CLAYTON HORTON
Ashtanga Yoga: Reconnecting to the Natural State

Awaken and harmonize the body and mind with the ancient traditional practice of Ashtanga yoga with Clayton Horton.
Benefit: This method of Yoga involves synchronizing the breath with a series of postures that awakens internal energy channels and vitalizes muscles and organs. The result is improved circulation, a light and strong body, and a calm mind.
Target Audience: All Levels

VINCENT TAM
Opening Up to Embrace the World: Partner Assisted Yoga

In this fun and invigorating session, we will be working individually and with partners to energetically awaken our body, mind and hearts. This practice involves physical asana, sense of touch, conscious breathing, humour and play. This session is a great way to get better acquainted, not only with yourselves, but also the other participants as well.

It is designed to unleash the power of play and spontaneity among the participants; strengthen self-confidence, trust, communication, focus and connection. A great way to start the day!

DR. FRANZ LINSER

Spas have to be seen as a mirror of society. A Spa offers what life outside can’t. It is crucial for the sustainable success of spas to understand the customers’ lives outside. With the ongoing socio-cultural and psychological changes in our modern society health and well-being must be redefined. Health today is more than the absence of diseases. It is more than the physiological normality in terms of weight, blood pressure and cholesterol. It is about the acceptance of the rules of nature. It is about the deeper understanding of the interference of body and spirit. It is about strategies to balance emotions, work and leisure, social interactions and personal desires. Health today is about life.

If you can’t manage life you can’t manage health. Therefore in the Spas of the future it won’t be enough to provide customers with medically correct know-how. It will be crucial to deliver strategies for the actual “do-how”. The do-how is the motivational bridge between know-how and change.

In order to deliver motivation one has to deliver sense. People who understand why to change will adopt change. This way change becomes a positive strategy for their very personal goals. People will want to change. Not considering this process of delivering sense leads to unsuccessful pseudo-strategies as for example “making a diet”. These are fights against one’s own body and usually end in failure and frustration. Modern health management is life management. 

DIETER BUCHNER & ALISON SNELLING

The most frequent message heard from the spa industry, apart from its phenomenal growth, is about  ‘The People Challenge’. What exactly is it? What causes it and most importantly what can be done about it?

Alison Snelling and Dieter Buchner present their findings of research conducted within the international spa industry, with a special focus on Asia. Factual evidence demystifying the issue and examples of how other industries are mastering their people challenge will hopefully inspire delegates to apply some of creative recruitment and people development initiatives suggested.

DIETER BUCHNER & ALISON SNELLING

Attracting and retaining talent is one of the biggest drivers for commercial success in our industry and a critical factor in overcoming the people challenge.

Join this interactive session and explore ways to ensure your selection strategies are effective. We will identify critical competencies your people will need to drive your spa to success and review how to develop success predictors measuring tangible and intangible traits at the recruitment stage.

FRANK WECKESSER

Dimensions of Future Spa Success
All business is about success. Success is how the outcome of our efforts is measured. But what is success really, especially in a Spa? It is not the same for everybody. New dimensions of our core purpose in business and life opens up and make us all think. This breakout introduces the latest insights on success. What are they? Facts & figures? A list of Achievements? Or are there more to it? Take a look at your own perception of the term success and then look for the updated definition. How will we approach the future: Struggling for success or choosing the easy way to accomplish success? How does the mix of modern success factors look and feel like? How can you turn failure into success? Are we able to follow our hearts and feel successful while heading for the great Spa Visions?

DAY 3 – PLENARY 7

The self-explanatory title rings a bell to the growing need for human touch to be a major ingredient in healing. Spas became popular as they delivered the much-needed human touch, but the advent of technology in healing is again threatening to take us back to square one. Or perhaps we could have the best of both worlds by merging the two instead of treating one independently of the other? Would the incorporation of high-tech gadgetry and diagnostic machines into spas define the spas of tomorrow?

DAY 3 – PLENARY 8

The convergence of industries – medicine, spa and wellness – gives rise to medispas and in one stroke redefines the landscape of medical tourism. Lower costs and faster delivery of conventional health services in developed countries have long been the key factors that sustained traditional medical tourism.

Now enter medispas. Can they lead the way for medical tourism in the 21st century with an array of new options? It has the makings of being a major cornerstone of medical tourism of the future and the trend looks set to stay if the new survey by Deloitte Center for Health in United States is any indication and it states that 1 in 3 US consumers want more holistic/alternative therapies in their treatment programmes. Yet there are hurdles. Are the hurdles major ones that may threaten its further flourishing?
• What are they?
• How do we overcome these?
• Have the risks associated with overseas treatments been addressed?
• Are there failproof mechanisms that allow for follow-up treatments?

DAY 3 – PLENARY 9

Taking into account the convergence of contrasting components – holistic, medical and tradition – how will the spa of the future look like? Which component gets more will be the constant conundrum.