MaryLou Costa is a business writer covering the future of work, in particular changes that advance women's careers and gender equality in the workplace. Her work has been featured in 

, WorkLife, Secure Futures, Reasons to be Cheerful, Catalyst, 

, UNLEASH, and others. She was shortlisted for Best New Freelancer at the IPSE 2021 Freelancer Awards. She is an experienced panel moderator and has appeared on Times Radio, the BBC, and Sky News as an expert commentator. She publishes a newsletter, ‘Your Best Work Life’, on advancing women in the workplace.

Beta Lives

Experience Hunters

People are looking for a visceral reprieve from the permacrisis

Essential Escapism

The ‘workation’ has gained buzzword status as the solution for professionals captivated by the idea of logging on from their chosen envy-inducing location, be it the beach, mountainside or rooftop bar. But as the workation narrative has largely excluded working parents. A lack of childcare options from the first movers in the workation package market has typically meant that parents would have to share childcare or home-school their children, resulting in one or both of them scaling back on paid work to take on this responsibility. Yet as data shows, working parents are growing ever keener to reframe work-life balance, and create more fulfilling experiences for all family members. Some 41% of the 3,000 UK working parents surveyed in 2023 say they’re working more flexibly than in 2022. And 67% believe they can progress their careers and work flexibly, up from 56% last year. 

Bright Horizons

There’s also an increasing desire among parents to spend more time travelling with their children. Some 70% of the 756 ‘anywhere workers’ – people who work remotely while travelling from at least two locations, domestic or international, throughout the year – are parents who take their children with them. A priority for these anywhere workers, compared with those of child-free digital nomads, is for locations that provide education facilities or childcare. 

Lonely Planet

 Another survey in 2022, of 1,000 UK workers aged over 30 shows that 72% want to work abroad again, with 69% motivated by wanting to experience a different culture and country. However, 42% believe it’s too complicated to do, with 21% citing family commitments as holding them back from working abroad – indeed, 70% of those surveyed were parents. 

Small Business Prices

There’s rising demand for family travel packages incorporating work for the parents, education for the children, and culturally rich experiences for the whole family. A number of companies are serving this niche within a niche, recognising the pain point parents of school age children face yearly to find childcare for the summer holiday period. Portugal is the springboard for many of these programmes, as a range of nationalities can stay up to 90 days without a visa. The country’s specific Digital Nomad visa enables remote workers to stay for up to a year.

 has built several co-working and co-living spaces in Portugal that connect families with their preferred local childcare option, like au pairs, babysitters or nannies for stays of a week to 90 days. 

 has established partnerships with property rental platforms and Montessori schools to create family workation experiences in Porto, the Algarve, Lisbon, and Esmoriz lasting a month to a year. Even travel company 

 has gotten in on the act, launching workation packages in a number of hotels, including those with kids clubs.

A better work/life balance is one of the top reasons people are interested in making a career change, and it’s the number one reason people want to quit their job. 

FlexJobs

 The search for ‘remote jobs’ grew by 58% in May in 2023, compared with the same period last year, with HR, marketing, finance, IT, and accounting, all functions in the top ten searches for remote roles, according to data from digital marketing agency Enflow. 

Talented Ladies Club

It’s the reason California-based entrepreneur Nick Taranto took his family on a workation to Sintra, Portugal in 20223, with 

, which launched in Portugal and since expanded to Greece, Italy and Bali. It offers a combination of apartments, co-working space, and its own in-house school. Prior to this, Taranto, who runs non-alcoholic beer alternative Hop WTR and online education platform Ever Scouts, hadn’t taken more than a week’s vacation at a time, after co-founding his first startup in 2012, and since becoming a father of three. “I've always been in the midst of too many things to be totally unplugged,” he says. Getting anything from zero to a real thing takes a tremendous amount of focus, discipline, and hard work to fight the inertia of things falling apart.” 

Interview with Nick Taranto conducted by author

Yet the month he and his family spent connecting and enjoying Portuguese culture, as well as indulging in yoga, hiking, wine tasting, beach trips, castle tours, and surf lessons, was ‘transformational’. Taranto walked his two daughters and son from their apartment to school daily, along with the children of around 20 other families in the group, all staying nearby. They took weekly field trips to local gardens, water parks, and farms, and went out for ice cream in the afternoons. Taranto kept Californian hours and worked from 7pm until 1am. “To have a month to change your perspective on the world wasn’t a reality before, but to have had this different living experience, and still be working, has changed how we think about travel, family, work and life,” says Taranto. 

As fewer travel destinations remain hidden and undiscovered, more travellers want to live like a local to enrich their holiday experience, which is driving the workation boom. Indeed, 76% and 77% of UK and US travellers, respectively, want to take a vacation that supports local communities. Some 79% of Gen Z and Y respondents are keen to partake in a day in the life of locals in the destination they are visiting. 

American Express

That’s what drives Boundless Life’s co-founder Rekha Magon to travel the world with her family. Magon, her husband, and two children base themselves from Canada in the summer, and rotate the rest of the year across Boundless Life’s destinations in Italy, Greece, and Portugal. Boundless Life’s newest destination, Bali, will be their next port of call.

“We’ve been travelling with our kids since they were born. We left the traditional school system when our son was in grade one because we knew we wanted the world to be our children’s classroom,” says Magon.“My son has played in Portuguese, Greek, and Italian local football leagues and demonstrated that language is no barrier when it comes to the universal language of sport. Slow travelling has exposed our kids to real-world learning experiences that go beyond what can be found in textbooks. They’ve gained practical knowledge about geography, history, and cultural nuances, making education more tangible and memorable.” 

Interview with Rekha Magon conducted by author

 Slow travel has taught her that there is always something more to learn, Magon says. “Being able to do this with my family – in the company of bold families on the same quest to break free from the norm – has been an exceptional experience that has exceeded all my expectations.” 

As parents look to travel to teach their children more meaningful lessons outside of the classroom, the philosophy of ‘world schooling’ is growing in following, with the associated buzzword ‘

’ catching on too. World schooling, described as homeschooling, but in the context of travel, is difficult to chart in terms of popularity, but Yahoo! Lifestyle reports that there are around 260,000 posts on Instagram with the ‘

’ hashtag, while Facebook has a range of private groups for world schoolers, the biggest with 

Yahoo! Lifestyle

Travelling teacher and tutoring director at private tutoring firm Education Boutique, Lucy Alexandra Spencer has accompanied families on trips of up to eight months at a time across Europe, the US, and Dubai. She believes real-life learning is one of the biggest advantages for children who accompany their parents on workations. “A child that has been in a very structured school environment, then goes to university or into real life, and there’s no one giving them a grade or a pat on the back if they do something well,” she says. “Losing that positive reinforcement can be very challenging to academic students.” 

Interview with Lucy Alexandra Spencer conducted by author

Leaning into this sense that learning never stops and that travel can be incorporated into schooling are companies like 

, which calls itself “the world’s first company providing co-working retreats for families with culturally immersive programming for kids and teens”. Programs include a month in destinations across South America, where children aged three to 18 attend a summer camp while parents can work remotely from a dedicated space. 

 puts a twist on the traditional cruise experience by offering a world schooling curriculum for children both on board and on land.

According to gig work platform Fiverr, 80% of the 2,000 ‘anywhere workers’ it surveyed plan to live this lifestyle for up to five years – a trend employers must recognise in terms of employee flexibility clauses. 

Fiverr

 Lona Alia, head of revenue at digital nomad insurance company SafetyWing has taken her husband and two kids all over the world for the past four years, due to the company’s work from anywhere policy. “When my kids were born, I decided I was going to continue being a ‘work from anywhere’ kind of person, as I felt life in the US doesn’t make a lot of sense,” said Alia at an 

 last year for digital nomad families. She credits travel with boosting her creativity, and with helping her children develop a wider perspective from an early age. “I can choose where I want to work and change it when I get bored, which makes me feel fulfilled as I achieve my goals,” she said on 

. “This also helps me maintain my sense of individuality, which is easy to lose and essential to protect once you become a parent.”

In fact, 55% of companies believe ‘work from anywhere’ will be a core employee benefit over the next decade, with 80% of job seekers wanting to live where they want for lifestyle reasons rather than for work. 

Work From Anywhere

 Berlin-headquartered carbon-neutral search engine Ecosia lets its largely international workforce to work from anywhere for up to half the year, so its people can visit home countries and escape the winter. It also wants to encourage slow travel. Business expense platform Pleo allows people to work from anywhere indefinitely, and buy an extra 10 days’ annual leave as part of its flexible benefits program. As senior recruiter Luke Haynie, who took his first family workation last year and plans to take one yearly, puts it: “I’m of the mentality that you’re hired to do a job, not hired to live a lifestyle. So as long as you meet the KPIs of the job that are set forth, then I don’t really care where in the world you do it from.” 

Interview with Luke Haynie conducted by author

As more companies figure out how to join the dots required for a successful family workation, experts predict more shifts in this space to accommodate working parents. “In popular workation locations, I expect there will be an increase in local schools and daycares becoming more international and increasing the flexibility of their services, so they always have capacity left for incoming kids of ‘workationers’,” says Pieter Manden, co-founder and MD of business travel and workation management platform WorkFlex. “We can also expect to see initiatives that will help spread the costs of a ‘bring-along-nanny’ between families that are ‘workcationing’ together. It’s also highly likely that we will see local accommodation – maybe even through organisations such as AirBnB – more actively try to liaise between local daycares/nannies, and even market themselves as workation-friendly accommodation spots.” 

Interview with Pieter Manden conducted by author

of UK working parents report they are working more flexibly in 2023 than 2022

 of the ‘anywhere workers’ are parents who take their children with them on the road

 of US travellers want to take a vacation that supports local communities

A new type of family travel package that incorporates work for parents, education for children, and a culturally rich experience is growing in popularity

As fewer travel destinations remain hidden and undiscovered, more people want to live like a local to enrich their holiday experiences

As more parents look to travel to teach their children more meaningful lessons outside of the classroom, ‘world schooling’ is growing in following

Nick Taranto is the founder and chairman of non-alcoholic beer alternative Hop WTR and co-founder of online education platform Ever Scouts.

Lucy Alexandra Spencer is the founder and director of bespoke alternative tutoring company Education Boutique.

Rekha Magon is co-founder and education lead at family workation company Boundless Life.

Luke Haynie is the founder and president of the boutique recruitment company Qualified and Co.

Pieter Manden is co-founder and MD of business travel and workation management platform WorkFlex.

Global

United States

United Kingdom

Travel and Leisure

Hotels and holidays

Parenting

Work

Remote and flexible work conditions are steadily becoming the norm, but the emergence of ‘workation’ is about to reframe this arrangement even further. With working individuals desiring a more nomadic lifestyle for themselves and their families, how can brands tap into this shift?