Calvin College is gearing up for "Business 99, An Outstanding Christian Calling." Already about 150 people have registered for the event. 

The conference will be held June 11-12 on the Calvin campus and is intended for "all who wish to think about how people in business grapple with the intersection of Christian faith, business decision making and the global economy." 

The conference will feature four keynote speakers - John Perkins, co-founder and chairman of the Christian Community Development Association; C. William Pollard, chairman of The ServiceMaster Company; Barbara VanderBrug, vice-president of Record Masters; and Dennis Kuester, president of Marshall and Ilsley Bank. 

There also will be a plethora of workshops, including: 

Cultural Transformation Through the Workplace 
Mark Peters, president and CEO of Butterball Farms, Inc. 

Employee Management: W.W.J.D.
Norma Coleman, director of personnel for the Christian Reformed Church 
Michelle VanDyke, executive vice president of Old Kent Bank 

Color and Covenant: Interracial Business Partnerships
Henk Bouma, chairman of Lumbermans, Inc. 
Roger VanderHeide, president of Lumbermans, Inc. 
Skot and Barbara Welch, CEO and president of Generations Products, Inc. 

Other workshops include such topics as 
How Do You Turn Around a Distressed Business
Merger Layoffs: The Effect on the Individual and the Family
Balancing Work and Family

Typically conference registrants comes from a wide variety of backgrounds, geographic locations, age groups and businesses. 

"What appears to draw participants together," said Shirley Roels, a Calvin professor and a chief conference organizer, "is the mutual interest in the interaction of Christian faith and business practice and that interest appears to be cutting across race, class, gender, age, geographic and denominational lines." 

The conference is being co-sponsored by Calvin College and Partners for Christian Development (a business support group with close ties to the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee). 

Roels is a nationally recognized expert on business ethics who wrote "Business Through the Eyes of Faith."