BUSINESS TRAVEL
candidates who have watched the videos of those workshops and are enthused by our culture.” Mr Blondeau plans to rent a hotel for a month in the Canary
Islands and he will encourage the entire workforce to relocate and work remotely there during the European winter. “Younger workers’ attitudes toward work are different,” he says.
“They grew up with smartphones and have been used to multitasking from day one. We use Slack to communicate and have a different way of working – more fluid and immediate. “We never send emails to each other and we have free seating in
traditional hotel models, with Millennials opting for platforms such as Airbnb when they made holiday bookings.
IMPLICATIONS FOR GLOBAL MOBILITY MANAGERS According to a recent SAP Concur GBTA survey, 78% of companies said they ‘sometimes’ or ‘always’ allow bleisure travellers to book the leisure component of their trip through company channels. Howevere, it’s up to the discretion of the travel managers whether this is something that can be offered to staff. One issue that employees may not have considered is whether
they are covered by the company’s travel insurance while they are on a combined business and leisure trip. What happens when they stay on in a city after a conference or business meeting? Is their personal time covered by the company’s policy?
SAP Concur has the following recommendations for companies: • Make plans to communicate the details of the company policy sooner rather than later, since it’s likely travellers are already blending their business and leisure trips without direct knowledge of the policy terms.
• Do you know where your employees are? Clear traveller safety and duty of care policies become increasingly important during bleisure trips, so determine and clearly define what portion of employee trips will be covered by the company’s travel insurance.
• Who picks up the tab? Who pays for what – and how? It’s common for companies to cover all costs for the days their travellers are there for business, as well as the round-trip flight, while the employee foots the bill for anything associated with their personal time off.
• Expense reporting can get tricky if you don’t define where business ends and leisure begins, and establish clear processes to separate the two.
CASE STUDY: PROXYCLICK Fast-growing tech company Proxyclick needed to recruit and retain a team of Millennials. It decided to rethink the concept of ‘the office’ in order to appeal to this younger generation. “We are a tech company with a growing team of new-generation
workers who want fresh ways of working and look for autonomy, flexibility and recognition,” says founder and CEO Gregory Blondeau. “We don’t have borders in our organisation, we don’t talk in
terms of the UK or the European team, and we take a global approach to the market, with staff working across the UK, Europe, Asia and the US. “We went to Athens last November for a team workshopping session over five days. Now, when we are recruiting, we find
the office. I heard a few years ago about how a large accountancy firm had decided to block access to Facebook from the company website. It’s such a backward step – what image does that give to potential recruits about the kind of place they would be working in?”
CASE STUDY: HOLIDAYPIRATES HolidayPirates sells travel deals online. The company was formed in 2012 and has promoted itself mainly through social media platforms. As a young company, 90% of the workforce are Millennials, recruited for their knowledge of social media – one of the key ways the company promotes its deals. “Millennials demand flexibility and a lot of involvement in
decision-making,” says David Armstrong, CEO. “They look for flexibility over where they work. Wherever they have an Internet connection they can do their work. We let them work from anywhere in the world.” He says this is something that appeals to the Millennial desire
for autonomy and helps the company to recruit the brightest and the best talent from a global pool. “This flexibility – the chance to do your job from the beach if
you want to – is not available in every company, so new recruits are very attracted by it,” he adds. HolidayPirates is as open as possible to requests for remote
working – although with exceptions, as it can’t have someone working without a work permit in the US. Mr Armstrong acknowledges that some of the flexibility his UK team currently enjoy may change if Brexit goes ahead. “Until now, if a member of staff has citizenship or permanent
work status in EU countries, then they can travel to any of our offices and experience working there. They can also stay on at the end of a business trip at their own cost and the return flight is already paid for. We don’t have a strict policy on accommodation – many Millennials prefer to stay in Airbnb accommodation anyway. “We have 170 in our headquarters in Belgium, of which 100 are
expats from Europe, the UK and New Zealand, and half of the rest are Germans,” he says. “Last year, we recruited people from Brazil, India, Bangladesh, Russia and China. “When someone from outside the EU wants to join us, we help
them navigate through the visa process. It is vital to our business, because we don’t find enough talent within Berlin or the EU to satisfy our demands when we need data analysts and software developers.” The company uses LinkedIn to advertise and flies potential
candidates into Belgium for interviews. They had tried doing the interviews remotely by Skype, but realised that meeting people in person was very important. “It’s about a mindset and trust,” Mr Armstrong explains. “It’s about having task-based objectives. We don’t worry about where and when – it’s about getting the job done well.”
RELOCATEGLOBAL.COM | 19
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52
