Good security practices for business trips

Traveling, especially abroad, inevitably takes people out of their familiar surroundings. Furthermore, when traveling for business purposes, the travelers themselves often have to deal with a busy schedule and the effects of jet lag, all in sometimes strange weather and in a foreign language. Given the pressures on companies to be efficient, business travel planning is too often rushed and business travel security is neglected or completely ignored. Only when an incident occurs does the importance of business travel safety become apparent and by then it is too late.

It is always better to prevent problems than to deal with them, and observing good business travel safety practices can provide peace of mind and allow entrepreneurs to focus on their main business tasks. This brings benefits to both employers and travelers themselves. Employers can demonstrate that they have exercised a duty of care towards their staff and be sure that they have taken reasonable steps to protect their business assets, human, physical and critical information. The individual business traveler can benefit from increased personal security, as well as ensuring the protection of their personal data by following simple good business security practices.

Good business travel security practices start with good planning, so the things you do before departure can have as much of an effect on the security implications for your trip as the things you do when you are there.

Depending on the nature of your trip, your available budget, and time constraints, it may be sensible to enlist the services of a business travel security consultant, but if for some reason this is not possible, there are a few things to do. can do. , prior to departure, to help ensure your safety and security.

Get as much information as possible about your destination, its laws, customs, and climate. This will allow you to travel without drawing too much attention. You should also obtain a specific threat assessment relevant to your destination to give you advance warning of the kinds of potential problems you may encounter. The depth of information required in the threat assessment will depend on the destination itself, clearly more details will be required if you visit one of the world’s terror hotspots, but the threat of crime is universal. The UK and US government provide free online advice for their citizens traveling abroad and local newspapers, often available online and in English, are also a good source of information on crime at the destination.

Before traveling, you should sanitize your laptop, mobile phone, and any other electronic devices you plan to carry, removing all personal details and critical business data. In a perfect world, you would leave your usual devices at home and take a clean device with you on the trip, but if that’s not possible, backing up critical data before you travel is essential, as is using a different password during trip. Also make sure that the virus and spyware protection of all the devices you use is up to date.

Good business travel security practices include carrying a copy of important documentation, such as a passport and driver’s license, before departure. Leave a copy at home and take another copy with you, but keeping it separate from the originals, this will be of great help in case of loss or theft.

Establish an emergency protocol, which will be enacted in the event of an incident, and write it down. This will give you a crucial procedure to follow when you find yourself in a stressful situation in an unfamiliar environment. You should know the emergency numbers for your destination, as well as the emergency contact numbers for your own organization.

Taking care of business travel safety properly it should give you peace of mind and allow you to properly focus on the purpose of your trip, taking care of business.