General Sessions

Gain expertise and insight on macro-level issues in corporate travel and how they affect your day-to-day operations. Keynote and Sponsor Industry Perspective presentations given by well-known, respected leaders in travel and business will challenge your thinking and provide you with innovative intelligence.

Monday, 17 November

Hot Spots in Travel Space

Premier authority on the business of travel, Professor Louis Gialloreto will share up-to-the-moment insights from the strategic to the tactical. In his fast paced presentation he will challenge your perceptions of the state of the travel industry and provide fact-based overviews from both a global and Canadian perspective. Discussion points will cover topics such as open skies, air traffic control and congestion, the changing state of regulation, airline pricing ,options for effective service differentiation, and thoughts on where future travel system efficiencies will come from.

Where are we in the business cycle and what does it mean to corporate travel managers and suppliers? What lies ahead? This general session leads the way for a better understanding of the business travel world today and lays the foundation for future discussions throughout the conference

Professor Louis Gialloreto BA, BA (Hon) Law, MBA, LLM, MRAeS

Executive Director, Program Director, Lecturer, President, Partner, and Editorial Contributor are all positions held by Louis Gialloreto. An author of over 50 articles in various marketing and air transport publications along with 20 years of corporate management experience with regional and major airlines, Prof. Gialloreto has developed and/or taught on executive and management education seminars and corporate consulting mandates with representatives of over 100 companies in the last 15 years. Prof. Gialloreto was awarded Best Professor (MBA) at McGill University in Montreal from 2002-2004. He combines this experience with specialization in marketing, sales, customer service, and competitive analysis. With clarity and a direct approach laced with humour, Prof. Gialloreto will share his extensive knowledge and insights in this dynamic and engaging presentation.

Monday, November 17 - Lunch Keynote Presentation

The Turbo Charged Brain

In this funny and unique keynote presentation, memory coaching specialist, Hall of Fame Inductee, and Guinness World Record Holder Bob Gray will reveal the untapped memory potential in each of us. Mr. Gray will begin by sharing the hilarious story of how his unique skills enabled him to immigrate into Canada. He then delivers two incredibly powerful memory demonstrations which never fail to astonish.

An excellent memory conveys the image of success and having a trained memory is a business asset attainable by everyone. Using humour throughout, Mr. Gray will share the practical “Chain” system which dates all the way back to ancient Greece and is still today an invaluable tool for memorizing speeches, presentations, lists and more. This empowering technique and its many applications suitable for the business world provides immediate “walk away” value.

Are you ready to accelerate your memory into rapid recall?

Tuesday, 18 November

Economic Snapshot: 2008 and Beyond

The current difficulties in the U.S. and international financial markets are expected to widely impact the Canadian economy. Where does Canada stand? What are the driving forces across Canada and the world that you need to know about?

Beginning with a global economic overview, this session will zero in on the impact of the U.S. economy on Canada. Up to date forecasts as well as valuable insights that go beyond statistics will demonstrate where Canada is heading. Expert economic forecaster and analyst Pedro Antunes will share his thoughts on how Canada will weather the storm. Onita Dey-Frankian of BCD Travel and former Regional Chair of ACTE Canada will be on stage to lend a travel perspective to the session. There will be an opportunity for audience questions and answers.

Pedro Antunes, Director, National and Provincial Forecast, Conference Board of Canada

Pedro Antunes joined the Conference Board of Canada in 1991. He is currently responsible for managing a team of economists in producing many of the Conference Board’s national and provincial forecasts and reports. He possesses an in-depth understanding of the economic issues unique to Canada and how these relate on the U.S. and international stage. Prior to joining the Conference Board, Mr. Antunes worked for two years with the Canadian Forecasting Group at the Bank of Canada.

Learn, Link and Lead into the Future

In the previous general session today, you were provided with a glimpse into Canadian economics and travel spend trends for 2009. What better way to cap off the conference than to examine the bigger and broader picture: the future of the ever-evolving technological world we live in. Two time Gemini award winning writer and broadcaster Evan Solomon shares insights about exploring the world of innovation, advances in technology, changing business paradigms, and creative approaches to managing and solving the complex challenges of sustainability in the 21st century. Mr. Solomon's knowledgeable views dispel many of the myths and hype not only surrounding the digital world but human progress in general presenting a unique, realistic picture of where things now stand, and where they may be headed. This final general session is one you don't want to miss!

Evan Solomon, CBC Television Broadcaster, Journalist and Author

A long-time print and broadcast journalist, Mr. Solomon is the co-host of the two weekly news and current affairs shows CBC News: Sunday and CBC News: Sunday Night.

He is also the host of the Gemini award winning CBC Newsworld show about ideas in print called HotType. For four years he was the host of the Gemini award-winning show Futureworld, which explored the latest developments in technology and innovation. He also produced and hosted a series called The Change Makers, and a series for PBS in America called Masters of Technology. Evan was the co-founder, and for eight years the editor-in-chief, of Shift magazine, an award-winning international magazine about technology and culture. Most recently, he co-founded The Ingenuity Project, a dynamic new series that gathers the best and brightest minds from around the world in order to generate new solutions to the most pressing issues of our time. As part of this project, Evan is the co-editor and writer of the best-selling book Fueling the Future: How the Battle Over Energy Is Changing Everything, which was nominated of the National Business Book of the Year in 2004 and the National Science Award in 2004. He is also the co-editor and writer of Feeding the Future: From Fat to Famine, How to Solve the World's Food Crisis, released in 2005.