By nature, air travel is a deeply personal thing. Travellers know the carriers they prefer to fly with. They know how they like to book, check in, and where they want to sit. They know what they like (and do not like) to eat. They know that the people setting their company's travel policy do not know these preferences.
With the plethora of corporate requirements and demands placed on employees in this day and age, is it any wonder that they choose to go their own way when they need to travel for work? Even if they're faced with that little pang of guilt, employees will sometimes choose to go rogue. It's a subject that comes up repeatedly but travel management professionals can do something about it. To help rein in your rogue travellers, we've pulled together our top five tips:
1. Provide them with support during disruptions
Travel disruptions ... They're the unfortunate but unavoidable aspect of travel. Whether it's bad weather, industrial action or an instance of unrest, there are countless opportunities for travel plans to be impacted. And whether your people are on the ground, in the air, down the hall or on the other side of the world, you have a responsibility for their duty of care. As a company, you need to know where your travellers are, and that they're safe and secure.
So needless to say, if your employees have gone rogue and have booked travel outside your company's policy, they are at risk of being out on their own. Communicating this message to your employees can help to encourage them back to compliance. In booking their travel according to your company's policy, travellers can be assured that your company (and your partner airlines) will be by their side, ensuring they are supported throughout any disruptions. So your employees can be safe (and productive) wherever they are.
2. Articulate the return on your company's investment
It won't be news to you that travel is consistently among the most investment-heavy items on a company's P&L, and is constantly being reviewed to ensure a strong ROI. To maximise this further, most companies work closely with their partner airlines to make the best use of their travel investment. This means negotiating preferred supplier rates, developing a policy to ensure employee compliance, and having maximum visibility of travel expenses.
Therefore, to ensure your company can continue to invest in travel, they need to have full visibility of where and how their employees are travelling. Of course, if employees book on their own terms, your company will not receive the full picture of their travel budget, and will not be able to qualify or quantify the ROI. Communicating this to your employees (and the subsequent impact – a potential reduction in travel) is critical to ensuring they understand your company's motivations.
3. Share behind-the-scenes information on corporate support
While employees may feel as though they are booking the best deal for them by going rogue (points hoarding, anyone?), there are a number of behind-the-scenes benefits that come with a company's corporate policy, which they may not be privy to. If your company is working with good supplier partners and travel management companies, they should be providing you with a full end-to-end experience that adds value to your overall travel programme. As well as offering savings through corporate fares and company deals, their service should allow for reduced administration, which saves your employees time, and assists with their productivity.
Your company's partners should also help to provide reporting and cost saving analytics to monitor your programme and identify optimisation opportunities. By sharing this information with your employees, you'll be helping them to understand how effective your travel policy can be. Not only does it make for good business sense, it also means that your employees aren't compromising that personal brand they have worked so hard to build.
4. Get back to business
While your employees may feel that they are proficient at booking travel, they won't have access to the tools and systems that are available to travel professionals. It should be the job of the supplier and TMC to work together to help maximise your company's investment in travel. Significant effort goes into analysing your company's spend, identifying opportunities, setting the right programme, and determining the best deals and routes for your business. Let your employees get back to business. Tell them to reinvest the time they'd spend researching and booking travel back into the role they are paid to do, and therefore back into your business.
5. Understand why they're going rogue
If we give your employees the benefit of the doubt, they may be going rogue simply because they know no other option. Perhaps some tweaking and communicating of your corporate travel policy is required. Are there too many options? Not enough options? A complicated booking process? A lack of communication around the programme and its benefits?
To truly realise the benefits of your company's travel programme, you need to assess it regularly to ensure it works effectively for both your organisation and your employees. Conducting this review will ensure that you're maximising its potential. Once that policy is in place, remember to communicate it so employees are aware of what is expected of them, and how they too can reap the rewards. You may find that employees have inherently wanted to do the right thing, but don't know how to use the tools or resources to do so.
So next time you're wondering why your company's travellers have gone rogue, perhaps spend less time wondering why, and a little more time communicating why not. By taking your employees on the journey of your corporate travel policy, you'll not only be optimising your programme, but also helping to create a culture of compliance and transparency.