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We sent our most overworked team member for a 24-hour workcation in Delhi; here's how it went for her and her laptop
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We sent an overworked team member to the Taj Mahal, New Delhi, for 24 hours, combining work calls, good food, comfort and relaxation.
There is a lot of advice around work-life balance, and most of it makes perfect sense. Work should stay at work, holidays should be holidays, and laptops should ideally have no place in a hotel room. Except that real life does not always work that way. There are weeks when work takes over, days when you are not necessarily working every minute but still need to be available, and times when you have very little leave left but could really do with a change of scene.
That was the thought behind a slightly unusual experiment we tried with our team. When Taj Mahal, New Delhi invited us to spend some time at the property, we wondered what would happen if we treated it as a workcation rather than a conventional holiday. So we picked the most overworked person on our team, our growth manager Niharika Rana, gave her 24 hours at the hotel and told her to carry on with her work as usual. The laptop came along, the calls stayed on the schedule, and the work still had to get done. The only thing we changed was where she was doing it. And that turned out to make quite a difference.
The workday started in a very different setting
Niharika arrived with her laptop and briefcase, ready for what was essentially still a working day. Except, instead of heading into the office or settling down at her regular desk at home, she walked into a spacious suite with a foyer, a separate sitting area, a dining space and French windows looking out towards the city.
The room had enough space for the day to naturally break into different parts. There was a dedicated study table next to the bedroom, a small armchair and a large double bed, along with a separate closet area. The bathroom had a rain shower and a large sink, and the whole space had that slightly strange but very pleasant quality of feeling like a home you had borrowed for a day, only with hotel staff looking after everything.
That made the first few hours of work feel quite different. She could sit down at the desk for a call, move away from it when she wanted a break, have lunch in the room and return to work without having to deal with the usual distractions of a regular weekday.
The laptop was still open. The emails were still coming in. There were calls to take. But the surroundings were doing their bit to make the day feel less like another day at work.
Being vegan was not treated as a limitation
Food was another thing we were curious about because Niharika is vegan. Anyone with a specific dietary preference knows that hotel dining can sometimes become a slightly repetitive affair, with the same few safe options appearing on the menu.
That was not her experience here.
After she arrived, the chef personally met her and asked what she liked to eat and what she preferred to avoid. The team then arranged her meals around those preferences, rather than simply asking her to choose from whatever happened to be available. The first meal brought to her room included vegan sandwiches, Thai curry, rice, pasta and several other dishes. There was enough variety for it to feel like a proper meal rather than a collection of substitutions put together because someone could not eat dairy or meat.
For Niharika, who was still answering calls and working through the day, it also meant she did not have to spend time figuring out what she could eat. The chef had already understood what she needed, and the meal simply arrived. It was a small part of the stay, but probably one of the details that made the experience feel particularly personal.
For anyone considering a similar stay, these were the details that made the working part easier:
- A proper work desk: Niharika had a dedicated study table close to the bedroom, so she did not have to work from the bed.
- Space to take breaks: The separate sitting and dining areas meant she could step away from the laptop without leaving the room.
- Dietary attention: The chef personally discussed her vegan preferences and the meals were arranged around them.
- Room dining: Having meals brought to the room meant she could eat comfortably without breaking up her working day.
- An evening change of scene: Once work slowed down, she could move downstairs and spend time at the bar rather than simply ending the day in the same room.
So, what does a workcation actually mean?
The interesting thing about this experiment was that Niharika was not pretending to be on holiday. She was working. There were calls, emails and tasks to finish, and the laptop remained very much part of the room. The difference was everything around the work.
Instead of finishing a call and immediately moving on to the next task at home, there was a comfortable room to sit in, a meal waiting, a view outside the window and the knowledge that there was nowhere she needed to rush off to. The day had more breathing space simply because she was not trying to fit the hotel stay around a commute, household chores or the usual weekday routine.
I think that is where the idea of a workcation makes sense. It does not have to mean pretending that work does not exist. Sometimes it is simply about giving yourself a nicer environment for a day when work cannot be avoided.
By evening, the workday had changed completely
The real shift happened once the work calls started winding down.
There was an event happening at the bar that evening, so Niharika went down to spend some time there. She tried a few cocktails, had snacks and spent time talking to the team. She also got a chance to visit the wine cellar and chat with the staff about wine, how it is stored and how the collection is maintained. After a full day of work calls, it was a welcome change to have a conversation that had nothing to do with spreadsheets, meetings or deadlines.
Dinner followed, with more food and time to relax before she eventually went back to her room. And that was perhaps the nicest part of the evening. There was no drive home, no traffic to deal with and no second round of work waiting simply because there was still a commute ahead.
She could just go upstairs, get comfortable and call it a day.
The next morning was intentionally lazy
The following morning was kept just as relaxed. Instead of rushing down to the breakfast buffet, Niharika chose to have breakfast in bed, which seemed like the right way to use the last few hours of a 24-hour stay.
There was time for a slow morning and a long bath before she got ready to leave. The workday had not magically disappeared, but the pace around it had changed enough to make the whole experience feel like a break.
And then it was time to pack the laptop and head home.
A 24-hour stay can give you more options than you think
Of course, you do not have to spend your entire stay working. If you have time, there is a pool, spa, several dining options, and plenty of space in the hotel to sit back for a while. The restaurants offer Chinese, Italian, and Indian cuisine, so food can easily become part of the reason to stay a little longer. The hotel also has a collection of themed suites that draw from different parts of India's artistic and cultural history. The Nizam Suite, Travancore Suite, Ikkat Suite and R.K. Laxman Suite each have their own design story, with art, furnishings and details connected to the person, region or tradition they reference.
That is a separate side of Taj Mahal, New Delhi, but it fits into the larger experience of staying at a hotel where the interiors and art are given as much thought as the rooms and restaurants.
For a 24-hour workcation, though, I would not try to fit everything in. The whole point is to slow the day down a little rather than create another packed schedule.
What can you do during a short workcation?
If you are considering this kind of stay for yourself, the nice thing is that you can make the 24 hours as work-heavy or relaxed as you need. You could;
- Spend a few hours working from the room and take calls without the usual office distractions.
- Order a meal in and ask the kitchen about dietary requirements before deciding what to eat.
- Head to the pool for some downtime.
- Book a spa treatment if you have enough time between calls.
- Spend an evening at one of the hotel's restaurants or bars.
- Take some time to look at the hotel's art and themed suites.
- Skip the breakfast rush and have breakfast in bed the next morning.
- Keep the final morning slow with a bath, coffee and a little extra time before checkout.
The important bit is not to turn the stay into another list of things you have to complete. Twenty-four hours go surprisingly quickly.
Maybe not every break needs to be a holiday
What stayed with me after Niharika came back was how little actually needed to change for a normal working day to feel different. She had not taken leave. She had not switched off her phone. She had not abandoned her laptop or ignored her deadlines. She simply spent those 24 hours somewhere that made the workday feel less repetitive. There was good food waiting for her, a comfortable room to work from, an evening outside the room, a proper bed to sleep in, breakfast in bed the next morning and enough time for a long bath before heading home.
It is easy to say that work should be work and holidays should be holidays. I agree with the sentiment, but I also think life has a lot more grey in it than those neat rules allow.
Sometimes you have three days for a proper holiday. Sometimes you have a weekend. Sometimes you have 24 hours.
And sometimes, when work is simply not going away, giving yourself those 24 hours somewhere comfortable may be the break you actually need.
Taj Mahal, New Delhi: Stay details at a glance
| Detail | Information |
| Hotel | Taj Mahal, New Delhi |
| Location | New Delhi, India |
| Stay duration | 24 hours |
| Purpose of stay | Workcation |
| Guest experience | Work calls, room work, dining, evening drinks and relaxation |
| Room | Spacious suite with foyer, separate sitting area, dining space, bedroom and dedicated work desk |
| Room features mentioned in this stay | French windows, double bed, armchair, closet space, rain shower and large bathroom sink |
| Work setup | Dedicated study table near the bedroom |
| Dietary requirement | Vegan |
| Food arranged | Vegan sandwiches, Thai curry, rice, pasta and other dishes |
| Personalised food service | Chef personally discussed food preferences with the guest |
| Evening experience | Bar event, cocktails, snacks and wine cellar visit |
| Morning experience | Breakfast in bed and a slow morning |
| Other options at the property | Pool, spa, restaurants and bars |
| Cuisine options mentioned | Indian, Chinese, Italian and other cuisines |
| Themed suites | Nizam Suite, Travancore Suite, Ikkat Suite and R.K. Laxman Suite |
| Best suited for this format | A short break where you still need to remain available for work |
| Booking tip | Ask the hotel about the room category, current package, check-in and check-out timings, dining options and any dietary requirements before booking |
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