Partner Article

The burden of face-to-face meetings

Traveling to meetings near and far: it’s a fate that faces many of us and can be especially unwelcome at this time of year, writes Robert Gorby, marketing director at Powwownow.

In the words of Chris Rea, the only place we really want to be driving to is home over Christmas. To those of us fuelling up or, worse still, packing an overnight bag for that last face to face meeting before the bank holiday, our latest research offers little comfort.

Following a study amongst management professionals who travel as part of their role, the average business person will spend up to three years of their working lifetime (or 45 years, as suggested by government statistics) in face to face meetings. That’s as well as the one week spent every year, on average, travelling to and from.

Many will be able to empathise with the 26% of respondents who continue to find that most of these meetings are a waste of their time, the 35% who feel under additional pressure following time away and the frustrated 15% who are forced to work out of hours to make up for lost time.

However, as well as the impact on business morale and efficiency, a company’s finance department also takes a significant hit when it comes to travel. Nearly one in ten of those polled spend just less than £5,000 a year on heading to face to face meetings and back, not even taking into account the cost of lost labour, sustenance, fuel etc. We’ve actually developed a Meeting Cost Calculator to help those that hold the purse strings determine exactly what they should budget.

To all those reluctant to hit the road or brace themselves for standing room only, here are a few ideas to help ensure you and your employees avoid unnecessary travel:

• It never hurts to put in one last call before setting off, or even booking tickets. Even the most reliable and amenable client or contact can forget a prior engagement – why not confirm your meeting to save yourself a wasted trip?
• Check with colleagues before finalising a meeting agenda. They may be able to foresee issues and make suggestions that can help you consolidate the contents of several meetings into just one.
• To help curb travel time and avoid average meeting costs of £394.80 (based on average salary, travel time and cost of travel from the respondents of our survey) conference calls should always be considered. Whether it’s voice or video, they can help free us up to pursue more important goals in the office. Also, it keeps evenings clear, leaving us to conclude that all-important Christmas shopping rather than play catch up.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Robert Gorby .