No more emails!

Hats off to Peter Long, CEO of TUI who in a Sunday Times interview puts business success down to clear communication.

We couldn't agree more!

It seems Peter does not even have a computer in his office and he does not answer emails. His view is that executives who send and receive emails are wasting their time.

‘Why are they doing a job an assistant should be doing? He asks, 'Is that really an effective use of their time? I don’t think so'.

FES have, on many occassions, seen organisations where the Chief Executive spends his entire day buried in emails, ploughing through memos that, they really should leave to someone else.

Peter adds, ‘You have to have trust in your teams and not meddle. There are not enough hours in the day to go controlling.’ How very true, CEO should lead and inspire, offer direction and clarity and really shouldn't be messing about in day to day activities that they can easily leave to their staff.

After working through three recessions, two Gulf wars and numerous other global problems, Long said: ‘I am always concerned but you just deal with it, because you have to.’

Of course you do. Well said Peter.

India Boutique Hotels

There is a lovely piece in the Observer newspaper this weekend about Boutique Hotels in India. Some of the hotels do lovely rather nice indeed.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2009/sep/27/india-boutique-hotels

A nose for good Business

You'll know you've arrived when you are greeted with a 'mélange of ginger, white tea, citrus and musk'. If however, you catch the distict whiff of 'sweet grass and green tea', then you know you've got a little way yet to go!

Yes, this is news that Holiday Inn's 3,300 properties across the globe are getting a $1bn (£600m) facelift, officially launched in New York this week. Battling ruthless mid-market competition, Holiday Inn is sharpening its act with a swish new logo, revamped public spaces, landscaping, better bedding and even a standardised scents (the full scale Holiday Inss will get the 'melange' while the cheaper Hilday Inn Express Sites have to make do with 'sweet grass and green tea')

Holiday Inn was founded with a single hotel in Memphis in 1952, the brainchild of Kemmons Wilson, an American entrepreneur who became frustrated on a family road trip at the gap between shoddy roadside motels and fussy, pricey posher establishments. The chain now has properties in nearly 100 countries, most recently opening in Vietnam and the Maldives.

Holiday Inn outlets will be obliged to spend an average of $100,000 to $200,000 per property on improvements. There will be new lighting, signature plant pots and a choice of soft or hard pillows in every room. Power showers will abound and staff are having friendliness drummed into them.

Properties unable, or unwilling, to smarten up will lose the Holiday Inn brand and older hotels with, for example, motel-style exterior corridors, face the chop.

Of course, many upmarket hotel chains are treading on the toes of Holiday Inn. No-frills offerings such as Marriott Courtyard, Hilton Garden Inn and Hyatt Place have appeared in the US over the past decade and beginning to appear in the Europe.

And the current economic climate has had an effect on occupancy – Holiday Inn's occupancy rate was 54% in the US and 61% in Europe during the first half of the year, with revenue per room down 17% to $51 in the US and by 16% to $66 in Europe.

But Holiday Inn is an iconic brand and it's essential that it 'does what it says on the tin'. Visitors know what to expect and the uniformity and reliability is appealling to routine business travel.

We only have one concern; apparently a global playlist of 1,000 soundtracks will greet guests, ranging from Sting to John Mayer and the Jackson Five!

There are a few local exceptions, in France, for example, Carla Bruni makes an appearance while Kylie Minogue will play in Britain!!

India: Making good progress. Can do better.

More good news arrives in the form of new data compiled by the Indian Ministry of Tourism. Figures show that North America and West Asia constitute the strongest growth for tourism to India. The number of foreign tourists visiting India increased from 7.99 million in 2007 to 8.27 million in 2008.

Growth in tourists has been greatest from Denmark, (by 24.1 percent), Brazil (by 21.8 percent), Russia (by 21 percent) and Norway (by 18.6 percent), followed by countries such as Israel, Bahrain and UAE. Traditionally, the UK has also provided the highest number of visitors but this year has been pushed to second place by the USA.Tourists from neighboring countries Sri Lanka and Bangladesh have also increased sharply.

After a drop of about 10 percent in foreign tourist arrival between October 2008 and June 2009, the inbound tourist market is showing definite signs of revival. Tourist arrivals in July 2009 have increased substantially although, less than July 2008 levels, but foreign exchange earnings have risen sharply in real terms.

The Indian ministry of tourism plans to continue its marketing campaign in the USA market with the colorful Incredible India ! campaign planned at the Oscar, Grammy and BAFTA award functions.

The top 10 source markets for Indian inbound tourism are :

1. USA
2. UK
3. Bangladesh
4. Sri Lanka
5. Canada
6. France
7. Germany
8. Japan
9. Australia
10. Malaysia

Compared to world statistics in terms of tourist arrivals however, published by the United Nations World Tourism Organization, India ranks 41st in the world.

India still gets far fewer visitors than much smaller nations like Ukraine, Tunisia, Croatia and Saudi Arabia.!

Is it going to be a V, W or U??

A record surge in confidence among business professionals indicates Britain's recession is at an end, according to research.

Optimism among professionals in the third quarter hit its highest level since the start of the financial crisis two years ago, the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW) said.

The confidence measure jumped to 4.8 at the end of June from -28.2 in March - the biggest improvement since the survey began in 2003. The institute predicts that the economy will grow by 0.5% this quarter, breaking five quarters of falling output.

ICAEW chief executive Michael Izza said the findings suggest that "the UK recession is at an end".

He added: "While there is no doubt that the UK economy is on its way to recovery, we shouldn't underestimate the challenges ahead for businesses."

The FTSE 100 rose 41.81 points to 4891.70 in early trading on Monday , a rise of 0.84%, following Friday's near-100 point gain when the inde x pushed through 4800 for the first time since last October.

Asian shares also rose strongly on fresh optimism over the global recovery, following upbeat comments from US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke and news that Thailand has come out of recession.

The ICAEW survey showed that UK businesses expected a rise in all but one of 14 key financial performance indicators in the coming year, in contrast to earlier in the year when most were expected to contract.

The research found 41% of senior business professionals were more confident about the economic prospects facing their business in the next year. But only 6% were much more confident, indicating a continued level of caution over the timing and speed of the recovery.

IT was the most optimistic sector, followed by banking, finance and insurance firms. The survey found "a remarkable upturn" in confidence in the banking sector. Signs of stabilisation in the housing market also helped boost optimism for property firms.

Debate now centres not on when the recovery will come but in what form it will be; as economist debate a 'V', 'U' or 'W' shaped recovery..

But more of that anon..

Wind City Afrika

Fes has just returned from a wonderful break in Morocco; our first time in this fascinating country and most certainly not to be our last. Although we were working with one of the developers in the town of Essouria, we had the opportunity to take a few days out to have a look round and enjoy the surroundings a little - a rare treat.

Keen to control our costs, we booked our flight to Marrakesh with our old friends Ryanair. And we were stunned by the efficiency and friendliness on board! The flight took off and landed on time (there and back) and the cabin staff were excellent. In fact, the hostess on our return was the very self same Magdelena that appeared, clad only in her swim suit, reclining in the mouth of a Rolls Royce engine as this months Ryan's Girls!

Essouria is 150km to the west of Marrakesh and enjoys the new moniker of 'Windy City Afrika'. And it is! A haven for windsurfers and kite surfers alike, the sea is lively without being too dangerous, the beaches are wide and flat and open and the wind strong and incessant. There's a very efficient Club Mistral at the end of the long beach that offers some highly economical packages for those wishing to try their hand or improve their technique. All the instructors are, of course, supremely talented and multi-lingual to cater for all nationalities.

We found the Moroccan people, charming, friendly, honest, modest and full of integrity. It was a joy to spend some time in their country and a pleasure to meet and work with the people we met. Particularly, we would like to thank Abdul our helper, Said our driver and importantly, Hassan our barman!

Twitter for the Travellers

At FES, we endevour to keep pace with technology and have for a long time been advocates of the new opportunities afforded by the Social Networking Sites. It's less than ten years since the first wave hit with the introduction of online travel agencies but big changes are afoot.

Online travel, in what ever form it was and still is defined, became the largest industry on the web in record time. Changes on a scale imagined only by few, have happened since then and there is not one segment of the travel industry that is not affected by that first shift to commerce transacted online.

Enabled by blogs, pod casts and social networking sites as well as other web 2.0 technology introductions like mashups, the consumer today can be as informed about any subject as never before in history and even more importantly, has the easy means to communicate his or her knowledge and expertise to anyone else in the world.

In the context of the travel industry, everyone can become a travel agent, tour operator, or even destination marketer at least in his or her own mind!

Companies and organizations will in future increasingly have to try to interject themselves into all the conversations going on among customers in the marketplace about their product, service, or destination, rather than dominating what in the past was a one-way communication. This new C2C reality will have a significant impact on the role of marketing in any industry. Conversations among the people in your marketplace happen whether you like it or not.

Good marketing is encouraging the right sort of conversations.

The first signs of this world of Web 2.0, which lets the audience participate in the production and distribution of content and tag it with keywords, are a number of new types of sites sprouting up such as Del.icio.us, Rojo, Digi, Tagzania, Gusto, Wikia, and many more.

The most important feature these sites have in common, is the ability for users to collect information and articles from sites they find of interest, add their own comments and tag them with keywords. This makes it easy for sharing with, and viewing by, friends or the public at large. Google Map mashups are other new types of sites allowing travelers to get a detailed look of a property or attraction location. Combined with personal annotations and reviews by others travelers can get a feel for the place more real and up-to-date than previously possible.

Then there is TVTrip offering detailed videos of properties as a useful planning tool. In the small group and affinity travel market there is Groople, which includes tools for group planners.

Traditional companies, such as Starwood Hotels also have embraced this new trend. Sheraton now makes customer feedback and reviews the focus of their web presence right from the home page.

Blogs and pod casts are other developments with significant potential impact on both travel planning and the actual travel experience. Anyone with web access and some basic knowledge of computer software applications can in fact start a blog or publish a pod cast, making their experiences immediately available to the world at large. With a free RSS feed reader, this new user generated content is easily available for anyone with updates delivered automatically.

The specific impact of Travel 2.0 on the various sectors in the travel industry is yet to be determined. What seems clear already, however, is that the role of any intermediary is being challenged even more by all this user-generated content.

For destination marketing organizations (DMO) the dynamics of existing business relationships will no doubt undergo rapid and significant change. It will no longer be sufficient to maintain and develop an information rich destination website. To build a platform that taps into and feeds off the various sites mentioned earlier and to facilitate the dialog among past and potential future visitors is fast becoming a necessity to stay relevant.

The opportunities have never been better to truly achieve Word of Mouth (and Word of Mouse!) and stimulate the buzz around a destination. What no DMO should attempt is try to control the dialog or manage it.

The mirror has never been shinier but it also has never before been pointed as directly at the destination and its suppliers as it is today. Accept it, embrace change, innovate and start joining the conversation, today. The alternative is being left behind and risk being ignored.