‘This business trip could have been a Zoom call’: Companies rethink travel

Boeing CEO David Calhoun has access to company aircraft as part of his job. Even so, he told an interviewer that he didn’t expect to fly nearly as much for internal company meetings after the pandemic.

Calhoun, like some of his peers, found that video calls were remarkably effective for checking in with colleagues, allowing him to pack in more meetings and schedule them with minimal advance notice, according to an account in “Leading at a Distance,” a recent book by James Citrin and Darleen DeRosa.

“I will do as much or more customer travel, because that’s still the most important way to build relationships,” Calhoun told the authors. “But most travel when leading big companies is visiting your own teams. I won’t be doing that nearly as much.”