Over the next decade, I anticipate significant innovation between supplier and traveler will allow us to reach a point of true automation.
Quote from David Thompson, CITO of American Express Global Business Travel, in an article on PhocusWire this week.
Technically Speaking - David Thompson of Amex Global Business Travel
For an industry that, nowadays, has technology running up and down its backbone, automation is a scary word for many that work within it.
Data, connections, consumer interfaces, web services - they all help to power the way the industry operates, mostly in an extremely efficient way that allows travelers to move and stay around the globe in a seamless fashion.
You only need to see the chaos (and the headlines) that ensue when something goes wrong with the technical infrastructure.
Yet so much of the technology operates in an automated way that it is strange that the word "automation," in Thompson's terms, is enough to give many pause for thought.
The vision for automation in the years ahead is one where processes that were perhaps previously handled by human beings are done away with because the technology is efficient enough - and smart enough - to handle many of the requirements of the traveler.
This level of sophistication also concerns some travelers, lest we forget.
But the gradual introduction of artificial intelligence and machine learning is now at a stage where some level of trust should be given over by both the industry and its customers.
Why?
At it's core, travel is about providing travelers with a good (leisure) or hassle-free (corporate) experience - or at least one where the so-called pain points can be handled with ease.
Technology WILL mostly, over time, be able to do this, as the machines become smarter and the behavorial trends that steer them become clearer.
This, in theory, leads the humans in the industry to do what they do best: provide a better customer experience at the points where the computers can't replicate the interactions where a person traditionally excels.
True automation, as Thompson puts it, will happen. The question for travel brands now is how they figure out their role to meet both the opportunities and the expectations that will inevitably come before them.