We’re about to head out on a grand adventure! Two weeks in Southern California attending an event with friends and playing for my birthday (yep… Gemini here), which naturally makes me think about what preparations need to be put in place to take care of everything while we’re away.
I’ve been traveling a lot for the past 3 years (well… a lot for me, which means roughly every 6 weeks for a while there.) I know some of you reading are even more voracious road warriors with a trip virtually every week. It’s a lifestyle, and we all need to find the version that works for us.
No matter how frequently you travel, I’m sure you’ve had that experience of having a lovely trip whether for vacation or business and then getting back and feeling immediately overwhelmed by all the things you need to pick up again and respond to… emails, meetings, mail, and phone calls to return. We’ve all been there right? OK, so let me offer a few suggestions to make your post-travel recovery easier.
What to do before you leave
Block Out Post-travel Reintegration Time – The best gift you can give yourself is to block your schedule for extra time immediately after you return. If the trip is only a couple days, then a half day should be sufficient. If it’s over a week, then at least one full day after your return will be appropriate. Keep you schedule on that day completely free of scheduled meetings and commitments. That doesn’t mean that you won’t be working, but it does mean that you’ll be able to triage what’s happened while you were gone and prioritize what needs to happen next without jumping up every 30 minutes for another meeting. (It also gives you time to unpack and do a load or two of laundry.)
Set Your Away Messages for an Extra Day (or two) – It’s all about expectations, and similar to my suggestion above you can help manage expectations in your auto-responder messages. By saying that you will not be available for an extra day (or two) after your actual return you are give yourself some breathing space and setting some boundaries so others won’t inundate you within hours of your return. The important messages and actions will be rapidly clear, and it doesn’t mean that you won’t respond to them on that first day… this minor adjustment simply creates a bit of space to allow you to re-enter more gracefully and prioritize everything appropriately.
Designate Your Alternates – You probably have a variety of projects on your plate, and your team members might be looking for guidance or feedback to ensure they can continue to move forward while you’re away. Pause for a few minutes before you head out on your trip and ask yourself if there’s someone else on the team that could stand in for you. Maybe you can grant them temporary decision-making power, or maybe they can just be a guide or resource to talk through options and handle emergencies. You’ll want to be very clear what level of authority you’re granting, but sometimes just taking this precaution will both allow you to let go of your work more fully while you’re away and ensure that the wheels stay on the bus even without your input!
What to do after you get back
Unpack and Get Personally Settled – I have found that if I don’t do this first, then almost assuredly I’m into my inbox and work and my suitcase languishes for days or longer. Unpack, get a load of laundry in, eat and sleep if that’s appropriate… then you can open your email.
Triage your actions into Horizons – It’s time to bring your Master List of tasks up to speed. Review your email, voicemail, and incoming mail and capture all the new tasks that have arrived into three categories: Today (ASAP), Soon (This week), Later… This is the critical time when it becomes so easy to get reactive rather than intentional. So, before you jump to doing everything, take 30 minutes to get a lay of the land and bring your systems up to speed.
Make updating your Master Task List the first priority, followed by triaging email and voicemail, and then paperwork. If you’ve left yourself adequate processing time by blocking your calendar as recommended above, then you should be able to get all your systems back up to normal within a few hours at most so that you can then start acting on the most important items. (Grab our eGuide to learn more about Starting Your Master List, if you don’t have one yet.)
Make sure you turn off/change your away messages – Once you’ve landed and triaged, now is the time to turn off your away messages for your phone and email. Don’t forget this step (which we all have done occasionally)… it’s just too funny (and a little embarrassing) when you get that friend who tells you that your voicemail still says you’re gone and it been days, weeks, or months since you got back.
Next steps
Do you have a trip coming up? Which of these tips are you going to use to make your post-travel recovery more manageable? Do you have pre or post travel tips that make coming back easier for you? I would love to have you share them in the comments below.
In the meantime… happy travels!
