Concluding its meeting here this week before about 800 members, the Association of Corporate Travel Executives introduced travel industry veteran Ron DiLeo as its new executive director effective July 1 and BCD global accounts senior vice president Chris Crowley as its new president and the first European to hold the post.
Introducing DiLeo, outgoing president Richard Crum emphasized his global experience, multinational achievements and "drive, vision and commitment to performance." DiLeo's career in corporate travel spans more than 30 years, the first 25 of which were at Rosenbluth International where he last served as chief operating officer, followed by a role as senior vice president and general manager of American Express Europe-Middle East-Africa's then $7 billion business across 21 markets. After leaving Amex, he served as chief commercial officer of OpenSkies, a British Airways subsidiary, and most recently has consulted with travel management companies and other suppliers through his consulting practice, In the Black.
Briefly addressing the closing general session, DiLeo told attendees, "I can't tell you how fired up I am about taking on this role. I can't think of a better place to make a difference than through this organization. Buckle up; it's going to be a good time."
DiLeo told Management.travel, "I love to make a difference and have a lot of passion about leading change and doing great things for this industry. When I spoke to Richard [Crum] back in December, it was a tough decision because my business is actually doing well, but I can add a lot of value, doing stuff that I've been doing in my business."
DiLeo emerged as the top candidate to lead ACTE from a field of nearly 80 candidates who applied after Susan Gurley last fall announced her departureafter four years to return to a government position. Rearden Commerce worldwide sales vice president Tony D'Astolfo headed a six-person search committee that reviewed resumes of those inside the travel industry as well as career association executives. D'Astolfo said the committee "vetted 18 and handed over a list of four" finalists to the board. "All were highly qualified" to lead the organization, he added.
From the four finalists, the board tapped DiLeo by early May and negotiated a contract just prior to the start of the conference. However, Crum, whose day job is president of AirPlus International, said executives decided to introduce DiLeo at conference end to keep the focus on the meeting that "volunteers had worked hard" to execute.
One of those volunteers is Crowley, who in January began preparing to take over as president in May. Crowley also is moving to a new job as BCD Travel senior vice president of the global client team in Europe instead of head of sales for EMEA and Asia-Pacific. Joining ACTE as a "young hotel sales executive" in the late 1990s, Crowley said, what most fascinated him about the organization was how "open and transparent the conversation was" about various industry topics, but then about whether the American or European business way was better. "The first thing I want to do is bring that slightly forgotten, but very important, element of openness and transparency back to the organization. The second thing I want to do is widen our scope and appeal" to allow members to share and exchange more knowledge, he added. "We have an industry that seems to be aging, so we need to attract young executives back to the business."
As an organization, ACTE also must help its members face two emerging issues, Crowley said. One is the "ability and challenges to plan for uncertain security or environmental scenarios. This will become more of a problem," and one that prompted ACTE to produce two sessions at the conference, as well as development of a white paper, to be released in June. "Second, we're seeing a sea change in the power and role of the individual traveler. Many discussions we have in the industry now are related to this fundamental point. How do we empower that individual without relinquishing our duty of care and help them work in a proper way? For several years, we've almost tried to scare people with this. What we've realized now is that this isn't the most helpful way to discuss it. Now we're talking about how to" empower travel managers and suppliers to best address and promote this change.
Crowley said his agenda is not about "reinventing the wheel or engaging enormous amounts of resources that we don't have. I view my role to be a strategic influence, [to offer] direction, support and [be the] voice of the industry."
ACTE's most recent tax filing--for the 2008 fiscal year--filed at the end of 2009, indicated a net loss of $362,990, compared to a balance of $141,426 the year before. ACTE in 2009 generated more than $6.2 million in revenues--of which $5.2 million were from conventions and meetings--but it also reported more than $6.7 million in expenses and a total shortfall for the year of $504,416.
"In 2010 and at the end of 2009, we owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to the registrants at our events and to our key sponsors, who have really stepped up and supported the organization," Crowley said. "We're in a much healthier position now than we were even 12 months ago. We're seeing significant claw back with the loans and finances. We have reorganized and restructured the ACTE organization to be much more cost-effective. This hasn't necessarily meant a lot of staff reduction, but it has meant a better application of our existing resources to the tasks at hand. We're being much more careful about the way we program events." For example, in Europe, Crowley said, ACTE held one or two fewer events than the year before, but all events were "oversubscribed by 25 percent. It's doing what we do better, so it generates a better revenue position for the organization and delivers more value to our sponsors."
ACTE has signed some new sponsors: Accor is one that "springs to mind as a new global sponsor," according to Crowley, but the asociation also resigned "nearly all of our existing sponsors, some at increased levels" of participation.
Crum said ACTE is "not in a critical position financially. We obviously did a lot to trim our expenses last year like every company going through leaner times. From a financial standpoint, we look good."
Crowley noted that besides having its first European president, ACTE also welcomed a board that for the first time is dominated by women. "We have nine or 10 women out of 14 board members. We're a very diverse, strong, multinational board."
But the U.S. membership and U.S. support is extremely important to ACTE. The "U.S. marketplace--and I can say this as a European--is the driver marketplace of corporate travel. We absolutely cannot succeed without the U.S. succeeding." When looking at rankings of the largest travel programs, 60 percent to 70 percent of the "global corporate decisions are made in North America, so it's absolutely critical that this marketplace understand its issues together, communicates well, feels part of the global family and actively engages in meetings and events. The ability of the U.S. market to deliver expertise and best practices is really important."