Business travel is making a comeback: Spending on corporate trips could match, if not surpass, 2019 levels, according to recent data from Deloitte.

And some companies are seeing that the opportunity to travel for work can be a major motivator for employees.

Aisha Khan, 39, leveraged her tech company's business travel program to spend a week in London in March.

Khan is a senior recruiter at Verkada, a cloud-based security company headquartered in San Mateo, California with 2,000 employees in 15 offices around the world.

Verkada's marketing department sends up to three groups on a business trip each quarter to share specific knowledge or ideas with teams in other office locations; since the program kicked off in February 2022, 35 workers have traveled to London, Japan, Korea and more as part of the program.

The program started when there were only three or four global offices, and marketing leaders felt it was worth the expense to help colleagues connect within their expanding international workforce.

Earlier this year, Khan was in the process of hiring marketers for Verkada's London office, so she submitted her application and explained what she hoped to learn from the experience.

"It was helpful for me to understand the office culture, dynamics, location, etc. so that I could better answer candidate questions" about working there, Khan tells CNBC Make It. Plus, "I was also able to get in-person facetime with both the teams I was supporting to hire, and cross-functional teams that my hires would be working with."

Khan also came away with a big lesson about the differences in U.S. and European work cultures.

"One of the big takeaways was that everyone at noon leaves the office [to] grab lunch together," Khan says. Colleagues leave the building to eat outside or grab lunch to bring back to the office and "they all take a solid hour to just sit together."

It's not just the marketing team's philosophy, Khan says: "It's cross-functional."

The habit stood out to Khan "because in the U.S., sometimes we get so caught up in the quickness of the day that we don't actually take the dedicated time to just sort of sit and have a meal with our colleagues," she says.

Khan believes the culture lends itself to people getting to know each other as people beyond just as colleagues; it also led to more friendships outside the office. "You see a lot of folks that would grab beers or go to happy hour after work, or even do a fitness class together," Khan says. "So I think it allows for more rapport and connection. And I thought that was really awesome."

Khan adds that the habit isn't the norm among her marketing colleagues in the California office, where lunch is provided and people are less likely to leave the building. "People do take breaks to sit with one another," Khan says, "but I think Europeans are just fundamentally better at it."

Verkada's program may be well-established, but Khan says workers may be able to start their own if they have offices in other cities, states or countries. Office rotations can be a good way to keep workers engaged and motivated, she adds.

"I think it's super beneficial for people to have those types of opportunities and learn about different cultures," Khan says. "It only serves to better their own careers and also get to know their fellow colleagues in other places."

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