# 4 Stakeholder Satisfaction

Metric Type                                                      Level
     SAVINGS: No                                                  MASTER
     SERVICE: Yes                                               ADVANCED
     SAFETY: No                                                    BASIC
     SUSTAINABILITY: No

Description
Simply put, corporate travel is in the customer-service business. If people do not like the service, they will push back, sandbag, complain, and work against the other goals of the program. It won't matter how much your program is saving if all senior management hears are complaints and criticism of the program. Employing and maintaining a structured set of satisfaction metrics enables you to a) get ahead of service issues before they blow up, b) communicate real results company-wide that minimize the impact of one-off anecdotes about horrible service, and c) show value to the company beyond simple spend-and-savings statistics.

To get started, all you need to do this are three questions and a survey tool (many online options to choose from). 

1. How well does the company's travel program suits your needs as a business traveler and/or arranger of business travel? Rate your satisfaction on a scale of 1 (Not At All) to 100 (Perfectly).
2. What do you think the travel program does particularly well? [Comment Box]
3. What do you think the travel program could do better? [Comment Box]

Why These Three Questions
The first question provides you with a benchmark score to compare over time. The following two questions are where you find out what people really think about the program. Simply read all the comments, categorize them based on what the comments relate to (e.g. the agency, the online tool, airline, etc.), and you have all the information you need to improve the perception of the program. 


After That
Asking questions is the easy part. However, it is critical that once the survey is complete that you quickly perform the following tasks. 

• Address any comments that require immediate attention (whether because of the timeliness of the complaint or the importance of the respondent). 
• Next, review the results and the comments with the agency, the front-line agents, concerned travel suppliers, and other relevant parties. 
• Draft action plans to address any significant and/or frequently cited concerns.
• Publish a summary of the responses. Highlight the overall satisfaction score, note some of the positive comments received, and share a high-level summary of the action plan to address some of the common complaints or opportunities for improvement. This summary should be published no later than 1 month after the end of the survey period. 

It's been said that one of the best ways to demoralize a group of people is to hang out a suggestion box and to ignore it. Think of the surveys as a periodic suggestion box. Once people see you are listening to them, engagement and satisfaction increases. 


Whose Satisfaction Are We Measuring?
Certainly the travelers and travel arrangers. You should do this at least twice a year, and as frequently as once a quarter if you can. You can get a list of who traveled and/or who booked trips during the time period since your last survey. 

Department/line managers who have significant numbers of travelers should be surveyed twice a year. For them, modify the first question to "How well does the company's travel program support your department/line of business?" or something similar to change the focus from the individual to the department. The other two questions stay the same.

Senior/executive management should be surveyed once a year. Again, simply adjust the first question to focus more on the company overall rather than an individual or a department. 

Suppliers with whom you have contracts and/or a lot of business should be surveyed at least once a year. For them, the focus is on how your company is perceived as a client and the ways in which you can improve your relationship to better serve both entities. 


What about Other Questions
When designing surveys, people tend to get question-happy--piling on question after question to try to learn everything about everything--seemingly afraid that they'll never get another chance to ask a question.

You can certainly add a couple of questions to the Basic Three. Here  are a couple you might consider:

• For the traveler/arranger survey, ask whether they felt they were quoted the lowest logical fare when making reservations (whether or not they took it). There is a strong correlation between low fare perception and overall satisfaction. Sometimes it's real, but sometimes the respondent doesn't take into account how the firm's travel policy affects what fares are offered.
• Consider having your agents add this to their script: "The lowest fare, based on the company's travel policy, is $650. However, there are fares between these two cities that can run as low as $250, but you would need to be flexible with your times or dates. Do you want me to investigate those for you?"  A few will actually work with the agent to look for a lower fare, but the majority will simply gain a better perception of the low fare performance of the agency--in turn improving overall satisfaction rates. 
• You may also wish to differentiate between satisfaction with the live travel agents and the online booking tool (if you employ one). The variance between these two modes of reservation can be stark. 

What you want to avoid when adding questions are those whose answers do not inform actions. For example, I've run across surveys that ask "Do you find the agents friendly, knowledgeable, and professional?" The results show that 67% of respondents do. What next? Does this mean that the agents are friendly and professional but not knowledgeable? Or some other combination? Do one-third of the respondents simply not like the agents? You can't tell from the way the question was phrased. This is the inverse of the old maxim which in case says:  If you can't manage it, do not bother measuring it.

Usage
The first question is used to evaluate, over time, changes in the perception of the travel program from a range of stakeholders. The others are used to inform your short-term action plans to improve and/or enhance certain aspects of the program based on respondents' feedback. 

This type of metric is easily understood by non-travel professionals.