IBTA Appointment Sparks Debate Over Future Path
<B> IBTA Appointment Sparks Debate Over Future Path</B>
By Amon Cohen
<I>Helsinki</I> - The International Business Travel Association has taken the controversial step of appointing a non-travel manager as its president. Glyn Farrell, an account manager with Gray Dawes Business Travel Management in London, was elected to the position on May 26 at a meeting of 12 national association leaders and allied council chairman Lou Maripolsky of Continental Airlines here at the association's annual congress.
The move was not endorsed unanimously. The National Business Travel Association and the Institute of Travel Management of the United Kingdom and Ireland are unhappy with the move. They believe IBTA is losing its major points of differentiation with the Association of Corporate Travel Executives, which has rapidly overtaken it in recent years as an organization of global stature. The Americans and British have even made veiled threats that they will find an alternative to IBTA if their grievances are not addressed.
Outgoing IBTA president Germain Birgen told the congress that the national leaders had voted to allow non-travel managers to hold the posts of president and vice president for the first time, and that Farrell had been duly elected for three years, with Dutch travel manager Ilja Dales as his vice president. Birgen said the policy change was made because "we need very professional people to lead the organization and to represent us to the outside world."
Privately, IBTA leaders told BTN that Farrell's election was a question of expediency rather than a change in philosophy, as no travel managers of sufficient credibility could be found to take on the presidency. Farrell is not only a former travel manager but also Birgen's predecessor as president. He served for 18 months until October 1997, when he was forced to step down after quitting Lloyds Bank, where he had worked for 24 years.
Despite the pragmatic reasons for changing the rules and appointing Farrell, the moves were voted against by the Australian Business Travel Association, while NBTA and ITM abstained. Although firmly against the idea, NBTA and ITM abstained as a matter of protocol, since all national leader decisions are supposed to be unanimous.
"As a representative of an organization that has worked hard in recent years to identify who its members are, I was not in a position to endorse the appointment of a non-travel manager and I will have to discuss this with the ITM board of directors," said ITM chairman Ian Hall. In mitigation, Hall pointed out that decision making within IBTA remains in the hands of the 12 national leaders, who are all travel managers, with only one allied (i.e., non-travel manager) member having voting rights.
NBTA executive director Norm Sherlock said the organization abstained from the vote because there had not been sufficient notice of a change in bylaws. "In our organization, you have to provide ample time and explanation of any bylaw changes, so we would know no less than 30 to 60 days before asked to vote," he said. "We think procedurally they should have given us more time."
Sherlock said NBTA has taken a "wait and see attitude" as to how everything will work. "We have yet to see what Glyn Farrell's leadership agenda is, and we would like to see that before we move forward on any judgments," Sherlock said.
While Sherlock would not comment about IBTA's decision to appoint a non-travel manager to its helm, he did note that it is NBTA policy to have a travel manager as its president, "because the organization was formulated with the clear objective of promoting travel management interests. That has been the case since our beginning in 1968."
Nevertheless, those who did not back the decision made it clear that they wish IBTA to remain first and foremost for travel managers, and that it needs to differentiate itself from ACTE. Originally, membership was open to travel managers only, but in recent years IBTA and its member national associations have allowed first suppliers and then agents to join.
Some delegates expressed their belief that IBTA is on an inexorable path towards merging with ACTE. This belief has been fueled by several recent clashes in dates between the two associations, with the Helsinki meeting coinciding with ACTE XI in Washington, D.C. Furthermore, IBTA announced the launch of a series of European regional educational forums, similar to those pioneered by ACTE in recent years. The first will take place in Belgium this fall.
Asked whether unhappiness with IBTA's new direction would prompt the ITM to quit, Hall said: "We are a small organization operating in a global arena and it is therefore important for us to be part of an appropriate organization." However, he added, "ITM is very committed to IBTA. Next year's conference (where IBTA and NBTA are both to piggyback on ITM's annual conference in London next March) is an example of that."
When asked if there is a possibility that NBTA will no longer be involved with IBTA, Sherlock said, "I haven't been asked to cross that bridge by anyone in the formal sense, and I am not speculating on anything in the future. We would like to see a strong IBTA."
Farrell sought to defuse the row by pointing out that his powers as president of the board of IBTA would be limited. "The best analogy to make is with a public company," he said. "I am an executive on the board of directors, but the national leaders are the shareholders and they have the power."
Farrell said he will be talking to ACTE about avoiding future date clashes and denied IBTA was in danger of losing its differentiation. "ACTE is more supplier-oriented, whereas IBTA is 50-50," he said. "We also have a lot more travel managers from smaller companies as well as from multinational companies. We need to look after those small companies and be a voice for them."
His agenda for the next three years includes improving educational opportunities for members plus restructuring the funding of IBTA and finding more countries to join the association, he said.