“To infinity and beyond!” – in memoriam Didier Scaillet.

by Pádraic Gilligan, Founder, SoolNua & Chief Marketing Officer, SITE

“To infinity and beyond” was a saying that Didier often used during his tenure as CEO of SITE when I served as his CMO. It’s half quoted in his last post on Facebook, from Christmas day, 2023 when he says “Merry Christmas to all my loved ones … and beyond”. Thinking about that in the aftermath of Didier’s death makes me profoundly sad, but it also gives me real hope that Didier has finally reached his aspirational destination.

News of Didier Scaillet’s death started to circulate on social media late last Monday, and, since then, Facebook and Linkedin have been inundated with posts expressing total shock at his passing – he was only 54 – and deep affection for who he was. And therein the challenge. Capturing who Didier was, his essence, is not so easy, for he was a many splendored thing, full of boundless confidence, on the one hand, vulnerable as a lost kitten on the other.

Having talked up his golf game during a visit of the MPI Board to Ireland in the early noughties, I invited Didier to play at Luttrellstown Castle, where I had recently become a member. I was a novice golfer at the time (still am!) but, in fairness, if I was bad, Didier was worse. The strange thing was, having taken a 9 or a 10 on the previous hole, Didier would manoeuvre his massive frame to the next tee box, brimful of hope that “he had this”, and that a birdie was surely on the way!

Quite soon after that, maybe sometime in 2004, I shared a stage with Didier at an industry event in Buenos Aires. He was speaking before me and I watched in awe as he did his thing, the words of Shakespeare’s Cassius ringing in my ears “Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world like a Colossus”. Here was a person in masterful control of his subject, totally at ease, in his element. Would I, one of Shakespeare’s “petty men” ever rise to such lofty heights?

I met Didier regularly at industry events during the years that followed and we always found time for each other, a word here, a “how’s it going?” there, a quick catch up at the IMEX Gala, ongoing e mails and texts. Then there were gaps after MPI and during the CLIA years when our paths didn’t cross. When Patrick and I were doing some work in Luxembourg in 2016, we reached out and re-connected. Didier had gone through a challenging time personally and wasn’t working and we committed to be in his corner, and channel any opportunities that we became aware of.

That all led, somehow, to Didier being appointed CEO of SITE in January 2018, the same month I became CMO. While it wasn’t without its challenges and frustrations, I absolutely loved working with Didier. Despite being an old dog, I learned many new tricks thanks to the boundless breadth of his thinking, the limitless horizons he envisioned. It’s unusual in business to get to your late 50s and re-discover the giddy excitement that brought you into business in the first place, decades ago.

Didier read widely across a variety of disciplines – economics, politics, literature, sports, music – and saw connections that others didn’t see. With Didier, it was all about the ideas. Ideas cascaded out of him like water out of the rock in Psalm 105. My job, and Mark Swets’ (SITE’s Head of Operations), was quality control. Judging what was feasible, figuring out what could be done with the limited resources we had.

That said, budgets and details were an irritation to him, nasty spoil sports that ruined all the fun, stemmed the flow, got in the way of what really mattered. Didier could see the exciting beginning and the glorious end. He was blind to the boring bit in the middle and left that up to other people.

One fruit of our collaboration that did get over the finish line was The Manifesto Series (Bangkok, Vancouver and Dublin), three white papers on the evolving nature, purpose and direction of the incentive travel industry. He was extremely proud of that, as am I.

But Didier was also needy, and could get massively deflated if he was called out on something, or if there was too much contrariness or negativity in the room. He was pathologically positive and could only soar confidently when the wind was beneath his wings. If it wasn’t, he suffered a lot.

Didier didn’t do cheap – so many of the tributes mention his expansive generosity. When Didier was hosting, dinners were supremely, expertly curated with perfect wine pairings (he once claimed to be a qualified sommelier. I don’t know if this is true or not but he never ordered a cheap wine or one I didn’t love).

He was a “go big, or go home” guy and lived in line with his stature. But he was also extremely generous with his time, his expertise and his advice and lavished praise and credit on his team at every available opportunity. Didier was a kind person and deeply empathetic. His last year with SITE was fraught with challenges and difficulties, mainly personal, his own health and the passing of close family, including his mother.

In her tribute to Didier, Peggy Whitman, former president of SITE, recalled a phrase that Didier used when offering condolences to friends and colleagues who had lost a loved one. It’s a fitting way to conclude my own tribute to Didier, giant of the business events industry, mentor to so many, valued colleague, inspirational leader, dear, dear friend.

“Do not cry because it is over … Smile because it happened”