With millions of employees still Zooming into work, the home and office have merged nearly into one, but some jobs have cracked a window for escape: The work trip.
According to The Wall Street Journal, industry conferences have opened back up from the lockdown days, and while these junkets used to be an inconvenience to some workers back in the day, more employees are now eager to sign up — just to get away from it all.
The paper chatted with designer Meg Fogel, who left her Atlanta home recently to attend the NeoCon commercial interior design conference in Chicago. With her husband tending to her two children at home, Fogel noted, “It was blissful. I didn’t have anyone to be responsible for—or to answer to.”
She even got away to see Top Gun: Maverick while she was out of town and had a meal and a glass of wine at the theater.
Ms. Fogel isn’t alone.
Forty-four-year-old tech executive Andrew Bate upgraded his recent stay in Amsterdam for a travel and tech conference to a five-star stay at the Hyatt Regency complete with a suite with “canal views and a free-standing tub.”
“There’s something about a clean hotel room with no responsibilities,” said Bate, who was expecting his second child at the time.
Conference organizers got hip to this trend quickly and now offer amenities for guests, including spa discounts, and baked-in free time for guests to do their own thing. They “don’t want to sit in a ballroom and watch PowerPoint slides,” noted Diane Schwartz, chief executive with one such conference company, Chicago-based Ragan Communications.
Some working couples, the article notes, are taking turns taking off so neither party feels short-changed with mommy or daddy duty.