Dear SAMA Members,
For the past 13 years, Christopher Forillo has served SAMA’s membership as Conference Manager, responsible for logistics coordination and fulfillment of the Conference Program. In this part-time position, his annual collaboration with Host Committee Volunteers and work in support of Instructors, Presenters and Vendor’s needs throughout the conference experience have shaped the success of the Conference Program and contributed to an excellent conference experience for attendees during his tenure.
Over the course of the past several years, the decline in member engagement and enrollment in programs has presented a challenge to maintain a fiscal environment that can sustain staff and paid contractors at current levels. It has been and continues to be a top priority to continually examine the benefits we offer members and now to rework our operational systems.
One of the first changes will be to rework how we manage and execute the conference program and in the interest of cutting expenses to more responsibly balance our income, we have released Chris from his position and will be creating new volunteer opportunities to support conference programming.
We are deeply grateful to Chris for his service to our members, sponsors and vendors over the past 13 years, and wish him all the best with his future endeavors.