SEI Investments chief Al West likes to reward his top employees with semiannual trips to places like Mexico City and Austria. Last month West and his wife, Loralee, took 200 staffers from his Oaks, Pennsylvania, money management firm on a weeklong trip up the Mississippi River, on the paddle wheeler American Queen. Ever the generous host, West, 58, imported country music legend Willie Nelson to provide the entertainment. "We stopped along the bayou near Baton Rouge and had ourselves a little swamp party," reports West, a Florida native. "Everybody got a taste of Southern culture - snakes, alligators and Willie." The million-dollar-plus tab for the jaunt would have given pause to some CEOs, but West's SEI holdings make him worth almost $1 billion. An outing for 2003 is already in the works. Says West, "We're going to Egypt."