PROFILE New Priorities Changed Focus, But Not Goals

What modified essentially the most, from pre-pandemic to now, in your position?

I’ve been with TTEC for greater than eight years. I used to be in finance in a pricing position beforehand, and the yr I took over the journey supervisor position, the pandemic began. I had not managed journey previous to the pandemic.

For managing journey, it was principally like the corporate was managing assets, ensuring that we don’t overspend, managing spend, managing security. Now  [travel management] shifted to being a precedence. So we’re not as involved concerning the volumes of journey, and we’re not as involved about traveler satisfaction. We’re extra involved about how protected they’re and that they’re compliant, so we will monitor spend we will ensure that every part’s going [well]. This has grow to be a No. 1 objective in my world a minimum of.

Is that this elevated stage of enforcement coming from the highest?

Sure. It comes from the C-suite. And the opposite a part of it’s that in the course of the pandemic when journey stopped they realized how a lot cash they have been saving by folks not touring. In order that was like very candy sweet, no person desires to offer that up. They do notice that face-to-face interplay is essential, however they nonetheless push this trade-off. Like, “how many individuals [do you] suppose must journey?”

How are the vacationers themselves reacting to this?

It will depend on their persona. Some individuals are like, OK, I haven’t traveled, so I don’t must I don’t must, however some individuals are so wanting to journey. They’re pushing for face-to-face interplay, and that is how they know find out how to do enterprise. So you’ll be able to’t actually inform them to do it in another way.

Has TTEC’s construction round journey modified? Your division studies to procurement, proper?

Sure, it has modified. The TTEC journey division was a part of procurement beforehand, then sooner or later it turned a self-standing division reporting to authorized counsel. Then from authorized counsel, it [moved to] enterprise companies. And now, we’re again in procurement reporting on to the CFO. It’s been form of thrown round a bit.

Does which have any impact on the way you handle issues, by way of your house within the group? Are you going to be assessed in the identical means?

Not likely. The targets are the identical, however priorities can change, the main target can change, and there may be form of a special lens to take a look at issues now, however apart from that, no, all of the targets are the identical.

Do you end up coping with different departments extra? Are folks Throughout TTEC in search of different issues from you?

Individuals attain out for data, particularly within the pandemic. Even the restricted quantity of people that have been touring would attain out for data, like what documentation they want. However now now we have nearer ties with the human assets division and with safety and security—the people who find themselves this companywide. Apart from that, it’s nonetheless the identical.

What are you holding your eyes on by way of potential challenges over the subsequent 12 months?

If the enterprise is de facto going to return to enterprise as normal, and other people come again to carry out their roles as they’d been doing it beforehand, or if it’s going to rework into one thing new as a result of executives are pushing to chop prices on journey. At this level it’s nonetheless unsure and it’s nonetheless form of forming. There are lots of departments and completely different guidelines. I feel for some departments it would fully rework to digital interactions, and for different departments, it would keep because it was beforehand.

Given that you simply got here up exterior journey after which got here into it, is there a risk if journey cutbacks proceed, they may redeploy you into a special side of the group?

It’s attainable. Coming from finance, from pricing, I’m well-equipped on the reporting facet and information facet as an analyst. So I used to be taking part in every kind of different initiatives and dealing with different departments earlier than. If the corporate decides to outsource [travel management], it’ll be fantastic.