Don Draves
Like an increasing number of his peers, Miller Brewing Co. corporate services manager Don Draves is balancing travel with a full plate of other responsibilities that range from dining and catering to mail, graphics, printing, shipping and receiving. He also manages the employee store for the second largest U.S. brewer, with seven breweries, 12 sales offices and more than 800 travelers a month. At least half his time is spent on travel, and increasingly meetings. Draves spoke with Management.travelabout key initiatives this year and his run for president of the National Business Travel Association. An excerpt follows. [ An interview with his opponent, Kevin Maguire, ran in sibling publication The Transnationalon May 2. Maguire has since left Applied Materials to become director of travel for The Expedition Development Company Inc. in Austin.]
During your tenure at Miller Brewing Co., ownership has shifted from Philip Morris to SABMiller, a London-based company formed by SAB of Johannesburg. How has travel management changed?
Our travel has always been primarily domestic, but since SABMiller was created, international travel for us has picked up to key cities, like London, Johannesburg and certain parts of Europe. About 8 percent of our travel is international. I don't have a lot of interaction with SABMiller from a global standpoint, but I work more with my own procurement department now.
What are your primary objectives in travel management at Miller Brewing this year?
There's quite a bit going on. Globalization is on the radar (at SABMiller), but I would like to make a global travel council go forward. There is no SAB travel management council, but that is a personal objective that I have been working toward. It's a great way to share best practices, consolidate suppliers--all the things that you know we should be doing as travel managers. I pretty much cut my teeth on the Philip Morris travel council, learning how all these pieces come together very effectively. I've also been working with our legal department, sales and marketing, learning and development, and procurement on a meetings policy. We've had a travel policy since the late 1980s, but we didn't have a meetings policy. Our meetings program is very diversified. We had a contract with American Express for business travel, and for our meetings portion we had a contract with Carlson Wagonlit. Learning and development, and sales and marketing also ran all the meetings. But we had a problem collecting all the data to do all the things we needed to do, so we rebid. American Express won the contract for the combined meeting and transient travel. Others also plan meetings. There's a portion still out there that we call "all other" that I still need to get my teeth around. To me, it's the most squiggly, squishy piece. When we rebid, I also changed the online booking tools, so now I have classes and webinars on the new online booking tool. Adoption rates are rising nicely, I must say, but I need to put continued pressure on for that. Just typical stuff to run a cost-effective travel program: increase online adoption, address meetings and enhance our expense reporting software.
Why did you decide to run for NBTA president?
I've been a member of NBTA since 1986 and I've always been impressed with the organization, with the hundreds of professionals--the allieds and directs that had so much knowledge about the industry. I have some management skills that I could bring to the office and some business acumen. I'm responsible for all these departments--13 direct reports and millions of dollars in budgets--so I figure I've got the experience to manage a complex organization and NBTA certainly is that. I think I have the credentials and as I outlined in my platform, there are seven key things that I feel very strongly that NBTA can do, should do. Those are the things that I want to get my arms around and make sure NBTA doesn't lose focus on any of those things.
Your platform includes ensuring that educational programs remain relevant and also references sustainability issues. What are you proposing?
Actually, NBTA has done a great job with educational programs. Every year we see more and more different sessions. But what's really important is to keep on leading-edge issues out there, giving our membership and member companies an awareness of them. Also, we need to keep a watchful eye on programs that may have lost their relevance. The big thing in my mind when we have people come to [the annual summer] conference, is that there are people from small, medium and large companies. We have to make sure there's a balance, providing the right sessions that fit well with all these different size companies, and with members who are new members and seasoned professionals like myself. The green issues in the United States have not had the visibility they had overseas. The first thing we can do is make our members aware of the environmental issues and how they can impact and influence them within their companies and maybe their personal lives. We have not been a good custodian. Perhaps through NBTA communications and initiatives we can let NBTA members know how to better influence these green issues. It can be as simple as travel managers telling travelers to consider the green issues of washing sheets and towels.
You are a founding member of the Wisconsin Business Travel Association. Do you feel that NBTA provides enough support for its chapters today?
Actually, I don't. Chapters are near and dear to my heart. NBTA has a great board of directors and staff. What I would like to see is more interaction between the board of directors and key staff going out to the chapters. When someone from NBTA comes to a local chapter, they are like celebrities; they ignite the enthusiasm of members. That draws a cohesiveness and sense of connection with the national [organization] so you can connect the dots. That is very important.