The unprecedented disruption to international travel brought about by the pandemic highlighted an urgent need for robust crisis management strategies amongst global corporations. In the event of a major crisis, the regional closure of accommodation options – or worse, the declaration of an unsafe city or state – makes extricating and reaccommodating travellers a priority. This is where the ubiquity of serviced apartments, combined with SilverDoor’s 24-hour a day service, provides the means to safely accommodate travellers around the world at short notice.
What is Crisis Management?
In broad terms, crisis management is a strategy employed to identify and respond to threats facing an organisation and its stakeholders. Often, crisis management is used pre-emptively to identify potential crises in advance - the end objective being to harness the organisation’s flexibility and survive the threat, no matter the impact on its normal operations. Anticipating and subsequently mitigating this impact requires the implementation of a business continuity plan – something that was lacking for many businesses when the covid-19 virus struck.
Crisis management also pertains to ensuring the safety and continued working capacity of employees and assignees (and any associated operations), wherever they may be. Unlike risk management, which involves planning for events which might occur, crisis management involves reacting to crises, and all their variable outcomes, as they arise – utilising emergency contingencies shaped by previously conducted risk analysis. Having a global network of serviced apartments built into these contingencies allows for workers to be expediently reaccommodated within the narrowest timeframes.
Crisis Management Strategy with Serviced Apartments
A Dedicated Service
Organisations that integrate SilverDoor Apartments within their travel programmes and crisis management contingencies tap into a 24-hour service and wealth of market expertise. Most importantly, having a responsive, impartial serviced apartment agency involved in crisis situations greatly extends the reach and likelihood of accommodation availability for immediate worker relocation. SilverDoor Apartments, for example, has over 250,000 apartments within its worldwide portfolio.
Leading Technology and Traveller Tracking
Utilising SilverDoor’s industry leading Orbi technology, travel managers can browse and book apartments remotely – as well as track all live bookings and manage billing and reports from one centralised data management system. This greatly reduces time-consuming administrative processes during a crisis event and enables travel managers to track travellers individually by using our integrated traveller tracking technologies – Anvil and International SOS – which are especially useful for carrying out risk analysis prior to and during a traveller’s journey.
Serviced Apartment Benefits
As demonstrated throughout the pandemic, serviced apartments are especially beneficial to travellers or relocated assignees during a crisis. Depending on the nature of the crisis, it is often necessary for workers to be reaccommodated on a long-stay basis at short notice. In these circumstances, there is rarely time for the retrieval of belongings and home comforts, which is why the home-from-home environment and furnishings included in a serviced apartment provides an optimum temporary living space in the event of a crisis.
The enhanced health and safety measures innate to serviced apartments mean they can be used to isolate safely for any duration of stay. With a fully equipped kitchen, living space, and separate areas to eat and sleep, serviced apartments are self-contained and require minimal contact with others –setting them apart from hotels during the pandemic. This universal design enables relocated workers to quickly adapt to their serviced apartment and continue to live on their own schedule and terms – crucial to ensuring guest wellbeing for any length of time.
Furthermore, with an increasing number of serviced apartment operators adapting their properties to suit the growing nomadic traveller market, the operational value of serviced apartments cannot be understated. Typically offering excellent Wi-Fi connectivity as standard, serviced apartments at the minimum offer somewhere to sit and work. The more agile operators are ensuring their apartments feature dedicated work areas, both inside the apartments and throughout the wider property. This may include the provision of an office chair, large desk, and stationery within the apartment, or the inclusion of on-site meeting rooms and hot desks. In either case, relocating workers to serviced apartments ensures they can comfortably and effectively work remotely until a long-term solution is reached.
SilverDoor’s Group Head of Operations, Wesley Shelling, said:
“Our ability to source apartments virtually anywhere in the world is invaluable to our corporate clients – particularly during crisis events. We have seen this more than ever in recent years – first during the upheaval of the pandemic when clients needed to extract their people from regions entering shutdowns, and again during the conflict in Ukraine. In these situations serviced apartments provide a flexible, secure, and safe space to call home – and we know from client testimonies that this can make all the difference.”
Chief Customer Officer, Martin Klima, added:
“Our 24-hour service was created with client support in mind. We are always available to provide assistance, and this is best demonstrated during crisis situations. Our international, on-the-ground teams provide the immediate support and expertise that is required to extricate and accommodate those in need. As such, we are well versed in crisis management, and understand the urgency with which our service needs to function to best support guests, no matter where they may be.”
Talk with us today
Optimise your crisis management strategy with SilverDoor – contact one of our international offices today and speak with a member of our team about integrating SilverDoor into your travel programme. You can also read more about our commitment to the ‘Four S’s’ – safety, savings, sustainability, and service – and how these factors reflect and optimise your organisation's CSR and ESG commitments.
