President's Message:How A Ten-Year-Old Changed The Business Travel
Industry
There was a time when a plan for a business travel association with
an equal vote for all members was considered to be too impractical. There
was once a period during which our concept of exploring higher areas of
joint interest between corporate members and travel service members was
thought to be too ambitious. And there was a brief span of years when the
word "volunteer" seemed to be synonymous with "amateur."
The tenth anniversary of the Association of Corporate Travel Executives'
founding is testimony to the fact that we were always slightly ahead of
those times. Our association has provided a working model of a travel manager/travel
service relationship that has been copied internationally, nationally and
regionally. Our educational programs have set the industry standard for
the last decade. And our volunteers comprise some of the most innovative
and influential minds in the business travel industry.
The cornerstone of ACTE is firmly set in education. Managing or selling
business travel resources is a delicate science which hinges on a thousand
economic variables. ACTE's unswerving focus on identifying those variables
and developing the appropriate response to travel industry changes greatly
enhances the value of membership. But you don't have to take my word for
it. The fact that our association has the largest percentage of senior
travel managers and the fastest growing international segment speaks volumes.
This is the legacy of success that brings us to New Orleans on May 31,
1998.
Ten years after this association's founding, ACTE is moving forward
with an ambitious agenda for the next decade and the millennium to follow.
We are committed to developing a multi-phase educational program designed
to uniformly elevate our members to the highest standards in automation,
management expertise, and business acumen. Our objective is to construct
an abstract of tomorrow's business travel challenges and to train the executives
to meet those challenges today.
Come to our 10th Annual Members Conference determined to be a part of
the future and a catalyst for progress. Take full advantage of the expertise
and industry resources available at this event. And carry back to your
company the message that the Association of Corporate Travel Executives
is part of the equation in keeping business travel cost effective and efficient.
We're ACTE: the brightest ten-year-old on the block.
Earl Foster, President
