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1 September 2004
Who's
responsible?
Someone to watch over you
By Terry Riley
A couple items came across my desk this past month.
One
Business Travel News
reported that fewer than forty percent of corporate travel departments
track their employees while they are on the road and only about half of corporate travel managers oversee travel
security at all. (It may be that this
responsibility is taken up by some
other corporate function such as corporate security, but one wonders.)
Two
The other bit of news comes from Australia where, in the wake of the
Bali terrorist attacks, the government may act to require travel agents to
give their clients copies of the Department of Foreign Affairs travel
warnings about the countries those travelers will be visiting.
Putting
these two news items side-by-side raises the question, "Whose
responsibility is it anyway to look after you when you're away from
home." Is it your corporate travel manager? Your security department? Your
travel agency? Your mom?
One morning I posed this question to a room full of attorneys.* I outlined a hypothetical case of a mugging in a hotel room
and asked, "Who's responsible."
After an intellectual discussion of contract law (remember the audience), what I got was that everyone—from
the travel agent who booked the room to the cab driver who delivered the
soon-to-be-victim to the hotel—could face a liability suit.
These lawyers were
"piling on" when, to her credit (and to my relief), a young woman said, "I
don't think Terry is asking who is legally responsible. I think he
is asking who is ultimately responsible. 'Ultimately,' like, 'Don't get
yourself killed, ultimately.'"
Which brings me back to the news items I referenced at the top of this
column. Organizations, from private companies to national governments, can
dictate all they want about who will look after you while you are
traveling. It makes little difference. The one person most responsible for
your safety and security when planning for and taking your trip is you.
Period.
* Note to aspiring workshop leaders: Attorneys are the worst! Every
question becomes a challenge, every statement a supposition, every
suggestion an argument. Caveat lawyer.
© 2004 Applied Psychology
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