Introduction
If you know that business travel is not without risk and the potential for a crisis, then you should read this article. In this article we are going to talk about crisis management and containment as it relates to travelers and travel managers. The aim of this article is to share with you the collective knowledge on crisis management and significantly improve your ability to identify and manage a crisis, but also improve the efficiency of your business trips.
During this article, I am going to discuss travel risk myths, crisis management, plans and options so that you can immediately compare or improve your own travel risk management system for your travelers or travel management department.
Crisis, by definition, is something you didn’t have a plan for or something you’re not prepared for. Also, it can be a series of events that together create a crisis. Events or problems that occur, for which you have a plan and a strategy, are simply an incident.
Crisis management / leadership
The first thing is to clarify what is the difference between crisis management and leadership. More importantly, which is more important?
Crisis management relates to responding to events that threaten your business, your travelers, or your travel activity. The event leads and follows with plans, decisions and actions.
Leadership in crisis, on the other hand, is more about getting ahead of events and issues to prevent, manage, and even contain the impact on your business activities or business trips. While management is a part of the demand for leadership, your actions and involvement drive results rather than a more passive wait-and-act approach with pure crisis management.
Leadership in crisis is the less practiced of the two, but the more significant in terms of results and reduction of risk and impact. If you take nothing else out of this session, it should be that your focus should always be on crisis leadership, not crisis management.
Myths
There are many myths and half-truths about crises, disruptions and threats within the travel management industry. Much of this misinformation has originated from travelers themselves, the media, travel managers, friends and family, or so-called “experts.”
For example, many travelers and planners focus on terrorism. The reality is that you have a very, very small chance of being directly exposed or affected by a terrorist act. It does not mean that you should dismiss it as a threat, but it should not dominate your plans or processes, if not a proportionate threat to you and your travelers. On the contrary, almost everyone overlooks car accidents. However, they occur much more frequently, can have a devastating effect on travelers, and are the least common plan contained in corporate travel management departments.
Travelers and travel managers must be prepared, informed and have support plans for any event that has the potential to delay, interrupt or harm the traveler or business.
The most common events include:
- Motor vehicle accidents
- Airline delays or cancellations
- Airport closures or interruptions
- Transportation delays
- Bad weather
- Sickness and disease
- Minor offences
- Hotel fires
- Political disputes
- Demonstrations and gatherings
Motor vehicle accidents Inside your own country it can be stressful and dangerous, but on a business trip abroad it can be 100 times more challenging and dangerous. Consider language, local authorities, first responders, standard of care, families, and support in your initial response and plans.
Airline delays and cancellations. They happen all the time, but they are not just an administrative response. You may need to consider security, transportation, quarantines, security threats, government response, and widespread service suspension to overcome the issue and keep your travelers safe.
Airport closures or interruptions. Faulty systems, electrical problems, threats, weather, construction, etc. they can prevent you from reaching your flight. Consider the impact this has on your plans and how your traveler may need to extend their stay, move to an alternate airport, or find accommodation.
Everyone else transportation delays and interruptions It can create a crisis when everyone no longer has access to trains, buses, key highways, or even water transport. Have a plan and add it to your immediate decision-making process.
2010 and the beginning of 2011 has seen trips of all kinds affected by natural disasters and weather. Climate and natural forces have had and always will affect travelers. It does and will continue to happen. It is very worrying how unprepared travelers and businesses are for volcanic eruptions, typhoons, floods, earthquakes and bad weather in general.
People get sick or feeling bad all the time. This is significantly aggravated when traveling. Level of care, language, access, cost, hassle, choice, and many other location-based concerns will determine the risk your traveler will take. A single “one size fits all” plan or solution will fail and you should be aware of these issues immediately with the emergence of an affected traveler.
Crimes they are a reality in any city in the world. However, travelers rarely know the risks and can be the victims of thieves and criminals. Losing phones, money, and other items may seem less likely to constitute a crisis, but when you’re abroad, injured, or unable to speak the local language, all of these simple events can create great concern for your business travelers. . This can be expanded if you have a senior executive or a group of affected executives.
Hotel fires and emergencies are more common than most people think. The immediate threat to an individual is quite obvious, but the impact that a lack of accommodation options can create from a temporary or permanent hotel closure is of much greater concern. This was graphically shown during the Mumbai terror attacks (extraordinary as the event was) when most of the best / preferred hotels were now unavailable in a key part of the city. This eliminated thousands of rooms for business travelers and forced many to cancel or significantly alter travel plans just because there were no suitable accommodation options, whether affected by events or not.
Any event that alters the political stability of a location or region or that causes thousands of people to take to the streets constitutes a risk for your business travel plans and for travelers. They can happen spontaneously or take time to develop. Immediate hazards and ongoing disruption can have a major impact on your business or traveler.
Again, planning, preparing, and reflecting on these topics will greatly reduce the impact and improve your business as well.
Now that we’ve eliminated the most common misconceptions, let’s focus on managing and containing a crisis.
Crisis management
The key to successful crisis management is planning, training, planning, decision-making, and adaptability.
Planning
Given the issues discussed above, you now have a better idea of how and why planning is important to remove more emotional issues from the realities of actual business events and threats.
Planning must include multiple departments and perspectives to be truly effective. One of the biggest weaknesses that I see regularly is that departments continue to manage the risk of traveling across multiple departments with multiple plans. The input and the plan must be unified. Depending on the business, it can include travel, security, HR, finance, marketing, C-suite, and operations managers.
All plans need to be continually updated, location specific, assist in the decision-making process, and be modular enough so that items are removed quickly and effectively. Modern and efficient plans embrace technology. Quick and efficient access to information, along with executing updates, is the hallmark of a modern and sustainable plan, regardless of the size of the problem or the company.
Training
No plan is effective without training and trial. Training, whether through simulations, drills or large-scale live exercises, is vital to the success of any crisis situation. These sessions do not have to be boring or overly complicated, but should include managers and trip planners along with the most common crisis and emergency managers.
Increasingly, training is becoming a mandatory requirement for key positions and functions. It can be linked to internal HR processes, but it should support business goals and measure how you reduce risk to individuals, businesses, brand, and travel demands.
While the plan creates the framework for crisis decision-making, teams can learn a lot from training on how and when to adapt their plans. The way the team interacts, the strengths, the weaknesses, the leaders, the followers, the limitations, the tools and many more planned and surprising results are possible with effective training.
Adaptations
No plan will completely write down every event, problem, and option available for every plausible travel delay, interruption, or crisis. It must be able to adapt and evolve from the original plan and intention. This can only be accomplished with planning, planning, and training.
Solutions So what do I need in my plan?
Here is the best travel risk management content for your plan:
- Objective (the most important part of any travel policy)
- References
- Scope
- Legal
- Sure
- Finance
- Refunds
- Limits
- Priority / precedence
- Administrative Authority
- Situations
The procedure will likely cover:
- Planning
- Means
- Instruments
- Authority
- Executive decision making
- Limits
- Budgets
- Training
- Compliance
- Pre-trip administrator
- Providers
- Booking
- accommodation
- airlines
- Ground transportation
- Protection and security
- Health & Wellness
- Emergency
- POE / Actions on
- Sure
- Travel tracking / tracking
- Reporting
- HOUR
- Rights
- Threat / risk levels
- Shelter in place
- Relocations / evacuations
- Administrative Authority
- Check
Don’t forget that your risk assessment should include the key elements:
- Traveler
- Rental
- Activity
- Support / Resources
- Answer
conclusion
There you go. Now that you know what is required, how do you rate your current plans and preparation?
You now have the most relevant issues and areas to focus on that will reduce or contain most of the incidents you may face, your travelers will be safer, your business will be more profitable, and your costs will be contained by reducing your exposure to costly crisis events. .
We’ve debunked popular travel threat myths, identified the difference between crisis management and leadership, outlined plans and options so you can immediately compare or improve your own travel risk management system for your travelers or management department. travel. Review your plans and make immediate improvements.
You will know when you have an effective crisis management system for your travel risk management strategy when you have little or no crisis.
You can have numerous events or incidents but you have a plan, you are prepared and your decision making is fast and consistent. If not, you have failed and will run from crisis to crisis regularly.
