Texas Hold ‘Em: NUCA Convention Meets in Fort Worth

Underground utility contractors, excavators and the suppliers that serve them gathered at the Renaissance Worthington Hotel in Fort Worth, Texas, March 12-16 for the NUCA Convention 2012.

This week is all about helping you manage the changes your company faces these days … and the ideas, camaraderie and morale boost you get from joining forces with your industry colleagues. The jam-packed week started off with a well-attended golf tournament and ended with an energetic night at Billy Bob’s famous Honky Tonk. In between, the event offered invaluable networking opportunities, problem-solving sessions, a diverse lineup of speakers and a lot of fun along the way.
   
Discover new ideas, new relationships and new product and services that can help you. Nine outstanding educational sessions address safety, productivity and other hot topics. They’ll help you gain new insights on things like managing a new relationship with project changes; leveraging your competitive advantage by improving productivity; managing employee use of social media; preventing working complacency and more.
Industry association meetings on Tuesday included Education, Safety and Damage Prevention and others.

Wednesday was all about NUCA’s Annual Meeting and Pancake Breakfast, sponsored by CNA Insurance, as well as the presentation of the Ditch Digger of the Year award to Dan East of Layne Heavy Civil, new chapter charter presentations, and the Chairman and CEO reports. Attendees also enjoyed Roundtable discussions on Tuesday and Thursday, spotlighting Profit Pipeline Roundtables.
   
Guest speakers at the convention included former First Lady Laura Bush, who answered audience questions, and New York Fire Chief Richard “Pitch” Picciotto, who was a Battalion Commander in Manhattan on Sept. 11, and was trapped for more than four hours when the North Tower collapsed. Brian A. Moore from FMI spoke about new strategies for repositioning your company after the Great Recession, and Jill Sharp of the Human Performance Institute offered insights and practical advice to make sustainable life changes related to human energy.