to the office, allow them to take advantage of the airfare that has already been paid to spend some additional time visiting the destination.

The traveler can also take advantage of corporate hotel rates when extending their trip. Now these arduous business trips can be looked at as a combination of work and play.

The biggest eye-opening impact to the traveler will be that their company is concerned with their health and well-being. The company recognizes that these business trips are more than just a line item on a P&L.

Behind that line item are key employees who are extremely important to the success of the business. The more enjoyable the employer can make these trips for the traveler, the longer they remain passionate and energized when traveling.

In the end, the company wins as retention and morale soar.

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Email the Travel Weekly team at traveldesk@travelweekly.com.au

amtrav corporate travel bleisure