Road Warrior

Phil's English Lessons

English - December 15, 2007 21:41 - 2 minutes - 2.73 MB - ★★★★★ - 1 rating
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If you have not heard the English language idiom "road warrior" before let me explain. A road warrior is a person who travels extensively and usually this means business travel. I believe I met the definition of a road warrior in 2007. I made six trips to China; probably 16 or more trips to Raleigh, North Carolina; 2 trips to California; two trips to Atlanta; and one trip to Seattle.

This kind of working lifestyle is particularly common among marketing professionals that sell expensive products and services to major corporations, executives with oversight of many different geographic locations, or any many kinds of management or technology consultants.

Being a road warrior has its positive and negative aspects.

• On the positive side, just being one usually implies that your employer has a lot of trust in your abilities. This usually translates into more responsibility and higher compensation. Hotels, car rental companies, and airlines all treat you as their favorite customer. It is common to get a free upgrade to a better room, a nicer car, or a better seat. You often get to meet a lot of very intelligent and very interesting people. You often get to have long discussions with these people over dinner in the evening at nice restaurants. It is possible to grow your expertise, skills, and network of business contacts very quickly.
• On the negative side, it is a stressful lifestyle. The greater responsibility at work usually means greater scrutiny by your boss. If you commute by airline, you have to worry about flight delays and cancellations. Constantly changing time zones can play havoc with your sleeping schedule also. The worst thing of all is the separation from family and friends.

So if you are considering becoming a road warrior, go into it with you eyes open. It can be exciting, rewarding, and invigorating. You'll not be bored. It will also be lonely at times. Both you and your family need to be able to deal with the separation and stress.

What’s a KPI? What’s the difference between scalability and reliability? What is a C-Level executive? What’s the difference between price and cost? The answer to these questions and even more like them can be found on my premium English language podcast “Idioms of Business and Technology” where I talk about a lot more than idioms. Subscribe at http://premiumenglish.podbean.com/ . Just click on the “Subscribe to premium content now” link at the end of a post.