[This article was ghostwritten for Dr. Shantanu Nundy, chief medical officer at Accolade]

At Accolade, we believe everyone deserves access to excellent primary and mental health care. That’s why we’ve launched Accolade Care.  

Leveraging the primary care model at PlushCare, Accolade Care is a solution that makes it easy for your people and their families to get the support they need. We look at physical health and mental wellness from a holistic perspective to obtain optimal outcomes.  

With Accolade Care, we also want to uphold the four pillars we see as necessary in delivering quality primary care: First contact, continuity, comprehensiveness, and coordination.  

In the U.S., only about one-third of Americans have a relationship with a primary physician, which contributes to a lack of having a first point of contact for any health need. Our virtual primary care option is one way we can contribute to providing consistent and ongoing access to a primary care physician. But we don’t stop at virtual-only solutions — we bolster this by helping people schedule in-person visits when they need them to deliver the most rounded primary care solution.  

Continuity is building a long-term relationship with a primary provider; comprehensive care encompasses every aspect of a person’s well-being — the entire spectrum of care, inclusive of preventive or chronic care and a person’s mental health. Coordinated care means that a primary care physician accompanies a person throughout their entire healthcare journey.  

To solve for the shortcomings we see in the current healthcare system, Accolade Care offers an innovative approach to virtual primary and mental health care. Our providers create long-lasting relationships with their patients, supplementing in-person visits and breaking down silos that segment care delivery between physical health and mental wellness.  

Let’s look at what has fueled this demand for virtual care, how Accolade Care is not simply another telemedicine model and why we think a holistic approach to a person’s health is imperative. 

How the impact of COVID-19 boosted demand for virtual care

The pandemic highlighted the existing challenges in our healthcare system, including access to care. I saw this firsthand. As a primary physician at a clinic in Washington, D.C., when COVID was running rampant throughout the country, it didn’t take long to realize that people were putting off primary care and suffering from a host of mental health issues.  

These statistics clearly illustrate the impact the pandemic had on people: 

• 4 in 10 U.S. adults reported that they avoided medical care because of COVID-19. 
• 12% of people avoided urgent or emergency care. 
• 32% avoided routine care. 
• 31% suffered from anxiety and depression symptoms. 
• 26% had trauma-related symptoms. 
• 13% uptick in substance abuse. 
• 11% seriously contemplated suicide. 

Making it more difficult, medical resources, including mental health support were re-allocated to address the pandemic. This meant that a lot of people who wanted care simply had to wait until their provider or specialist was available.  

To solve for this, within weeks my clinic pivoted from being primarily in-person to 80% virtual. When an under-resourced clinic like mine demonstrated it could shift its care offerings due to emergent — and urgent — issues, it became clear to me that we could deliver a vast amount of care virtually and embed this approach into the existing healthcare system.  

We knew this approach could work because we saw people seeking virtual care in record numbers. Nationally, 46% of U.S. consumers used telehealth in the first months of 2020, up from 11% in 2019. What’s also telling is that these virtual visits weren’t only requests for COVID tests or urgent issues, but for primary and mental health care or specialties like physical therapy. 

More than telehealth

It’s important to understand that Accolade Care is not just another telehealth solution. We didn’t want to be hamstrung with telehealth’s current limitations. Traditional telemedicine focuses on urgent or episodic health moments. It also tends to follow the fee-for-service model, which doesn’t build long-term relationships between providers and patients. We know these types of relationships are essential to benefit people’s well-being for the long term and made them a key component of Accolade Care.  

Accolade Care takes a longitudinal approach. Our providers accompany people on their entire healthcare journey and work to establish long-term relationships with them. We also have all health records in one place, so whether a provider is a primary care physician or a mental health specialist, they have a complete view of a person’s entire care needs. 

Building a holistic approach

It’s important to look at healthcare from a holistic perspective. Approaching healthcare in a silo, or treating people in a siloed manner, doesn’t benefit people — or make the system better. Our in-depth approach to primary care focuses on having providers who are well-trained so that they can help people manage everything from diabetes and heart disease to mental health and substance abuse issues.  

Our primary care physicians work closely with our mental health specialists. It’s an expansive view that doesn’t segment care; instead, these primary care providers are astute enough to assess a person’s mental health well-being to know when to bring in a mental health professional to provide the right care.  

We created Accolade Care to deliver a solution that encompassed the entire spectrum of a person’s well-being. This is our holistic approach — it doesn’t parse primary care from mental health wellness. We see this as integral to delivering high-quality healthcare. 

Delivering healthcare equity through access

In the U.S., access to quality healthcare care isn’t equitable. Those living in rural areas are hit particularly hard. It’s estimated that as many as 30 million Americans live more than 60 minutes away from a trauma center. We know that nearly 33% of adults don’t have a primary care provider, and it’s estimated that between 54,000 and 139,000 physicians will be needed by 2033 to address the population’s healthcare needs. 

Demand for mental health specialists is also increasing, especially after COVID. It’s projected that by 2025 there will be a shortage of up to 250,000 mental health providers. The one upside to this is that mental health professionals, who have long been in demand to meet people’s needs, have been using virtual care much longer than other providers. We can learn from the head start these professionals have to further improve access to deliver equitable care to everyone. 

We also have technology on our side. At Accolade we use smart tech and data to provide the best experience possible. Data helps our Care Team get people to the right care at the right time. And our technology makes access easy — people can get the support they need, from anywhere — all it takes is a phone call or a tap on our mobile app.  

A solution to benefit everyone

Accolade Care is yet one more way we are looking to deliver the right care at the right time. It’s a seamless solution that’s easy to access and focuses on a person’s physical and mental well-being. COVID may have highlighted the shortcomings of the healthcare system, but it also gave us the impetus to find new ways to reinvent healthcare.  

Shantanu Nundy, MD, MBA, is a primary care physician, technologist, and business leader who is the chief medical officer at Accolade. He is the author of “Care After COVID: What the Pandemic Revealed Is Broken in Healthcare and How to Reinvent It.”  

A digital-first approach is changing the banking industry — and quickly. All you need to do is look at fintech disruptors like the peer-to-peer payment app Venmo (owned by that other late ‘90s disruptor, PayPal), micro-investment platform Acorns or the fee-free mobile banking app Chime to understand that tech-savvy consumers’ demand is forcing the banking industry to adapt.

Digital transformation has been bandied about for years, but it’s no longer a buzzword and instead is now defining how banks are using technology and modernization to meet their customers’ needs. Consumers are also demanding experiences similar to what Netflix or Amazon offers, a consistent experience across any device, and ease of use. One way to meet this is to adopt a digital banking platform.

Regardless of size, digital transformation is shaking up banking. While large, global banks are often able to invest to quickly scale to what their customers want, community banks and credit unions can be just as competitive in offering products and pricing that consumers want. How? By giving customers the experiences they want, rewarding them with personalized incentives to increase loyalty, and using personalization to meet each customer’s specific need. 

Transform your bank, products and pricing with a digital platform

In order to remain competitive, community banks and credit unions need to adopt an agile model that offers customers the services and experiences they demand.

Most smaller banks haven’t changed their business model much over the years and stuck to an in-person strategy to deliver first-class customer service that built loyalty. In the U.S. there are more than 5,000 credit unions in 2020, a decline of 2.4% since the previous year, and nearly 5,000 community banks, a number that also declined due to asset thresholds. American Banker reports that for these banks to successfully transform and modernize, there are six steps to follow, including adopting a top-down commitment to organizational change and making innovation a priority and part of an organization’s structure. These decisions reside at the top and for a bank to be successful, it needs to be embraced throughout the entire organization. 

Beyond recognizing the need to modernize, a customer-centric approach is essential. In some ways, this is intuitive — community banks have long focused on supporting their customers by investing in organizations or causes they care about, and credit unions operate as nonprofits where customers as members own the bank. In each instance, this gives these banks a unique understanding of who their customers are. What’s trickier is finding out what each customer wants.

Helping these banks better understand what their customers want and allowing them to be nimble in delivering their products, Zafin’s enterprise-wide solutions lets banks determine the products and pricing that meet market and customer demand. 

Zafin lets banks determine who their target audiences are, provide offers to meet demand, and iterate as customers evolve or new consumers enter the market. Our solutions also enable banks to quickly transform lines of business when the landscape shifts. 

For example, when the coronavirus pandemic started, community banks and credit unions were on the front line of helping small businesses navigate through a time of severe economic stress. For a community bank to be able to quickly — and positively — react to unpredictable situations is an essential way to foster customer loyalty and give customers what they want, when they need it most. 

On top of this, a recent Zafin survey showed that during the pandemic 80% said that online and mobile banking is making it easier for them. This adoption rate is projected to increase — the growing Gen Z segment, many of who are under the age of 10 and have yet to establish a relationship with a bank but are digital natives, further emphasizes why digital innovation and personalized experiences will help banks gain more customers in the future. A move to a digital banking platform is not just a solution for now, but the future as well. 

“It’s widely known that the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the use of digital banking tools,” Alexandra Roddy, Zafin CMO and EVP, said. “The biggest takeaway, however, is that many banks have not been prepared to match consumers’ desire for a more personalized banking experience because of their outdated legacy systems. [Our] survey shows expectations have changed, and banks now have a massive opportunity to re-evaluate how the systems they have in place may be holding them back from the modernization they know their customers want and need.”

What differentiates Zafin is that our solutions can scale to specific product delivery needs, get these products to market quickly, and use personalization technology for a customer-centric experience. This allows banks to be nimble and cost-effective when innovating to give their customers what they want, when they want it and whether it’s a situation that’s anticipated or not.

Giving customers what they want

The rise of fintechs has shown how customization of products and services can match user demands. Zafin’s solutions make it easy for banks to do the same. Beyond the need to pivot quickly because of coronavirus, our survey went more in-depth to find what consumers want. Here are some highlights:

• 88% want their banks to provide them with relevant recommendations, but 41% say their current bank doesn’t offer them what they’re looking for
• 86% of millennials said if they received rewards to help them meet their financial goals, whether it’s saving for a down payment on a house or reducing debt, they would expand their current relationship with a bank or move to one that offers such incentives
• Online banking is the most important factor when Gen Z and millennials choose a bank while those near or at retirement age look for low fees
• Nearly 8% of Gen Z does not use a bank. Banks with the foresight to prepare now for this next digitally native generation will be in a good position to establish long-term relationships. (And let’s not forget this generation comprises 68 million people in the U.S. alone.)

Every generation wants to get all the services they need from a single bank. With Zafin’s segmentation targeting and personalization technology, it’s easy for banks to identify — and meet — this demand.

Your bottom line

Time is money. That’s why Zafin’s implementation is fast, meaning that you can move your product and pricing offers quickly to the market and reap the benefits.

We’ve created an 8-step process to get you up and running quickly. Starting with an assessment, we work with you to develop a plan that fits your unique needs. We provide training, configure solutions that work for you, and test and iterate so that you can meet your goals. 

Our goal is to help your product managers get your products to market quickly and have the capabilities at hand to identify, customize and adjust to any changes in the market or consumer demand. The Zafin solution also seamlessly integrates with legacy tech stacks.

At Zafin, we’re with you every step of the way. Our suite of solutions includes easy-to-use dashboards to help you segment and target specific audiences of any size, monitor and measure, and streamline compliance by consolidating product and regulatory information into a centralized repository. 

At Egencia, we take travel seriously. We don’t play games or tell travel managers to dangle carrots in front of their business travelers to get them to comply with policy. Instead, we provide a single, easy-to-use corporate travel platform that will help your business save time and money — no gimmicks needed.

Let’s face it — money matters to every business and time is valuable. Whether you’re a global organization or a small or medium-sized business, with our business travel technology you can build and monitor a travel program that eliminates guesswork. Our platform meets your specific needs when it comes to travel spend, expenses, and compliance. You can save time with up-to-date reports, streamline travel expense processing, and easily book travel from any device.  

Here are 19 ways we can help you save time and money:

1. Negotiate the best business trip rates

We offer a huge supply of travel options, with exclusive, preferred rates, across the globe. How do we do this? As part of Expedia Group, we have extensive scale when it comes to what we can offer. Whether you’re booking travel in one region or worldwide, we can accommodate complex travel programs or offer solutions for your specific business needs. And you don’t need to worry about having suppliers in every region where your travelers need to go — our supply is open to all of our customers.

As a bonus, the variety of travel options aren’t limited to hotels, so your travelers can choose from a wide selection of air, car rental, and rail. Our technology surfaces the most relevant content — meaning that you, and your travelers, save time. No more sorting through endless lists of irrelevant travel options or multiple booking tools — you save time and keep business travelers happy with choices that matter to them.

2.  Boost travel policy compliance

We’ll help you structure a managed travel program that achieves compliance. Think of the time you’ll save if you don’t have to chase down travelers that go rogue. And think of the travel spend you can save if you have a travel policy that makes it easy for travelers to stay in compliance. On top of that, you can control costs even more by setting spending caps in your policy, making saving money and compliance a breeze. 

In our experience, we’ve found that if travelers can use a clear, easy-to-understand corporate travel policy that suits their travel needs, they’re likely to be happier. Traveler satisfaction can help you retain highly valued road warriors or it can be touted as one of your company’s benefits when speaking with potential employees.

4. Airfare savings

Savings Finder for Air constantly searches for lower-cost flights and alerts you when savings are found. How much can you save? We’ve been able to deliver average savings of $170 per plane ticket in the US and an average of $660 in EMEA and APAC. 

5. Save money on hotels

Beyond saving money on airfare, you can also realize more savings when it comes to hotels. We always provide you with the best preferred rates, and our Air and Hotel packages help you save even more when you book flights and hotel rooms within 10 days. What’s even better is that these savings are surfaced to you — there’s no need to hunt and peck to cobble together the most cost-effective package for your travelers. 

The savings don’t stop there. Our Savings Finder for Hotel eliminates the frustration of seeing room rates drop after you book. Using machine learning (ML) to search for price drops, we’re always on the lookout for ways to save you money. If we find a rate that’s at least $10 less than your original booking, we’ll automatically book the lower rate for you — you don’t need to lift a finger — and we’ve been able to save our customers an average of $37. We also know that things can change at the last minute, and that’s why you can save up to 70 percent on last-minute bookings with the Egencia mobile app.

6. Simplify the browsing experience

Technology is in our DNA. It’s been the driver of everything we’ve built, and we constantly iterate and innovate to deliver the best single business travel platform to you.

We’d like to introduce you to Smart Mix, which uses ML to provide you the best hotel and air sort for your business. What does this mean for booking flights and hotels? You’ll get the most options that meet your policy, with personalized choices and rates surfaced to the top.

How do we do this? Essentially, with ML, we train artificial intelligence (AI) to find patterns in our data. We have billions and billions of bytes of data, and what AI does is find repeated data points that wouldn’t be obvious to humans who can’t process that much data quickly. This makes the entire travel management system more predictive and action oriented.

With this technology, we can give you what you want as your first choice — that’s the power of ML and AI. For example, let’s say you have a bi-annual event every year, one in Berlin and one in San Francisco. Our ML knows what hotel chains, flight times, and ground transportation options your travelers prefer, so those results are what you see first.  

7. Connect with your hotel — before check-in

When your travelers are on the road, time is of the essence. Between getting to the airport and catching a flight or a connection, the last thing they need is to try to figure out how to get to their hotel, grab a bite to eat, or log on to Wi-Fi in their room. Hotel Conversations lets business travelers speak directly to the hotel, so they can find out if there’s a shuttle at the airport, if the hotel has a restaurant, and if Wi-Fi login information will be in their room when they arrive.

8. Drive online booking adoption

With an online adoption rate of more than 90 percent, we return productivity to you through our intuitive booking platform that’s easily accessible from any device.  

9. Travelers get help when they need it, wherever they are

It’s a given that when people are on the road, things don’t always go as planned. We’re here to help your travelers with always-on customer service, 24/7 every day of the year. The mobile app features AssistMe with callback functionality and our highly trained consultants can help with complex travel itineraries. We also offer native language support with customer support teams that speak more than 30 languages.

10. Monitor your travel spend

The value of ongoing and consistent reporting is important to anyone managing a travel program. The Egencia Analytics Studio is an easy-to-use data visualization tool that lets you constantly monitor your business travel budget and keep a close eye on your spend. It’s easy to zero in on what your travel spend is, day-to-day, month-to-month or year-over-year. You can gain insights on how you can save money and look at spending trends to analyze and implement in your program.

11. Find your travelers, wherever they are

Taking care of your travelers is important to you, them, and your business. Ensuring your travelers are safe also helps your bottom line. In the event you need to quickly locate your travelers, Traveler Tracker lets you search by city or a specific region on a map. Whether it’s a weather system that could disrupt travel plans or a rail workers’ strike, finding and alerting your business travelers to any potential impacts is at your fingertips. And if you need to find out where your travelers have been, you can also take a rearview 30-day look at their travel. 

12. Alert business travelers

We help your business travelers stay one step ahead of any travel changes or last-minute updates with flight alerts, so you don’t have to. Your travelers also have the option to use Online Air Exchange, a platform feature that allows them to change flights on the web or in the app, with instant visibility to any changes in fares or penalties. 

13. Integrate with HR and expense systems

We make it easy to adopt a travel management program, which means you can save time and money. Simply set up your travel policy and integrate it with HR and your expense system with a few clicks. Your travel program dashboard will provide you a complete view of your company’s savings, spend, and travel trends.

14. Manage business travel expenses

Managing travel expenses across multiple credit card receipts and reconciling accounts can be time-consuming and tedious. We offer streamlined, end-to-end expense processing with multiple providers to free up your time and your travelers’.

15. Save in bulk

Group Trip is a collaboration platform feature that saves time by alerting a specific number of people simultaneously instead of creating a back-and-forth email chain. It’s easy to view and book similar flight times and hotels and track group arrival times for coordinated (and cost-saving) ground transportation.

16. Streamline approvals

Out of the office and need to modify or make travel arrangements? With just one tap, trips are approved with Arranger Mode.

17. Hire expert help

Let our travel management consultants provide expert advice and help you assess your travel program to find potential savings, streamline operations, suggest ways you can make your travel program more sustainable, and manage your hotel RFP program.

18. Save with value-added partnerships

We go way beyond booking and offer services you and your travelers need the most on the road. The Egencia Advantage program is a one-stop shop that provides access to AirHelp, insurance, visa services, and more.

19. Get the best rates

Optimize your travel program and fine tune your policy by finding hidden savings. It can be appealing to cut back on travel by simply curbing spend, but there are smarter ways to save. 

With Egencia Analytics Studio, you can analyze your travel data and find saving opportunities with our Benchmarking dashboard. The Benchmarking dashboard lets you look at hotel destinations by spend, negotiate rates with hotels that meet your eco-friendly goals and look at top airline routes. You can also measure your travel spend against that of similarly sized companies. Armed with this data, you can approach suppliers with confidence to renegotiate rates.

Travel expenses are part of the cost of doing business, and it can be challenging to navigate the business travel landscape on your own. At Egencia, we’re a travel management company that makes sure you get the most out of your investment. We have all the travel spend management services and support you need to determine how to realize corporate travel savings during times of crisis or how to optimize your travel management program.

No matter what industry you’re in, every aspect of your business requires planning, organizing, and analysis. One of these aspects is business travel — and that involves a lot more than booking. From logistics and travel spend to tracking your travelers and monitoring travel expenses, a lot goes into creating a successful corporate travel program.

The advantages of having a managed business travel program are extensive. Beyond tracking and managing your travel spend, a well-executed program also helps you ensure your business travelers are safe, provides them with personalized travel options, and empowers travelers to book and update their travel at their desk or on the go in the mobile app. A managed program should also give you the technology you need to gain in-depth data insights so that you can optimize your program to increase compliance, find new savings opportunities, save time, and more.

What are the benefits of a managed business travel program?

Travel programs are beneficial to businesses of all sizes. A growing business needs a travel management company (TMC) that will support its corporate travel program so they can scale and evolve. A global organization needs a business travel management solution that can be tailored for each region where they conduct business so that local requirements and travel options are centralized and easy to find. This also means each area can be measured for compliance, costs, spending caps, and more.

At Egencia, we help corporate travel managers in a number of ways, including:

• Providing tools to create a travel policy that meets the business’ ROI goals by monitoring and forecasting travel spend. A well-crafted policy also helps you increase compliance — and when compliance goes up, costs go down.
• Savings opportunities at 35,000 hotels with Egencia Preferred Rates. Last-minute mobile-only deals that can save you up to 70 percent and access to an extensive travel inventory from Expedia Group to find the options that fit your travel budget.
• Optimization reporting from Egencia Analytics Studio to find more savings. The Benchmarking dashboard lets you measure your spend against other, similarly sized businesses to use this data to negotiate better hotel and airfare rates.
• Data visualization dashboards make it easy to pull reports on your most traveled routes by individuals or groups, find your CO2 footprint, and understand the impact of global travel situations like COVID-19.

Need help building a travel policy? Use our free guide.

How do travel management software and technology help?

When it comes to managing travel, technology matters. This holds true as much in the workplace today as it does in your personal life. Booking business trips should be as frictionless as booking a vacation. We understand this — Egencia was the original innovator in digital corporate travel. We built and own the technology we use for business travel management, allowing us to innovate quickly and deliver a complete and seamless end-to-end travel experience that delights travelers and travel managers.

Egencia meets all your travel needs to help you create and manage a successful corporate travel program. Easily manage traveler profiles, payment options and travel policies, or use risk management tools like Egencia Traveler Tracker to help you locate business travelers in case of an emergency. With everything in one place, it also makes approving and travel booking processes simple — there’s no need for multiple online booking tools or complicated approvals. And you can make booking, company policy updates and approvals from wherever you are, across any device.

Travelers on the road will get alerts in real-time if anything that could disrupt their travel happens. If they need help, they can use Egencia AssistMe and get a call back within a few minutes. Our expert travel consultants use the same tools as travelers and arrangers so they can view any traveler’s complete itinerary to resolve any issue and get them back on the road as soon as possible. These experts provide support around the clock, every day of the year, online or off.

What role does travel data play?

An abundance of business travel data from Egencia and Expedia Group fuels our technology; machine learning uses what we know about corporate travel policies, booking histories, property preferences, travel industry benchmarks, and a host of other information to create compelling, relevant travel choices. Travelers can find in-policy options at the top of their search, making policy compliance easy, encouraging traveler satisfaction, and keeping travel costs under control.

As part of Expedia Group, we can deliver the benefit of having the same choices and prices your travelers would get on Expedia.com or Hotels.com alongside specifically negotiated corporate rates corporate. Egencia Preferred Rates offer your travelers better value flights and hotel stays with exclusive rates that aren’t available to other TMCs and include amenities like flexible cancellations, breakfast, and Wi-Fi.

Corporate travel management from Egencia

Travel management services should help you gain efficiency in your travel program, save time and money, take care of your travelers, get around-the-clock customer support, and provide you with actionable data.

At Egencia, we’re always here for our customers, from onboarding to helping them navigate travel disruptions. Find out how corporate travel expertise from Egencia can help you have a successful travel program.

• An insider’s guide to business travel management
• Travel culture: Your competitive advantage in a global market
• Business travel management in a time of crisis
• Why a TMC is vital for savings
• ROI and digital transformation in business travel
• How to protect your travel culture during a recession
• The essential checklist for business travel savings
• A toolkit to redesign your business travel program post COVID-19
• A modern take on business travel procurement
• Simplifying complex travel programs

Company: Kaspersky

Industry: Cybersecurity

Kaspersky, a global cybersecurity company, struggled with consistent definition and enforcement of its corporate travel policies. The Egencia travel management platform and online resource center enabled Kaspersky to gain increased global and regional policy compliance as well as better communication and consistency in its travel program.

Kaspersky is one of the world’s pre-eminent cybersecurity companies and its travel managers oversee a corporate travel program of significant scope. The international company has more than 30 offices globally and supports more than 400 million users with 270,000 corporate clients.

Managing a global ecosystem of this scale means that many Kaspersky employees are frequently traveling internationally. This includes people from the company’s Moscow headquarters who need to go to North and South America, Africa, Asia, and Europe. Employees at numerous local offices must also travel regionally and internationally to support the company’s far-flung operations.

Challenge: Achieving consistency in policy compliance

Kaspersky’s corporate travel program is based on two levels of policy. Global policy affects everyone in the company and sets the maximum limits for travel, accommodation, and per diems. It defines what’s reimbursed and what isn’t, who can and can’t book business class airfares, and so forth.

The second level of travel policy focuses on regional or local policies that are defined for specific regions and countries. These policies reflect regional nuances and specifics and take into consideration cultural differences in various parts of the world. Local policies also include local legal and financial compliance. The local travel policies can be seen as more rigid than the global policy since none of those policies can conflict with the global policy. For example, if the global policy states that something isn’t allowed, then the local policy can’t allow it either.

“One of our main motivations for this dual global/local approach is to create a fair environment, where everyone feels as if they are being treated the same way,” Irina Kostyukova, head of business travel at Kaspersky said.

“We also want to keep compliance high, which is only realistic if policies are flexible to address local needs. If we didn’t have a global policy, local policies could go separate ways — it would be chaos. On the other hand, if we had just a global one, we could not cover all the specific local requirements. From my perspective, a multinational company needs both types of policies.”

The challenge Kaspersky faced was one of consistency in policy definition and enforcement. Kostyukova’s goal was for the travel policies to be clear, realistic, and simple to follow. All employees of a multinational company should (in an ideal situation) get the same experience and level of service when it comes to business travel. But this wasn’t easily accomplished when the company first set out to implement its travel policies. Compliance was an issue, which became a source of frustration for Kostyukova.

“If two employees from different countries are checking into a hotel and see that their stays are booked at different rates, this can cause all sorts of problems from a policy compliance perspective,” she said.

“Similarly, if one of them can pay for their stay using a corporate card while the second one has to pay with his personal credit card, you will have trouble. The second traveler might just avoid booking the corporate rate next time.”

The issue of consistency comprised a number of related challenges. One problematic area for Kaspersky was travel-related communication and education. The company’s employees often didn’t know the details of policies or had forgotten them. Maintaining a consistent travel policy also relies on good relationships with travel managers in the other regions.

“It is very important, nearly imperative, to keep open, full communication with travel managers in different regions,” Kostyukova said. “This ensures that we are all working together to provide the safest and the best quality service for our travelers. We have to discuss different new ideas and the ways to handle problematic situations.”

Solution: Increased compliance with clear communication of travel policies

To achieve travel policy consistency — along with the business outcomes provided by such consistency — Kaspersky built an intranet portal that contained its global travel policy information so that travelers could find the information they needed to stay complaint. When it came to building a robust international travel program, Kaspersky was able to use our platform to implement the specifics they needed in their travel policy to meet their needs on a global and regional basis.

The Kaspersky travel program now enables its employees to book travel and easily stay in policy. It’s able to answer virtually all travel-related questions. If a traveler doesn’t know how to book a trip, or a part of a trip, the internal knowledge base gives them the answers they need.

The platform is tuned for local travel. For instance, based on Kaspersky’s requirements, travelers in a particular region see specific hotel chains or regional air carriers available for their trips. There’s also global transparency — using the intranet portal a traveler from one country can see how it works in another — and that “creates a sense of community,” Kostyukova said.

Results

Now, Kaspersky travelers have the same booking experience wherever they’re located, regardless of destination. “This is important, not just for the booking experience, it’s important for the whole travel experience,” Kostyukova said. 

Our platform has delivered a number of additional benefits to Kaspersky. These include more combined air and hotel approval requests, which reflects an increase in compliance as more travelers are booking hotels according to global and local policies.

The platform has also enabled Kostyukova’s team to consolidate travel vendors. “When it comes to our business travel program, minimalism is the key,” she said. “We should have as few service providers as possible, for air, hotels, taxi, payment solutions, and so forth.”

This makes it possible for the company to get the best rates and keep things simple and consistent for their travelers. It’s also easier to establish standard levels of service across the world and troubleshoot issues if they arise.

Data is a common thread across the Kaspersky platform experience. “I’m fan of data,” Kostyukova said. “I love to work with it. I love seeing how figures can show what is happening, where we are going, what the trends are. I use it to generate different types of reports like compliance reports, global travel reviews, and more. This data is a great support for me.”

Working with Egencia, Kaspersky has been able to develop and implement a travel program that addresses its need for policy consistency.