By Dr. Daniel Diermeier, Dean of the Harris School of Public Policy and Emmett Dedmon Professor of Public Administration at the University of Chicago. This article was produced in partnership with On Call International.
To appropriately address travel risk, companies need two broad sets of capabilities. First, they need to respond quickly and effectively to any travel-related incident. Such responses need to be both competent and caring, putting the needs of the victim(s) first. Second, companies need to anticipate risks and prevent them from occurring or, at least, to limit their potential impact. The preferred approach to the multifaceted risks associated with traveler protection, then, is one that prevents incidents or at least reduces their likelihood, but also prepares the organization to deal with any issues that do arise.
Prevention is about making sure adverse travel events are less likely to occur, ideally as part of a travel risk management program. This involves identifying potential risks and then limiting or eliminating them. Such actions may include carefully monitoring potential destinations for hazardous conditions (such as natural disasters or civil unrest), distributing timely alerts to decision makers and employees, and modifying travel plans accordingly. It may also involve employee training to avoid or limit travel health, safety, and security risks.
Preparation tends to be overlooked by most organizations as a risk management tool, as most companies lack adequate awareness of potential travel risks, let alone an effective system to manage them. Preparation is about limiting the impact of an adverse event. Effective response capabilities allow fast and competent execution. Companies should remember that unfortunate incidents tend to trigger strong emotions, such as anxiety and fear in the face of the event and anger and disappointment post-incident if competent assistance is not perceived as forthcoming. Ineffective management of a negative travel incident can weaken the trust of employees, as well as that of outside constituencies such as customers and business partners. Perceived incompetence, lack of foresight, or a callous attitude toward victims can be interpreted as representative of deeper flaws with a company’s leadership or its culture.
In such cases, lack of awareness and preparedness or a prior decision not to invest in protecting employees due to cost considerations can quickly trigger a substantial loss in confidence in the company and its leadership. For traveler protection, errors of omission, or failure to institute safety and emergency management measures, can be as damaging as errors of commission, such as sending travelers knowingly into hazardous situations. To address such concerns, companies should ask themselves the following question: “What kind of facts do I want to create today that can withstand intense public scrutiny tomorrow?” In thinking about traveler protection measures in this context, a simple first check is the “Wall Street Journal Test”: When making decisions, ask, “If what I’m doing right now was accurately reported on the front page of The Wall Street Journal, would I feel good or bad about it?” Companies that appreciate the broader risks associated with travel protection will invest in capabilities that allow them to demonstrate their concerns with the safety and security of their people--that means developing a holistic traveler risk management program that includes elements of strong preparation and preventative measures. Companies that carefully monitor travel conditions, equip their employees with information and resources, and respond effectively to severe incidents best communicate effective leadership not just to their travelers, but in all areas of the company.
Process and Components of a Comprehensive Traveler Protection System
The many facets of travel risks require extensive capabilities. Indeed, there is growing awareness that protecting travelers is largely about planning for and dealing with critical traveler issues. An effective, coordinated, risk-mitigating traveler protection system should have multiple processes and components: development of clear organizational responsibilities and accountability for the system, deep understanding of specific individual and organizational travel risks, preparation of both travelers and the organization to face potential risks, careful monitoring of all travelers at global and individual levels, strong abilities to communicate with travelers and respond to incidents, an ability to continuously improve the traveler protection program, and clear evidence (such as a reporting/paper trail) of the organization’s proactive approach to travel risk (in the event it faces future media scrutiny, legal challenges, or audits).
Develop Responsibilities and Accountability
Multiple organizational areas should be involved in and accountable for traveler protection. In a corporation, this would include security, travel, legal, risk management, and HR. While travel managers may be the source of most knowledge related to travel risks and share much of the responsibility for travel risk management programs, they should not be the only ones responsible for such initiatives. They require input and shared accountability from other departments. Strong support from senior management for traveler protection programs is also essential.
Understand Exposure
The organization needs to understand its exposure to travel risks at a broad level. That means assessing both the risks associated with specific destinations to which members travel, as well as the various risks the organization faces related to traveler incidents. Given the multiple dimensions of risk, this is a cross-departmental responsibility, with corporate participation ideally involving travel, HR, risk management, legal, security, and other relevant areas for the business.
Prepare Travelers and the Organization
Commensurate to the level of risk, both travelers and the company must be prepared. In fact, many organizations choose to partner with a third party, such as a travel assistance firm, to help enforce the following components of an effective travel risk management program:
Traveler information: A company needs to ensure it has all the relevant information related to current and future travelers and that this data is captured somewhere safe and accessible. Who is traveling now or in the near future? Where are they going? How are they getting there? For what purpose? For how long? Is there any pertinent information related to their health (such as heart conditions or allergies)? The information gathered should also include all contact information (including emergency contacts) and information related to travel documents, such as passports and visas. This provides the organization with a dashboard view of travelers for quick status checks. It also provides individual-level information for ongoing monitoring and decision making, along with the ability to share it with outside organizations if needed (e.g. with overseas authorities in the event of a crisis). Moreover, the ability to extract traveler information from a central organizational database (and to update that database with new information regularly) can boost efficiency and save costs. Requiring travelers to make all arrangements through the organization’s central booking system can expedite this part of the process.
Destination information: This includes all pertinent safety information for the destinations in question, including civil unrest, military or terrorist activities, infectious disease (such as an influenza outbreak), natural disasters, weather conditions, and even air quality. Again, the information should be part of a centralized system. Pre-travel and ongoing access to this information ensures knowledge of potential hazards and the ability to take preventative or mitigating action. Such capabilities are still lacking for many organizations. A recent survey showed that nearly half (48 percent) of all corporations fail to conduct full assessments of the destinations of their travelers (Somerville, Gael. “Safety and Financial Issues to Consider When Traveling for business,” Personnel Today, December 1, 2012). However, on the other end of the spectrum, some organizations maintain a comprehensive database of all possible traveler destinations, with specific information related to multiple types of risk, organized at the level of destination city or sub-region.
Traveler education: Merely compiling information about employees and their destinations will not fully minimize risk. Connecting these components by sharing key destination-related information with travelers before and during travel is a crucial step. This information should include relevant travel warnings and alerts issued by governments or other agencies (as related to civil unrest or weather conditions, for example), along with health and safety information (disease-related). The details can be both general and customized to traveler needs as appropriate, such as air quality information for travelers with respiratory conditions, and should include specific, practical tips for handling a range of situations. Moreover, all travelers should be made aware of the resources available to them for travel support, including emergency contact numbers. Such information should also be part of the orientation procedures for employees who travel.
Planning: All the information in this section can be integrated into a travel risk management program to generate thoughtful plans for handling small and large-scale risks. That might mean understanding evacuation routes for a conference event or executing a plan for helping those in large-scale disasters, such as an earthquake, to gain fast access to relief resources.
Monitor
As implied above, it’s important to monitor travel information for status changes for both employees and their destinations. This involves two primary levels of monitoring:
Global: At the aggregate level, it’s important for the travel risk management system to capture where all organizational travelers are at a given time, and to match that information with any incoming alerts, warnings, or ambiguous information about a given region. This type of monitoring helps the organization to quickly understand the number and nature of travelers affected by issues related to security (such as terrorist attacks or communal violence), transportation, weather, disease outbreaks, or other areas, and to effectively communicate this information to the travelers and outside parties as needed.
Individual: At the individual level, organizations need to be capable of monitoring the whereabouts of specific travelers by enabling them to check in frequently or allowing them to opt in for GPS-based tracking as part of a centralized travel risk management system. Individuals also need to be able to report any health or safety issues through the most expedient and reliable means, as wireless phones and Internet connections can be unreliable in many overseas locations. Sharing of this information enables ongoing two way communication with employees about potential risks in real time, as discussed below. Travelers are broadly supportive of such activities: anecdotal evidence suggests the majority of business travelers are comfortable having their location tracked by their mobile device, especially when they are in higher risk areas.
Communicate and Act
The ability to communicate reliably with employees and take necessary action to ensure their safety is a vital component of an effective traveler protection system and one that will likely be scrutinized carefully by legal and regulatory entities, the media, and the public in the context or aftermath of a safety incident. There are two primary modes of communication and action to consider.
Status checks: Ideally, travelers would be automatically prompted to check in when arriving at their destinations, along with updating their location and health status regularly. This enables complete and accurate information for ongoing monitoring.
Incident response: While most travel-related communication should be routine (such as arrival confirmations), communication and actions related to specific safety threats or incidents must be as accurate as possible. In the event of a safety alert (e.g. related to a potential natural disaster), the organization should be able to communicate at both a group and an individual level with all travelers to confirm their whereabouts and status, advise of the threat, help determine the best plan of action, and communicate with emergency contacts (such as next of kin) as needed. The organization should also be able to maintain an archive of all such communications. In the event of an incident, the organization must be able to take mitigating action, including locating injured or deceased travelers, working with local authorities and healthcare facilities to provide protection and care, notifying and maintaining contact with next of kin or travelers’ other emergency contacts, and arranging for transportation of emergency contacts to the incident site or repatriation of the affected individuals. Post-incident follow up of travelers’ statuses are the final component of an effective response system.
Adapt Continuously
The travel risk management program should have a built in component of continuous improvement. That means incorporating new information about destination-related risks, recent incidents, and employee insights/suggestions. Assigning accountability for this kind of continuous improvement and building in regular calls for information from the traveler-focused segment of the organization can yield important enhancements to the program, boosting its effectiveness.
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