INNOVATIONS Get creative


‘Thinking out of the box’ can play a vital part when it comes to tackling travel management challenges


By ROB GILL U


NLESS YOU’VE BEEN LIVING IN A CAVE or a galaxy far, far away, then you will have heard of the gaming phenomenon of Pokémon Go, which has been sweeping the world this last few months. The ‘augmented reality’ game has become the talk of workplaces and playgrounds around the world since its launch in early July, as well as spawning a succession of stories about the scrapes people have got into while playing the addictive game on their phones – including a group of teen- agers getting stranded on an island and numerous car accidents. The massive popularity of Pokémon Go, in which players go on a quest in the real world to try to catch virtual characters, reminded the scribes at BBT about the concept of ‘gami- fication’ that was all the rage at business travel conferences four or five years ago, but has now slipped into the background. Will games such as Pokémon Go en- courage companies to take another look at


80 BBT September/October 2016


gamification as a way of encouraging their travellers to follow policy and book their trips within the corporate programme? And what other creative ways are travel manage- ment companies (TMCs) and other suppliers coming up with to help buyers to do their jobs more efficiently and effectively? Creativity isn’t the ‘c’ word that most readily comes to mind when discussing corporate travel management. Cost, control and compliance feature much more often in the pages of BBT and at industry events. But the advancement of technology is giving buyers more opportunity to try something different in a bid to bring errant or ‘rogue’ travellers to heel, or going the other way with a more open policy.


DRIVING TRAVELLER COMPLIANCE The concept of gamification was once a buzzword within the industry and was seen as a tool to help drive traveller com- pliance. But it doesn’t seem to have taken off in the way its proponents suggested back in 2011 or 2012.


Adam Knights, UK managing director


for ATPI Group, says: “The purpose of any gamification within a travel programme is to convince users to book travel that cor- responds with the company, travel manager or procurement goals. This can involve cost savings, early booking or choices that support a company’s travel policy. “However, at this time this is not an initia- tive that has been widely adopted by our clients, or across the industry for that matter. There are also conflicting views within the industry on its use of gamification as some see this as a bribery-type of technique to get travellers to do what they should be doing already.”


One of the chief supporters of the concept has been leading TMC Carlson Wagonlit Travel, which integrated an element of gamification into its mobile app, CWT To Go, a couple of years back. This allows companies which award points to employees based on their policy- compliant bookings to track their position on a leaderboard against their colleagues.


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