If you’ve ever dreamed your office could be the entire world, look no further than a career in the travel industry. The travel industry and various related fields offer a great variety of exciting and rewarding positions that will allow you to constantly be on the move exploring exotic cultures and accumulating valuable experiences in addition to a paycheck.

Whether you’re a tour guide taking tourists through historic cities or embarking on a nature trek in search of wildlife, taking to the skies as a flight attendant, or even teaching English to students around the world from the comfort of your laptop, there are plenty of careers that will allow you to see the world.

Let us look at some of the most common careers that will allow you to travel the world, as well as a few options you may not have considered. Thanks to technology and a worldwide tourism industry that seems to only grow every year, no longer do you need to decide between earning an income and seeing the world.  

7 Travel-Related Jobs You Have to Consider

Travel Agent

Photo By Platform London via Flickr CC BY 2.0

One of the most classic travel industry jobs is working as a travel agent. Travel agents play a vital role in planning and organising holidays for both individuals and groups of travellers, assisting with booking flights, hotels, car hire, and tours.

They basically handle all the logistics of booking a trip and can provide helpful information about what visas you’ll need, passport info, travel insurance options, and vaccination requirements. If you are already a knowledgeable traveller having visited countless countries around the world, being a travel agent will allow you to share your expertise with others which will allow you to relive all those special moments and help others to experience the same.

But filling your day simply talking about travel isn’t the only perk of being a travel agent. Many travel agents often receive discounted travel rates and opportunities to travel frequently themselves. Such discounts are often offered by travel companies as incentives for agents to experience their products and services first-hand in the hopes they will then book a large number of clients.

Travel agencies and tourism boards often organize so-called FAM or familiarization trips for travel agents, which are designed to assist agents learning more about destinations so they can better recommend them to their clients.

Travel agents also regularly receive complimentary travel upgrades such as nicer hotel rooms and upgraded flights, access to exclusive events, and other industry perks. Of course, the extent of travel opportunities and discounts will vary with each agency and your personal level of expertise when it comes to travel knowledge and experience.  

To ensure you get the most travel opportunities out of being a travel agent, do your research in selecting a travel agency to work for and the get help creating a professional-looking free cover letter template to ensure your curriculum vitae or résumé stands out from the crowd.

Tour Guide

While making a career as a tour guide is a perfect option for people who love to travel, they aren’t always the easiest to get. Working as a tour guide with a notable company who pays a decent salary often requires you to either have specific qualifications or undergo extensive training in some cases.

You often need to be licensed in some way and may have to undergo additional training such as First-Aid and CPR training since you will be working with a lot of people of all ages. Companies often hire multiple guides that each excel in specific subjects whether its zoology, conservation, history, art, or music, and then assign guides with such superior knowledge to lead tours that focus on those subjects.

You not only have to be knowledgeable about the subjects you will be educating travellers about, but also need to be skilled in customer service and have a personality that people enjoy. Some tour guides may also be required to be fluent in several languages since clients often travel from all around the world on tours.

Keep in mind as well that although the job may be quite rewarding and you’ll be doing something you are likely passionate about, days as a tour guide can be long and both physically and mentally demanding. That being said, many tour guide positions do offer flexible schedules, including seasonal or part-time work to avoid burnout.

The other good thing is there are a great variety of tour guide jobs such as offering city walking tours, museum tours if you don’t enjoy being outdoors, or adventure guides who lead hiking, snorkelling, or mountain biking trips.  

Travel Writer

For the writers out there, travel writing is a dream job that allows you to explore new places while documenting your experiences. Successful travel writers have a flair for storytelling and describing the true feelings and experiences of a destination.

The best travel writers make readers feel like they are right there experiencing destination as well. Travel writing can involve touring on assignment for guidebooks, magazines, your own blog, or other publications.

Independent travel writers can also sell freelance travel articles and photographs easily online to all kinds of travel-related companies like travel insurers or airlines. You can earn income through writing sponsored posts, affiliate marketing, ad revenue, and organising social media partnerships.

Becoming a travel writer can therefore be a great way to swim with dolphins Panama City Beach or embark on an African Serengeti safari and get paid for it. With that said, travel writing and especially travel blogging requires dedication, hard work, and a willingness to navigate financial uncertainty and stiff competition since the market has become quite saturated in recent years.

However, travel writing offers so much creative freedom, flexibility in work schedules, and of course the opportunity to explore the world. Keep in mind that some travel bloggers are on the road almost constantly, exploring new destinations every few weeks, while others may take trips only a few times a year. It will depend on your income streams, savings, and personal level of desire to travel.

Flight Attendant

Imagine getting paid to fly around the world. That’s the life of a flight attendant. Most major airlines have flight attendant training programmes to gain the skills needed for this position. It goes without saying that you must not have a fear of flying, as you will be spending a great deal of time above the clouds in this rewarding career.

If you are the type of person who loves to be independent on your travels, with lots of quiet time for personal reflection and introspection, a flight attendant position may not be for you. Remember that this is a customer service position where you will be dealing with hundreds if not thousands of passengers daily with a broad range of personalities and needs.

It’s you who will have to attend to passenger needs, including serve meals and beverages, calm passengers’ nerves, clean up messes in seats and in the bathrooms, resolve disputes between passengers, deal with emergencies, and possibly even have to deal with a death onboard a flight.

You need to be someone who genuinely likes helping people and must be calm when dealing with emergencies whether its handle medical situations, turbulence, or mechanical issues with the plane. You may need to administer first-aid and assist passengers during evacuations if necessary.

With all this said, flight attendants do get to travel frequently, both domestically and internationally. Your schedule may include layovers ranging from a few hours to several days, depending on the airline and flight routes. This means you may get time to actually explore the destinations you fly to.

The reality, however, is sadly that many layovers are short, providing limited or no time to actually explore a destination yourself outside of a hotel at or near the airport. You may only have a few hours to rest before your next flight, having no desire to want to check a city out in that time due to exhaustion or jetlag.

Flight attendants do often receive free or heavily discounted flights for themselves and sometimes for family and friends, which can come in handy for when you do get time off to travel yourself. And while the job can involve long and irregular hours, you often have flexibility with schedules and can easily trade shift with coworkers and bid for preferred routes.

Regularly being away from home can be challenging if you have a family, and you will need to get used to dealing with jetlag as mentioned before. Therefore, maintaining a work-life balance can prove rather difficult due to the nature of the job.

Cruise Ship Worker

Like flight attendant positions, working on a cruise ship also allows you see exotic parts of the world while getting paid. Unlike working on a plane which basically offers up just pilot and flight attendant jobs, working on a cruise ship comes with a choice between a wide variety of positions.

You usually work on contracts that can commonly last last 6 to 12 months, during which you can explore different destinations when the ship makes ports of call. Meals and lodging are provided while on board, but it’s hard work since crew members usually work seven days a week.

One bonus if you love to be travelling regularly, is that cruise ship workers are constantly on the move. You will be going from port of call to port of call and often get a chance to go ashore during port stops. The amount of time available to explore depends on your personal job responsibilities and schedules, with some roles offering more flexible schedules, while others might have more restricted shore leave.

Types of jobs a cruise ship offers include cabin stewards or stewardesses who are responsible for cleaning and maintaining cabins, guest services officers that handle guest inquiries and provides assistance, and concierges that assist VIP guests with special requests.

If you have a background in the restaurant industry, you may want to seek out a position as an onboard waiter/waitress, bartender, or cook. If you’re more of the artistic type, you may be able to get a job in cruise entertainment as a singer, dancer, or comedian. There are most always spa therapist and fitness instructor positions as well.

Those with higher-education skills like engineers and onboard doctors are also needed and these jobs pay quite well. There is of course also everything from maintenance and ship cleaning crews to onboard professional photographers and tour guides which add even more options for jobs.

Working for a cruise ship company offers a dynamic and ever-changing work environment but be warned it can be a rather regimented job with long contracts that require having to endure extended periods away from family and friends much like a flight attendant. You may also have to deal with frequent seasickness when sailing in rough conditions.

Online ESL Teacher

One career you may not have thought of that will allow you to see the world with ease is an online ESL teaching position. Online English teachers have the unique freedom to work and travel from anywhere with a stable internet connection. Also known as online TEFL/TESOL teachers, they teach English language lessons to students via video chat.

Companies like VIPKid match online tutors with students in China and other countries trying to learn English. To teach ESL online, you need TEFL certification, teaching experience, and eligibility to work in your country. With a flexible online teaching job, you can make money while journeying abroad long term or working anywhere you can set up your mobile classroom.

Another perk that works if you are constantly on the move around the world is that many online ESL teaching platforms offer flexible scheduling and the ability to choose your working hours. And unlike many travel-based jobs that might require you to take time off, online ESL teaching allows you to continue earning an income while traveling.

You can also choose to live in countries offering a lower cost of living while earning an income in the currency of your home country, potentially allowing you to actually save money which would otherwise prove difficult or impossible.

Many online ESL teachers choose to stay in one location for several months before moving to a new destination as this creates a healthier work-travel balance. And despite the amount of freedom and flexibility this career offers, it does require you to implement effective time management skills in order to balance work, travel, and personal free time.

Tour Company Manager

Those with strong planning and logistics skills can put them to use as a tour company manager. Tour managers develop, market, and operate tours and travel packages. This involves designing tour itineraries, hiring local guides, arranging transportation and accommodations, promoting tours, and providing customer service.

It’s a fast-paced job coordinating the many moving pieces that pull off successful tours and holidays. The role can include office-based planning and travel to oversee tours. If you enjoy curating exciting trips for travellers, tour operations just might be yet another ideal career path for you.