Enjoy this spotlight interview with one of our own TRUE advisors, Megan Tabor, CTA. Megan recently completed all certification requirements and proudly earned her CTA designation through The Travel Institute. I asked her a series of questions about her journey, and below is a refined version of her responses—edited for clarity while preserving her voice and insights.
1. What motivated or inspired you to pursue your CTA certification?
– I would say what motivated me to pursue earning my CTA certification was a desire to continue to grow my knowledge in this profession and to continue to strive towards professionalism. I think this certification is something reputable that will show my current and future clients how dedicated I am to ongoing education to ensure I can serve them as best as possible. I can of course, and do, show my professionalism in how I work with and communicate with my leads and clients. But I think there is something truly invaluable about having something “physical” or “tangible” to display your professionalism to people in another way.
2. How do you feel this certification will support your business goals, grow as an advisor or strengthen your client relationships?
– I feel that this certification will help support myself and my business in the way that it informed me of practices to manage my business and work with clients. As well as the suggestion of how to grow my knowledge on locations, which I plan to use to build my own knowledge base of the various locations around the world, so that I have a quick reference guide to help me assist my clients as quickly and efficiently as possible. There’s a lot to consider and think about in this industry and I have found that the courses through the Travel Institute have really helped open my eyes to ways to grow my understanding and knowledge on some of these things in a relatively simple way. I hope that this is something that will improve my client relationships and add to my sense of being knowledgeable for them.
3. What was your experience like while completing the CTA course? Were there any specific modules or lessons that stood out to you or had a lasting impact?
– I really enjoyed the legal and business focused modules. It showed me areas I want to improve for next year and beyond. I also really enjoyed the geography and location based educational sections as I struggle with that and have always wanted to learn more about that. I find geography and learning about different locations and cultures fascinating. Learning about other places and cultures has always been something that’s interested me. I found the program easy to navigate through and as an individual who was pursuing a career in teaching at one point, I LOVE that the travel institute provides downloadable workbooks to use also to use as you go through the course and or to use after as well should you choose to do so. They make the process seamless from start to finish as well for us, which is wonderful tool!
4. Did you face any challenges during the process? If so, how did you overcome them — especially when preparing for or taking the exams?
– One challenge that I found was in feeling a little overwhelmed at times when going through the course work. Theres so much valuable information that was provided in that course, but simultaneously it felt like I wasn’t going to be able to take in all the information. By taking my time, and managing my time, including how much time I allotted each day or week that I chose to work on the course work it helped me make sure it was manageable. Geography in school and even now is not my strong suit and so having teachings on this in the course I really appreciated. I hope that as I progress in this career my knowledge on geography will expand as a result.
5. What advice would you give to other travel advisors who are thinking about getting certified? Any tips, encouragement, or insights from your journey?
- Don’t rush the decision to pursue it, and don’t rush your way through the program. You have a whole year to study and then take the exam. Go at your own pace as you go through the course if you choose to do it and manage your time wisely. When it comes to studying for the CTA Exam, I used the website Quizlet and its corresponding app to study. I used their following study options/tools: Test, Matching Game, Blaster game, and more to study ahead of the exam. However, I did find that, when I sat for the real exam, there were only a few questions on it I was not prepared for.
- You’ve got this, and you can do absolutely anything you put your mind to! It’s but another adventure that we get to experience should we choose to pursue it! Anything is possible as long as you believe!
Shining bright, Megan! Huge congratulations on earning your CTA.