We live in an era where we can connect with consumers, clients, and business partners who live thousands of miles away. Nonetheless, this doesn’t mean that face-to-face meetings aren’t still valuable, which is why for your business you may have to hop on a flight to another country overseas to meet with people for business purposes. Here are three tips you should apply the next time you embark on an overseas business trip:
Tip #1 - Research About The Native Culture and Customs
Before you leave to any country, you should at least invest a little of your time into learning about the culture and the customs of that country. There are a wide number of ways you can do this: you can watch YouTube videos, read articles and books, talk to colleagues or relatives or friends who visited the country before, and even attend cross cultural training seminars as well. Specifically, you want to focus on the native customs and cultural norms that relate to business. For example, is it considered rude to arrive even just a minute or two late? Do business meet-ups tend to be formal or informal? Is it considered polite to bring a small gift? Should you engage in small talk before the meeting begins? Those are the kinds of questions what you would need answered.
Tip #2 - Have A Means To Pay For Thing
Traveling to any foreign country means that you will need to have a plan on how to pay for things, and again, there are a wide variety of ways to do so. The first method would be to use a credit card that can be used in a foreign country, and hopefully one that will charge little to know fees for each transaction. Another method would be to use a remittance service where you can send yourself money. Remitly notes that you can easily do this on an app, where after signing up, you simply select the currency to convert your money into and then select a recipient (which can be yourself.
Tip #3 - Try To Become Conversational In The Native Language
You don’t have to become fluent in the native language of the country you’re traveling by any means, but you should at least strive to become conversational by learning basic words and phrases. This can be a great way to pass the time on your flight over. When you meet with people in the upcoming business meeting(s), they’ll at least appreciate the effort of you attempting to learn the basics of the language.
Embarking On An Overseas Business Travel Trip
In many ways, traveling overseas for business purposes isn’t all that different from travel overseas for vacation or leisure. Still, you will want to put extra effort into things like becoming conversational in the native tongue and learning about the local culture, as doing so will make you seem much more professional and prepared.
