Find the Right Corporate Tech in 4 Easy Steps

The entire travel industry has spent the past few years adapting to unexpected circumstances, forcing organizations to completely rethink their technology infrastructure. As we move on from challenges like getting accurate health and safety regulations or up-to-date flight information, new technologies and services have emerged.

It can be fun looking at all the new options that are available when shopping for new corporate travel technology, and these tools are being released or updated on a near-daily basis. The real trick is knowing what to look for.

We’re here to help you with that.

Identify your needs

First and foremost, you need to have a clear understanding of the problems you need to address. Do you need to improve compliance with any government regulations? Do you need a solution that’s compatible with the tech you’re currently using? Are you trying to find ways to improve your duty of care efforts?

Once those key issues are identified, you can start looking at the corporate technology options that are available. 

Knowing the main issues you need to solve helps you understand some of the baseline capabilities you’ll need from your new tech. As a happy coincidence, a full understanding of what you need to achieve can also help you find the success metrics you’ll be measuring for this implementation. 

With those key performance indicators identified, it’s time to look at the logistics for implementing your new solutions. It takes a village to implement new technologies into a corporate infrastructure, so you’ll need to identify the key stakeholders that will be evaluating your solution. 

Once you have your success criteria identified, you can then look at logistics.

Create a support network

Finding the right external partners to onboard and implement your new technology platforms is easier said than done. That’s why performing your due diligence while identifying your needs is critical to finding a software vendor that meets your requirements.

So, how does someone find the right vendor? We’re so glad you asked.

Some of the questions to think about while considering a service provider includes:

• Do you have experience with our industry?
• Can you support a company our size?
• Do you have any certifications relevant to our business?
• Are you compliant with the rules and regulations for our business?
• What is your strategic and financial outlook?

Some of these questions are designed to make sure they can keep up with the specific demands of your business, while others examine whether or not a vendor will still be in business and can support you for years to come. 

Tip: Extra points goes to any vendor that can provide a live demo that uses your organization’s real-world data.

Make sure technology works with your foundation

There are a lot of options for service vendors available today to serve more or less any function for corporate travel and beyond, and each one approaches software architecture differently. Any organization needs a level of flexibility for any aspect of operations, and making sure your technology can keep up with your needs will always be a concern. 

That’s why it’s always a good practice to confirm that any new services or solutions work with the foundational technologies you already have in place, especially when it comes to T&E.

At Deem, we recommend taking a technology-first approach that makes sure your tech works together in harmony, rather than buying a bundled solution that may not completely meet all of your needs. For example, Etta, powered by Deem, offers a best-in-class open expense functionality, which means it’s compatible with virtually any expense platform available today including Chrome River, Certify, Workday and more. 

After all, why should you have to sacrifice quality just to find new tools that work with your existing technologies?

When evaluating a T&E service vendor, here are a few great questions to consider:

• How does your current workflow operate?
• What kind of APIs does a service provider offer?
• Does a vendor provide the required tools and support to successfully operate the service?
• Does this solution offer the microservices to scale with my business?

Own your implementation

Corporate technology integrates into multiple systems throughout a given business, including accounts payable, procurement, or even sales and talent management, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. 

To ensure the most optimized results, a business must provide active, meticulous oversight of the implementation of software at every step. Constant communication and coordination is critical throughout this entire implementation process.

Fortunately, a few simple questions can act as your guide to take out some of the complexity of setting up a new corporate platform.

• What levels of support can be offered to my business?
• What are some guidelines for creating service-level agreements?
• Can my current tech systems support this solution? 
• How complex will integration be for my existing solutions?
• Can we support regular product updates for this platform?

Once your new solutions are selected and implemented, it’s all about adoption. Any adoption strategy is dependent on clear communications that inform employees that a new solution is available. Along with awareness efforts, a resource center to provide training and other materials is a pragmatic approach when educating your team and encouraging adoption.

I mean, making sure your team knows how to use your fancy new tools is a part of making them successful, right?

Now that you know what to look for and how to implement new tech, we’ll show you how to apply that specifically to a corporate travel program. 

You might also be interested in:

• Is sustainability for your corporate travel a priority?
• Can Workday be used with corporate travel technology?
• What is business travel software usability and why is it important?
• Is your travel and expense software mobile?
• Discover what your employees really think about corporate travel 

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