Why do companies send employees on business trips? The reasons can be very different – to agree with a partner or investor, find new customers, attend an industry event, pay a visit to a branch of the company in another city, and so on.
We recently conducted a survey among customers of the ONEWTRIP For Business service and revealed the most common goals of employees’ business trips. After processing the results, we received the following picture:
Business meetings
Representatives of most companies, in response to the question of what goals are the goals of business trips, most often indicate meetings with clients, business partners or investors. A third of all respondents called business meetings the most common cause of business trip.
This is not surprising: quite often, the interaction between counterparties in business requires personal presence. For example, if we are talking about concluding an agreement on long -term cooperation, the parties will almost certainly want to meet “live” in order to better recognize each other. And after the conclusion of the contract, many issues are easier to resolve when meeting than remotely from video communication or in correspondence.
Conferences and forums
Participation in various industry events is another popular goal of business trips. This includes all kinds of forums, exhibitions, conferences and other events, one way or another related to the specific direction of the company.
At the same time, various tasks may be set for business employees: to present a company at the exhibition using a stand, find new customers or suppliers, make a report at the conference, conduct a master class or gain new knowledge.
Visiting branches or offices of the company
In large companies with many branches in the country (or even in different countries), there is often a need for actions or negotiations that require the personal presence of one or more employees from another branch.
For example, this may be a business trip to the employee from the head office of the company in order to teach new employees in the just opened branch. Or the director of the company attends all branches in turn to get a detailed picture of what is happening in the field.
Performing work at facilities or watch
The slightly less common reasons for the business trips of employees are participation in shift work or the implementation of certain work at facilities related to the activities of the company and/or its partners. About 16% of respondents indicated this reason for business trips as the most common in their organization.
As a rule, this type of business trips is often practiced in mining, energy, construction, service and other similar companies, the activities of which implies the presence of employees at infrastructure facilities or “in the fields”.
Other formats
This category included the formats of business trips, which are not found so often. For example, this may be a trip for the internship or undergoing training, delivery of documents or trademarks, which for some reason cannot be delivered by courier service, representing the interests of the company in court and other instances.
