The facts are straightforward: in a known high-risk country, a global organisation’s business travellers were held against their will and threatened with a weapon following a dispute about payment of a bill. After a tense period, the travellers were located, police informed, release effected and immediately transported back to their home country.

Initial review summary:

  • Senior Managers felt that responsibility for the incident lay with the business travellers and the travel risk manager.
  • The TRM programme required the Operations’ Directors to inform the TR Manager at planning phase in order to discuss risks, conduct a threat assessment and then develop an appropriate TRM plan for the Board to approve prior to any bookings being made.
  • One of the travellers blamed themselves and began to exhibit symptoms of post-traumatic stress
  • Inaccurate, salacious and critical rumours began to circulate amongst other staff within the organisation about the incident

Some relevant factors stand-out:

  • The travel authorisation process was inadequate in that managers approved travel, but this by-passed the TRM function
  • Authorising managers did not have sufficient awareness of the travel risks associated with the business travel
  • The inexperienced travellers did not receive adequate pre travel safety and security advice; particularly about what to do in the event of an incident
  • The means to immediately identify their whereabouts were not available
  • The process was written but leadership avoided practical tabletop exercises and taking accountability for their roles, (e.g. gold, silver, bronze)
  • A resolution and evacuation plan was communicated but ignored.

What can be learned from this case:

  • It is essential that no traveller and authorising manager can by-pass the TRM function, especially in respect of higher-risk locations
  • Travellers must be trained in emergency contact protocol, including the use of a ‘duress phrase
  • TRM leads and Operations and senior leadership must understand very clearly who is responsible for what, and in what circumstances; this is particularly important when subsidiary and parent bodies are involved
  • Involving stakeholders in exercises against realistic but challenging scenarios is essential
  • Address business dysfunction – every operational department followed a different process.
  • TRM resources must be sufficient and proportionate – a single TRM for a global business operating in over 100 countries was clearly inadequate.

The end result was that the position for the travel risk manager was made untenable, and at least one of the travellers’ health has been compromised. It brought unnecessary worry and concern to travellers’ families and reputational impact amongst the organisation’s workforce. By following the lessons learned points made above, you can avoid this happening in your organisation.

If you want to know more about travel risk management and how well prepared your organisation is to meet the challenges that confronted both the organisation and the travel risk manager contact us.