Kathryn Kamin is a senior content marketing strategist for the SAP Concur Enterprise Americas team, where she leads customer improvement and lifecycle content programs and initiatives. Her work experience in hospitality, telecommunications, healthcare, and education combined with a Master’s degree in Communication of Digital Media from the University of Washington, have refined her ability to wield the narrative arc of storytelling around content with empathy and curiosity. Kathryn enjoys the outdoors and loves watching her children marvel at ordinary and extraordinary aspects of life.
There’s a commonly held belief that airfares continue to rise every year — even if the price of oil is dropping — and that the cost of last-minute travel follows suit. But the truth may surprise you. There’s more to the cost of last-minute travel...
From trade show costs and conference room rentals, to consulting fees, subscriptions, training, and office supplies, many employees have purchasing power beyond traditional travel and event expenses. Because expenses are diverse and are used in a...
Time is money and accounts payable departments are continuously looking for ways to optimize cashflow by avoiding late fees, taking advantage of early payments, or negotiating better pricing and delivery terms with vendors. Evaluation of the...
If you could save your organization money and help your team travel more safely, would you? Of course, you would. Our quick fix: increasing rideshare over other ground transportation options. Travel by car is still one of the primary modes of...
Resources to help you thrive in new and trying times Being part of a merger or acquisition (M&A), and still doing your “regular” job, can feel overwhelming. Whether you’re a first-timer or an M&A veteran, thoughtful policy and procedure...
An immediate way to get a pulse on who, how, and when your organization’s dollars are being spent –what we call spend governance – is to look at your corporate card usage. The perks of maximizing corporate card rebates go beyond optimizing cash...
While budget management is certainly complex and highly specific to each organization, being proactive with budget management reduces operational interruption by keeping an organization’s cashflow adaptable to change. However, how do we actually...
Our employees are our most valuable assets, however, managing their spend across a growing number of spend categories and payment methods often leaves room for error and non-compliance. These are serious (and time-consuming) issues that can create...
Transformation of a travel and expense program served as a starting point for simplification in other areas of the organization, for medical device company, Smith & Nephew. Smith & Nephew’s choice to prioritize employee satisfaction...
“The fact that we have greater control over spend and visibility…has allowed us to really position ourselves as business partners-not only creating information but also actually enabling decision-making to our senior executives,” shared Jorge...
An SAP Concur podcast conversation with Deloitte: While COVID-19 presented vast challenges, it also forced organizations to evolve to a more digitized infrastructure that supported employees personally and professionally. “2020 was the perfect...
Auditing is a powerful and fundamental operation for every organization. But how much money and time should be spent on it, and how do you measure accuracy? Once you have audit results, which operations do you adjust first to have the greatest...
Stewarding a county budget has always meant working under pressure with complete transparency. But now, when most of your coworkers and partners are working remotely, cost control pressures and the demand for new ways to demonstrate spend...
Accuracy and risk mitigation have long been the primary focus of finance operations, but it’s time to expand that horizon. County finance leaders can no longer afford to ignore inefficiencies around invoices and employee discretionary spend that...
Knowing where your employees are now, where they are traveling to and how to communicate with them has significantly increased in importance this year. Recent crises have deepened the appreciation that some organizations have for their duty of...
When driving for work, the last thing that most employees want to focus on is tracking their mileage. From site visits to team leadership meetings and keeping their eyes on the road, mileage reporting is likely to be one of the last things on...
Maximizing people’s ability to do their best work by reducing menial tasks through automation has helped organizations survive the pandemic and create cultures of top talent that are mostly thriving despite crisis. Regardless of industry,...
Many employees are leaning into the work-from-anywhere lifestyle and organizations are shifting to accommodate these new and evolving expectations. Designing a winning mileage program that is fair, comprehensive, and relevant to the times is no...
“Just like we cannot ignore the pandemic...we cannot ignore climate change and the major contributions of enterprises. Together, we can lead this change and become intelligent enterprises, to make sustainability profitable and profitability...
The “great leap of evolution” towards a digitized infrastructure sparked by COVID-19 is picking up speed. Ryan Hamilton, of the SAP Concur Value Experience Group, had the opportunity to interview Oren Geshuri of Deloitte on the current state and...
Streamlining a travel and expense program can serve as an indicator of process simplification, allowing employees to focus on what actually matters. In this podcast, Smith & Nephew, used SAP Concur solutions to implement a Global Business...
Listen to our podcast with Huron Consulting Group for tips on building a resilient travel and expense program The disruptive environment of the pandemic has unified our workforce through empathy, humility, and resourcefulness, all of which have...
When the COVID-19 crisis hit, it very quickly highlighted the drawbacks of legacy systems, demonstrating the need for modernization in state and local government IT. With funding available under the American Rescue Plan (ARP) Act. These agencies...
The pandemic has disrupted every aspect of travel and expense. Creative collaboration has worked during the global pandemic, but the not-too-distant fond memory of in-person meetings, events, and workplaces leaves many longing for a return to some...
Whether you’re clamoring to return to the office, contemplating a hybrid work model, or are staunchly opposed to ever setting foot in the office or going on a business trip again, workplace setup opinions are at an all-time high. And why not?...
As we look for ways to increase corporate sustainability, it can be difficult to know where to start. Understanding key terms as well as what to measure empowers organizations to set science-based targets, and then to monitor and adjust. We asked...
From building the right reporting, to creating awareness, to guiding behavior, and making direct contributions, there’s a lot that organizations can do right now to increase their sustainability. We asked Ryan Hamilton, Senior Value Consultant for...
Emerging from the challenges that a pandemic caused K-12 school districts are opportunities to innovate and modernize curriculua and instruction, information technology, and building maintenance. While strategic collaboration and needs assessments...
As business travel becomes safe again, organizations are empowering their employees with greater autonomy to use their best judgement and comfort levels to determine when, where, and how to meet with clients and team members. Get thinking about...
Whether you’re dreaming of working from an exotic island, moving somewhere with affordable housing, or can’t wait to get back to corporate office life, “there's a lot of diversity in terms of what it means to be working outside of the office, and...
When it comes to information technology, there are specialists that focus on operations, software, development, and logistics and then others that focus on business – but few that can do both. We spoke with one of these unicorn IT and business...
Taking a spend management program from excellent to astounding is a specialty that Huron Group does for its SAP Concur partner customers daily. This certainly was the case for Penn State University, one of the longest-running higher education...
“I always liken Concur to a condominium building; if you have been on the Concur platform for 10 years and every time you move somebody into the new building, you let them decorate their condo the way that they want it, they have their own set of...
An increasing number of organizations are including corporate sustainability goals in their strategic imperatives—even more so since the start of the pandemic. But what does sustainability really mean from a business perspective? We asked Ryan...
From the original graphical user interface (GUI) and using a mouse to manage business expenses, to leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to create context for spending and identify patterns, finance has always been...
Higher education institutions have always had to be resourceful, but the global pandemic increased this pressure on creativity in a whole new way. Chinks in the armor of legacy systems patched together over the years really showed themselves when...
As organizations slowly return to business travel, many are reassessing their travel policies with an eye to traveling more sustainably. How can you reduce emissions from corporate travel while managing costs? And what solutions can help you...
Before the pandemic, few employees realistically thought the concept of “work from anywhere” would ever truly be viable. Now, after working in hybrid environments since early 2020, many people want their organizations to move toward a new model of...
“We don't like the paper processes, which we have, we even hate approval workflow. So, please, set up the system in an innovative way,” was the challenge a customer shared with the neylux team. Jeanne Dion, Director of the Value Experience Group...
As employees abandoned airports for spare bedroom workstations during the pandemic, one silver lining was the sheer amount of money that organizations saved by slashing corporate travel activity. Still, for many businesspeople, there’s no...
“We are really good at doing the things of IT, but we were really bad at doing the business of IT,” shared Bennett Ulmer, Operations Analyst and Manager of Analysis and Audit for Penn State University. Phil Bunnell, Solutions Consultant for SAP...
Innovation is often the sum of many parts that occurs after years of measured improvement and thoughtful collaboration. Since Penn State University has been at the forefront of expense management technology since the 1980s, and is one the earliest...
“It was interesting that during such a slow time, many organizations seized the opportunity to retool their programs or retool their platforms,” shared Kara Bernard, Managing Director of the Lyndon Group. For the vast optimizations that the Lyndon...
Clients of American Express Global Business travel were clamoring for a consistent online booking experience in all markets-not just in the primary markets, like France or London, but in secondary markets, like Peru and Saudi Arabia. "When you...
Finance has always been at the forefront of the digital revolution. No, really. Finance teams are some of the first ones that began using a graphical user interface and servers to manage business expenses. Now, they’re leaning into technology like...
Regardless of where they’re traveling for business, employees want a reliable online booking experience. But undependable, inconsistent experiences aren’t just a headache for travelers. When employees begin to mistrust their travel bookings and...
The need for organizations to shift corporate online interactions to a consumer-like digital experience exploded amidst the global pandemic. American Airlines prioritized friction-less business travel in what was (hopefully) the most complicated...
For decades, paper reigned as a key component to workflow processes, including the approval system surrounding travel and expense management. But as the world grows increasingly digital, organizations are finding new delights in the power of...
The onset of the pandemic took online interactions to a new level, and organizations around the world urgently sought ways to improve the digital experience for customers and employees alike. Even as business travel became increasingly...
Having a plan for financial recovery, without sacrificing employee productivity or risk, is paramount for your organization to prepare for the next disruption. We asked Jason Grunin, Senior Value Consultant for the Value Experience Group at SAP...
In a time when, “self-serve is the new full-service,” event essentials now include things like instant communication, event ROI reporting, and seamless event experiences for all stakeholders. Having deep levels of database and platform integration...
Anyone who’s ever been tasked with coordinating a group meeting knows how challenging it can be. You have to find the right venues, set up dinners and events, keep track of attendee dietary restrictions and shirt sizes, on top of making sure that...
The pause placed on business travel during the pandemic, along with the shift in the way employees work, has created vast opportunities for organizations to revamp their expensing systems. Deciding how and where to allocate and categorize expenses...
Getting teams to think critically about what they need to spend to achieve their goals is no simple feat. Defining the outcomes to be achieved places value realization on any change for an organization. If overall growth and profitability are key...
So much has changed in the past couple of years, and nearly every shift has impacted organizational budgets in some form. Rather than making deep cuts with percentage-based reductions when planning, organizations have the chance to do more with...
County finance managers and elected officials do their best to oversee programs that serve their citizens. While recent government funding sources have provided much-needed relief, they also have generated increased reporting as to how and when...
Over the past few years, as priorities have changed and margins and budgets have tightened, organizations have looked for more ways to save money and maximize the value of every dollar they spend. To help identify potential areas for cost savings,...
Learn about how you can measure the carbon impact of your travel and spending to easily set baseline sustainability goals for your organization. Listen to the Co-founder and Head of Product for Thrust Carbon explain what a carbon emission is, how...
Resetting employee and manager expectations around the best ways to collect and leverage experience data is now a need to have rather than a nice to have. Listen to a Principal Value Experience Architect of SAP Concur and a People Advisory manager...