Podcast: Jane McFadzean from Trip.com on Sustainability in Travel

Our latest Industry Leaders episode is a fascinating chat with Jane McFadzean, Director of Global Sustainability and ESG for Trip.com Group. It's inspiring to hear how Jane and the Trip.com team are raising the bar for sustainable travel across the industry. Join us!....

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Sorcha: Hello, and welcome to the Industry Leaders Podcast. I'm Sorcha O’Boyle, and on the show with me today is Jane McFadzean, Senior Director of Global Sustainability and ESG at Trip.com Group, the one-stop travel service provider. Now, Jane, it is great to have you here.

How are you doing?

Jane: It's great to be here. I'm doing fantastic. Thank you so much for having me.

Sorcha: Yeah, I'm delighted to have you here. Jane, I think what's really interesting about you is you've worked in really large-scale businesses for most of your career. So would I be right in saying that you're someone who's worn a lot of different hats in that time?

Jane: Yes, you would be right. Yeah, I have had the privilege of working in a lot of different places and doing a lot of different roles within those organisations. I actually started in radio, which is, I think, why I love a podcast so much.

I'm a bit of a podcast nut, so I'm so pleased to be here. But yeah, I started in radio on media sales, and from there, I was pretty quick to move into the digital space and joined Microsoft. I'm going to give my age away now and say that when I joined Microsoft, my first project was working on MSN Messenger.

Sorcha: Oh, really? I think that was my first account I ever had was probably MSN.

Jane: A lot of people say that to me. So that aged me straight away. But yeah, I joined Microsoft, obviously a fantastic business.

And then from there, I stayed within a number of large US corporations, Microsoft, Disney, ESPN, Expedia, CBS. Typically, I did similar roles within those businesses. I sort of created a bit of a niche where I was building their international media business, usually from the UK, covering EMEA and APAC.

So all the thrills and challenges that come with that. And that grew from media sales to content, creative, marketing, and then finally into sort of more retail and e-commerce. But Expedia was my first job in travel.

And as soon as I got there, I knew that that was the sector for me. And I had a number of absolutely fantastic years at Expedia. And from there, I went, you know, I tested out some different travel businesses, went to scale up, went to a startup.

And now I'm at Trip.com Group. So I feel I've kind of gone full circle and back at a huge global travel business. And I'm delighted to be there.

Sorcha: Hmm. And what was it about Trip.com Group that really caught your interest?

Jane: So for me, from the outside looking in, Trip.com Group seemed to be one of the most exciting, one of the most innovative, fast-growing travel businesses. And now that I'm there, it is exactly that. So just to give you a little bit of context, we are one of the world's largest leading travel service providers, as you said up front.

You know, we're a one-stop shop for all your travel needs. And we're made up of a portfolio of different brands. So Trip.com, which is our international OTA. But then we also have market-leading brands in China with C Trip. We have a huge footprint in APAC. But we also have huge growth internationally.

And that includes some of our friends and fantastic colleagues at brands like Skyscanner, who are also part of our family. And I'm sure you've probably heard of those guys. So there's a lot of opportunity within the business in terms of different markets, different brands, different products.

So that was a real driver, a real sort of pull factor for me. And then second to that, I think there's also, you know, when you're choosing the job, you're looking at potential for growth, but also in travel industries, you have a relatively small place and there are some people there that I'd previously worked with. And I think, you know, for me, working with people that you know and trust and respect is also a real driver.

So there was a lot to like about the opportunity. So I, you know, I snapped up and I've been there for, well, I'll be coming up for nearly a year. I joined in the February, March of last year.

I joined in a marketing role. I joined in destination marketing to build their European business, which was a real privileged. What happened quite quickly when I got there - well, there was two things that happened. One, we realized that the destinations that I was working with, so those are tourist boards across the world, but mainly in Europe, they were really asking us and asking me, how can we work with you more sustainably? And so that was really core to every conversation I was happening with in terms of destination marketing.

Then the other thing that was happening was our senior team in Shanghai, our senior team, and I mean everybody from our chairman, James, to our CEO, Jane, are incredibly involved in sustainability and ESG and really put it at the centre and the heart of our business. And they were keen to have more people internationally involved in that area. So just over the last few months, there's been a really natural progression.

I've moved from working with tourist boards and destinations to working in the leading part of sustainability and ESG, which is a complete privilege, very challenging, but most rewarding thing I've ever done.

Sorcha: That's really, really interesting. So what actually does that involve now? So what's your kind of day to day?

Jane: Yeah, that's a great question because I'm just getting my hands around it. I'm new to the sustainability sector, so I'm very much in learning mode. And what are my remit and what our goal is, is that I work really closely with our sustainability experts, the team who are based mainly in APAC, but, you know, in Shanghai, but mainly in APAC.

And part of what I hope to bring to our sustainability strategy and solutions is my expertise in the rest of the part of the business. So what we recognize within this part of our work is that the need to bring along our partners, so our external partners. So that's everybody from tourist boards to our hotel partners and, you know, our flight partners as well, all of those people that make up that travel ecosystem.

So how can I help bring them along on our sustainability journey? And also the team within our own business, you know, sustainability, we don't want to act as a silo within our business. We really want to bring everybody else along.

And just simply by the fact that I come from a different part of the business, what we're really aiming to do is connect all those pieces together. So it's working to bring our sustainable solutions to our partners and to the rest of the business.

Sorcha: That sounds to me like a really sensible way of doing it, because I think sometimes sustainability, particularly for an industry like travel, is such a massive, you know, mindset change. It's a huge, huge thing to take on.

Jane: It's enormous, right? You know, my first month or two, you can get hung up on language, you can get hung up on the enormity of what it is that we want to do. But I have a fantastic colleague who sits in Shanghai and she always talks about step by step.

That really is our sort of MO, it's step by step. What's really encouraging and, you know, one of the reasons that I was desperate to take the opportunity on is that it does also filter from the top down. And again, you know, I say our CEO, Jane, prioritizes this within the business.

And it's not just sustainability. My role goes further into ESG and all the different parts of that. You know, women within the travel industry is another passion of Jane's, for example.

So it is a really broad church. It is really easy to get overwhelmed. But what we continually say is step by step.

And I think that people get a little bit overwhelmed with the language. And there is a lot of data behind sustainability in terms of what we do. You know, so we work very closely with external partners in terms of offering lower carbon options for our travellers.

That can get quite nerdy and quite geeky quite quickly in terms of numbers, in terms of language. What we hope to do and what I'm really prioritizing doing is making that more accessible to everybody within the business and to our partners.

Sorcha: Yeah, I think that's really important, being able to create a narrative that resonates with people and that, you know, kind of people can feel that they can see themselves in it, they understand their role in it. It's so much more convincing.

Jane: Exactly, exactly. One of our sort of mantras is, you know, we want to maximize the positive impact of travel whilst minimizing the negative. People have this inbuilt innate desire to travel and we want to enable them to do that in the most responsible way possible.

So it's about connecting those two pieces together. The benefits of travel in terms of connecting cultures, of breaking down barriers, of opening opinions. You know, people talk about travel as a force for good.

Again, we could get hung up in a lot of the language around that. What we really see our job is doing is making sure that we are offering our travellers and our audience, wherever they are, whether that's in the US or whether that's in APAC, we want to offer them credible, clear, sustainable options and then it's over to the traveller to make those decisions. And as long as we're doing our job and making them as clear and as plentiful as possible, then that's a good first step.

Sorcha: And you mentioned earlier that tourism boards were kind of coming to you looking for sustainable solutions and sustainable options. To what extent are the travellers considering sustainability when they're planning their trips now?

Jane: It's a great question and one that we talk about every day. In fact, we launched a, we published a report, which I can make available for anybody who wants to go deep. It's our Sustainable Consumer Report in October and it told us, it's that same thing we talk about all the time, the say-do gap, the action versus awareness.

So 97% of respondents of this survey, it was a really big survey. It was like, you know, nearly 10,000 respondents over a hundred countries. So it's pretty robust.

97% want to do more sustainable travel. However, only about 57% are acting on that, even in a small way. So there's a huge gap there.

So what our job is to do is to try and sort of close that gap. So people are definitely thinking about it, but what they're not clear on is how they can do it. There's confusion around what makes sustainable travel.

There's even confusion around the word. In fact, I was speaking to one of my colleagues in Korea and we were talking about the word sustainable. Actually, when you translate it into different languages, it means so many different things.

So it does get quite confusing, but the challenge is real. So our tourist boards, especially if we look at Europe, we've seen a lot of it this year. You take the protests in Barcelona, for example, and we're doing a lot of work with our friends in the Italian tourist board at the moment.

You know, the challenge is real. What they're seeing is they tend to typically not try to term it as over-tourism. What they're trying to do is create a better flow of tourism and management.

So talking straight, not having everybody come to the same place at the same time. That is the challenge that they face. What we can do at Trip.com group, and why I got so excited about joining the sustainability team is that we can use our AI tools and our AI capabilities to help them with their sustainable goals. So what does that mean? We have AI trip itinerary builders, which can encourage our travellers to go at different times of year to different locations. So we're therefore avoiding those kind of bottlenecks that the tourist boards are trying to work around.

What we have is a very sort of real life on the ground challenge in places like Italy, for example, and Spain. But what we can deliver is a very intelligent AI driven tool, which gets me excited because that to me is showing sort of a real world impact about how that sort of is helping in terms of sustainable travel. I mean, AI will be no surprise to you is woven through the fabric of everything I touch at work.

It is the fabric of our business. And thank goodness, because it allows us to do some fantastic things. But for me, where it becomes really exciting is when you see the way that that can impact, for example, hoteliers on the ground in Venice, and I think that's where we're seeing a real impact and shift, and that's what gets me to the office every day.

Sorcha: And is it that Trip.com group is kind of just a very adaptable business that you're able to kind of work with AI so quickly, because it sounds like you're quite advanced in how you're using it compared to a lot of other businesses?

Jane: I think that's really fair to say. It is the forefront of what we do. It is at the heart of everything that we do.

And we built the business around that. So we're a relatively new business as well, in terms of, especially when we look at Trip.com, which is one of our biggest brands, that is really being built with AI at the core and at the heart of it. And obviously AI is transforming all businesses, but I think the way that we've approached it means that it's in everything that we do.

I think the business leaders within our organisation have been very smart and very future-facing in terms of how we adopt the technology. You know, we adopt it ourselves. I think that's, you know, one thing that I was really struck by when I entered the business is that how it helps me just in my day-to-day.

So then it's a really easy step for me to understand how it then helps our travellers in the day-to-day. You know, I'm not a tech person. And I think that helps me to understand how we can use it for our travellers because I use it and I don't even really understand sometimes that it's helping me.

So I think that our business is incredibly successful and incredibly pioneering in the way that we use it. But I think also other travel businesses are doing similarly great things as well. If we look, we're 25 years old this year, which does that feel old or not?

I'm not sure. I'm just starting to feel old. It's hard to tell.

But I think at the very beginning of what we'll call online travel. So when you were able to start to become online travel, the travel industry was really innovative. You know, you used to walk down the high street, go into a travel agent, tell somebody where you wanted to go.

They would put it into a computer. Suddenly the travel industry turned that computer screen around and allowed the consumer to put the information in themselves. So that was really innovative and really exciting.

Then it felt like we, I think for a few years, there didn't really seem to be a huge amount of innovation. We went from being this completely pioneering industry to sort of, we got quite slow, quite big and quite fat and a lot of the big players maybe didn't move forward. However, I do believe we're all now very much so back in this really exciting new wave of new innovation.

Obviously this is powered by AI, but that's definitely sort of one of the ways in which I think the industry is changing now.

Sorcha: And do you think that's in response to the pandemic or do you think that change started pre-pandemic?

Jane: Yeah, it's really strange to think of the pandemic now to look back and feel so far away, but obviously like any business in any industry, you had a huge impact. I think that a lot of the change was probably happening anyway and it just fast tracked that. And so I think that in many ways, you made a lot of travel businesses at the time – I was in a smaller travel business – and it made a lot of travel businesses really sort of look at themselves, look at what they were offering their customers.

I think it made a lot of travel businesses become more customer centric as well and think about their partners more. And I think that was probably due and the pandemic's really just sort of fast tracked that. And here's something that I'll share something with you that was like a real surprise for me when I joined Trip.com group. And this was an invention that happened in pandemic and is now one of the biggest parts of our business in terms of marketing. During the pandemic, our chairman, James, did launch some live streaming events for destinations. And just to give you the short version of the story, it's really hard for me to overestimate the impact that these live streaming events have on our business, have on our partners, have on our destinations and the amount that our travellers and our audience get out of them.

We still do them now. They are a huge part of our marketing assets. They drive huge millions.

The audiences are huge. It drives a huge amount of engagement. And live streaming, especially in terms of retail, is not really necessarily a thing here so much.

But in terms of our APAC region, the growth that is still coming from this amazing vehicle that we use. Just recently, I think it was a couple of months ago, we launched a fully dedicated studio in Thailand for live streaming. So it's like I said, it's really difficult for me to overestimate how important a tool that is for us.

Not so much here. It was a real surprise for me. I just didn't get it.

Now I do and now I see the power of it. So it's those really interesting things that have remained or that were invented in the pandemic that are now serious parts of our business that I find really interesting. All of the other stuff around it, everybody sort of experienced that, all the good and the bad.

Businesses shrunk, they grew again. You know, there was the revenge travel, all of those different things. We've been on a real roller coaster and I think it's really only just settling down now.

But it's those little things like, you know, live streaming. Who knew? Fantastic.

Sorcha: And do you think live streaming might be something that might take off in other markets? Do you think people are getting more used to the idea?

Jane: Yeah, I hate forecasting anything because I'm always wrong. But I'm going to say yes. I'm going to say yes.

It doesn't feel like it at the moment, but because I can see the power of what it delivers in other regions, I think I'd be a fool to say it won't gather momentum in other regions, too. It may look a little bit different stylistically. There's obviously, you know, the way that we present content, there's a lot of sort of editorial differences in the way that we present and position and brand.

All of that will be different. Of course, the content, the storytelling, the narratives, all that good stuff that you get right into. Right.

But I think essentially the vehicle may make it here. But come back to me, I'm sure I'm probably wrong. I always am.

Sorcha: I don't know, because sometimes when we talk to people generally in retail on this podcast, but, you know, often founders found during the pandemic, you know, that they started just doing pieces to camera on Instagram Live or something like that. And a lot of them really developed really strong connections with their audiences. So, I mean, I would see that as essentially live streaming in a slightly different format.

I kind of think audiences could well get used to that.

Jane: Yeah, I think so, too. I mean, I hope so, because it seems we can harness it in a different way. You know, a lot of the live streams are not so much now, but in the early days, you know, they were three, four hours long.

I don't necessarily think that's maybe for all audiences, but what we can see is, you know, in terms of commercialisation and in terms of the numbers, in terms of the bookings, and this is where our partners get really excited. We can see that happening in real time. These are bookings that are happening.

You know, the typical window booking for travel is going to be quite long. You know, people do research and you go on different sites and they have a full journey before they end up booking. That can be, you know, days to weeks.

This is driving bookings in hours. Really? Yeah, it's really fascinating.

So will we see that? I don't know. I'd love to, but I think that we've got it as well, as you remember, is the scale and the audience.

It's all very different, but I think it's going to, you know, you heard it here first.

Sorcha: Yeah, we're breaking news here. OK, so we've done a little bit of talking about the pandemic and, you know, how difficult it was and also what innovation it drove. But I wondered, like, where do you see, aside from obviously live streaming, where do you see kind of the exciting opportunities for travel in the next couple of years?

Jane: I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't say, you know, the brands and the companies that really focus on delivering genuinely sustainable solutions for travellers. I think, you know, going back to that, 92% of people want those options. I think the brands that do that well, do it authentically, do it right, will benefit.

It's not just the right thing to do, which of course it is, it's also what customers want. So the opportunity there is significant and huge. What I would say is, and I'm learning this as being new to the sector or new to that space, is work with the experts.

You know, we have a lot of partnerships with real experts in that area. So, for example, we partner with the Global Sustainable Tourism Council. Now they're excellent partners of ours and they are the experts.

We want to get this right. There's a lot of ways to get it wrong. And I think that our strategy is a lot based around working with the experts.

Another group of experts that we work with are Travelist. I don't know if you've heard of this coalition that was actually founded by the Duke of Sussex, who was on our Zoom call the other day, which was quite exciting, quite exciting, did take a sneaky photo. I'll send it to you.

And what that is, and this is where the travel industry is really coming into its own and being really smart. This is a coalition of all the world's largest travel organisations. So Trip.com Group, Expedia, Booking, Google, a real coalition of all the big players. And we come together in a pre-competitive environment. What does that mean? We just sit around a table together and talk about how we are going to give travellers and consumers credible, clear, consistent information.

And that's thanks to Travelist, who is this coalition that we're part of. Now, I'm sure it does happen, but I can't think of any other industry where everybody sits around the table like that. We're very open and we're working really hand in hand because we have to.

Like you said at the very beginning, it's such a big challenge. It's so huge. Not one person is going to do it on their own.

So we very much come at this in terms of a collaborative approach. We need to work together. And, you know, working with the experts in that space, I think, and we think, and in our organisation anyway, it's very much the strategy that we want to take.

Sorcha: And how do you see the kind of culture in the travel industry? To what extent has that changed since you've been around? Like, were you always sitting around a room having open conversations with each other or was it a bit different?

Jane: I'd like to say so, but that's a really good point. I've not really thought about it in those terms before. You know, again, back to the pandemic, I think the culture and the travel industry has changed.

I mean, I've been in it now 15 years. I'm really aging myself on this conversation. I think that a lot of things have changed in terms of the culture.

I think that 15 years ago when I joined the travel sector, if someone had told me that, you know, the two CEOs of the two largest travel companies would be female, I would have thought that was a reach. So we have a fantastic female CEO, Jane Sun, and Expedia that is also now run by Ariane Gorin. So, you know, that alone feels like a real sort of shift.

I mean, I think like every industry, we appreciate there is still a lot more to do in terms of diversity and inclusivity, but definitely progress has been made. You know, my sort of younger self would not have seen that before. So I definitely think a lot of progress has been made and a lot of progress to be made.

And it's really exciting for somebody working in a role like I am because I can sort of help to try and have a bit of impact there.

Sorcha: And if you were to speak to somebody maybe who's kind of mid-career, you know, in the travel industry, wants to have an impact, wants to work on that kind of genuine will that seems to be there in terms of, you know, diversity, equality and inclusion and so on. What advice would you give them? Massive question.

Jane: No, it's a great question. It's a great question. So I take it in two parts.

I think if you're a big company, maybe go try a smaller business. You know, that's what I did. I learned lots.

It was a great experience. Ultimately, it taught me I'm probably at my best at a big business.

Sorcha: That's really interesting.

Jane: Yeah, I think that was a really good sort of journey. I hate saying that word journey, but I think that's exactly what I went through. So, you know, maybe have a think about that.

If that's not something that you're comfortable with, maybe try something that we do really well in our business, in our organisation is, you know, maybe go and try and work in a different market. A lot of the team members in our London office, they've come from different regions. We have a lot of people there from the Shanghai office and from lots of offices across the world.

We work in travel. It's a great thing. We've always had a bit of that remote working idea behind us.

But obviously, it's a lot more every day now. So, you know, if I was a little bit younger, you know, go work in the Sydney office. That's not obviously open to everybody.

But I think if you're working in a business where you can go and experience not just the culture and the destination of working somewhere, but also the different business practices. And I think that's part of working in the travel industry. Right.

It's the privilege and it's the joy, you know, go and sort of experience some of that. I think that I've had the privilege of managing, you know, a lot of people within their mid-career. And I think that that would be my recommendation.

That would be one of the things I would suggest people do.

Sorcha: OK. And we've kind of done the serious stuff, Jane, but my kind of burning question for you is, what's your worst ever travel story? I'm expecting good stuff here.

Jane: No, no, no. I tell you what, I'll spin it around and I'll say, look, I learned quite early on, do not let a delayed flight ruin a trip. Right.

Pop on a podcast, settle in. You know, I do think genuinely it has changed my travelling experience. And get yourself a good pair of earphones and just settle in because there's only so much within your control when you're going on a trip.

Funny enough, this actually came up the other day. I will always remember where I was in the first week of March in 2020. I was lucky enough to have been in St Lucia just before I was joining a new job.

And I decided to go to St Lucia, go on holiday, completely unplugged. I'm actually really good at doing that. With one bit of advice, I'd say completely unplugged.

And this was about a day before I was due to fly back, switch my phone back on. It's just exploded with all of these messages of, are you OK, how are you going to get home, what happens if you can't get home? And of course, this turns out to be two days before lockdown.

And I had no idea. You know, cut long story short, obviously I made it home. I felt like I was on the last flight into Heathrow.

It did feel like they turned the lights out when I left. And that will always stay with me. I don't think that would happen now.

You know, I look at the reason it came up in a call. I was having a call with our, we have this fantastic network of customer service, 24 hour customer service teams across the globe. And I was learning about that.

I really wanted to understand what it is they do. And they reach out to anybody in a destination. So whether that was me in St. Lucia, you know, two days before lockdown or whether it's a natural disaster. Unfortunately, we were talking about the floods in Valencia or whatever that may be. If you're a trip.com traveller, you will get a care letter within 15 minutes and a plan to get you home.

Sorcha: Wow.

Jane: I was like, that's incredible. So I don't think my position with that sort of slightly terrifying end to my beautiful stay in St. Lucia, by the way, which was just gorgeous, but a rather terrifying end. I just don't think that would happen today.

And I think a lot of businesses, a lot of travel providers do provide that service, but I was blown away. We do it exceptionally well. We've got this real great mix of the human touch on the customer service side, but they're all, but it's all powered by AI.

So it's that beautiful combination. And, you know, I would have loved to have got a note 15 minutes within 15 minutes saying, here's how you get home. But I made it, so it wasn't that bad.

Sorcha: That's incredible. I personally think kind of those crisis communication pieces are, I mean, obviously they're incredibly important, but they're also really interesting when they work really well like that.

Jane: It is, it is extraordinary the processes that are in place from our side to help our customers and therefore then help our partners, whether that's then the flight airlines or hotels, but it's really customer first. Our biggest brand in China is C Trip. And actually everybody thinks the C stands for China, the C stands for customer.

And so it's always customer first. And so that's been a long held belief of our business. And then to see it in action within these excellent customer service units that they really take on as their mission to make sure that our travellers and our customers are safe or they get home and they have a plan.

And I'm just like, yeah, that just wouldn't have happened before the pandemic. And now it's just part of our everyday sort of customer service. It was just so satisfying and so motivating to see.

Sorcha: Yeah, that really is extraordinary. Really, really interesting. And just before we wrap up, Jane, as someone who obviously is an expert in travel, what are the destinations that you think are really cool at the moment? Where should I go on my next holiday?

Jane: I love and hate this question. It's like saying, what's your favourite song?

So one thing I do say, one thing I will say, and then I promise I will give you a couple of my faves, I think everybody should treat themselves to a holiday on their own. I think everybody deserves a solo trip. So it almost doesn't matter.

I think that terrifies some people. A lot of my trips I do on my own because they're extensions of business trips. I think there's something so good for the soul about just being able to be on your own timetable, do your own thing.

So that's always my first bit of advice. Anybody's, you know, try it, even if it's just a day, even if it's just a weekend, go suit yourself, go do whatever you like. So that would be my first bit of advice.

And I am sitting here working from home. It's a Friday. It wouldn't be fair if I didn't say Scotland for a trip because I'm so lucky to be here. I think everybody deserves a trip to Scotland as well.

But if I was to give you my places, my kind of hit list, I tell you what, I went to Montenegro this summer and it was really beautiful. And I've been meaning to go for a long time. So that was definitely a place that I loved and would recommend.

And I don't think in terms of a real different travel experience, I think it's really hard to beat Japan. I think it's just absolutely extraordinary. I tend to choose a lot of my trips based around food and the food is just extraordinary.

And if all of that fails, download Trip.com, our app, get on Trip Genie, the itinerary builder I was telling you about, just ask it. Then think of a few of the things you like and you'll be surprised for maybe some suggestion that it pops up because again, it's a big world. There's so many options out there. I would give it a shot.

Sorcha: Thank you so much. It's been so interesting talking to you.

I learned so much about things I didn't even know I didn't know. So thank you. It's been really enjoyable.

Jane: Thank you so much for having me. I've absolutely loved it. As a podcast nut, I can't thank you enough. It's been terrific.

Sorcha: Thank you. Thank you.

That was Jane McFadzean from Trip.com Group. Thanks for listening. And don't forget, if you want to listen back to any of our previous episodes, you can find them wherever you get your podcasts. That's it from us for now. So until next time, take care and bye bye.