Jobs with heavy travel
April 14, 2010 8:11 AM Subscribe
I want a career that requires a lot of travel. What are my options, and how do I position myself to get one of these jobs?
For many reasons, I'm intrigued by jobs that require heavy (40 weeks+) travel. I'm unfulfilled with my current career choice now (financial planning/analysis) and am looking to change. I figure that if I were going to take a job with lots of travel, now is the time - I'm in my 20s, single, already separated from family, etc. so the drawbacks in that sense are limited.
What industries should I look into, and is there anything that my finance background (in-house corporate fp&a, not wall street) would lend itself to? What are your experiences in this kind of work?
For many reasons, I'm intrigued by jobs that require heavy (40 weeks+) travel. I'm unfulfilled with my current career choice now (financial planning/analysis) and am looking to change. I figure that if I were going to take a job with lots of travel, now is the time - I'm in my 20s, single, already separated from family, etc. so the drawbacks in that sense are limited.
What industries should I look into, and is there anything that my finance background (in-house corporate fp&a, not wall street) would lend itself to? What are your experiences in this kind of work?
Maybe accounting working at deloitte i heard will get you lot of travel within the country.
Or something in Information systems at Deloitte.
Or become a purser i.e. an airhost on airlines, sure to give you plenty of travel.
posted by iNfo.Pump at 8:18 AM on April 14, 2010
Or something in Information systems at Deloitte.
Or become a purser i.e. an airhost on airlines, sure to give you plenty of travel.
posted by iNfo.Pump at 8:18 AM on April 14, 2010
Indeed, if you generally like the financial analysis aspect but don't like being stuck in one place I would suggest working as an auditor.
Training in financial systems might also be a good bet.
And on the word of caution note: Be careful what you wish for. I used to long for a job that had me traveling a lot. I got it. And I burn out. It's hard to make/maintain friendships, let alone a relationship. Yeah, at first it seems like a great gig but it can be lonely even when you enjoy being by yourself, as I do. Just something to think about.
posted by FlamingBore at 8:27 AM on April 14, 2010 [1 favorite]
Training in financial systems might also be a good bet.
And on the word of caution note: Be careful what you wish for. I used to long for a job that had me traveling a lot. I got it. And I burn out. It's hard to make/maintain friendships, let alone a relationship. Yeah, at first it seems like a great gig but it can be lonely even when you enjoy being by yourself, as I do. Just something to think about.
posted by FlamingBore at 8:27 AM on April 14, 2010 [1 favorite]
Sales and business development. Channel partner manager.
It will take some time to work up to this role.
Start out as an inside sales rep making cold calls. Choose a company that sells internationally. Make sure there are opportunities for advancement, or start planning for your next company asap.
posted by KokuRyu at 8:27 AM on April 14, 2010
It will take some time to work up to this role.
Start out as an inside sales rep making cold calls. Choose a company that sells internationally. Make sure there are opportunities for advancement, or start planning for your next company asap.
posted by KokuRyu at 8:27 AM on April 14, 2010
Corporate training.
posted by WeekendJen at 8:30 AM on April 14, 2010
posted by WeekendJen at 8:30 AM on April 14, 2010
Yeah, I was going to say sales as well.
I also know professional-services-type folks who travel 4-5 days per week - segment to segment until they return home on Friday. Dunno how they do it, but they do.
posted by jquinby at 8:31 AM on April 14, 2010
I also know professional-services-type folks who travel 4-5 days per week - segment to segment until they return home on Friday. Dunno how they do it, but they do.
posted by jquinby at 8:31 AM on April 14, 2010
The skillset of a solid FP&A analyst can be useful in other fields of management consulting besides finance. Even if you're doing operations work, lots of time half of the job is taking a huge set of screwed up data that a client doesn't understand and try to build a model to separate the good data and make predictions and recomendations based on it. I think if you're good at FP&A, you're more than likely to be good at that as well.
Aslo, all of the Big 4 have "risk advisory" or similarly named practices that are sort of midway between being audit and consulting in the services they provide - things like advice on internal controls and Sarbanes compliance. That might be a fit for your skills as well, though I think the job market for those positions is sort of contacting now that the huge bolus of initial SarbOx compliance work has been digested.
And yeah, be careful what you wish for.
posted by strangely stunted trees at 8:39 AM on April 14, 2010
Aslo, all of the Big 4 have "risk advisory" or similarly named practices that are sort of midway between being audit and consulting in the services they provide - things like advice on internal controls and Sarbanes compliance. That might be a fit for your skills as well, though I think the job market for those positions is sort of contacting now that the huge bolus of initial SarbOx compliance work has been digested.
And yeah, be careful what you wish for.
posted by strangely stunted trees at 8:39 AM on April 14, 2010
IBM has a huge consulting arm now - almost all of which is travel all the time. (The rest of them are stuck in Washington on government contracts.) I just did a search for Finance/Consultant/USA/Mobile and got 34 hits.
posted by ansate at 8:50 AM on April 14, 2010
posted by ansate at 8:50 AM on April 14, 2010
Consultancy, definitely.
Nthing being careful what you wish for*. When I started my job, almost every single one of my fellow recruits asked the question "is there much travel?" I look back on that question with a wry smile.
But it turns out that business travel is, with very limited exceptions, an exercise in spending a lot of time cursing your company for flying you coach, endless expenses claims you have to complete to get cash back you've basically loaned your company, and a succession of rather dull hotels. Often located in suburbs or near business parks some distance from the action.
In summary: there's travel - lots of moving around - and travel - spending quality time somewhere on assignment. Unless you have a peculiar fetish for catching glimpses of exciting cities from the back window of a cab, you want the latter.
To put this in context, my job now doesn't involve much travel. But so far this year it's involved 3 days locked in a 70s-built and styled hotel on the edge of an otherwise interesting South American city I never got to see; 4 days shuttling between hotel and office in South Asia with only an hour to myself each day; and my latest trip, a 5.25am train journey to go meet a client. In the past, I spent 6 months abroad running a team and loved it, getting to know a lot of nooks and crannies in the city where I was based.
* Not least because the moment a significant other appears somewhere you're not, international travel becomes a lot less appealing.
posted by MuffinMan at 8:57 AM on April 14, 2010
Nthing being careful what you wish for*. When I started my job, almost every single one of my fellow recruits asked the question "is there much travel?" I look back on that question with a wry smile.
But it turns out that business travel is, with very limited exceptions, an exercise in spending a lot of time cursing your company for flying you coach, endless expenses claims you have to complete to get cash back you've basically loaned your company, and a succession of rather dull hotels. Often located in suburbs or near business parks some distance from the action.
In summary: there's travel - lots of moving around - and travel - spending quality time somewhere on assignment. Unless you have a peculiar fetish for catching glimpses of exciting cities from the back window of a cab, you want the latter.
To put this in context, my job now doesn't involve much travel. But so far this year it's involved 3 days locked in a 70s-built and styled hotel on the edge of an otherwise interesting South American city I never got to see; 4 days shuttling between hotel and office in South Asia with only an hour to myself each day; and my latest trip, a 5.25am train journey to go meet a client. In the past, I spent 6 months abroad running a team and loved it, getting to know a lot of nooks and crannies in the city where I was based.
* Not least because the moment a significant other appears somewhere you're not, international travel becomes a lot less appealing.
posted by MuffinMan at 8:57 AM on April 14, 2010
And on the word of caution note: Be careful what you wish for. I used to long for a job that had me traveling a lot. I got it. And I burn out. It's hard to make/maintain friendships, let alone a relationship. Yeah, at first it seems like a great gig but it can be lonely even when you enjoy being by yourself, as I do. Just something to think about.
I cannot emphasize this enough. (Where's that blink tag?)
It doesn't really go with your skillset, but skilled touring stagehands travel as much as they can stand.
posted by mollymayhem at 9:18 AM on April 14, 2010
I cannot emphasize this enough. (Where's that blink tag?)
It doesn't really go with your skillset, but skilled touring stagehands travel as much as they can stand.
posted by mollymayhem at 9:18 AM on April 14, 2010
it turns out that business travel is, with very limited exceptions, an exercise in spending a lot of time cursing your company for flying you coach, endless expenses claims you have to complete to get cash back you've basically loaned your company, and a succession of rather dull hotels. Often located in suburbs or near business parks some distance from the action.
Yep. If you're a corporate air/road warrior, you'll likely be staying in perimeter hotels with other air/road warriors, with plenty of meetings in perimeter offices and venues, and your travel experience will be mediated through homogenised "non-places", like an touring commute without a home at the end of the day. That might suit you, but not if you want travel to have a broadening effect, as opposed to turning you into an expert on the platinum miles upgrade process.
There are finance jobs that would give you some actual travel, especially in the NGO/non-profit sector, but NGO work can be just as corporate in character (and in some ways, worse) than big finance.
posted by holgate at 10:35 AM on April 14, 2010
Yep. If you're a corporate air/road warrior, you'll likely be staying in perimeter hotels with other air/road warriors, with plenty of meetings in perimeter offices and venues, and your travel experience will be mediated through homogenised "non-places", like an touring commute without a home at the end of the day. That might suit you, but not if you want travel to have a broadening effect, as opposed to turning you into an expert on the platinum miles upgrade process.
There are finance jobs that would give you some actual travel, especially in the NGO/non-profit sector, but NGO work can be just as corporate in character (and in some ways, worse) than big finance.
posted by holgate at 10:35 AM on April 14, 2010
Business development in a large company - identifying and visiting targets, and performing diligence can involve travel to the targets and to industry trade shows and conferences. Followed by stints at the office to analyze and make the case for the acquisitions, which is heavily finance-weighted.
I had a tri-lingual friend (raised in the US) who used her Swiss citizenship to get a job as a flight attendant on Swiss Air for 3 years right out of college - she traveled the globe and occasionally had long enough layovers to see parts of it. Having gone into it for just that reason, she didn't mind the dull parts.
Being a guide for a tour company with some opportunity to change locations could be fun for a while too.
posted by Sukey Says at 10:40 AM on April 14, 2010
I had a tri-lingual friend (raised in the US) who used her Swiss citizenship to get a job as a flight attendant on Swiss Air for 3 years right out of college - she traveled the globe and occasionally had long enough layovers to see parts of it. Having gone into it for just that reason, she didn't mind the dull parts.
Being a guide for a tour company with some opportunity to change locations could be fun for a while too.
posted by Sukey Says at 10:40 AM on April 14, 2010
A friend-of-a-friend is a flight attendant for very wealthy people on their private planes. She has to be on-call all the time, ready to get to the airport within some ridiculously short amount of time (an hour, maybe). She gets a call telling her the plane is going; she immediately gets caterers to prepare food, which she brings to the plane. While flying she does all the usual flight attendant things. Once they reach their destination, which could be anywhere in the world, she stays there as long as the clients do and acts as their concierge. She needs to know restaurants, hotels, stores, all that stuff, for anywhere she might end up.
She makes huge amounts of money, I've been told, and travels around the world.
posted by The corpse in the library at 11:12 AM on April 14, 2010 [1 favorite]
She makes huge amounts of money, I've been told, and travels around the world.
posted by The corpse in the library at 11:12 AM on April 14, 2010 [1 favorite]
Probably not at all what you're looking for, but I worked as an Oceanographic Technician for about a year. Hardly as glamorous or intellectual as it sounds, I would drive around the southeast, from North Carolina to Key West To Louisiana, servicing tide gauges for NOAA. The job had me traveling three weeks out of every month, and I really enjoyed the travel at first. I got to be outside most of the time, near the water, and I had to scuba dive and operate boats to get my work done. I also had to learn about land surveying and solar cells, so it was marginally mentally stimulating, but for the most part it was a by-the-numbers job (though those numbers were frequently interspersed with various problems and hang-ups). It was dirty, muscular work most of the time, but I truly enjoyed being outside and having the opportunity to see so much of the country*.
However, Being so distant from friends and family, it was much, much harder to maintain relationships that I had anticipated. Good friends were still good friends, but I'd see them doing things with people who were always in town, and slowly felt my orbit in the social sphere grow more elliptical. At one point people just stopped inviting me to things because they assumed I wouldn't be around, which sucked.
My girl is an amazing person, and all the time apart actually helped us appreciate our time together even more, but I don't know what I would have done if she and I hadn't already been an item before I started traveling. I imagine it would be extremely difficult to engage in romantic entanglements beyond the one-night-stand variety for a single person traveling as much as I did.
So, once again, be careful what you wish for, and good luck in any case.
*Especially rural Louisiana. Best food I've ever had, anywhere.
posted by Pecinpah at 12:05 PM on April 14, 2010
However, Being so distant from friends and family, it was much, much harder to maintain relationships that I had anticipated. Good friends were still good friends, but I'd see them doing things with people who were always in town, and slowly felt my orbit in the social sphere grow more elliptical. At one point people just stopped inviting me to things because they assumed I wouldn't be around, which sucked.
My girl is an amazing person, and all the time apart actually helped us appreciate our time together even more, but I don't know what I would have done if she and I hadn't already been an item before I started traveling. I imagine it would be extremely difficult to engage in romantic entanglements beyond the one-night-stand variety for a single person traveling as much as I did.
So, once again, be careful what you wish for, and good luck in any case.
*Especially rural Louisiana. Best food I've ever had, anywhere.
posted by Pecinpah at 12:05 PM on April 14, 2010
I have a friend who graduated with a degree in (sports) Journalism who was the sports editor of the student newspaper for like 2 years. He ended up getting a job traveling around to various newspaper companies to install and train people in using specialty software. The place ended up going out of business. He took a side-job for awhile but now he's just about to start doing a similar job except with police software instead of newspaper software.
If this sounds interesting to you MeMail me and I'll ask my friend for more information on what he thinks you'd need to do to get that kind of job.
posted by Green With You at 12:19 PM on April 14, 2010
If this sounds interesting to you MeMail me and I'll ask my friend for more information on what he thinks you'd need to do to get that kind of job.
posted by Green With You at 12:19 PM on April 14, 2010
At big universities which attract a lot of international students, you will often have people in the major gift fundraising department who are considered "road warriors" - who are out travelling around the world meeting with alumni for weeks at a time (the standard can be as little as 30% of the time away to as much as 60%-75%).
posted by elkerette at 1:05 PM on April 14, 2010
posted by elkerette at 1:05 PM on April 14, 2010
I'm a strategy consultant, and spent 49 weeks on the road in 2009. I'll also echo all the warnings above about getting what you wish for...
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 1:16 PM on April 14, 2010
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 1:16 PM on April 14, 2010
Print production aka print buyer. You source and quote printing jobs for a company (usually with in-house designers) or agency, then travel around the country and world to go on press checks. The Wikipedia article I linked to mentions that electronic media are changing the print buyer's role, but print will never go away as long as there's packaging. A lot of companies have trouble hiring for this position because it's tough to find people who want to spend much of their time traveling.
posted by TochterAusElysium at 4:39 PM on April 14, 2010
posted by TochterAusElysium at 4:39 PM on April 14, 2010
Oh, should have read more closely: this wouldn't really be related to your finance background, but there are plenty of programs to learn about print production quickly.
posted by TochterAusElysium at 4:41 PM on April 14, 2010
posted by TochterAusElysium at 4:41 PM on April 14, 2010
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posted by xingcat at 8:16 AM on April 14, 2010