Member-only story
An Airport Sojourn
Why we still travel for business
This week I have been travelling on business. “Where are you off to?” a client asked me the morning I was travelling. “Hmm, just visiting a couple of airports” came my flippant reply.
On Thursday at 12.30pm I arrived at the airport for my 1.30pm flight. 5 hours later I arrived at my destination airport. Due to the 3 hour time difference, it was a quick Uber ride to the airport hotel, a light snack and off to bed. On Friday morning, after what seemed like a very short sleep, it was back in an Uber and back to the airport for a 3 hour meeting in the airline business meeting rooms. Later that afternoon, it was a switch of airline terminals, a 2 hour flight delay and finally, the 5 hour journey back home, arriving at 7pm Friday evening. Yes, technically, I’d travelled to another city, but it had really been an 18 and a half hour airport sojourn.
My travel story is not uncommon. It is certainly a journey I have made many times before and I know many others do it often.
I can’t help but wonder why, in 2019, so many of us are still catching planes for short business trips every day. Wasn’t technology — in particular, the easy to access and operate video calling options available today — going to save us all from travelling so much? If so, then why did all the parties in my meeting this…
