Just in time for your 2010 budget planning, American Express Business Travel (AEBT) announced the launch of a new, C-level (as in Chief level for Chief Executive or Chief Financial Officer) planning and budgeting dashboard. The cXo dashboard provides customizable, forward-looking insights to make targeted, strategic travel and entertainment (T&E) cost reductions, AEBT reports.
AEBT’s new cXo Dashboard integrates travel, card, expense and human resource data and selected key performance indicators into one source while utilizing AEBT’s benchmarking to perform in-depth opportunity analysis. Executives can weigh potential compliance and policy changes and gather insight in an interactive format by benchmarking their program against best-in-class travel programs to project maximum savings.
“Looking ahead to 2010, companies will need to remain competitive in their respective marketplaces, and challenge the status quo to identify more opportunities for savings,” said Frank Schnur, vice president of advisory services for American Express Business Travel. “Through the cXo planning dashboard, companies can gain increased transparency into corporate travel spend as well as foresight into T&E program changes that enable them to make targeted, strategic T&E cost reductions. This can help remove excess expenditures and minimize the risk of cutting into revenue-generating travel that could hamper return-on-travel-investment over time.”
AEBT says that as the first dashboard of its kind, cXo integrates travel, card, expense and HR data and selected key performance indicators (KPIs) into one source while utilizing American Express Business Travel’s benchmarking to perform in-depth opportunity analysis. Executives can weigh potential compliance and policy changes and gather insight in an interactive format by benchmarking their program against best-in-class travel programs to project maximum savings. Delivered monthly or quarterly, the cXo planning dashboard can be customized.
“Being able to accurately assess data and use it to project the impact of change to corporate travel programs will enable executives to achieve a level of precision and control that was not possible before,” continued Schnur. “As we move toward economic recovery, companies will continue to look to be more resourceful when it comes to their T&E spending. Innovative technology tools such as cXo that can efficiently capture current and future spend and savings opportunities will play an essential role in driving ROI.”
Before designing a company’s customized cXo planning dashboard, AEBT consultants sit down with senior executives to first understand the current status of the program as well as goals and objectives. Consultants then evaluate the culture, business purpose, procurement strategy and current policy in order to select critical KPIs, business units, and other data to ensure the dashboard’s projections align with a company’s unique business needs and project the most accurate view into T&E program changes.
Visit www.americanexpress.com/businesstravel.