Annual Conference: A Forum for Sharing Ideas

Posted April 24, 2015 at 10:24 am

TRSA’s 2015 Annual Conference will inspire current and future top management in textile services companies to collaborate with each other more effectively. Together, they will attend presentations and other activities that encourage improved communication and idea-sharing between generations. The conference will take place Sept. 9-11 at Wild Dunes Resort, Isle of Palms, SC.

Speakers include keynoter Alison Levine, a world-class mountaineer and polar adventurer, and Jim Knight, the hospitality employee trainer of Hard Rock International fame. Both appeal across generations with their emphasis on balancing tradition with new ideas as they motivate their business audiences to improve everyday management practices.

Levine, who taught at West Point, will offer ideas for creating more cohesive teams, taking responsible risks and developing leaders who succeed in times of uncertainty. She draws on her academic and business experience and particularly her high-adventure feats to deliver practical, humorous and often unorthodox advice about how to grow as a leader.

She's ascended the highest peak on every continent, including Mount Everest, and skied to the North and South poles. Less than 40 people have accomplished all these. Her business career includes 20 years in the pharmaceutical/medical industry, Goldman Sachs and consulting.

Knight will lead a workshop to help companies in attendance bridge their generations of management, prompting them to consider legacy and emerging tactics to perpetuate their historic brands. He’ll help them articulate their operations’ heritage and culture and recognize whether these should be maintained or revolutionized. Now a consultant, Knight oversaw training for all Hard Rock cafe, hotel and casino properties.

Other presenters will include:

Juha Laurio, president & CEO, Lindström Group, the Helsinki-based textile services chain that employs 3,000 in Europe and Asia.  As chairman of the European Textile Services Association, he is enacting ETSA’s charges regarding the roles of textiles, energy, water and detergent in industry operations’ sustainability. He’ll encourage attendees to recognize the environmental impacts of products (textiles, equipment, more) from the harvesting of the raw materials needed to create them, to the resources they require to use, to their end-of-life.

Andrew Wittmann, director and senior research analyst, Robert W. Baird & Co. He’ll identify the latest economic tailwinds contributing to the textile services industry’s momentum as well as the headwinds working against it, examining market and employment trends. Wittmann’s market analysis will spark the established and new players on each management team in the audience to unify their views of the competitive landscapes their company faces.

Also on the agenda are business and social events that foster discussion between peers from different companies:

  • Welcome reception
  • Young/Emerging Leaders (Breakfast)
  • Chairman’s reception and dinner
  • Women in Textile Services (Breakfast)
  • TRSA awards ceremony

For relaxation and recreation, as well as mixing with executives from other companies:

  • Yoga and restoration (for attendees’ spouses/guests)
  • Golf tournament
  • In-shore creek fishing
  • Lunch and carriage tour in nearby historic Charleston

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