Corporate India often equates travel frugality with wisdom, forcing CXOs onto grueling long-haul flights when well-structured first-class allowances could yield far better business outcomes.
Kenichi Ohmae, management thinker and author of The Mind of the Strategist and The Borderless World, once told me that McKinsey had changed its travel policy for him. While everyone else travelled in the same class as their client counterparts, Kenichi always flew first class. In my entire corporate career, neither an employer nor a client ever offered me that privilege. I suspect I am not alone. For most Indian CXOs, first class is a distant aspiration.
Corporate travel has its own caste system. Economy gets you to the meeting. Premium economy suggests HR has begun to take employee wellness seriously. Business class is available to senior executives, unless the promoters start showing the virtues of frugality. First class? That is where the travel policy goes into “maunavrata”. On an Emirates A380 journey from Bengaluru to New York via Dubai, I experienced the first class cabin I’d watched in countless videos.
My principal motivation was embarrassingly simple: I wanted to take a shower at 40,000 feet. The shower was extraordinary. So was the private suite, the bed, the dining, and the level of personal attention. The bigger revelation was the luxury of arriving after a long-haul flight totally refreshed, bathed, and detoxed. Business class gets you to a destination in reasonable comfort. First class makes you wonder why you ever thought arriving exhausted was an unavoidable part of doing business.
So here’s a question for corporate India: why do you spend crores recruiting, retaining, and rewarding senior executives, only to treat their long-haul travel as an opportunity to practise austerity? The conventional answer is that first class is extravagant. To be fair, it often is in carriers like Emirates. A ticket that can cost several times the business class fare isn’t easily defended by the words leadership productivity.
A private suite and a five-minute shower are unlikely to transform a mediocre strategy into a market-winning one. But neither is the cheapest possible travel policy the smartest. If a company expects a CEO to negotiate a multimillion-dollar deal after an 18-hour journey, is a `12-lakh first class ticket a big deal? First class cannot claim a productivity dividend. But where privacy, recovery, service, and schedule flexibility offer additional value, companies should at least be willing to examine the case.
Companies reward top executives with performance bonuses, stock options, club memberships, and other benefits. Why should a defined first class allowance be considered outrageous, provided it is transparent, proportionate, and approved? Exceptional responsibility need not always be accompanied by an exceptionally uncomfortable seat. On a more serious note, India Inc should consider a few practical changes.
Let the executive pay the difference—make it transparent and official; buy when the price gap is small (a policy could allow an upgrade when the additional cost falls below a predetermined amount or percentage of the business class fare); create a long-haul exception—permit first class on journeys above a specific duration, or before designated business-critical engagements; use miles and upgrade credits—where airline rules and corporate policy permit, executives can use personal loyalty benefits to upgrade a ticket; establish a premium-travel budget; negotiate with airlines (firms with substantial international travel volumes should ask airlines about corporate premium fares, upgrade arrangements, and route-specific deals); make it an approved executive benefit.
Boards or remuneration committees could incorporate a travel entitlement into the executive compensation framework, with appropriate review. Corporate India often confuses frugality with wisdom. It will lavish on leadership retreats, motivational speakers, and glossy transformation programmes, then debate if an executive can afford to arrive rested for a crucial meeting. I am not arguing that every CXO deserves first class.
If you expect your leaders to think beyond the next quarter, perhaps you need to change the travel policy beyond the cheapest available seat. Disclaimer: The views expressed are the author’s own and do not reflect the official policy or position of Financial Express.
