12.10.2008 Values

What Is Luxury?

“Our Heads Are Round so our Thoughts Can Change Direction” [Francis Picabia]

What is luxury to you? Is it the ability to travel the world? Is it a challenging job? Is it time with your family and kids? I do appreciate your feedback!

The luxury of my life was to get my eyes lasered. Some of you may recall me with the glasses. Thank goodness I got rid of them – sometimes reading glasses, I do not get younger either 😉

Currently the luxury I want is to be Married with Children 😉

To achieve this, I think I prefer a decent job. The fun part on that one: If I send out an application (even if on demand), I usually do not even get an answer. And that is especially in the hospitality industry… Excuse me? I would consider it an honor that you apply with me and a common courtesy to tell you if you don’t fit my needs.

Ahem. What's the Question? — Ahem. What’s the Question?

Not to answer is a typical sign of what is wrong today in the travel industry. It is a service industry. Decent treatment of applicants and staff, decent salaries and work hours are complains I hear all over the places. Be it travel agency, airline, or hotel industry…

Two side notes: This is a pre-prepared post as I return today from Russia. Interested to know more? Let me know! And I sure will write a summary of my experience with that trip.

December 3-5 I will be doing a workshop and a presentation at the conference in London. If Sales, Marketing and CRM in hospitality are your business, I sure appreciate to see you there 🙂

05.10.2008 Russia

Web 2.0 and Modem 57.6 …

In all the euphoria for Web 2.0 I am lately traveling in “Modem-country” again. Oh no! Do you remember?! No high speed Internet, connections with 40K or even 33K (thousand) only, where a slow DSL is 768K, normal are 2M (million). Wow. It is relatively easy to use Google and many other websites, but then I stepped into “Web-2.0-content” and got into the World-Wide-Wait…

And I realized how many website developers add into “unclean” code, complex but unnecessary flash animations, large images that have not been optimized to quick loading times. I received mails with 2MB attachments, happy that we use an IMAP-server, so I did not need to download the attachments as in earlier times!

It’s also frustrating if you send me my entire inquiry back, as if I wouldn’t be able to remember what I wrote or look up my mail. If you quote, fine. If not, be so kind and delete the inbound mail. Ctrl-A to mark all, or Ctrl-Shift-End to mark from the cursor to the end. Then hit “delete”…
We became so quickly used to high speed, many just don’t care what the recipient uses to connect. And yes, I got a 20MB file attachment too… Lucky I use a decent software that did not automatically try to download it… Sorry, I will only read it upon return.

Best of all, I do like the Word.doc-attachments, they always look so funny when I open them with Open Office. Some even warn me of activated Macros in the document (which I usually disable) I know why I prefer PDF 😉 And sorry people, I will not click to auto-confirm reception, I find this rather annoying.

So my friends, you better think about all this gadgets you like on websites. Especially when you address an international audience, I may not be the only one who cannot use your site.

Mimizing to the maximum is my recommendation.

28.09.2008 Aviation, Low Cost, Russia

From Russia With Love …

This blog-post has been prepared, as are the next ones the next two weeks. I decided to go for an adventure trip to Russia. And no, not to Moscow or Saint Petersburg, but into the country.

The region I visit is addressing international markets but lacks a decent airline connection. In fact, there is one. But being expert for aviation distribution, I was simply unable to book the flight and have to travel from Moscow more than 12 hours by train. The flights I intended to fly out of Germany on were just cancelled on short notice. So I had to adjust my plans and that involved to stick within the schedule. Ad hoc changing the visa due to a flight cancellation? No way! Booking an affordable flight to Moscow? Nonrefundable. So I had to wait for the visa to be issued before I could book. Hotel? More expensive than in Berlin. So the entire trip turned out to be a preplanning nightmare and a bureaucratic Ironman challenge.
If I would like to do business there? There is a lot to be done and I work on a study to give them the look from the outside.

Thanks to exceptionally motivated people in the German Foreign Chamber of Commerce in Moscow, Olga Bleykhman, being a member of the Russian Marketing Guild in St. Petersburg, who became quickly a very close and valuable friend, Alla my personal translator in Magdeburg and long year friends such as Heinz, Richard or Mike, to mention some, I have been able to compile quite a detailed study, I am now trying to complete “on site”.
I will report upon return!

21.09.2008 Values

Are You Good At Selling Yourself?

A discussion on LinkedIn triggered thoughts about personal priorities in business. And keep in mind that it’s the (wo)man in the mirror that makes a change (or doesn’t).

I do think we far too much try “selling” and many people have forgotten the good old habits of reliability, honesty, trust and faith. We spend all our time making money to spend on luxuries and saving it for spare time we do not have. We forgot how to live.

Many managers nowadays aren’t any better than Ebenezer Scrooge and one just wishes the Ghosts of Christmas to visit them! What is important? The money you make? The money some unknown investor makes? Welcome to the Grey Gentlemen! If you are a manager, what are your values? Think about it!

14.09.2008 Values

From: http://bringmearock.blogspot.com/
By Edward J. Fern, Time to Profit, Inc.

Throughout the time I was employed by others, I played a game I call, “Bring Me a Rock.” The game has thousands of minor variations but they all follow the same basic format.

The game begins when the boss calls me into his or her office and invites me to have a seat. Over the next several minutes of extended conversation, the boss’s message can easily be summarized in four words, “Bring me a rock.” I’d then return to my own cubicle or office and construct a list of the features I believed the boss’s rock should have and begin to study where and how such a rock might be developed.

Hours, days, weeks, or months later I’d return to the boss’s office and proudly place my rock squarely in the middle of the desk. Aghast or at least disdainfully, the boss would ask, “What the #e!! is that?” Gently I would remind, “You asked me to bring you a rock.”

“That,” derisively, “is not the rock I wanted.”

Then I would inquire, “Can you tell me about the rock you want?” “Yes!” emphatically, “I will know it when I see it!”

Eventually my last boss got tired of the game and let me know I was being laid off. As I heard his words, I realized that I too was tired of the game.

If this has happened to you, this blog is just for you.

07.09.2008 IT

Do you still enjoy privacy or do you Google already?

A German saying asked “Do you still have sex or do you play golf already?” (Hast Du noch Sex oder golfst Du schon?). Adapting it this week to “Hast Du noch Privatsphäre oder googlest Du schon?” (see title).

Following the general and naive media hype (can the media be truly that naive?!) about the new Google Chrome, German ZDF and some other more reputable news media took a closer look. Do you remember the public outcry when Microsoft was found “phoning home”? Google’s Chrome does not just call home. Your browsing history (aside others) is stored right on the Google servers. Interesting enough, despite ability to develop tools cross-plattform, the Chrome browser is only available for the Windows environment.

Another report did address the fact that Google builds “The Cloud“. As most my readers are travel industry related, you may recall that Amadeus Germany (“Start”) replaced the last “dummy terminal” in 1993 with a “PC”. Enabling storage of information locally. With “The Cloud”, you need to be always online, but you do not need a large hard drive any more, as all programs and data is stored on the servers in the web. The Google servers that is if you ask Google… Welcome back to our roots!

1 ½ years ago, at my anual ASRA presentation (4,1 MB), I addressed data security. The friends in ASRA joked about me being paranoid. Last weeks the “loss” and misuse of private government data (in large style) is all over media and politics in Europe, especially U.K. and Germany. In Germany even the official registration office (where any citizen must register one’s address) sells the data quite publicly. So paranoid? Or just realistic? Or underestimating the case?

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is reported to actually pick laptops from travelers without a particular security concern (“spot checks”). Too bad, if that happens to an Airbus official, who denies to give the passwords to access the encrypted data. And there is no official information, how the data is secured by the DHS. So the data may end up at Boeing quite “legally”. And yes, sure there are many ways to ensure the DHS not getting access to any privacy data. The Cloud Computing can also be set to communicate not with Google but with your own server(s) and a nice, unobtrusive special login allows you to invisibly purge (not just “delete” recoverably) all private data including server accesses in case that becomes necessary. Then you login in via VPN (access details not on the computer) and just restore your work environment. On this or just another PC… Details on request 😉

Hmmm… The DHS and politicians sure know that terrorists are not so stupid as to answer “did you pack a bomb” with “yes” (still “normal” question at U.S. airport check-in) or that they are usually organized good enough to secure their backs better. So if they know that, am I paranoid to believe them to not be interested in terrorists but to increase their control of us, their citizens?!
It is a radical change of the legal paradigm that one is innocent until proven guilty. Today we are all presumed terrorists and have to proof we are innocent citizens! All that under the argument that an innoncent person does not have to hide anything? What a complete farce!
George Bush, Wolfgang Schäuble, read my lipps: You will be going into history for having brought down freedom and established the surveillance state. Oh, sorry George Bush, you did better, you’ve become the president leading the U.S. into global wars being proven lier, using faked proof for “weapons of mass destruction”. Your “holy wars” have as much justification as the holy wars of the mideval ages! What was that movie? Wag the dog… Good to start a war to cover up the real business – such as to establish a surveillance state? The land of the free… The what? … Well done Mr. President!

So as a summary: Be careful with your private data and start to consider preference of non-commercial Open Source software, such as Mozilla, Open Office and Linux instead of Windows – it becomes increasingly a (vital) privacy issue! Not only privately, but increasingly also for corporations…

31.08.2008 IT

Data Security

Best Western hit the media this week being reported to have been hacked and 8 million customer datasets being stolen. Best Western objected the news, mentioning they have no proof for such hack and they would delete their data anyway frequently.

Say WHAT? Corporations spend millions acquiring customer data and Best Western deletes them? Hmmm…

No matter, if this has been a newspaper hoax, there is something good in this. Who knows today, where data is collected, how it is stored, kept secure, who has access to it? How “secure” is “secure”? The Internet by definition is insecure. An old – even pre-WWW saying in IT: To have a secure system, remove all input… If a user in old DOS entered “format c: /u” the drive was formated irreversably. Oops, I forgot to backup that file? Too late. In my 2007 ASRA-presentation on Airline Sales & e-Commerce, my friends in ASRA joked that I would be paranoid… Today they know better, thanks to media coverage of data insecurities. I get increasing inquiries.
Most large corporates have a faulty and flawed security. Most even do not use encrypted communication with the most sensitive data they send through the web. Discussions on LinkedIn confirm the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to pick Laptops. Where does the data on them end up? Maybe your U.S. competitor has access to it?

But now we talk about personal profiles. Where is what data stored electronically about you? Have “they” told you they store the data beyond the immediate transaction? No. We only learn by security breaches becoming public that such behavior is not the exception but the rule. And thanks to the global networked world we live in, data is no longer limited to “my hotel”, “my supermarket”, “my anything”. But the hotel reports some or all of the data to the central server somewhere. Next you arrive in another city, they do have your address data on file. Hmmm… What else do they have???

And then we come to the new laws in the U.S., Germany and sure elsewhere, legally forcing providers to collect data and make it available to their government representatives. Said what? What is a “government representative”? Do I trust him or her? Not the government – I don’t trust “government”. But worse, “the representative”. Who controls the controller?

So sorry for the bad publicity Best Western, but thank you for another example to make people aware and think about their personal information. Did you ever read 1984? George Orwell did not even imagine what exists today!

Shift happens! Internet meet World. World meet Internet…

23.08.2008 Aviation, Sales, Values

General Sales Agents

This week I addressed the issue of General Sales Agents (GSA).

In general, the GSA is a very good idea. If you cannot afford your own staff, why not share with other companies just as yours? There are two major hurdles:

1. In many cases, the GSA is considered a “second class employee”, as they only spend a part of their time on your product. My recommendation: Have the key people (reservations, sales) invited within four weeks to your location to get familiar with your product, philosophy and work style. Have them meet the decision makers personally they need to have contact to. This will not only motivate them, but also make them truly represent you in their respective markets. Repeat this frequently. Your GSA sales representative(s) usually should be invited to attend your sales meetings. I have seen results by thus motivated staff, that exceeded the results of an entire airline office in another market. And listen to them. Their prime interest is (or should be) to increase your revenue and make your product sales stable.

2. In other cases, GSAs work on a “minimized effort” scheme. Instead of sharing the resources properly, they try to tweak the last dollar out of you, until you recognize they just drain you. Ensure to have an as close contact to their sales teams as you have to your own. Ensure to have a clear manpower commitment. It is reasonable for a GSA sales person to have three or four, either similar or complementing products. I have seen cases where one person was asked to fully represent six or more products.
That might work, if the products are complementary, but that is not the common case.
Assure to have your GSA benefit fair from all sales in their region. In that case they are interested to support you to spread your distribution channels. Otherwise they will try to keep all dropping through their office, limiting the market awareness.

So GSA can be a very good thing, there are many very good and motivated GSAs out there working 150% in their client’s interests. But ensure that the principal and the GSA work on the same goals. Set targets. Find a GSA that has experience in your market. Not only the branch, but also the global region. Ethics, work style, etc. do differ.

The GSA is not a panacea. They need reasonable funding. But usually, you can pay them a base fee covering their normal operations, with marketing funds depending on the revenue they generate. But check what interest they have to sell you!

If you have questions or wish to select a GSA in Europe, ask me. And if you want to build your team and seek experts for sales, business development, reservations, etc., let me know, there are some good out there seeking a decent job 😀

17.08.2008 Russia

Tourism in/to Russia

Thanks to last weeks blog and the war-situation between Russia and Georgia, this week, I had a rather emotional and some more reasoned discussions about the Russian Tourism Market. There are many obstacles that were addressed, but I found only very few being valid.

» Understanding travel as an economic factor. According to Wikipedia, travel is one of the top three economic factors world wide. Easing (leisure) travel to and from a country is a cash cow for the country.

» Infrastructure. People travel everywhere, they are found in the middle of the Amazonas. It cannot really be the infrastructure. Only if there is justification by people traveling somewhere, infrastructures are building themselves. Funny, the people who traveled there for the “untouched nature” then are replaced by the masses expecting the bus to take them somewhere to watch “untouched nature”. People breaking their bones for taking the cable car up into the mountains walking there with inadequate footwear!

» Language. I love doing my vacation in Spain, but my Spanish is rudimentary at best. But I learn enough to get around. People go to Greece and cannot read Greek either, less understand it.
Where language is a limiting factor is when Russians want to address another market. There are flights from Frankfurt to Saratov (14th largest Russian city!) and you can purchase tickets only at the airport…?
It is important to understand that as much as we ourselves may ponder reservations about Russia, the Russians ponder reservations about us. It”s important to overcome such reservations, but that only works with trust, not by overpowering it!

» Technology. The Internet made it”s way to Russia. For students, Internet is quite “normal”. The (commercial) e-Commerce still is sometimes very badly addressed. There is quite some potential there! But keep in mind these vast distances!

» Visa. The requirements for visa are counter-productive to any country, but other countries require visa too and they prosper. I just hope that Russia lowers visa-bureaucracy.

Other issues:
I was very much concerned hearing that virtually all mail is opened, I admit, I was not used to that in the “western hemisphere” and it strikes me very “old-fashined”, reminding me of the times of a cold war. But (except maybe for George Bush) that is history and it is difficult to overcome old habbits. Like myself. Forced to look into the Russian market I found many images in my head being simply wrong and outdated. I watch recent TV travel reports about Russia, seeing the wrong, outdated image they show. But all truths I learn impress me. There is another “tiger”-industry waking up.

We all know that the U.S. “land of the free” is only the land of the “adjusted”. Black”s to date are second class citizens, slums exist in every township there, there is Guantanamo and the Homeland Security under the cloak of “war against terrorism” adds more eavesdropping daily. Germany, “partner” in that “war against terrorism” (and approach towards a totally controlled society) is strangled by commercial lobbies. If that is the “good”, I must admit, I prefer Putin”s way to keep the oligarchs and the commerce strictly out of government. Freely quoted from Wikipedia: Do what you want, but don”t interfere with the politics.

Then a German feedback claimed Siberia as “fallen behind”. If I go just 30 km”s out of Leipzig, there are ghost towns. Visit Halle or other small cities in East Germany. Did the luxury of “civilization” equalize these areas with the West German regions? Far far missed that goal! Leipzig, Dresden, Berlin are the main centers of commerce, as are Moscow and St. Petersburg. It takes time to build up infrastructure, but even in Saratov students enjoy modern PCs and Internet…

About the war, German ZDF-TV pointed out very correctly: It”s another powergame by America (namely Cowboy George Bush), trying to secure the pipeline (= oil = energy = power) bypassing Russia there. They position rockets in Poland. All very “friendly” gestures? For experts a Russian reaction was overdue. Again, this was the summary of a special report by renowned ZDF.

My summary about the many discussions on Russia last week.

Remember: This blog is called food for thought and I do like your feedback, it is your feedback that makes me post here!

10.08.2008 Hotel, Russia

Winners and Loosers

Russians outnumber German visitors in Antalya. Russians invest in TUI, Air Berlin, Öger Tours and other travel companies being “unsexy” to “traditional”, “Western” investors… Oh god, the Russians are coming…

Eyes on Russia… Lately (as usual: Thanks to a beautiful woman) I learn a lot about Russia. The image shown mostly on TV is misleading. That is an emerging country! Do not look at the old Russians. Look at the young generation, the students! Oh yes, they have a long way to go. But they prosper, figures show a clear trend.

A luxury hotel chain did a check recently, their receptions noting down, which age group visitors mostly belong to. The boom market China was a niche… Germans and British were +90% in the age group 60+, where the Russians were 90% in the age group -40. And they spend four to five times as much “aside” than the good old Europeans.

Shift happens. Are we ready for it?

Food for Thought

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