Steve Gillick, CTM
President, Talking Travel
www. talkingtravel.ca

Steve Gillick loves to travel and loves to talk to people who love to talk about travel!  And he’s been at it since 1967 when he took a school trip to visit nine European destinations and kept a detailed diary of every day’s events and experiences.

Steve worked a tour guide, in between studies at the University of Toronto, and after obtaining his B.A and B.Ed, he joined Keating Educational Tours as the Director of Educational Services, and then served as Vice President from 1984 to 1991.

After a stint as a full time Camp Director for four years, the call of travel was too strong and in 1995 Steve took on the role of Executive Director of the Canadian Institute of Travel Counsellors-Ontario, the educational arm of the industry in Canada’s most populous province.  In 2001, Steve successfully led the project to amalgamate all of CITC’s provincially incorporated associations into one national body and became President and Chief Operating Officer of the new national organization.

Steve continued to pursue his passion for travel by founding the Global Explorers Club for industry professionals, featuring informal destination talks, contests, and the food, drink and music from the featured country.

Steve has presented workshops and delivered keynotes at industry events across Canada, in the United States, as well as in Peru, South Africa and South Korea. His style has been described as energetic, electric, interactive and effective.  He uses highly creative visuals to both educate and entertain.

Steve started writing about travel in the last 1990’s when he authored the Scam Watch column for Canadian Traveller Magazine for five years.  He currently writes “The Travel Coach”  column for  www.travelindustrytoday.com, as well as blogs on www.talkingtravelblog.ca, and contributes articles to www.sellingtravel.net and www.travelmarketreport.com.

In 2012, Steve founded Talking Travel to exercise his passion for travel by working with travel professionals to help them appreciate the importance of their role in global society and imbibe their sales and marketing skills with ‘infectious enthusiasm and positivity’.  His stated goal is to ‘transform travel professionals into destination masters’.  Steve’s most popular programs include “Destination Master Classes”, the live industry conference game show, “Are you Smarter than the Average Traveller®”, and his talks on Travel Safety and Travel Scams.

To date Steve has visited and explored 68 countries, and over 500 destinations.  He is forever completing his first book about his travels.