Companies ask people to travel in order to do business that is best done face to face; either directly or indirectly, business travel contributes to the bottom line. So when should an employee be able to decline a trip and when should an organisation deem a destination too risky?
Rather than say no, experiential marketing company Imagination looks at ways to enable the trip to safely take place: “We are primarily concerned about people’s wellbeing but do not necessarily say ‘no’ to something as a default setting towards risk,” says Nicola Mahon. “Where some companies might have said, we are not going there, Imagination asks, what do we need to put in place? Whom can we partner with and how can we make this work? rather than just not go. We think creatively about what we are being asked to do and do it in a safe way. Our core business is design and communication; we are being paid for our creativity.”
“I don’t think people should be prevented from going somewhere on business because laws of that country aren’t inclusive,” says Caroline Paige. “They need to be briefed. In the military, if we went to a country where they were hostile to us or there was a security risk to personnel and to material, we would get a brief on that country and take it from there.” But it is not possible to cover all corners: “Say, this is what we know and then direct people to the websites of LGBTQ+ communities, which give advice to their own people on safety, security and good/bad places to go; there are some very good international ones,” she says.
Paige has encountered hostility in some surprising places and although she has never been attacked physically, she has often been subject to verbal attacks. “My top advice is to walk away to somewhere public and safe,” she says. And on whether to report it: “It depends on the country you are visiting and their tolerance of that kind of behaviour towards women or the LGBTQ+ community for instance. It would depend then on how much trust you had in the police force, the laws of that country and the medical services, as to what you did.”