After an early breakfast, attendees gathered Monday morning inthe ballroom for RILA's first panel discussion, Reality Retail:Much More Than Fiction. Fox News economic analyst Stuart Varneymoderated the open-forum session. Panelists included Gordon Brown,managing director of United Kingdom-based Wilkinson Hardware StoresLtd.; Howard Levine, chairman and CEO with Matthews, NC-basedFamily Dollar Stores Inc.; and Kathleen Mason, president and CEO ofDallas-based Tuesday Morning Corp.

The discussion centered on the role of a company leader in theface of a changing industry. All panelists said that whiletechnology plays a critical role in the 24/7, 365-day-a-yearposition, a hands-on approach to leadership and hiring the rightpeople are key ingredients to the most successful companyrecipes.

"I would say my approach is collaborative," Mason of TuesdayMorning said. "You have to have the best people in place, andeveryone needs to work together. You can't know everything that'sgoing on, so you need people you can trust."