Common goals
How to be on the winning side by keeping your travel programme aligned with corporate strategy
By ROB GILL
manage whatever change comes your way. An extreme example of how things can change suddenly occurred in the oil and gas industry when the oil price fell sharply two years ago leading to a rapid reassessment of all types of corporate spending, including travel costs. The impact this had on travel management within the energy sector was discussed in a feature in the last issue of BBT (November/December 2017). While most sectors, thankfully, don’t have
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to endure such volatile situations, how do buyers ensure that both their travel policy and programme are in step with their organ- isation’s corporate priorities – and continue to stay that way when these goals shift or change completely? Who are the key stakeholders that travel buyers need to engage with in this process? Also, what happens when a company goes on an acquisition spree that creates a period of transformation for the travel department? And finally, can buyers show their worth to their organisation by successfully keeping in lock-step with the overall corporate strategy?
If you look at recent surveys of CEOs
HANGE IS A FACT OF LIFE and this is just as true for an organisation’s strategy as any other facet of business. The trick is being able to
– such as the 2017-2018 study by Gartner – their main priorities continue to be business growth followed by product improvement and technology, with cost control lagging well behind towards the bottom of the Top Ten list.
CULTURE AND COMMS So, when it comes to travel buyers making sure what they are doing is aligned to help achieve these wider corporate goals, current and former travel buyers have two words to say about this important subject: culture and communications. Yves Galimidi, veteran former travel
buyer and now owner of YG Business Travel, Meetings & Mobility Solutions, says: “Corporations absolutely need to have a very strong corporate culture and strong corporate values. Communication is key – CEOs should communicate with their co-workers/travellers at least on a yearly basis and inform them about the company goals, strategies or pillars. These include financial goals, of course, but also goals related to life-balance and sustainability.” So aligning a travel policy is not simply
about financial targets and keeping a tight control on costs. There are inevitably other issues, such as ensuring duty-of-care to
BBT January/February 2018 67
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