Bill Gates has said that 50 per cent of business travel would go following the pandemic, but he would say that, wouldn't he? His company Microsoft has a very powerful alternative to business travel in teams, after all.
Yet many companies have used the virtual standstill of business travel due to Covid to take stock of what parts of business travel are essential. You could argue that many businesses have survived well enough without travelling at all.
Companies are now having to focus more closely on what types of business travel will be allowed to come back. Will training and internal meetings be forced to go virtual and is that a good thing? Are the days of day trips numbered?
The cost of a trip, whether that is in terms of pounds, planet or people, is going to be increasingly under scrutiny in the future and travel managers will need to educate bookers and travellers about just how their business travel fits into the organisation's overall strategy.
Join EY's Karen Hutchings, Nike's Daniel Tallos, Gray Dawes' David Bishop and Festive Road's Paul Tilstone with regular host Mark Frary to hear what the shape of future business travel will be.