Business trips sound glamorous right up until you're 30 minutes into a delayed flight, clutching a half-warm airport coffee, and wondering if you packed any socks that match. Whether you’re off to Paris for a pitch, New York for a networking event, or just popping two cities over for a suspiciously early breakfast meeting, the goal is the same: survive the travel, get stuff done, and maybe even enjoy yourself (just a little).
But between missed connections, suitcase roulette, and hotel breakfast buffets that blur the line between “continental” and “questionable,” it helps to go in prepared. Here’s your practical, honest guide to owning your next business trip like the smooth professional you pretend to be on LinkedIn.
1. Travel Light. Then Lighter. Then Regret Nothing
If you think you need five outfit changes for a two-day trip, take a deep breath and step away from the packing cube. One carry-on is your best friend. It saves time, luggage fees, and the soul-crushing experience of waiting at baggage claim next to a conveyor belt of disappointment.
Pick versatile pieces. One blazer, two shirts, one pair of shoes that won’t murder your feet. You’re going to a business meeting, not auditioning for a fashion show or filming a travel vlog. And yes, you can wear the same trousers twice. That’s not a crime. That’s efficiency.
2. Charge Everything Like You’re Expecting a Power Outage
The moment you forget to charge your phone, laptop, or noise-cancelling headphones is the moment the travel gods will decide to punish you. Planes get delayed. Trains stall. Hotel rooms have one poorly placed outlet. Be prepared.
Carry a portable charger. Carry two. Make sure all your devices are at 100 percent before you leave your house, hotel, or weird coworking space you found on Google Maps. Bonus tip: airplane mode is not just for flights. It saves battery and protects your sanity when you’re too jetlagged to reply to yet another Slack message.
3. Learn the Art of Strategic Airport Dining
No, you don’t need to survive on overpriced bags of trail mix and stale croissants. But you also don’t want to eat something so risky it leaves you running for the bathroom five minutes before your big pitch.
Stick to simple, familiar foods. Hydrate like a plant in summer. And maybe skip the third espresso unless you want to show up to your meeting vibrating like a tuning fork.
4. Store Your Luggage, Not Your Anxiety
Ever tried sightseeing with a suitcase in tow? Not recommended. Whether you’ve checked out of your hotel or arrived hours before check-in, dragging your bags through the Louvre or along cobbled streets is a special kind of torture.
If you're in France, or most cities around the world, in fact, services like Radical Storage Paris let you stash your bags safely while you enjoy the city like a functional human being. Use it. Your shoulders will thank you. So will your mood. Nothing ruins a business trip faster than sweat, blisters, and the feeling that your wheeled bag is plotting against you.
5. Become One with the Hotel Iron
Wrinkled clothes say, “I’ve given up.” Even the best-laid travel wardrobes suffer when crammed into overhead compartments and trampled by turbulence. Learn to use that weird hotel iron. Or better yet, pack wrinkle-release spray and pretend you’re above the struggle.
You only need to look presentable for a few hours. Get the collar crisp, flatten the front, and ignore the back. If someone is staring at the back of your shirt that hard, they’re probably not listening to your presentation anyway.
6. Know the Wi-Fi Situation Before Panic Sets In
Hotel Wi-Fi can be either a miracle or a menace. One minute you're uploading a crucial file, the next you’re in a buffering spiral that makes dial-up look fast. Always have a backup. Tether to your phone, use offline apps, and download any documents you might need before you even step into the hotel lift.
And for the love of all that is functional, don’t rely on public café networks to do your big presentation upload. That’s not “edgy digital nomad energy,” that’s asking for a meltdown in front of strangers.
7. Schedule Some You Time (Even If It’s Just Sitting Quietly in a Park)
Business trips are often more exhausting than they look. You’re “on” all the time, smiling through time zones and schmoozing over stale coffee. Schedule 30 minutes to do absolutely nothing. No emails, no calls, no networking. Just sit, breathe, and enjoy the fact that no one is asking you where the printer toner is.
If you're in a city like Paris, this is the perfect time to sneak in a moment of actual enjoyment. Park bench, pastry, phone on silent. Revolutionary.
8. Prepare for Small Talk Like a Pro
Small talk is inevitable. Airport lounges, networking mixers, awkward elevator rides with the keynote speaker. Be ready with a few conversation openers that aren’t about the weather. Ask about food spots, share travel tips, or gently moan about the universally hated hotel pillows.
Avoid politics, deeply personal questions, and anything that starts with “not to be rude, but…” Just be pleasant, not weird. That’s the golden rule.
9. Don’t Over-Schedule Yourself into Misery
The temptation to cram every minute with meetings is strong. You’re there to get results, after all. But squeezing in ten back-to-back appointments with no margin for traffic, confusion, or mental fatigue is a fast track to burnout.
Give yourself buffer time. Accept that you’re human and that things will occasionally go sideways. Build breathing room into your calendar so you’re not sprinting across the city in full business attire, swearing under your breath.
10. End on a High (or at Least a Decent Meal)
Wrap up your trip with something nice. A proper dinner. A stroll through a new part of town. A final meeting that feels more like a chat than a checklist. You’ve done the work, survived the transit, and hopefully impressed someone important. Now give yourself a soft landing before diving back into the chaos of everyday work life.
And yes, you’re allowed to expense that last-minute croissant. You earned it.
When jet lag meets PowerPoint, you can make it through, business trips, as you can see, really don’t have to break you!
