Traveling for work can be a fun way to change up the routine, but once you’ve done it enough times it can start to get rather boring. Well the truth is, it could be lonelier than boring, but it can lose its luster all the same. If you’re trying to find a way to enjoy your work trips again, here is how to beat boredom when traveling for work.
- Make sure to have some great podcasts to listen to on your phone. When you travel for work, you spend a lot of time at airport gates, on airplanes, in cars and waiting for cars to arrive. If you want to find a way to pass the time quickly, you should find a good podcast that you can listen to for hours. That way, you can always be listening, no matter what you’re doing. Plus, you can pause and pick back up whenever you like.
- Have a few fun things set in your itinerary to explore during your down time. Once you’ve scheduled all of your meetings, workshops, business lunches, etc., make sure to schedule some fun time. Find out what people do for fun in the city you’re visiting and carve out some time to experience those sites in between all of your work obligations. After all, just because you’re visiting that city for business, it doesn’t mean that you’re only allowed to engage in business related activities. So long as you get all of your work done, you can have fun and do whatever you want on your own time.
- Try to make a friend or two while you’re out there. If you’re staying in Dallas, you don’t just want to book a hotel in Dallas and spend all your time there alone. You want to be sure that you have some fun locals to meet and hang out with. Or you may want to reach out to somebody within your business to explore the city with. Just make sure that you don’t spend your entire trip feeling isolated and bored. Get out there and make friends.
- Do some research on the city that you’re visiting. Aside from finding out what the main tourist attractions are, you want to learn a little bit about the history of the city you’re visiting. Learn about the different neighborhoods, the architecture, the major industries that keep the city running, etc. When you know a bit about the places that you’re visiting, you can look at them in a completely different light. If you don’t, you will be passing by tons of historical monuments and markers with absolutely no clue as to their significance, and you won’t feel moved by any of it at all.
- Get all of your work done as quickly as possible. One of the main reasons why people feel bored when they’re traveling for work is because they don’t feel like doing work, and so they spend a lot of time in their hotel rooms working slowly and wishing they could be out exploring. This is possibly the worst way to spend your time when you have the opportunity to travel for work. So get your work done quickly and then get out there and have fun.