Workation with Purpose – that’s what I call these seven weeks in Australia. Because it isn’t a holiday, even though many people wished us exactly that.
The only real holiday was the one week on Hamilton Island, right in the middle of the Great Barrier Reef. Or the short trip to Brisbane to visit Bluey World together with grandchildren.
The true core of this journey lies elsewhere: closeness to family.
We live in Sydney, right near our daughter. And our everyday life here includes the same kinds of things we know from Frankfurt: picking up the kids from kindergarten, the train ride to get there and an ice cream afterwards. Small rituals that feel like purpose.
At the same time, I continue working. And I genuinely enjoy it. I’m preparing my stand at the Newcomers Network in Frankfurt, a talk in Berlin, and my appearance at the book fair. I meet people who are shaping intercultural topics, and staff members of the German-Australian Chamber of Industry and Commerce at Sydney.
My work isn’t interrupted here. It’s relocated into a different resonance space.
And then there is Sydney itself. A city that makes leisure feel like vacation. Spectacular walking routes that begin right outside the front door. Today it was the Kirribilli Walk: skyline, Opera House, and Harbour Bridge in view. Iconic, almost surreal.
These weeks are, for me, the essence of workation: working in the rhythm of life. And purpose emerges from the relationships with the people who matter to us, and with the places that shape us.
I’m not travelling away. I’m expanding my everyday life.
And now I’m curious: How would you connect work and life if you could choose freely?
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I am Bernd Scharbert, member of the German Australian Business Council (GABC) and regularly travelling between Frankfurt am Main and Sydney.
I am happy to support and advise you on intercultural leadership. And a look into my book Prepare for Landing: Leitlinien für interkulturelle Führung is always good for a piece of advice or a practical option. It is available in bookstores all across Germany and online from Verlag Barbara Budrich.
#Prepare4Landing #LeadershipInBalance #ExpatLife Budrich Inspirited
