EXPERT
From Company Cars to Corporate Mobility As a new generation dominates the workforce, expectations on vehicle-based mobility are changing, as are the choices.
LUKAS NECKERMANN International Fleet Expert
HIGHLIGHTS The value of a company car as a perk has diminished, yet the relevance of vehicle based mobility in the corporate environment remains. The need to visit clients, patients, suppliers and partners is as great as ever. Lukas Neckermann notes, "Companies are learning from Millennials, reevaluating their fourwheeled assets and are becoming more flexible. All over Europe, car sharing and ridesharing is beginning to play a larger role in moving people – and even goods – from A to B."
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By 2020, Millennials will comprise over half the global workforce. Members of this Generation Y (and for that matter, Generations Z and Alpha) have a different understanding of value than their parents: they don't want the corner office, most certainly don't care about the potted plant and they can't be lured with the prospect a company car. With a higher rate of urbanisation, they desire flexibility in life, a career on their own terms and mobility on-demand. They are a generation that has grown up with PCs, smartphones and being able to command "stuff" online and immediately – be it books, food, or transportation. They may even have arrived at their first job via Uber.
countries. We conducted over 50 fleetmanager interviews and consulted with experts across Europe, the US and China to evaluate the potential for corporate car sharing and multimodal mobility cards. In short, it's an exciting time to be a fleet manager, travel manager or finance director; the time is ripe for creativity and new approaches.
In a PWC study of Millennial graduates, only 4% rated a company car as the perk they desired most – behind a greater vacation allowance and flexible working hours. In their professional lives as at home, an overall preference for flexibility and on-demand access to mobility trumps a shiny set of parked wheels.
Among others, I have seen examples of organisations that: • Have replaced their entire fleet of poolcars with corporate car sharing, • Have signed dozens of employees up to public car sharing schemes, • Have amended their company policies to allow peer-to-peer sharing of company cars (effectively allowing the employee to earn some extra money from the idle asset), and • A llow managers to choose alternatives to company cars, that might include mobility budgets via car sharing and ridesharing companies (such as ZipCar or Ubeeqo).
Either encouraged or forced by this new wave of thinking about mobility among their staff, companies are also considering their own use of assets – whether it be the valuable real-estate wasted on parking spots, company funds locked in fleets that sit idle 95% of the time, the company cars that are no longer perceived as a perk, or the utilisation rates of their pool-cars.
Fleet managers have told us of increasing pressures to maximise utilisation of vehicle assets – including when staff are on holiday or travelling. This has led to considerable creativity (multiple keys issued, better use of space in commercial vehicles), but also to exploration of technological options, including corporate car sharing, such as via AlphaCity, Ubeeqo and Enterprise.
Over the past months, Progenium Strategy Consultants and I have conducted an extensive study on the use of corporate mobility alternatives across five European
Many of their – especially city-based – staff is already very familiar with car sharing, as they might already be a member of ZipCar, DriveNow or car2go.
FLEET EUROPE #83