- Details
- Category: Industry News
Her tenure officially began September 1, and she has accepted the role on a temporary one-year basis, with the option to extend her duties if she wishes to.
Oliver said that she happened to be on a conference call with MLOA President Maurice Brewster of Mosaic Global Transportation, who volunteered her for the executive director positon.
“It’s hard for me to say no to certain people—and Maurice is certainly one of them,” she said with a laugh. “We spent a month working out the details of making this happen, since I do have a day job and I wanted to guarantee that I can give the time required to make it a successful partnership.”
If Oliver’s name sounds familiar, it may be because of that day job as publisher of the award-winning Minority Business Entrepreneur (MBE) trade magazine, as well as her role as president of the minority- and woman-owned Enterprise Publishing.
Her time with MBE has, in fact, given her “a periphery view of the transportation industry” well before she first teamed up with the MLOA.
“MBE was born from the transportation area,” Oliver said, explaining that the previous owner was inspired to found the publication by reading about minority business opportunities in Department of Transportation work—but that “nobody was really talking to minority businesses to let them know about these opportunities.”
“The magazine was essentially born from what she was learning back in the early ’80s about what the government was doing to encourage more minority businesses to participate in the transportation world.”
Oliver also is an active supporter of the Western Regional Minority Supplier Development Council and serves on various committees for the Women’s Business Enterprise Council-West, Women’s Business Enterprise National Council, and the MLOA. She has been a keynote speaker, moderator, and panelist, and is the recipient of several organization awards. The wife and mother of two is a native of Jamaica who earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in English Literature from Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.
Along with an impressive background, Oliver also brings big plans to her new role at the MLOA.
“There are a few things that need to be done strategically, and that’s what we’ll be working on initially,” she said. “The MLOA meeting at the Chauffeur Driven Show is where we’ll lay out our plans for the next six to 10 months after that, which runs to the end of my initial term. I’ll be working hard to get the association to the next level.”
MLOA’s meeting at the 2018 Chauffeur Driven Show will be the morning of October 9.
Visit mlooa.org for more information.
[CD0918]
- Details
- Category: Industry News
A total of 108 golfers comprised 27 teams and raised nearly $44,000 in the yearly fundraiser benefiting Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. It is one of the largest nonprofit children’s cancer and research centers in the world—and a favorite charity of GALA’s.
“We’ve donated more than $60,000 to Children’s Healthcare over the past few years, and they’ll be getting a nice surprise from us when we present them with the donation check at our next membership meeting,” said Golf Chair Fred Rich of CTN Global Chauffeured Transportation.
Rich said that GALA’s golf outing is now the biggest in the industry, and has attracted more than 40 sponsors accordingly. He cited Enterprise, Mercedes-Benz, Chosen Payments, Grech Motors, and Ford-Lincoln Limousine and Livery Vehicles as being among the event’s major sponsors.
In addition to doing some good, golfers had ample opportunities to win big in a various contests, as well as the auction held during the awards banquet that serves as the event’s capstone dinner. Items like airline tickets to anywhere in the U.S., hotel certificates, tickets to sporting events like Braves and Bulldogs games, and more helped stuff the charity coffers.
Contest winners included Hoss Oskouie of Atlantic Limousine & Transportation for Longest Drive, Mark Mayfield of RBM of Atlanta for Closest to the Pin, and Khari Dickson of Divine Chariots for Straightest Drive. A hole-in-one grand prize offered a trip to Scotland, which Rich said that went unclaimed.
“No one’s ever won the hole-in-one prize,” he said. “We have to ensure it every year because somebody’s going to win it one of these times!”
The RBM of Atlanta team ultimately came in first, with the Casey Corporate team placing second and the Chosen Payments team clinching third.
Rich said that, just as in previous years, participants raved about the golf tournament.
“First-timers said it was one of the best tournaments they’ve ever played in,” he said. “Everyone just had a ball. We had a great time and a great awards banquet—and it couldn’t have been for a better cause because, frankly, there is no better cause than the kids.”
He added that Dave Winokur, the development officer at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, is a big supporter of the charity outing, and reminds golfers that their generosity is making a difference to the hundreds of young patients the center treats every year.
“Dave always speaks before the tournament, and he talks about how they treat more than 400 cancer patients a year,” Rich said. “That means that every day, they’re telling a family that their child has cancer. And it feels good to know that we’re helping them give some of those families good news.”
The next GALA meeting will be September 20, where representatives from Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta will be given proceeds from the tournament.
Visit galalimo.org for more information.
[CD0918]
- Details
- Category: Industry News
GBTA held its first-ever Awareness 5K Run & Walk to raise awareness and funding to stop human trafficking on Sunday morning of Convention with more than 200 registered participants. GBTA continued to raise money throughout Convention, presenting a $20,000 check on Wednesday to benefit ECPAT-USA and its efforts to end child exploitation and trafficking.
GBTA made two key announcements during Convention including the merger of WINiT for Women into GBTA. The merger will allow GBTA to take WINiT’s mission worldwide. Members of GBTA and WINiT will benefit through access to both organization’s programs, services, and an expanded network of approximately 12,000 industry professionals. Additionally, leadership from GBTA and the Institute of Travel Management (ITM), the leading managed business travel association in the UK and Ireland, announced a joint venture that is part of a deeper, collaborative partnership between both associations kicking off with a London-based event for the managed travel and meetings sector on January 31, 2019.
GBTA Convention 2018 featured top industry leaders on Center Stage focused on business travel’s most pressing issues. As only the third person in 90 years to head the largest hotel company in the world, Marriott International President & CEO Arne Sorenson shared his outlook on the business travel industry, the shakeup over group commissions and the company’s home-sharing strategy in a one-on-one interview with GBTA Executive Director and COO Michael W. McCormick.
Dorothy Dowling, Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer for Best Western Hotels, led a session of top female business travel executives sharing their insights on the unique challenges they faced as women arriving in leadership positions within their companies. Although their personal leadership journeys differed, their advice for women in the business travel industry coalesced around a few core themes: taking risks, thriving through failure and talking the talk.
Transportation Security Administrator (TSA) David Pekoske and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Commissioner Kevin McAleenan took the stage together for the first-time in an interview with McCormick where the two highlighted technology’s potential to dramatically increase security and passenger facilitation. On the horizon, the two agencies are also planning to better integrate the PreCheck and Global Entry programs.
Kurt Ekert, CEO of Carlson Wagonlit Travel, led a panel of experienced travel buyers in a shift from typical GBTA Convention Center Stage sessions, which often put a supplier on the hot seat. The discussion focused on the growing responsibilities for travel buyers and technology’s increasing role in travel management as buyers work to ensure duty of care responsibilities and cost-savings measures are in place, while also balancing individual traveler preferences and convenience.
Center Stage wrapped up with Guy Langford, Deloitte’s Vice Chairman, U.S. Transportation, Hospitality, & Services Leader, asking a panel of executives covering various sectors of the business travel industry if bigger really is better, prompting a discussion of advantages and disadvantages of industry consolidation. Being bigger can help companies learn, negotiate better and innovate, the panelists said, as bigger companies often have advantages in boosting investments in marketing and new technology to meet consumers’ evolving expectations. Being larger can also create disadvantages, especially when growing through acquisition as you must understand how to assimilate and integrate diverse cultures and systems.
The keynote stage at Convention Arena featured sports icon, social justice pioneer, and entrepreneur Billie Jean King; investor on ABC’s Shark Tank, chairman of O’Shares ETF Investments Financial Group, and bestselling author Kevin O’Leary; and John Walsh, victims' rights advocate and host of Discovery ID's In Pursuit with John Walsh.
More than 170 education sessions gave travel professionals of all levels more opportunities than ever to help them advance their careers and improve their travel programs. Topics covered top travel industry issues including duty of care, technology and innovation, procurement, and sustainability. Attendees can access all of these sessions and more with GBTA Convention 2018 On Demand.
The sold-out Expo Floor featuring more than 400 exhibitors showcasing the latest and greatest in business travel products and services. Nearly 30 companies participated in GBTA’s fourth annual media day and shared their breaking news announcements.
GBTA concluded the event with 6,755 attendees—including more than 1,350 buyers—making this the largest GBTA Convention in history and one of the largest gatherings of travel professionals in the world.
The 2019 convention will be in Chicago from August 3-7.
Visit gbta.org for more information.
[CD0918]