www.buyingbusinesstravel.com
Talking business
our travellers have to give notice of their international travel to our insurance office, and that may result in a discussion as to whether a planned journey is appropriate.
You have recently celebrated 15 years’
service at the University of Exeter – what aspects of the job give you most satisfaction? Working with really talented people to help them achieve whatever their objectives may be, whether that’s a university-wide objective or a very specific research- related project. My colleagues are really passionate about what they do, and some may see procurement as a hindrance, but our task is to get in there and persuade them that we are here to provide a service and deliver a result that is better than they could achieve without our aid.
If you could change any one aspect of the wider business
travel industry, what would it be, and why? Personally, I think travel agents have been quite slow to engage with technology. For
example, a lot of agents are now implementing things like online booking tools – and some are better than others – but they really have fallen behind the curve as airlines, in particular, invest in mobile solutions. In an environment where our travellers can do almost everything via their iPads, they are less than impressed to have to use a laptop to access the agent’s online booking tool to organise their travel.
There’s also the issue of system capabilities – a lot of our travellers’ journeys involve multi-sector trips, and they may be away for three or more weeks at a time with four or five legs to the journey, and as far as we are aware the IT has not yet been developed by travel agents to respond to online itinerary planning at this level. There is so little in the travel media about who is doing what in regard to investments in this area. Every time we go out to tender, we try to develop our technology offering, and it’s enormously frustrating that the market just does not respond.
When the working week finally draws to an end,
how do you relax?
Well, I bought a horse last July, and I spend as much of my free time as I can with her. I’m not the sort of person who likes sitting around doing nothing – I get cabin fever and would rather go out for a walk than sit indoors watching television. I love the theatre, and I’m also very involved locally with the Lions Club International, and spent much of the run-up to Christmas dressed as Santa Claus and clutching a collection bucket. Me, dressed as Santa, has to be worth a charitable donation!
The Southern Universities Purchasing Consortium was formed in 1974 when a handful of universities came together for the collaborative purchase of stationery. It has since grown to become the largest of the six regional higher education purchasing consortia in the UK, offering its membership of more than 100 higher and further education institutions a wide range of collaborative purchase agreements. The University of Exeter was founded in 1955, although its predecessor institutions date back to 1855. Today, it is home to nearly 17,000 students. The university has recently completed a three-year, £300 million capital investment programme, and was named as The Sunday Times University of the Year for 2012-13.
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