This past week I traveled to Florida for the Syngenta Lawn & Garden sales team training and meeting. The event was held at the Omni Resort and Spa in Championsgate Florida which is about 20 miles south west of Orlando.
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| Swimming pool at the Omni Resort |
The training was quite interesting and was taught by Col. Kevin Ferrell who is a professor of Military History at West Point Academy. The training was based on leadership styles, successes, and failures of several of the commanders at the Battle of Gettysburg. We spent the day analyzing the actions of several of the key commanders including Robert E. Lee, George Mead, Jeb Stewart, Richard Ewell, Peter Longstreet, John Buford, and Joshua Chamberlain.
I learned a lot about the background history of the battle that I had never known. Lee had been asked by Jefferson Davis to take the army of Norther Virginia to Mississippi to relieve the siege of Vicksburg. Lee knew he couldn't get there in time to help so instead he proposed that he move his army into Pennsylvania to draw the Army of the Patomac out in the open where he could destroy them. Meads instructions were to repel the confederate army and keep them away from Washington and Baltimore. These were the basic objectives that drove the action.
The rest of the week was spent in sales team activities. I finally got to give my presentation on rodent control along with some data from our field trials last year. Because I work alone at home it is always nice to spend some time with my colleagues discussing the business face to face rather than by phone or email. In two more weeks I'll be back in Orlando on vacation with Susie.
