Latest / Success Story with Scott Clary / Lessons - Make a Bet on Yourself | Bob Richards - Executive Vice Chairman at Cushman Wakefield

Transcript

Lessons - Make a Bet on Yourself | Bob Richards - Executive Vice Chairman at Cushman Wakefield · Success Story with Scott Clary

• 0:00
  Now the real, I guess the real like hockey stick growth curve in your career would be when
• 0:16
  you started your own brokerage.
• 0:18
  So what differentiated you that made you, because not now look at where you're at, like
• 0:23
  this is the, you know, this is the epitome of real estate and commercial real estate.
• 0:27
  You're there now.
• 0:28
  How'd you get there?
• 0:29
  Back.
• 0:30
  Yes.
• 0:31
  So, you know, I mean one, you know, when I talk to younger people, I think one important
• 0:35
  lesson is don't be afraid of moving on from success, right, because think about it.
• 0:43
  I was 30 years old at the time.
• 0:45
  I had only been in the business a year and a half and I was fortunate to be, you know, the
• 0:50
  top salesperson in that real estate company with probably, I don't know, 40 brokers, you
• 0:55
  know, a year and a half in.
• 0:57
  And so it was kind of like, why would you ever leave this company to go to this fledgling
• 1:01
  boutique, balance and a carter, but I just knew in my gut that I was going to have more
• 1:06
  opportunity and a wider runway than after being with that organization and having a great
• 1:13
  run.
• 1:14
  I think one of the things that really fueled my desire there was, was leadership and having
• 1:19
  a chance to lead an organization, you know, wasn't as rewarding to just do another deal
• 1:25
  or a bigger deal, but it was a chance to kind of help young people and, you know, we ended
• 1:33
  up, you know, starting the company, you know, in July, whatever that was, three months before
• 1:40
  9-11.
• 1:41
  So talk about not a whole timing.
• 1:45
  And you know, we went from at that point, it was bigger organizations, but we just thought
• 1:51
  there was a better way to have a smaller boutique company.
• 1:57
  And one of the really interesting things we did was we went as opposed to straight commission,
• 2:03
  we went on a salary bonus program.
• 2:06
  So as opposed to everybody eating what they killed, whatever everybody earned, we brought
• 2:12
  in and twice a year sat down, subjectively bonus the non-partners and split amongst
• 2:19
  the partners equally, what was remaining.
• 2:22
  So the team work and the knowledge sharing and the support that we developed there really
• 2:29
  differentiated ourselves.
• 2:31
  And then, you know, after the horrible 9-11 and the economy and the tailspin, you know,
• 2:37
  when people were, you know, thinking about trying to get rid and market their excess property,
• 2:46
  they said, you know, we can go with the normal folks or we've got this young aggressive
• 2:54
  energized group and they were like, listen, we can take some chances because we got to
• 2:59
  get rid of this space, you know, if the man that had been swimming with, I think we would
• 3:05
  have had a really much harder time, you know, getting going, but the fact that the economy
• 3:11
  was in a bad, a bad place, and you know, one and only you could kind of, you know, have
• 3:18
  your head down and say, oh geez, you know, no one can make it work in this environment.
• 3:23
  It was the total opposite for us.
• 3:26
  That's amazing.
• 3:27
  You were 100% like you, it was funny, it's funny because it was a, it was a poor economy.
• 3:33
  For most people looking outside in, it's the worst possible condition you could possibly
• 3:37
  ever expect.
• 3:38
  Right.
• 3:39
  But that's opportunity.
• 3:40
  Yeah, not in a malicious way, it's, it's opportunity in like, you have to, you have,
• 3:45
  you're going to work hard, you're going to hustle, you're going to differentiate, you're
• 3:48
  going to take advantage of the fact that no one else can get this done and you're going
• 3:53
  to have a team and a culture that supports this, this kind of mindset, how did you find
• 3:58
  people that were, they were right for this, bring into your firm.
• 4:01
  It was really hard and it was really happenstance.
• 4:03
  I mean, frankly, like, you know, the, you know, so it's Richard's Barry Joyce.
• 4:07
  I mean, John Barry, I had done some work with, um, and Mike Joyce, um, we, we were playing
• 4:15
  in a pickup hockey league.
• 4:17
  And I remember just saying, you know, who's that number 11 as a, that's Mike Joyce and
• 4:21
  you could just see the way that he competed on the ice.
• 4:25
  And then, you know, we, we filled in other like-minded people with, within other geographies
• 4:31
  to cover, but we just had that mindset.
• 4:34
  And, you know, once again, by doing the compensation, the way we did, um, it just fostered this,
• 4:41
  uh, sort of brotherhood of, of commitment, um, and it, it, it paid great dividends.
• 4:49
  What about, uh, this one, make a bet on yourself and take the chance to be a difference maker.
• 4:54
  Yeah.
• 4:55
  Walk me through that.
• 4:56
  Well, I mean, I, I, I just thought, you know, as we said, we have, uh, an opportunity
• 5:00
  to work with some great organizations, which gives us kind of great reward.
• 5:05
  But, um, you know, I think people, you know, I think in, in, in our role, they're, they're
• 5:11
  looking for, um, uh, advisors that could kind of help steer them into what, you know, an
• 5:19
  educated person, uh, experienced person thinks is going to happen, right?
• 5:24
  Because there's, there's constant decisions, should we sign a three year lease, should
• 5:27
  we sign a five year lease, is the market going to give us, is the market going to get better.
• 5:33
  And, um, you know, especially in the real estate brokerage world, I always like to say, you
• 5:37
  know, um, uh, to, to clients when they're asking about their advisors, um, uh, I'm like, when
• 5:45
  you have real estate broker tells you not to do a deal.
• 5:50
  That's when you have an advisor and not a broker, right?
• 5:54
  I don't think we should go transact right now because I think it's going to be better
• 5:59
  in three years.
• 6:01
  You're not going to find a lot of salespeople that are going to say, I'm going to turn
• 6:05
  down today's commission because, you know, hopefully, I'll be working with this company
• 6:10
  in three years and we will transact.
• 6:13
  So, you know, that, that's, that's what I mean by making a bet on yourself and it's, it's
• 6:18
  once again, people that kind of get stuck in, in roles that, after a while, they just
• 6:24
  don't find rewarding, um, they're, they're, they're not really, you know, passionate about
• 6:31
  it.
• 6:32
  They're not having that much fun at it, but they're afraid to make a bet on themselves
• 6:38
  and, and, and do something else and take a chance.
• 6:41
  Finish as strong as you start.
• 6:43
  And obviously everybody thinks that that'll make sense.
• 6:46
  But what have you seen?
• 6:47
  And we can talk about in a commercial, commercial, real estate context, sales context and just,
• 6:52
  you know, as a, as a good business individual or professional, walking through that concept.
• 6:57
  Yeah.
• 6:58
  I mean, that's a lesson I learned from a mentor of mine's wife, um, you know, it was the
• 7:04
  headmaster of a, of a private school where, where two of my kids went and she was always
• 7:09
  like finished strong.
• 7:10
  It's sometimes easy to, you know, start things, get almost to the finish line and fade.
• 7:18
  You know, you got to get through the finish line and be just as engaged at that point
• 7:24
  in time as when you were first even, you know, pitching a, a project.
• 7:30
  So it's just so important and, I mean, it happens in real estate all the time, especially
• 7:36
  in commercial real estate where, um, you know, you get to like, uh, an M.O.U.
• 7:42
  where it's called the letter of intent in real estate where you, you, you nail the business
• 7:46
  terms and then you start negotiating the actual lease document.
• 7:52
  And there's a lot of people that just get it to the business, to the L.O.I. and then just
• 7:57
  kind of keep their fingers crossed that everything's going to work out and the two attorneys
• 8:01
  are going to work through the lease.
• 8:03
  That's not how we were, you know, we, we, um, you know, provide extensive lease comments
• 8:10
  to the in-house counsel or outside counsel for our clients and are on every lease negotiation
• 8:17
  call.
• 8:18
  You can fade early or you can stay on.
• 8:21
  And I think our clients really appreciated and, you know, once again, the, the Christmas
• 8:27
  and resources we have people in our organization that are attorneys and operating expense
• 8:32
  experts in measurement of properties experts and project management experts that dig into
• 8:39
  every detail of that lease and that's how you separate yourself from the pack of dropping
• 8:44
  off before you even started talking about, you know, issues that'll cost hundreds of
• 8:51
  thousands if not millions of dollars over the course of a, you know, 15 year major lease.