Young travel leaders build connections at The Phocuswright Conference

The Young Leaders Summit is an annual highlight of The Phocuswright Conference, bringing together the industry’s brightest leaders ages 35 and younger to participate in a program that helps build connections, opportunities to learn and personal and company branding.

Two of the session moderators, Aurélie Krau, founder of #MissionNomad, and Evan Konwiser, chief marketing and strategy officer at American Express Global Business Travel, visited the PhocusWire studios to discuss the program during last month’s conference in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. They were joined by one of the participants, Vanessa Karel, CEO and founder of Greether, which was named that week as one of the Hot 25 Travel Startups for 2024.

“We created the Young Leaders Summit because we see it as a launchpad for future talents in our industry,” Krau said.

Konwiser echoed that sentiment, emphasizing the opportunities for networking and making connections with more veteran leaders in travel.

“Because there’s such a great executive presence here, we’re able to bring in top-notch speakers, CEOs of large companies, entrepreneurs building really innovative technology,” Konwiser said. “And young leaders get access to have conversations that they’re just not going to get anywhere else in this industry.”

Karel said that had been her experience, as she had already scheduled meetings that came about because of the connections she met in the program.

“I met a lot of people who are leaders at [the corporate level],” she said. “And these are fostering conversations about creating partnerships with these companies that otherwise would take me so much more time and bandwidth to connect with.”

Watch their full discussion with PhocusWire news editor Derek Catron below.