Author: Kathleen Tibbetts

Executive Sponsor Marc Christensen and the OE2C Travel and Entertainment Committee is pleased to announce the selection of Concur® as SMU’s new electronic travel and expense management solution. The initiative committee would like to thank the faculty, staff, and students who provided feedback and attended the finalist demonstrations in early September.

Based on the feedback received from across campus and from consultation with peer and aspirant universities, Concur® emerged as the best option for SMU. Concur® offers higher education organizations an absolute, integrated, and tailored solution for easier management of travel, expense, and travel risk management obligations.

The Travel and Entertainment Initiative Committee will continue their review of the University Travel and Entertainment Policy to build a simpler, more standardized process as the implementation of Concur® begins in the coming months. Additional suggestions or feedback from the SMU community are encouraged as this important initiative moves forward.

Thank you to those who attended our four travel-tool vendor demonstrations on Thursday and Friday, Sept. 4-5, 2014! If you have additional feedback about the vendors or your preferences, please send it to us via the OE2C questions and comments form by end of day Monday, Sept. 15, 2014. Select the “Travel/Entertainment” dropdown.

The OE2C project has identified Contract Administration as the next initiative. The Contract Administration initiative team will seek to update risk policies to streamline the contracting process and to create a prioritization system for contract requests. These actions will help individuals understand how the contracting process works and create more transparency of the time required.

Dean David Chard of the Simmons School of Education & Human Development and Dr. Thomas Tunks, Professor of Music and former SMU Associate Provost, will lead the initiative. Project team members are being identified and the team expects to kick off in early September.

As you may know, a complete review of SMU’s Travel and Entertainment Policy is underway as part of the OE2C Initiative. As part of this review, we are evaluating the implementation of an electronic travel software solution to better manage and streamline SMU business travel. Faculty and staff input on the solution is vital to ensuring the tool meets the needs of all SMU travelers.