How can corporate travel leaders take advantage of artificial intelligence today? | Focus
Across the corporate travel space, there is a growing recognition that AI will fundamentally reshape the way we go about our work. We are at a pivotal moment, with new capabilities emerging that have the potential to transform how business travel is planned, managed and experienced for years to come.
As I touched upon in a recent piece, this technology has the potential to transform our sector by removing much of the friction that still surrounds the experience. Instead of spending time searching for options, managing approvals or dealing with disruption, business travellers will be able to rely on AI to deliver personalised, policy-compliant recommendations, automate routine tasks and provide proactive support throughout a journey.
For businesses, the benefits go beyond convenience. AI can improve operational efficiency, strengthen compliance, generate better insights from travel data and ultimately allow employees to spend less time managing travel and more time focused on the business outcomes that matter.
Challenges to be overcome
Much of the technology to unlock these opportunities is being built today or already exists, but adoption is being slowed by a number of challenges. Chief among them is governance, as organisations navigate evolving security, privacy and compliance requirements.
In many cases, organisational readiness also needs to be addressed. Successful adoption depends on whether businesses have the skills, confidence and processes in place to put new technical solutions to work. At the same time, many travel leaders are still navigating a steep learning curve, identifying the use cases that will deliver the greatest value, and building confidence in what AI can achieve.
There are also practical hurdles to overcome. Investment decisions, fragmented data, evolving user experiences and unanswered questions around accountability all influence the pace of adoption.
But these barriers should not be seen as reasons to wait. The organisations making the greatest progress are not attempting wholesale transformation overnight. Instead, they are starting with targeted, high-impact use cases, building trust in the technology and creating the foundations for AI to scale across the business.
Taking the first steps
For travel managers, the first step is to focus on the business challenge rather than the technology itself. Understanding where the greatest friction exists in a travel programme, whether that is booking, policy compliance, traveller support or disruption management, makes it much easier to identify where AI can deliver meaningful value.
Many organisations may be surprised by how much is already available today, with conversational booking experiences, intelligent policy guidance and other AI-powered capabilities ready to be deployed without major transformation programmes.
Equally important is laying the right foundations for long-term success. Travel managers should engage IT, security and risk teams from the outset, ensuring governance becomes an enabler rather than a barrier to innovation. Building a stronger understanding of AI across the organisation will also help teams ask the right questions of technology partners and make more informed decisions.
In terms of governance, success depends on embedding robust policies from the outset, keeping sensitive data within trusted environments, and ensuring AI is deployed transparently, responsibly and with appropriate human oversight.
Above all, the organisations seeing the greatest progress are those that start with a focused use case, learn quickly and iterate, recognising that AI adoption is an ongoing journey rather than a single implementation project.
Taken together, these steps are less about a single switch-on moment and more about starting a journey, one that begins with small, confident moves today and builds as the technology, and a travel management program, mature alongside it.
Orchestrating Success
As Amadeus explores in our new report, Orchestrating Success, AI is more than a technology trend. It is an opportunity to make corporate travel more intelligent, more efficient and more personal. The organisations that start building the right foundations today will be best placed to unlock its full potential tomorrow.
More Information
Amadeus Cytric aims to deliver a frictionless, intuitive, and collaborative corporate travel experience by embedding travel and expense management into everyday apps and workflows.
Find out more here.
