Without question, corporate travel took a major hit due to the pandemic, but a new travel phenomenon arose from the ashes of the global COVID outbreak, which rather suddenly rendered remote working the de facto model for many office employees.
While company offices remained close and employees became accustomed to working from home, many people realized they weren’t tied to any particular location, provided that they could maintain a high-speed internet connection. Some folks took the opportunity to move across the country, while others pulled up roots entirely and started living out of a suitcase as “digital nomads”, going wherever the wind blows them.
But, plenty of employees found a happy medium somewhere in between nonstop traveling and staying put all the time. Some of the buzz words that have emerged over the last few years to describe it include “bleisure” travel, “hush trips” and “workcations”.
Whatever you call it, the trend toward travelers integrating work into their leisure vacations, phoning (or, rather, Zooming) it in from destinations abroad, continues to grow, as remote or hybrid working arrangements solidify into a permanent norm.
The blending of work and vacation enables employees to take longer trips, since there’s no longer a need to rush back to their desks, which also makes traveling to farther-flung destinations more feasible. Since they’re not having to use their paid vacation days all in one go, remote employees are also finding they’re able to travel more frequently, as long as they can balance their workloads from abroad.
How common is combining work with leisure trips and vacations?
IWG, the world’s largest provider of flexible and hybrid working solutions, recently released some key data points that emerged from its research into the “workcation” trend, including:
- The majority (88 percent) of hybrid workers surveyed reported that they “worked from anywhere” in 2022.
- Almost three in five (57 percent) of respondents reported that they were ablet o extend their vacations last year by working from abroad.
- Over two-thirds (67 percent) of the workers surveyed believe they can effectively perform their jobs from abroad.
- 71 percent of respondents said they would only consider a job that offers the flexibility to work remotely, at least part of the time.?
- Over three-quarters (76 percent) of study participants said that “work-life balance” was the top benefit of being able to work from anywhere.?
- The ability to spend more time with friends and family abroad (52 percent), save money by traveling during off-peak times (47 percent), and enjoy longer holidays (30 percent) were some other key advantages cited by respondents.
“For an increasing number of workers, hybrid working offers the opportunity to work wherever we will be the most productive. And thanks to cloud technology, that can be anywhere in the world, provided there’s a high-quality internet connection available, said IWG Founder and CEO Mark Dixon.“So, it’s no wonder that more and more individuals are embracing the idea of combining work with travel, whether it’s for a few days tacked on to the end of a vacation, or a few months as a digital nomad.”
He also added, “This trend is set to accelerate further, and we will continue to see more and more companies embracing WFA policies to improve employees’ work-life balance and increase their attractiveness as an employer.”
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What are the world’s best cities for a workcation?
IWG, which operates 3,500 flexible office locations in more than 120 countries, also undertook to identify the best cities around the globe in which to take a workcation, comparing 25 of the world’s leading destinations across nine key criteria. They were evaluated for suitability according to the quality of their climate, culture, accommodations, transport, food and drink, happiness, broadband speed and the availability of flexible workspace.
Cities were scored on a ten-point scale in each of these nine categories, for a possible total of 90 points overall. Of the top ten cities, several wound up tied in terms of ranking. Only one is located in the U.S. and the results may surprise you.
Here are the top 10, along with their overall scores:
Barcelona: 58.5
Toronto: 58.5
Beijing: 57.5
Milan: 57
New York: 56.5
Rio de Janeiro: 55
Amsterdam: 55
Paris: 55
Jakarta: 55
Lisbon: 54.5
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