Alisa Walsh Reports from SITE 2019 Global Conference in Bangkok, Thailand

Alisa's immediate reaction: "I can't wait to go back". The #SITEGC 2019 was attended by hundreds of event pros from around the globe. Alisa reports from Bangkok.

Alisa: "I am so proud of our Southern California Chapter for winning the Excellence in Education Award. The Global Conference in Bangkok was a wonderful experience of meeting friends, making new ones and exchanging ideas. I had heard lots of praise about Thailand. It's all true. It is the Land of Smiles."

Alisa proved once again that she has more energy than most of us can fathom. She co-presented "Crushing It" at The Special Event on Wednesday, January 9th, dashed from San Diego to the Los Angeles airport, flew 20+ hours with a stopover in Hong Kong and landed in Bangkok on Friday, January 11th,  just in time to take a shower and change to attend the opening night events at the beautiful Shangri-La Hotel.
Alisa grins at the memory: "Being busy right away kept me awake but after the reception I almost fell asleep at the table! After that many hours I got a great night's sleep and by Saturday I felt really fresh. It was definitely helpful that I was really excited and happy to see everyone once I got there."

What are the most lasting impressions of this year's conference?

Alisa: "It was my second global conference, I had the pleasure of attending last year in Rome, This year was somewhat different. Last year was a combined conference by SITE and MPI Global. This year it was solely a SITE event,  focusing on incentive travel with about 360 attendees. I  enjoyed the fantastic speakers snd learned a lot about bringing new creative aspects into incentive travel events.
On a more personal level I was really happy to see friends again that I had met last year. We had stayed in touch over the year and it was wonderful to reconnect in person. It was great for me because I was looking at it from the perspective of being a President Elect. I got to meet with many other chapter leaders and learned a lot about what worked well for them and their chapters. It helps me prepare for next year."

Have you noticed any new trends, ideas and topics that colleagues from other countries are interested in?

Alisa: "Ease of Travel was an interesting topic and especially the ever changing process here in the United States. Entering this country now can be a lot more challenging depending on where people come from. There was a large contingent of attendees from Europe for whom travel from country to country is a lot easier due to the proximity and the open borders in the European Union. They seemed to have a lot of global knowledge about incentives in Spain and the UK and Paris, France, and Italy, to name a few, due to the easy access to all these countries and cultures.

I felt really honored to attend. I was excited to learn more about global trends for my EventWorks team and it was very interesting and valuable to me to meet so many international leaders of different chapters in person and to learn from them for my leadership role for SITE SoCal this year and next."

With Southern California friends Orion Hailu, Brian Griffith and Jennifer Shafer in Bangkok, Thailand.

Thank you for reading!