Travel Manager Salary & Attitude Survey--Changing Industry Requires Creativity, Affords Visibility

Buffeted by a whirlwind of changes in the methods in which suppliers choose to negotiate and distribute their products, most corporate travel managers during the past 12 months needed to employ a great deal of creativity and ingenuity simply to navigate their programs through the new landscape.

Successfully navigating the minefield of airfare reform, a white-hot hotel market, the continuing maturation of travel technology, the myriad changes in corporate payment supplier structures and offerings and the growing prominence of strategic meetings management theory, however, can offer travel managers the visibility and responsibility within a corporation that, given the level of expenditure involved, few other positions can claim.

Though not many corporate travel managers predicted their industry would expand to the point where corporations will hire more of their peers by 2007—only 20 percent of travel buyer respondents believed this will happen, according to Business Travel News' 2005 Travel Manager Salary & Attitude Survey—many respondents indicated an expectation to advance within their own firms or another.

Much of this optimism likely can be traced to the increasing visibility of travel management as a profession, and those who practice it, among corporate senior executives during the past several years. Even within the past 12 months, almost 49 percent of the survey's travel manager respondents said their senior corporate executives have recognized travel management more.

Additionally, corporate travel managers in 2005 are more likely to report to financial or procurement structures than they were 12 months ago. In this survey, 32 percent and 21 percent of travel managers reported to finance and procurement, respectively, numbers that last year reached only 20 percent and 15 percent.

Between 2002 and 2004, said Carol Devine, outgoing president of the National Business Travel Association and director of strategic sourcing for Fort Worth, Texas-based Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp., 4 percent of NBTA's travel manager members shifted from reporting to administrative or human resources divisions to purchasing or finance departments. This, too, could lead to greater career-development opportunities for travel managers, she said.

"There's a lot of opportunity in sourcing departments, and not only in larger companies," Devine said. "There's more of a career development scenario in procurement than in administration or HR. There are so many functions in procurement and so many more opportunities for advancement. We have many members that are taking on meetings—when you take on additional responsibility, you see higher levels of titles."

Dallas-based Meeting Professionals International president and CEO Colin Rorrie said the effect of the growing impact of procurement philosophies and departments on his association's industry, and the prospects for the professional advancement for its members, will vary. "Some people are light years ahead, others had a lot of uncertainties at first," he said. "In many cases, now, they are partners. Folks in procurement really have helped with standard contracts for protection."

Rorrie said meeting managers and travel managers likely would have different experiences and feel different impacts, from procurement.

"Travel's a much different breed," Rorrie said. "Meetings are highly complex entities and not subject to the same kind of standardization. Meeting professionals can help procurement understand the complexities and both end up helped. You have to understand how you can help each other."

That said, many corporations have asked travel managers to begin to manage corporate meeting planning and strategy, as well—12 percent of travel buyer respondents began managing strategic meeting functions within the past two years and 14 percent expect to by 2007. That, however, is only one change travel managers lately have experienced, and not all of them necessarily offer the opportunity to prove their value to their corporations.

Given the de-emphasis on corporate discounts and institution of fare caps, the airfare reform pioneered earlier this year by Delta Air Lines and matched, in one form or another, by all other major legacy carriers, has reduced in some cases the ability of travel managers to negotiate with carriers for better deals. A booming hotel market has prompted many hoteliers to limit negotiations of many amenities and fees, which also hampers travel managers' ability to prove the quantitative value of their negotiating ability and the cost avoidance inherent in their corporate contracts.

"Certainly, in the past year, there have been a lot of changes, with the new carrier deals and the recovery in the hotel area," Devine said. "Beyond cost savings, however, there are things that travel managers can do to mitigate risk, facilitate corporate policy and prove their value."

Devine specifically pointed to travel managers' potential ability to help ensure data is in compliance with federal Sarbanes-Oxley regulations and, particularly in light of the July 7 terrorist bombings in the subways of London, their ability to track travelers.

"There are a lot of things in the economy that make these positions more valuable, if the travel manager knows and understands the issues," NBTA's Devine said.

Meeting buyers, too, have faced tumultuous times: Hotels are negotiating far less, fare reform has prompted one major carrier—Delta—to eliminate its meetings program, two of the industry's largest technology firms merged, several strategic meetings management schools of thought matured and the convergence of meetings and transient travel management continued.

Navigating these waters, too, is challenging for a given meeting buyer, as is the prospect for career advancement in such a fragmented, complex environment as meetings management.

MPI plans to introduce in January 2006 a suite of online and offline professional-development educational tools and resources, including a gap-analysis tool that would not only measure users' proficiency at basic meeting-planning skills, but also identify areas of expertise users would need to advance to senior-level roles within their organizations.

"It's still an untapped area," said MPI's Rorrie. "We're showing the embodiment of what it takes to elevate the profession. We're identifying what core competencies and bodies of knowledge are necessary. There are 13 skill areas, and meeting planning is only one. Strategic thinking is another. Logistical planning has been important and the foundation of our profession, but it will be an expected part to a senior vice president looking for input at the strategic level."

The ability to advance within a corporation, however, is based on a wide variety of factors, many of which are company- or industry-specific, and though there is a standard set of skills and competencies that most meeting planners who advance within an organization possess, these factors will influence their ability to do so.

"It varies," Rorrie said. "It depends on the industry, where the company is. We're focusing on the pharmaceutical, financial services and technology industries, because they are more advanced in the thinking in this area and use meetings much more than others. However, that will vary by individual company too."