I am considering a new job that will have me on the road a lot. Pretty much every work day will be gone. 3-5 days away with maybe 1-2, 3 at best off and at home. Pays good and it will be a new experience for the resume. Im lucky that I dont have kids, but I do live with my girlfriend of over 2.5 years, and I have a dog and parrot that I love to death and will miss all 3 like crazy. So how do you handle being away so much? If you have been doing it a while, do you regret it or enjoy it? Anything I should expect or do to help keep things good at home? Thanks a ton in advance!
I live in NC and Im sitting in a hotel room in Palm Springs California until this friday. Im married with two kids. Short answer is that it sucks but seems to be a necesarry evil in todays work world. My travel is fine since im elite marriott, elite airline etc. so travel in that regard is not too bad. However, I miss my wife and kids. Facetime makes it better then even 4 years ago. One plus is the money. The other plus is that when I am home I am really home. So while some in my office are cubicle drones putting in 5 days a week for 40Plus hours, I kinda come and go as I need to. Downside is juggling other commitment outside of family. You may wind up paying a lawn service for instance and get used to being tired on the weekends. All in all, if it furthers your career for the long term, do it now. If this is the right girl for the long haul discuss it first. If its not, she may split. Did I mention the money is good.
Yes I have talked to her a lot about it. Have been for a few months now, because I have been wanting a career move and every option pretty much leads to travel lol. Thank you for the advice...means a lot and was very helpful!
Little back ground for ya. I work out of state my schedule is 15/6 which is 15 days at work an 6 days home. I have been doing it for 4 years. It sucks I'll be honest. Like nchunter said face time is a great. I have a very supporting wife and two daughters who understand that I have to go to work to make the money (their money). An they all understand that this is what needs to be done. I'll say this also the more busy you are the faster the time goes by. Plus is. the money is good for ya an the more experience to show on your resume. Hope this helps ya. Good luck. Country_ Boy
I recently took a new job which requires me to be gone Monday-Friday. Been doing it for about 3 months now, It sucks a lot. Puts a lot on my GF shoulders. If our daughter was younger it would a pain, but she is old enough to be more dependent and help around the house and take care I the dog and what not. Hopefully it won't last much longer. Trying to find a house in between where both of us work. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
You might as well ride a bike afflic. Don't know How you can take stopping in between so many chaptera. That would irritate me
I traveled a lot for my old company. In 2012 I was out of town for 9 months of the year. I was married, but we did not have kids yet. It sucked, but I really enjoyed the extra money. But once my wife got pregnant, I knew that I could not do that anymore, and the company I with at the time had grown too large to really accept any of the smaller, local projects. They only wanted the big, multi million dollar projects, and there were not many of those locally, so everyone was traveling a lot. So I got a job with a smaller consulting firm that works mostly with the local businesses. My base pay is more here, but it still is a bit of a pay cut if I included all the travel bonuses from my old job, but I really enjoy being home with my wife and daughter every night. It's worth it to me.
I used to travel a lot more but these days I can do almost everything remotely via the web (google earth/GIS) and e-mail. Even meetings can be online now. I do travel a little bit but not much anymore. I would never travel a lot if I had kids. I also have seen a fair amount of marriages break up due to one of the spouses traveling a lot. It is hard on a relationship.
Thank you everyone for the advice. Yes I do worry how itll be on the relationship. I have seen it break up couples a lot as well. But I think (think) I have found a good one, and she seems very understanding. Pretty sure Im going to say yes if they offer me the position. Just waiting for background check so shouldnt be any issues there. Its scary, but I think Im ready for a change.
I travel a fair amount. I'm opening a new office on 5/1 in Irvine, CA as well so I'll be on the road even more then, the plan is to spend one week a month in that location and then the other three in this location in Chicagoland. I also of course have the usual travel to visit with customers, etc. On average I'd say I'm away between 5-10 nights a month. The travel gets old. I loved it a few years ago, but since my son was born I'd really much rather be home. It's not only a strain with family stuff, but it's also a strain on everything else because when you finally do get home you want to spend time with family and other houshold chores and extra curricular things fall by the wayside when you have been gone all week. Luckily for us this position allows us to keep my wife at home with our son otherwise I wouldn't want to be doing it. My wife is very tolerant of the work travel, but understandably tends to get less tolerant of extra curricular activities on the weekends when I've been gone a lot. While I'm happy and lucky to have the position I have today, there will be a day in a few years when we look to move back to NY and I certainly hope I won't have to travel as much.
I'm debating this road travel thing when I get out. Most likely I will be doing that for 2 to 3 years and yet again have my personal life suffer but once I get that time done I want to settle down. As much as I love traveling I do want to one day have a life of stability.
If we didn't have tools like WebEx or gotomeeting I would have to travel alot more for my job but luckily I can do most of it from my office. Travel seems to go in spurts for me. I may not travel at all for a couple months and then all of a sudden it seems like every other week I am flying out for a meeting or office visit.
I'm on the road approximately 15 weeks a year. It is usually only 3 or 4 nights of the week. I have 3 kids, so it does get a little stressful for my wife at times. I could travel more and make a lot more money, but I have to keep a balance point. I think I'm right at it!
Do it for the experience. It will pay off. I use to travel a lot for the company I worked for. I worked as an Engineer there for nearly 20 years. I live in NC and I would fly to Seattle, work for 10 days, come home for 4 and then go back. I did that for over a year. We didn't have Facebook, Skype back then. Just a lot of phone time. The experience and expertise I gained was well worth it. I own my own business now and I make 2.5 times what they were paying me.
