About five years ago, Microsoft created an internal carbon tax of sorts. Since then, business units have been responsible for carbon emissions associated with their electricity use and air travel. This year, the company began estimating the carbon footprint of its business travelers’ hotel stays. It will assess whether to include that information in calculations for the carbon… Read More »
Traveler engagement is an area of opportunity, but translating touchy-feely principles for a procurement mindset of compliance and savings is problematic. Many practitioners remain in the earliest stages of a more robust engagement program, studying and planning. According to an Association of Corporate Travel Executives/American Express Global Business Travel September 2016 survey of 254 corporate travel managers, 90… Read More »
Microsoft has avoided “significant disruptions to stakeholders” since deploying in May 2016 a travel management outsource model that pushes the frontier of process over people. While the client continues to “own” strategy and sourcing, American Express Global Business Travel handles day-to-day travel manager tasks previously assigned mainly to travel department contractors. The setup freed Microsoft’s own travel professionals… Read More »
There’s a new player in corporate booking technology. Before the year is out it expects to activate a booking portal for an undisclosed Fortune 10 company. Phase two early next year would bring a proactive artificial intelligence service scanning emails and calendars to present optimal itineraries based on corporate policies. It’s already working with two travel management companies… Read More »
[UPDATE: President Donald Trump announced that the United States would withdraw from the Paris Climate Accord. “But we will start to negotiate,” Trump said in August 2017, “and we will see if we can make a deal that’s fair.”] After decades of hesitation, the business world has embraced climate protection. More companies than ever are taking stock of… Read More »
[UPDATE, Feb. 24, 2016: Microsoft discontinued this project.] [UPDATE, April 10: Concur press statement added.] Microsoft is testing an expense app for iPhones that apparently integrates with Concur. “Nobody likes filing expense reports,” Microsoft wrote on Facebook, mimicking the raison d’être for expense providers like Concur and Expensify. “Each of us has a powerful computer sitting in our… Read More »