Are you reading this at home? Perhaps in the spare room/kitchen table/garden shed “office” that has been your improvised workspace for most of this year? Poleaxed by the pandemic, many of us have had to adjust to a strange new era of business travel – one abruptly shorn of getting on planes and going to offices and where the business day is now conducted almost entirely via electronic screens. The trend towards remote working has been rapidly accelerated (even Zoomed) by Covid-19, along with the dreamy thought that we might as well do this somewhere warm and uplifting – a lifestyle change that is now being encouraged by exotic destinations ranging from Anguilla to Georgia, inviting us to up laptops and “work from paradise”.
Doing so is worth considering, given that the technology exists to allow work from almost anywhere and that Covid-19 isn’t going away. As Professor Sir John Bell, a leading immunologist and Regius professor of medicine at the University of Oxford, has put it: “There’s going to be lots of this virus around for a long time, probably forever.”
At the same time, working remotely is going mainstream. Microsoft has said it will allow staff to do this permanently, even from another country if approved. Germany plans to make working from home a legal right, while the Welsh government wants to see “around 30 per cent of the workforce working remotely on a regular basis”. Pontypridd or Bora Bora? Now that is a question.
This story is from the November 2020 - January 2021 edition of Business Traveller UK.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the November 2020 - January 2021 edition of Business Traveller UK.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Four Seasons Hotel Los Angeles at Beverly Hills
A highlight is the rooftop pool, which is a tropical oasis for post-meeting R&R
The Peninsula London
The design is all about natural light, greenery and open-plan spaces
Raffles London at The OWO
A stay at Raffles London at The OWO is bucket-list worthy
Vietnam Airlines Boeing 787-9 business class HO CHI MINH CITY-LONDON
The bedding was nice - with pre-attached seat protector plus soft pillow and silky duvet
Royal Air Maroc Boeing 737-800 business class CASABLANCA-LONDON GATWICK
The service was great throughout the flight and the cabin crew were very friendly
Istanbul
Mosques, subterranean reservoirs and waterside attractions in the cosmopolitan Turkish city
Barking mad
Hoteliers worldwide are reaching for their dog bowls to meet the increasing demand of business travellers bringing their pets
BANGKOK RENAISSANCE
Whether it's extended metro lines, the huge number of new hotels or the parks springing up in the heart of the city, Thailand's capital is so much more than a stopover destination
GRAPE EXPECTATIONS
Discover the best wines available in the sky - and why you should avoid bold tannins inflight
RISKY BUSINESS
Business travellers need their wits about them more than ever these days with strategies in place should the worst happen