Werner Henschelchen, General Manager of gasq, says: ‘There are a number of training organisations across Europe which are interested in delivering accredited training courses around information security management, business resilience and IT governance. The new IBITGQ framework will define structured learning paths from foundation courses through to advanced and expert-level qualifications. Qualifications will initially be built around the implementation and audit skills required for best-practice management standards, such as ISO/IEC 27001, ISO/IEC 27005, BS25999 and ISO/IEC 38500.’

IBITGQ will develop and publish syllabuses for each of the qualifications that it establishes, as it establishes them, and these syllabuses will be freely available from the IBITGQ website, www.ibitgq.org, which is currently under development and will be launched within the next two weeks.

‘Open examinations for all IBITGQ courses will be available online through gasq and at the end of accredited training courses, through accredited exam centres. We have already accredited IT Governance Ltd for the delivery of training leading to the first two IBITGQ certifications’, adds Werner Henschelchen.

Alan Calder, Chief Executive of IT Governance, says: ‘It’s hard to assess the relative quality and value of many training courses without standardised testing and external accreditation by established examination bodies. IT governance, information security and business resilience are increasingly important to organisations worldwide. We believe that a formal qualification scheme will provide a framework for professionals within the industry to develop the range of interconnected skills that employers will need in the years ahead.’

IBITGQ, an association working non-for-profit incorporated under German law, draws initially on gasq’s international expertise in the accreditation of training providers, provision of examinations and certification of personnel, and the well-regarded IT governance, information security and compliance training expertise of IT Governance Ltd. IBITGQ is actively recruiting additional board members from the industry and will be developing relationships with relevant industry bodies in the UK, across Europe and in North America.

Those training organisations that wish to deliver IBITGQ-accredited training courses will be able to use the published syllabuses and range of supporting materials to develop their own capability to the point that they and their courses can be accredited. There will also be a range of supporting manuals, training and examination guides, and approved courseware to simplify the route to accreditation for training organisations and to help candidates prepare for the examinations. Everything that a training organisation might need in order to prepare for accreditation, and more, will be available from the IBITGQ website.

The first two IBITGQ-accredited courses are the Certified ISMS ISO27001 Lead Implementer and the Certified ISMS ISO27001 Lead Auditor courses. The first ATO delivering these courses is IT Governance Ltd, and the first courses will take place in London in May.

‘Continuing professional development is critical for IT governance, information security and business resilience professionals today’, adds Werner Henschelchen, ‘and, for this reason, we will be working with IT Governance and members of the IBITGQ board to develop a CPD scheme that will ensure that employers continue to value the IBITGQ range of certifications. All members of the broad IT governance industry are welcome to join IBITGQ, which can be done (for a small annual fee) by going to the association’s website when it is launched.’

Those were the words of Yves Weisselberger, chief executive officer of KDS, the leading European supplier of integrated travel and expense (T&E) management systems, speaking this month at the company’s first annual ‘KDS! Now’ conference in Paris.

“Cloud computing has caused a revolution,” said Weisselberger. “You can seamlessly deliver a software upgrade to every single one of your customers at once.

“Mobility is another key technological trend. We used to live in a world where technology meant people had less to do. Now we bring technology to people wherever they are, so they can do more with their lives.”

The new ‘KDS Mobile’ service, launched at ‘KDS Now!’, brings the company’s T&E services to employees on the move anywhere in the world, through a mobile phone or similar hand-held device. Staff downtime is therefore minimised. Among the many advantages, expenses can be entered whilst, for example, staff are travelling between meetings in a taxi, and travel requests and approvals need never be delayed again simply because an employee or manager is off-site. “‘KDS Mobile’ is our first-generation mobile product,” says Weisselberger, “and we are very excited about the prospects. Further generations of KDS mobile products will follow soon.

“The common theme for all our technological advances at KDS is ‘people’. We know our customers want measurable savings, happy employees and control over what happens in their companies. Our efforts constantly focus on those goals.”

Speaking at the company’s ‘KDS Now! 2011’ conference in Paris, chief executive Yves Weisselberger said: “We’re unveiling technologies that will give companies unprecedented levels of flexibility, visibility, forecasting, ease and efficiency in their travel booking and expense processing.”

Through an on-screen ‘dashboard’, the ‘KDS Executive Suite’ provides companies with an instant graphic overview of their T&E performance. In a single glance, a financial director can see many key performance indicators (KPIs), monitoring concerns from whether company policies and processes are being correctly applied by staff to what would happen if those policies were to change. “Best of all,” says Weisselberger, “the Executive Suite’s revolutionary new ‘Foresight’ early warning system follows and predicts KPI trends to provide advance warning of forthcoming problems. If company targets are not going to be met by year-end, ‘Foresight’ can recommend practical, pre-emptive corrective measures. There has never been a technology-based solution to this problem before.

“Finance directors will love the ‘Executive Suite’,” continues Weisselberger. “You can customise the dashboard to show the KPIs that really matter to your business, from ‘Return on Investment from T&E’ through to ‘Compliance to Travel Policy’. Then you can immediately assess your company’s performance and solve any problems – or even potential problems – with just a few taps on the keyboard. Realising too late that you have a crisis – and introducing a panic travel ban, for example – is just not a sign of good management.”

The Executive Suite ‘Index’ function allows the user to see exactly how money is being spent, and by whom, even breaking figures down into spend on individual vendors if required.

“T&E spend normally represents 2-8% of a company’s turnover,” says Weisselberger. “The ‘Executive Suite’ brings the same level of visibility and cost discipline to T&E management as companies routinely demand in other areas of substantial spend.

“The ‘Executive Suite is a landmark in T&E management; a major step forward in helping companies maximise the return on their travel budgets.”

‘KDS Mobile’ brings the company’s T&E services to employees on the move anywhere in the world, through a mobile phone or similar hand-held device. Staff downtime is therefore minimised. Among the many advantages, expenses can be entered whilst, for example, staff are travelling between meetings in a taxi, and travel requests and approvals need never be delayed again simply because an employee or manager is off-site. “‘KDS Mobile’ is our first-generation mobile product,” says Weisselberger, “and we are very excited about the prospects. Further generations of KDS mobile products will follow soon.”

The new KDS ‘Receipt Scanning’ service removes the paper trail from expense processing. “The employee could, for example, scan his receipts on the office photocopier and then send that scan electronically when submitting the claim,” says Weisselberger. “Or he could even photograph the receipts with his mobile phone and attach the images to the claim.” Finance teams therefore no longer need to waste time matching a pile of physical receipts to the entries on a claim form. By improving the reconciliation of routine receipts and claims, the team can focus instead on missing or unusual receipts.

Finally, KDS is launching a ‘Partner Programme’ service that offers travel management companies (TMCs) the best package yet for communicating with corporate customers through a portal. “Our goal,” says Weisselberger, “is to allow our partners to serve their customers in the best way possible. We want to make our partners self-sufficient in a shorter timeframe than ever before. Our fully-hosted portals already allow TMCs to forget about infrastructure and focus on customers. Through the Partner Programme, TMCs can now look forward to software, services, training and tools designed to accelerate revenue and drive customer satisfaction.”

Over 380 people attended ‘KDS Now! 2011’, which was hosted by leading travel journalist and broadcaster Simon Calder.

KDS is creating the ‘KDS Now! 2011’ event as a forum for sharing knowledge and insight into this increasingly important aspect of business finance. Companies invest up to 8% of their annual turnover in staff travel and, on the long road to economic recovery, optimising the return on that investment should be a priority.

‘KDS Now! 2011’ will be hosted by leading travel journalist and broadcaster Simon Calder. Over 450 people are already scheduled to attend.

A full programme for ‘KDS Now! 2011’ will be backed by the launch of a white paper drawn from the results of the latest KDS survey, analysing how organisations are coping with the complexities of modern T&E management, from the smallest procedural details through to return on investment (ROI).

Yves Weisselberger, chief executive officer of KDS, says: “As a business our focus is on delivering an enhanced ROI when it comes to T&E and ‘KDS Now! 2011’ is the embodiment of everything we do. Businesses are getting back out into the travel market but costs are at a premium so this event is an opportunity to take the pulse of business travel and to discuss best practice.”

Registration for ‘KDS Now! 2011’ can be found at: http://www.kds.com/kds-now-2011-registration.