During the weekend I attended the Advantage Conference where several UK-based small and medium-sized TMCs gathered to talk about the theme of 'man and machine'.
The topic is timely as the business travel industry wraps its head around rapid technological change, who pays for it and how it shifts travel programmes or business models.
One of the main concerns was job stability. As bots and artificial intelligence are weaved in to make processes quicker and automated then jobs either need to be adapted or are redundant. Suppliers have similar challenges. Airlines and hotels have long been talking of more attentive staff to counteract self-check in services and when driverless cars go mainstream…well the term 'driverless' gives that one away.
I do wonder if this reluctance prevents some innovation and it'll be interesting to see who wins especially with so much consolidation happening.
Where is the man/machine balance?
Simplistically, the machine handles booking, transaction, pay and effectively relives administrative burdens so humans have more time to be focused on service, strategy and creativity.
It's about adding value.
At the same conference UBS executive director Mark Cuschieri explained that while a review of its travel programme found the company needed to be more technology-savvy, travellers still want to talk to someone when a situation is one of the following.
"The TMC relationship will change; we don't want a transactional relationship but we want value. It will move to high touch support and disruptive management," he said.
There's also the TMC's ability to act as a centralised platform for content and reporting. Rod Richardson, travel manager at The Wellcome Trust said his data is the best it has ever been with the help of the flexibility and number of suppliers that his TMC has data for.
What of travel managers?
In a recent survey by the UK's Institute of Travel Management 47.7% of buyers somewhat agreed and 24.6% totally agreed with the statement that 'the role of the travel manager in the future is bright'.
For many the role and day-to-day functions will shift; Cuschieri now sees himself as more of a marketer. In her piece on career strategies Caroline Strachan outlines why buyers should be careful about their expectations as an enabler for the business.
Technologists stress that robots will never be able to replicate the creativity and relationship building qualities we humans have. That will keep people travelling and, as Susan Hopley writes, finding value in data will become the norm. In fact it probably already is.