What a journey it’s been at the CDO Travel & Hospitality Exchange at Syon Park in London!
Over the course of the two days, we had the pleasure of hearing about data literacy, the importance of customer trust, hiring and retention, and predictive analytics from some of the top data leaders in the industry. The topic of culture took centre stage in many a conversation, with the biggest challenge being to communicate capabilities upwards. Some potential solutions to this included securing one or two data allies at an executive level and making them champions, and showing reason behind a strategy – in other words, answering the question “why?” for stakeholders.
During a particularly energetic round of lightning debates, attendees were asked to agree or disagree with prompts such as “personalisation is overhyped in the travel & hospitality sector” (divisive) and “AI should have the autonomy to make ethical decisions without human intervention” (not so divisive). At some point, the concept of definitions came up – what is ethical, really? What do we talk about when we say “AI”? How can we define the success of a data team? Hopefully, all of our attendees left with a clearer definition of their role, and actionable insights to take away to their teams.
The question of whether the travel & hospitality industry is behind from a data maturity perspective came up a few times throughout the event – but with such incredible case studies and projects, the buzz in the room and a whopping 48% of attendees calling the data maturity at their organisation “established”, this industry shows no signs of slowing down.
A special thank you from me to our chair Brian Jones and to all of our speakers – Gillian Cossey, Pal Erik Waagbo, Alexander Dean, Nikhil Gupta, Eric Bobek, Dee Samra, Kinnari Ladha, Radoslaw Berger, Tracy Ayepe, Mohit Joshi, Ashley Mckenna, Krzysztof Kąkol, Pietro Martone, Chris Lowe, Dominic Shillingford, Andrea Ferrari, Philip Cotton, Mark Powell, Dean Clyne, Matt Lovell, John Bartlett, Paula Tighe, Kyle Winterbottom, Krzysztof Krasnodebski, Dan Grainger, Nick Beresford, Oleg Kravets and Karol Kuhl – thank you for joining, and for sharing your ideas, experiences and insights across the two days. Of course, a big thank you also to our sponsors and attendees who I had the pleasure of meeting and speaking with, and to the onsite and off-site team – Hannah, Gabriel, Ana, Crispin, Emma, Lucy, Ben, Kazia, Alex, Emily, and David – without whom the event would not be possible.
If you haven’t had the chance to, don’t forget to let us know your thoughts through our survey – in the meantime, check out some snaps from the event!