What Workers Say They Do On Business Trips

Bosses may not be too happy if they knew what workers were really doing when they travel for business. A new study found that 94 percent of Americans said they misbehaved during business travel.

Overall, 71 percent of workers said they felt people drank too much when traveling for business. Other bad behaviors were a bit worse, however. Sixty-six percent of workers said they cheated on a spouse while traveling and 54 percent said they spent too much money while away. Workers also said they did not stick to their exercise regimes, went to bed late and took illicit drugs while away for business travel.

"We have found that business travel can bring out the worst in us," said Denise Persson, chief marketing officer of virtual communications platform ON24, which conducted the research. "But it’s these travel nightmares that make some of the best comedy. Our research demonstrates that our work and the resulting business travel put too much pressure on ourselves and our families."

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That added pressure is being felt by a majority of Americans. Eighty-five percent of respondents said they felt work infringed on their personal time. The top cause of this stress is the long hours workers feel they must work. Workers also blame employers for demanding more of them in a bad economy and the accessibility of technologies that allows workers to work from anywhere for infringing on their personal time.

In addition to cutting into personal time, 91 percent of workers also said that too much work has other consequences. In particular, 75 percent of workers said they had increased stress resulting from too much work, while 70 percent said too much work resulted in a failed marriage. Workers also reported that too much time away from work resulted in health problems, rebellious children and an increased probability of an affair.

Even though work presented challenges to home life, one-third of workers said they would not be willing to do anything more to add an extra year to their life. Among the workers willing to give up something for an extra year, 22 percent said they would give up shaving forever. The research found that an additional 22 percent also said they would quit their job while 18 percent said they would give up television forever. Other workers said they would give up a winning lottery ticket or their pets for one more year.

The research was based on the responses of more than 2,000 people. The research was conducted by Harris Interactive for ON24.

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