Steven Schoen's Teamwork Drives E2E Travel@Siemens

"We're not here to make a headline. We're here to make a difference to our travelers." That's what Siemens director of mobility services for the Americas Steven Schoen told BTN last June when he was nominated by an industry peer as a candidate for BTN's 2016 Travel Manager of the Year Award. During that conversation, he spoke of the importance of convergence and the way Siemens saw the entire program coming together.

"Innovation, customer satisfaction, mobility and bringing meetings and transient together—it's like all the puzzle pieces are starting to fit and it's extremely motivating," he said. Yet, there were hints that Siemens had more transformation in the works.

BTN folded the corner down on Schoen's nomination and put it in the "2017" folder, interested to see what another year might bring. We thought the year would find the Siemens' travel program settled in, getting comfortable and getting results. Schoen has rewarded our wait-and-see instincts, but in terms of Siemens getting comfortable, BTN's prediction was off the mark.

Instead, Schoen's extreme motivation has positioned him as one of the key contributors in the crossfunctional global team that is transforming the way Siemens approaches travel and expense management. With the U.K., Germany, Brazil and U.S./Canada markets being in the first wave of Siemens' global rollout, Schoen is playing a leading role in representing the challenging and diverse U.S./Canada markets as part of the global travel and expense program transformation.

With the sponsorship of Siemens' executive management, the strong crossfunctional leadership of global and local human resources and supply chain management, and numerous related functional groups such as IT and finance, Schoen and his global colleagues formalized Siemens' E2E Travel@Siemens to be an increasingly seamless experience. As a start, the company has formulated a new global travel policy framework leveraging four strategic enablers. In the U.S. alone, Siemens will realize annual productivity benefits measured in man-years as opposed to man-hours.

The Four Strategic Enablers

"Siemens as a company has been going through a significant transformation," said Schoen. "There were a few concepts and principles that started coming out about three years ago. As a crossfunctional team, we looked at those principles and realized this was our opening. This was our moment."

Driving an ownership culture. There was a mismatch at Siemens in the way the company entrusted sophisticated business to its employees but had not entrusted employees with the power to make travel and general expense-related decisions that were right for the business. On a corporate level, Schoen and his colleagues saw Siemens stripping away many of the layers between employees and leadership, bringing them closer to one another so they could understand both strategy and on-the-ground realities to drive better business decisions. The team wanted to do the same with travel and expense by putting employees and their first-line managers at the center of travel booking and general expense decisions.

Digitalization. With technologies at the center of much of Siemens' business, digitalization has been a cornerstone of corporate strategy. "How can we sell the concept if we aren't living the concept?" Schoen asked rhetorically, admitting that the company has been on different systems for booking, on an internal expense system in the U.S. and even paper-based expense reporting in certain markets. As part of E2E Travel@Siemens, the company will standardize and integrate travel booking and expense reimbursement on the Concur platform, which will start to roll out in the coming fiscal year. On the travel booking side, the U.S. has had device parity for at least two years, Schoen told BTN, characterizing mobile parity as table stakes for a modern managed travel program. He expects the E2E Travel@Siemens rollout will provide the same, plus add mobile expense reporting.

Simplification. Along with flattening out bureaucratic corporate structures, Siemens management was also simplifying corporate processes. "This has become an issue of employee productivity and satisfaction and among other things, to help attract and retain talent," said Schoen. "That includes corporate travel processes. Employees don't want to have to jump through hoops to do their jobs. They just want to be productive."

Transparency. The team wanted to move responsibility and accountability for travel decisions directly to the traveler as an owner. "What a concept!" Schoen said. The deal was that travel and expense management would clear the heavy lifting away in exchange for transparency. "It's like we are telling them: 'We'll do all the above for you. But you and the first-line manager are going to be responsible for the decisions that you make,'" he said.

Global Policy Galvanizes Change

Global human resources and supply chain management recognized early in the process that Siemens would require a globalized travel and expense policy to ensure its strategic transformation. "We also had to understand that the new policy was not about savings; it was about wowing the traveler," Schoen said, advising that the biggest challenge with mature programs is that savings largely come as a byproduct of progressive procurement, streamlined processes and behavioral change that facilitate a shift to personal responsibility.

The team spent a year creating the global framework, all the while building buy-in and increasing engagement with Siemens executive leadership. "We measured the benefits against our four strategic enablers. Whenever anyone got too overboard or involved in their own heads on this, we could say, 'You are not wowing me,'" Schoen said. "We wanted to focus on the experience of the traveler and how the program would further enable the business purpose of the trip."

Last September, the Siemens global managing board issued the global travel framework. Each country was required to submit a single version based on the framework but adjusted to reflect local law, regulation and labor agreement requirements. "Otherwise, any deviations have to be presented to leadership and could be difficult to realize," said Schoen. "Our leadership is that invested in the outcome."

Empowering Siemens' Businesses

The new policy framework provides a road map for Siemens businesses to liberate travelers from onerous requirements and to drive more agility in travel decision-making.

Eliminating pre-trip approvals. In terms of minimizing process, eliminating pre-trip approvals was among the biggest policy changes. While much of the company was subject to trip approvals, some regions required numerous layers of approvals before booking. This was the kind of bureaucratic red tape that frustrated travelers and reduced Siemens agility and productivity. Aside from the time it took to chase approvals, transactions were stopped if approvals didn't come through and that meant more time spent rebooking. "We had over-engineered the process," Schoen said. "By pushing travel decisions to the first-line manager and the traveler, we remove that uncertainty and potential productivity loss."

"Best practice" vs. "out of policy." Siemens is quick to point out that it doesn't tolerate excessive travel spending. That said, no content is blocked in the booking tool and the concept of "out of policy" is changing. Instead, travel choices will be considered "best practice" or "not best practice."

"If we are giving travelers and their managers the power to make these decisions, they need to decide what is best for the business," said Schoen. "However, we want to be very clear on what is not best practice." He added that the global team is looking to configure Siemens' incoming online booking and expense tool to reflect "not best practice" bookings and expenses based on the company's specific travel patterns, preferred partners and business purpose of a trip. On the back end, booking and card data currently provide a backstop for business accountability.

Today, a monthly scorecard in the U.S. shows how often an individual traveler or a business has deviated from best practice and reports that information up to senior executives. As the E2E Travel@Siemens technology rollout is completed, expense data will join the business intelligence mix. The goal is to provide a self-service business intelligence platform that will allow businesses to spot check their scorecards and missed opportunities on demand.

Receipt capture & local regulation. With the focus on policy adjustments driven by local regulations, Schoen's U.S. project team, with input and support of local tax experts within the company, took the opportunity to confirm receipt requirements in the U.S. for audits. "It turned out Siemens was asking for a lot of documentation not required by law," Schoen said. As a result, the project team lobbied executive leadership in the U.S. to liberate U.S.-based business travelers from having to keep track of receipts—whether paper or electronic—as long as travel bookings are made through the proper channels and expenses are charged to the corporate card. Approval was achieved based on diligence-based facts and figures.

"[In the U.S.,] we no longer require receipts for airlines, no receipts for car rental. If [a purchase] is charged on your corporate card, no receipts under $75, and we no longer require receipts on any expenses under $25 regardless of the form of payment," Schoen said. He said the decision on receipt requirements was ultimately a no-brainer. "The argument was based entirely on legal requirements and traveler productivity. The new policy allows [the U.S. program] to eliminate submission of 1.3 million receipts a year and saves us more than 30 man-years [of labor]."

Mature Travel Programs: Taking the Next Step

By 2016, Schoen knew Siemens had checked all the boxes to make a mature program best in class: innovative supplier relationships, mobility, integrated meetings. "The question, when programs get to that level, is whether we are willing to take chances," said Schoen. "Things are moving quickly and there has to be a willingness to evolve. Siemens leadership encourages 'bold moves,' which I've always promoted with my teams. Taking on big changes is challenging, but it is exciting."

Schoen also made some major supplier and sourcing strategy changes over the past year, going out to global bid on legacy car rental relationships and shifting the business to a new partner. At the same time, his team cut the pain of his hotel sourcing nearly in half by driving 80 percent of his hotel partners to two-year agreements.

Schoen stands at the head of the crowd in terms of taking responsibility, owning his work and showing both his team and the industry how to manage corporate travel at the highest strategic level. Asked how that leadership role suits him, he said he always sees his work as an opportunity. "Siemens executive leadership gave us this opportunity. E2E Travel@Siemens is a game changer for Siemens and after this first phase of implementing the new policy in the U.S., I'm excited to see what is next."