How the IBTTA Tech Summit Is Built Specifically for Younger Professionals

The IBTTA Technology Summit taking place March 19-22 in Orlando, FL has gained a reputation over the last few years as an ideal conference for younger tolling professionals to attend. It’s even the place where IBTTA’s Young Professionals Council (YPC) first came into being in 2019. 

Since then, the engaging and insightful content and connections made through YPC—especially its Tolling 101 or 102 basics sessions— at the Tech Summit has sweetened the deal for fledgling tolling employees to sell the summit to their supervisors in the hopes of attending. 

“I know dozens of young professionals who had been asking their managers if they could go to IBTTA conferences and were never approved to go because of the cost commitment,” said Jason McCartney, project manager at Gannett Fleming and chair of the YPC. “At least, until their managers saw young professionals meeting on the agenda. Having that helped get them to go.”

But there are other reasons to send younger professionals to the Tech Summit beyond just the fact that the words “young” and “professional” appear on the program.

When people first enter the tolling industry, they’re not typically starting at the top rung of their organization. When they come on board, they’re often only a few years out of college and closer to ground-level, in terms of what tasks they’ll be performing. The Tech Summit program is geared specifically towards these types of personnel who are really doing the work instead of delegating it.

“Of all of IBTTA’s conferences I think the Tech Summit focuses the most on technology, and that’s where a lot of young people are in their careers,” McCartney said. “They’re on the technical side, not the management side. Odds are if you’re just starting out in tolling, you’re doing something very hands-on technical in your work, and the Tech Summit plays to that audience.”

Beyond the direct appeal of the program, the Tech Summit’s large turnout helps make it an even higher-value proposition for newer tolling professionals and their managers looking to strengthen their teams. “It’s the most widely-attended, it’s the biggest and it hosts the most young professionals,” McCartney said. “As a younger person, it’s the conference you’d get the most benefit from.”

This year’s YPC-led Tolling 102 session at the Tech Summit will focus specifically on roadside technology and will feature a generation-spanning interview with industry leader Joe Waggoner, recently-retired CEO of the Tampa Hillsborough Expressway Authority (THEA). To learn more about the Tech Summit and to register your team members, click here. To learn more about the YPC click here and join the YPC Discord chat to stay connected and get involved.