VIP, Brainstorming, Accelerated Disintermediation

This week, IREI held it's annual institutional real estate industry 'homecoming', VIP.  More than 350 people were there.  Lots of people who knew each other and lots of people looking to meet people they didn't know, particularly if those people were institutional investors and especially if they had money to invest.  VIP has grown exponentially since Geof Dohrmann and I launched it six years ago.  Yes, there was a lot of good content offered but the most interesting time for me to both participate in and observe are those when people have the opportunity to "network."  The participation part for me is easy as a bunch of those attending knew me or knew of me.  The difference this time was that, having recently launched my new company, Solutions By Steve Felix, I too had something to promote.  So here are a few of my takeaways:

• Things are going well-in the context of 'the new normal.
• We don't like investing where there's a 'leap of faith' involved.  (Comment about investing in certain emerging markets)
• It's the uncertainty in the Eurozone, not how horrific the situation is, that is causing investors to sit on their hands.
• The most danger to the U.S. recovery?  U.S. Political Gridlock and Uncertainty (Audience Quick-Tally Response)
• One year from now there will be fewer countries in the EU.
• I don't believe that Greece runs out of money on March 20th.  I believe they're out of money now!
• 2012 will be the worst year for commercial real estate loan defaults.
• Investors just don't invest in assets that are over-leveraged.
• Some of the best opportunities today are in preferred equity but off-shore investors have to be educated.
• Accelerated disintermediation of the sale of loans via an eBay type auction process has become an extraordinarily powerful tool in selling loans.  This could be the thing we look back on and say it was a game-changer for the commercial real estate industry.
• Tenants don't like being called tenants anymore but they are the people who truly Occupy Wall Street.
• The Greeks invented defaulting on debt.

Restricting Retail?

A proposal is being considered in New York that will limit the ground-floor width of all new stores to 40 feet (and new banks to 25 feet) on two major streets on the Yupper West Side, Amsterdam and Columbus Avenues.  "Across New York City, the proliferation of chain stores, banks, pharmacies in the past decade or so has robbed many neighborhoods of the quirky one-of-a-kind shops that give those places their distinct personalities and where customers can form a relationship with their shopkeepers."  In Napa, California, there is a group called, "Napa Local" that was formed to protest against a Starbucks leasing space at the corner of First and Main (really!).  They want the city to adopt an ordinance controlling "Formula Businesses," i.e. chain stores to "preserve the unique quality that is downtown Napa."  Hmmm, let's see, in both cases, as a landlord, you would be restricted from who you can rent to.  While tenant mix and use-clause restrictions have been used in the shopping mall industry (where one landlord controls the whole shebang), trying to stop individual landlords, who own a building, from renting their space is not a good direction to be going in.  Can you imagine the lawsuits that would be filed against municipalities if they were successful in enacting this type of legislation?  Also, to me it's pretty simple why the independent retailers have disappeared from the landscape:  customers don't support them.  People talk about having quaint shops and no chains but if you can't pay the rent, how are those specialty stores going to stay in business.  It'll be interesting to see what evolves.  By the way:  the 'unique quality' of downtown Napa is vacant.  While there have been some wonderful additions in the past years, including a new hotel and several 'celebrity chef' restaurants, if you drive down First or Second or Third Street you'll notice that there are so many vacant or 'fake' storefronts you'd scratch your head...maybe.  In Napa Valley, the town that has the 'one of a kind shops' is  St. Helena and those merchants have chosen to open stores there because people who spend money go there.  I spent many years in the shopping center, shopping mall and outlet center industry.  At one point, I developed the "Everything's Big/Everything's Small" theory of retailing.  I won't bore you with it now but when reading about these cities (and how many others may be talking about it) it's like you're trying to control things a little too much and, if you look back in history, there are serious prices to be paid when that starts happening...it may be only the beginning.  

I've always been a proponent of value of brainstorming.  I found this comment from a piece I read this week particularly

enlightening.  Early brainstorming advocates strongly recommended that the "Do Not Criticize" rule made those sessions more effective.  But recent studies suggest differently:  "....debate and criticism do not inhibit ideas but, rather, stimulate

them....imagination can thrive on conflict....dissent stimulates new ideas because it encourages us to engage more fully with the work of others and to reassess our viewpoints....maybe debate is going to be less pleasant, but it will always be more productive."   Pretty interesting, huh?  It comes down to the idea that we can't get bent out of shape when someone comments on an idea we have but rather take it as contributing to the group goal of coming up with the very best idea or solution.   Sometimes easier said than done.

Wouldn't it be great if our memories only remembered happy things?  But that's not the way it works.  Yesterday, the weather was really nice where I live, probably about 65 degrees in the afternoon.  I was driving somewhere and out of the corner of my eye saw a dad and his son throwing a baseball back and forth.  What jumped into my mind was a day, a long, long time ago, when I was throwing a baseball back and forth with my older son.  It was obviously a moment which I have never truly forgotten. It had been sitting in my sub-conscious all these years. Funny how the mind works isn't it?

More kids:  Congratulations to my nephew and his wife on the birth of their little girl.  Our family now has five cousins born within less than three years of each other!  Are they going to have fun or what?  

With gratitude:  Thanks to all of you who sent me notes (or talked with me in person) about last week's story of my friend in Geneva. It meant a lot to me. 

Final item:  Angelo Dundee died on Wednesday (90).  If you aren't a fan of boxing (or in my case grew up in a boxing family) you probably don't know his name.  For 60 years he was a trainer and manager of professional boxers, the two most well known are Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali) and Sugar Ray Leonard.  My uncle, Barney Felix, the senior boxing ref in New York State at the time, was in the ring when Clay took the heavyweight championship from Sonny Liston in Miami Beach in 1964.  Barney told us one story about that bout that never made it into the papers.  One day, when we're having a drink together make sure to ask me about it..... 

On the road next week...

Feb. 6-10:  New York

Go Giants!

He not busy being born is busy dying

"He not busy being born is busy dying."  Bob Dylan from It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding). 


In the spring of 1992, when my mother was dying of brain cancer, I watched as she used her brain to try to fool the doctors.  They would ask her questions, "Good morning.  Can you tell me your name?" (Her name was Lorna).  And some days she got that right.  But as she deteriorated, often she couldn't answer that one, or what day it was or what month or what year.  Yet my mother was a very sharp cookie.  When asked questions she rambled around, telling the doctors about a variety of things, most of it not making any sense depending on which electrical impulses happened to make their way through the frayed wires of the plugs in her brain that used to fit in the right sockets.  It was heart-breaking.


While in London this week I took a planned side trip to Geneva to visit my old friend Deb.  She was my brothers' first girlfriend when we were all in summer camp.  We reconnected after many distant years in 2003 at a camp reunion.  My wife and Debbie hit it off and a couple of years after that took a "Thelma & Louise" road trip through the Southwest U.S. which they documented with some incredible (and funny) photos.  


As a group, we counselled each other (not the summer camp variety but the kind that good friends do for each other).  Deb has always been a brilliantly talented writer (and deft Scrabble player) who for the past number of years has been living in Geneva and working for Rolex, creating and editing some of their most prominent and visible marketing materials.  Before taking that job, she was free-lancing as a web music journalist and interviewed some very well-known names in rock, blues and jazz.  Music has always been a strong bond amongst our camp friends and her appreciation and love of music even led her to taking up blues harmonica which she played with friends in her adopted country of Guatemala (Debbie grew up in Montreal).  We've all seen each other through some of life's growing pains and soul-searching times.  Deb is a breast cancer survivor which is one reason why her current condition is so sad.  She is suffering from Glioblastoma, an inoperable and except in rare circumstances, incurable brain tumor.  More than a year ago doctors gave her three months to live.  She embarked on a series of experimental chemotherapy and while it hasn't been any fun (the side effects and what-not) she is still with us.  But, her brain is messing with her too.  


My wife and I call her periodically and on those calls she sounds extremely lucid and her memory seem phenomenal.  She sounds up-beat and tells us of the books she is reading, the writing she is doing and other stuff that had us feeling more hopeful.  But a few weeks ago, one of her sisters' told us that all Deb was telling us was fantasy.  Well, I witnessed that first hand yesterday and today at her bedside.  Yesterday, her 59th birthday, she remembered me as soon as I walked in the door.  But this morning she didn't know who I was at first and as the time wore on, she knew me and called me by name.  She drifted in and out of making sense or talking nonsense.  At times, she used a word that she knew was wrong and tried desperately to correct herself.  This morning, a doctor and his colleague came in to talk with her about how she wants to live the remainder of her life.  The "living will" stuff.  And while Deb gave some conflicting answers (I think I would have too if I was her) she did tell the doctors that her best friend was the one who knew her wishes and should be the one to have the legal authority in such circumstances.  It was a heavy scene for me to observe.   


The weirdest thing was that during the time I spent with her she got two phone calls and was talking as lucidly (or perhaps even more) than you or I.  She remembered projects she'd worked on, the names of children and grandchildren.  She said some random things which I told her I'd make into a song and send her the demo.  The first line (all her) is "You can't take the sunshine with you no matter where you go."  We had a great time writing those lyrics together.  The brain is an unbelievable thing; how it works and how it fails to work in almost the same moment.  


She is in the palliative care unit of a wonderful hospital just outside Geneva.  It's for end of life care, usually very short term, but she has fooled them.  There are people who have helped her draw her will for the first time and prepare for death.    To some of us, death comes sudden and without warning.  The rest of us don't want to admit to ourselves that Bob Dylan's lyric is totally true.  And who is to say that we will be given the luxury, of sorts, to have the time to wrap things up in a tidy package and say, "There, I've done what I wanted to do and I am at peace."  Deb told me that she's heard how some other patients answer the question, "What do you dream of?"  One said, "To swim with dolphins."  Deb's dream is simply to see another spring.  I don't know that she will.  Do we know how many springs we will see?  Does anybody really know what time it is? Shouldn't we start caring?




On the road....


January 30-February 1:  Scottsdale, Arizona:  IREI's VIP Conference
February 6-10:  New York
(NEW) February 15 & 16:  London and Frankfurt to moderate breakfast briefings for RCA (Real Capital Analytics).
February 23 & 24:  Chapel Hill, NC to be attend the UNC Kenan-Flagler Real Estate Conference and be a judge at their case competition.
February 25-26:  Asheville, NC
March 29-30:  Philadelphia, PA to be a judge in the Villanova University Real Estate Case Challenge
April 25-27: Vienna, Austria to attend the INREV Annual Meeting
May 17-20:  North Palm Beach, FL to attend the meeting of The Homer Hoyt Fellows.

2012: The Year of Caution? The Corner Office. Apple's Obsession

Resigned is not a particularly positive word.  The thesaurus suggests submissive, reconciled, accepting, stoic, long-suffering, prepared to accept.  Well, some of these are even less appetizing.  But resigned is the word that came to my mind this week about the state of things in the commercial real estate industry (perhaps throughout the business community in general).  While we were all waiting for things to revert to normal, the normal that we wanted it to be, it hasn't.  It's been a while now and I believe we've all accepted that we may not see a time like the last 'normal' for a long, long time.  But what's interesting to me is that there are groups, not long-time real estate investors but rather private equity firms, hedge funds, etc. who have seen the light and see that there is opportunity in that there real estate business.  And, they've started building real estate investment groups within their companies.  They're hiring top talent and throwing dollars at, hopefully, doing it right.  Some, perhaps most, of the money these firms manage is not institutional in nature and yet, some of it is.  And, at a time when many investors are staying close to those managers with whom they've had a good relationship with and who have proven trustworthy and putting new money out with them, either in the form of a separate account or a joint-venture or a club deal, there are some investment fiduciaries who have been successful in raising good-sized commingled funds.  That's what makes this time in the history of our industry so fascinating to me.  We are living through change and it's not a change that has been thrust upon us by an alien force, it's an organic change that develops based on the fact that any company that launches a new product or service either has to fill a need or solve a problem.  And if you can bring that to the table, whether you are an investment manager, a manufacturer or a consultant or any kind of service provider, there is business to be done.


A weekly column called "The Corner Office" interviews executives and asks them a few questions.  I thought this one was pretty good:  "If you could ask someone only two or three questions to decide whether you would hire that person, what would those questions be? (1) What idea is driving you right now? (2) What’s on your mind about any aspect of life that you’re really excited about? (3) Tell me about that."


CBRE published its' The Global View 2012 this week.  Here are the bullets from their executive summary:

• Macro-economic and political landscape uncertainty across the world suggests that a cautious outlook in local property markets is likely to persist into 2012.  While 2011 is in the past, many of its challenges continue.
• Corporate occupiers in 2012 will continue to exercise caution in their decisions, and demand for space will remain moderate.
• Investors in Europe and the United States will therefore tend to adopt more defensive strategies, focusing on high-quality buildings in prime locations within the most liquid and transparent markets.
• Asia has not decoupled:  Occupiers and investors are becoming more cautious in many markets across Asia due to slowing economic growth in China and concerns about the global impact of the economic slowdown in Europe and sluggish growth in the U.S.
• High-quality real estate assets in prime locations should continue to perform well compared to secondary real estate and very competitively with regard to other asset classes.  From an investment point of view, secondary property will continue to underperform.
• A lack of new construction in many markets globally will boost the performance of existing prime properties.

In line with my first paragraph, note these words sprinkled about in their executive summary:  uncertainty, cautious, caution, defensive strategies, cautious.  It appears that we may be resigned to accept that 2012 will be The Year of Caution.  But, it sure sounds to me like there is opportunity out there, ready to be mined.

I've only had a few of my friends become published authors.  The latest, a long-time friend and the drummer in the first real band I played in,  Ken Segall's.  His book, Insanely Simple:  The Obsession That Drives Apples' Success will be released on April 26th.   While not suggesting that you do it, I've pre-ordered it for my Kindle.  Ken is a veteran advertising guy on the creative side.  He has been behind some of the most recognizable advertising campaigns over the past 30 years including some of Apple's major ads and branding stuff.  He's a brilliant guy and pretty funny as well.  I am sure this will be a good read and not just for core Apple fanatics. 

On the road...

Jan. 23-25:  London to attend the INREV Winter UK Seminar 2012 and the Thompson Reuters Global Property Outlook 2012 

Jan. 30-Feb. 1:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend IREI's VIP Conference

Feb. 6-7:  New York

Feb. 8:  Baltimore, MD to speak with students in the Accelerated Masters of Science Real Estate Program as Johns Hopkins Carey Business School about careers in commercial real estate.

Feb. 9-10:  New York

Feb. 23-24:  Chapel Hill, NC to attend the University of North Carolina Keenan-Flagler Real Estate Conference and be a judge at their real estate case competition.

Feb. 25-26:  Asheville, NC

Feb. 27-29:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend the NCREIF (National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries) Winter Conference

March 29-30:  Philadelphia to be a judge at the Villanova University Real Estate Case Challenge

April 22-25:  Chicago to attend the CRE Mid-Year Meetings

April 25-27:  Vienna, Austria to attend the INREV Annual Meeting

May 17-20:  North Palm Beach, FL to attend the Hoyt Fellows/Weimer School Annual Meeting

Visualizing woodpeckers, One moment of insight, TV Dinners

One thing that has been coming up more and more in conversations is the idea of raising capital for private equity real estate funds from smaller pension funds, endowments, foundations and family offices.  There are investment managers who have been doing this for years.  But, as more and more of the big boys are sitting on the sidelines, managers are looking for alternate sources of capital for their commingled funds.  

Historically, if you raised money from a family office or just plain ol' rich people, the institutional investors did not relish being in the same fund. I wonder if that will still be the case as we move into a new world order in the institutional real estate investment industry.

Presentation Suggestions (There's obviously a story behind his comments but the main thrust of his suggestions are what grabbed my attention:  

The unexpected will rivet audience attention. Breaking a pattern is a very basic way to grab attention. How can you break a visual or sensory pattern in your next presentation to grab attention and get your audience to take action?

Be careful with negative instructions. If you don’t want your audience to do something, don’t even put the idea into their heads. If I tell you to NOT think about woodpeckers right now, guess what you’re going to do? You’re visualizing woodpeckers right now, aren’t you? Yet, you had no intention of doing so… until I told you NOT to do it.

Take words seriously. If you want me to take your words seriously, how about making your font size huge and clearly visible? What about placing your sign (or your PowerPoint) almost smack in front of me, instead of making me peer down a gully or around a post or from the side or through someone’s head?

I've been reading some good books lately-ones that get you thinking about important things.  And I was talking with someone this week who said that they'd like to make a contribution to the world and 'leave something behind.'  Then yesterday I read this obituary about Dr. Mary Ellen Avery, a medical researcher who helped saved hundreds of thousands of premature infants with a single, crucial discovery about their ability to breathe.  Her principal contribution to medicine was in finding out why so many babies died at birth. The answer: their lungs lacked a foamy coating that enables people to breathe. “There was one moment of insight,” she said. “And that was it.”  

When Dr. Avery started her work, as many as 15,000 babies a year died from the syndrome. By 2002, fewer than 1,000 did. Estimates of lives saved exceed 800,000.  One moment of insight.  Such a humble statement about something that has had such an enormous and, in a way, miraculous impact.  Very few of us will leave a legacy of this stature.  But there is something we can each do that will make a difference.  Of course, it'll involve the one thing that I feel is the most valuable thing we have in our lives:  time.  My proposition to you:  make time to spend with an industry person (or someone not in our industry for that matter) who is out of work, or looking to get into the business for the first time or is trying to figure out how to make a career change and get future employers to see them as a whole individual rather than just labeling them by the title of their last job.  Most, perhaps all of us, has been in one of those situations in our lives.  Remember what it feels like?  In learning about what makes me tick, I am clear about one thing:  if I can help just one person every day, even in some small way, then it's been a good day for me.  We all need each other lean on from time to time.  We are all part of a global commercial real estate community (or as Seth Godin calls it 'a tribe.')  I can almost guarantee that you will feel better about yourself when you help someone else.  P.S.  I've been working on a plan to create someplace where we can all gather together and help each other.  Stay tuned!

San Francisco International Airport (SFO) always has a cool exhibition in Terminal 3 in the main walkway to the majority of the gates.  The current one is on the history Television or TV as we know it.  Not only do they have TV sets dating back to the early days, they have games that were spawned by TV shows, lunch boxes (did you have one?) and other sorts of branded stuff. It's a walk down memory lane:  We had a black & white TV set.  My father and I used to lay on the floor on our left elbows to watch the shows.  For some reason the channel dial was funky and periodically my Dad, using his right foot, had to jiggle it a little to get the picture clear again.  We lived in a simpler world.  There wasn't much fear in America in the Post WWII years (except when we got frightened by who knows who and people started building bomb shelters in their basements).  TV was our friend and our nemesis as people bought frozen TV dinners and either set up TV tables or rolled the set into the dining room.  So that was our technology addiction.  How innocent!

Note:  Please feel free to tweet this column. 

On the road....

Jan. 17-20:  New York

Jan. 23-25:  London to attend the INREV UK Winter Seminar 2012 and the Thompson Reuters Global Property Outlook 2012

Jan. 30-Feb. 1:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend IREI's VIP Conference

Feb. 6-10:  New York 

Feb. 23:  Chapel Hill, NC to attend the University of North Carolina (UNC)/Kenan-Flagler Real Estate Conference 

Feb. 24:  Chapel Hill, NC to be a judge at the UNC Kenan-Flagler Real Estate Case Challenge

Feb. 27-29:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend the NCREIF Winter Conference

March 29-30:  Philadelphia to attend and be a judge at the Villanova University Real Estate Case Challenge

April 22-25:  Chicago to attend the CRE Mid-Year Meetings

April 25-27:  Vienna, Austria to attend the INREV annual meeting

May 17-20:  North Palm Beach, FL to attend The Hoyt Fellows/Weimer School Annual Meeting

New Year, New Band, New _________

In 1975, legendary bluesman, John Mayall, released an album called, "New Year, New Band, New Company."  If you haven't heard of him, perhaps you've heard of some of the musicians that have either  recorded or toured with him:  Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce, Mick Taylor, John McVie, Mick Fleetwood, Dr. John & Paul Butterfield (a seriously partial list).  Well, this week that title suits me pretty well also:  New Year (duh), New Band (I sat in last week with a group and they've sort of asked me to join them.  they're now called "Four Shotz" and are rockin' blues band) and New Company.  This last category is a curious one at this exact moment in time.   While I am involved in a couple of serious dialogues regarding new 'jobs', nothing is definite yet.  So, as I've done for many years, I'm offering to provide fee/assignment based services as a management consultant.  


In preparing to 'hit the road' I've ordered some new business cards  which have this as the headline:  "Solutions by Steve Felix" and my contact information.  I'm trying to follow all the things I've been reading, and passing on to you guys, about keeping things short and simple.  I've also sent this email to a number of my former clients and industry friends:


Dear Friend:


I am offering my consultative/solutions services to a few companies.  

One of the services I could provide is to facilitate an internal senior level strategic discussion about how to grow your business.  Using a knowledgeable, third-party facilitator like me helps open the conversation and take it to areas that might not be discussed when a meeting such as this is 'moderated' by someone in the firm.

I can also help you in the following areas:

1.    How to make your client events more memorable and effective

2.    How to improve your presentation books & marketing material

3.    How to make your face2face presentations more effective

4.    How to improve your communications with clients

5.    How to address certain client feedback about your services and client care

6.    How to expand your net of potential new clients/investors

7.    Providing internal career coaching to help you retain your best people and understand what their aspirations are.

8.    Providing recruiting services.

Anyway, if this has piqued your interest, perhaps we could set up a phone call to discuss.

Thanks.

Steve

So, please let me know if you or someone you know may have an interesting in talking with me.  Thanks.  P.S.  I've received some requests to set up calls starting next week and have sent out my first proposal to facilitate an internal product strategy meeting!

Vis a vis last week's career thoughts I was reminded that one very important thing (how could I have forgotten this one) is finding the right people to work with.  This involves confidence and trust.  Twice in my career I was in a position where I needed a job to support my family.  In those instances, I took jobs with people that I didn't trust and didn't like but thought, "Hey, maybe I'm wrong,"  But I wasn't and both ended in less than a year.  When it comes down to it, it's all about the people, isn't it?  Thanks for reminding me, Albert.

I've been putting some down time to good use updating and adding to my contact database.  While doing this I found a site that has Career Advice for Real Estate Professionals from some industry heavyweights.  I offer a few of them here:

-Get a Solid Education: When you enter into real estate, you may work in only one area, such as property management or brokerage, but it's important to have an educational overview of the entire business to guarantee your long-term success.

-Maintain your Education: Have a commitment to keep abreast of all the changes in the industry by attending conferences, educational programs, and by reading and writing for business and academic literature.

-Have Perseverance:  One of the most important skills that you need to be successful in business is perseverance. Quite often when you start down a path, you're naive about what it takes to get there. So you can be surprised to keep running into problems. But, you just have to stay with it until you find solutions to move forward.

-Know What Matters: You must be able to look at many complicated issues and see what really matters. People often get caught up in the preciseness of the numbers and the methodologies instead of finding what really matters. And if you can simplify things, then you can make better decisions, and you can also explain things to your clients.

-Measure the Risk: Risk is an essential element in the business. So learn to manage risk. The key to risk is to do extensive research so that you can carefully consider, creatively integrate, and rigorously test information, before making a decision.

Good stuff, right?  Pass it along.

Congratulations to my friend Dietrich Heidtmann who has joined Grosvenor as Managing Director of Client Services.

On the road....

Jan. 11-13:  Chicago

Jan. 17-20:  Laguna Beach, CA to attend IMN's Ninth Annual Winter Forum on Real Estate Opportunity and Private Fund Investing

Jan. 23-25:  London to attend the INREV UK Winter Seminar 2012 and the Thompson Reuters Global Property Outlook 2012

Jan. 30-Feb. 1:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend IREI's VIP Conference

Feb. 6-10:  (t) New York 

Feb. 23:  Chapel Hill, NC to attend the 2012 University of North Carolina (UNC) Real Estate Conference 

Feb. 24:  Chapel Hill, NC to be a judge at the UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School Real Estate Case Challenge

Feb. 27-29:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend the NCREIF Winter Conference

March 29-30:  Philadelphia to attend and be a judge at the Villanova University Real Estate Case Challenge

April 25-27:  Vienna, Austria to attend the INREV annual meeting

May 17-20:  North Palm Beach, FL to attend The Hoyt Fellows/Weimer School Annual Meeting

"Where we're going we don't need roads."

Zowie!  The end of the year.  It was a great year for me and I hope for you too.  But day after day, year after year, your support for this column and hearing from you from time to time continues to be a very special thing for me.  Each year, I get to meet some of our OTR community whom I've never met before and this year was no exception.  You guys are a special bunch.  I look forward to us sharing another year together.  Btw, you can connect with me here (felix.steve@gmail.com).  Thanks to all of you.

For me, 2011 has had lots of twists and turns professionally and I look forward to new opportunities in 2012.  It's been a year of a lot of babies being born into our family and now the planning of how to visit them face2face periodically until they are old enough to come visit us.  We're already talking about where everybody will sleep but, as many of you have probably experienced, when it comes to family every available bed, couch, futon and inflatable mattress (aren't those things great?) is fair game.  


A number of you have written to me about the changes that either have happened to you or that you're initiating in your lives.  Philosophically we're told that change is good.  But it also brings with it uncertainty and some degree of stress.  Everyone handles stress differently.  For almost my whole life, I have used banging at (when I was very young) and playing the piano as one of my 'Stress Reduction" tools.   I also like going to a movie theatre and eating buttered popcorn and drinking a Coke (This week I saw a nice feelgood movie, "We Bought A Zoo."  


Today is the last day for me in my current job. I got to work with some great people and I learned a lot.  When I talk with people about their careers, I offer this suggestion:  "Decide what you like to do, decide what you're good at and then find a place to do it."  So now, I'm remembering to follow my own advice. A quote from Goethe that I've always liked, ""What you can do, or dream you can do, begin it! Boldness has genius, power and magic in it."  And one more quote from the movie, Hoosiers. "Boys, don't to get caught watchin' the paint dry! (A basketball term which basically means, "Don't get caught asleep at the wheel.").  

Recurring Notes On Technology (the original title of this column when I started writing it at IREI in 1999):  Last week I was riding my bike and passed a park where two boys were tossing a football.  It only lasted two tosses as one of the boys dropped the ball, pulled out his cellphone and appeared to be responding to at text!  Technology.  A wonderful tool that should not be allowed to take over our lives.  

Remember: "Where we're going we don't need roads"!

Happy 2012 everybody.

Steve

On the road...

Jan. 11-13:  Chicago

Jan. 17-20:  Laguna Beach, CA to attend IMN's Ninth Annual Winter Forum on Real Estate Opportunity and  Private Fund Investing 

Jan. 24: London to attend the INREV UK Winter Seminar 2012 

Jan. 25:  London to attend and moderate a panel at the Fifth Annual Thompson Reuters Global Property Outlook 2012 (Invitation only)

Jan. 30-Feb. 1:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend IREI's VIP Conference 

Feb. 27-29:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend the NCREIF (National Association of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries) Winter Conference

March 29-30:  Philadelphia, PA to attend and be a judge a the Villanova University Case Challenge

April 25-27: Vienna to attend the INREV annual meeting

These are my views and not that of my employer.

Sports Slang, Networking Redux, Joe Robert, Necessary Endings

Sports slang has been used to describe business situations for years:

1. Play ball. To go along with what everyone else wants. 
2. Ball park. To estimate something. 
3. Step up. Short for “step up to the plate.” To take responsibility
4. Level the playing field. Make things even across the board
5. Play hardball. To get mean and get tough. 
6. Slam dunk. A complete and easy success. 

But when I was reading a listing of upcoming concerts this morning what struck me is that there are words used to describe musicians and bands that are also adaptable to companies and people in the commercial real estate industry.  While I will not commit industry suicide to applying any of these terms to any company or person in particular, wouldn't it be fun to do an anonymous survey? 

1. Miraculously nimble
2. Smooth and swinging
3. Heartthrob
4. Seasoned trio
5. Powerful vocalist
6. Tragic emblem
7. Enigmatic artist
8. Frequent collaborator
9. Over-caffeinated electronic art rock
10. Nightlife kingpin

Thanks to my friend, Tom, I offer you the following "Tips on Networking" previously published in the Wall Street Journal:

1. Have a Solid Introduction: First impressions count heavily. Make sure your attire, attitude and overall appearance are the best possible before introducing yourself to someone
2. Don't Confuse People with Your Pitch:  No one needs to hear your entire work history upon meeting you. If someone asks you to tell them a bit about yourself, your explanation from start to finish shouldn't take more than 30 to 60 seconds
3. Don't Tell a Sob Story: No matter how tough it's been, you need to paint a positive picture when you're making new connections. 
4. Spend More Time Listening Than Talking:  The old adage is true: People were given two ears and one mouth, and you should use them proportionately. 
5. Avoid Being Socially Inept: There's a fine line between being friendly and personable and being awkward. You do not want to be the latter
6. Don't Overstay Your Welcome:  Taking up too much of someone's time is almost as bad as ignoring them entirely.
7. Hand out Your Business Card, Not Your Resume:  It's not ok to pass along an unsolicited resume. Offline or online, you need to work on forming a relationship with someone before you ask them for anything at all. Many people overlook this professional courtesy, and ask brand new connections to serve as a referral when submitting a resume or application.
8. Follow Up and Through:  Perhaps the "Cardinal Rule" of networking is that once you've planted the seeds of a new relationship, you must follow up to maintain it. Whether it's a business referral, job lead, or a professional connection, get in touch – within 24 hours – to say you enjoyed meeting them.

So true although I've allowed myself 48 hours to follow up with everyone whose card I get at any event with a simple email.  At the same time I enter them in my contact database with a notation of when and where I met them and anything else that I learned (or that I can remember!)  Although it's not acceptable in many Asian countries, the first thing I do when or after I meet someone is make a notation on the back of their card (except for those companies who, for some reason unknown to me, have allowed their card designer to have the back of the card be a dark color.  Go figure).

Joe Robert died recently at age 59.  As many of you know, Joe became visible during the RTC (Resolution Trust Corporation) days when he started managing and then buying assets from that agency that was formed to workout the Savings and Loan crisis in the late 1980's and early 1990's.  He built a successful investment management business.  I met him only once, at an industry event some years back where he was the keynote speaker.  My first impression was that he was a good guy with a contagious positive personality, a sentiment apparently echoed by many who knew him both in business and real vs. real estate life.  Anytime a thing like this happens, dying so young, to someone you either know well or know of. it is another wake-up call. We don't know how many days we will be granted the privilege to exist on earth and when I am awakened I get back to doing certain things that I may have put on, as it were, the 'back burner.' These include documenting as many stories as I can about my growing up as a personal history for my grand children.  I also have been working on an autobiography for many years and have been negligent about that after a blazing start.  The advice I've been given about writing is to write every day, at the same time of day, for a minimum of 30 minutes.  When doing this, don't try to edit yourself but just let it flow-there's time for editing later.  But it's the discipline that is the key.  We all have stories to tell about a family member, friend or acquaintance dying at a young age. But we also read about people who accomplish a lot during their years.  I recently interviewed for a new job and was asked, "After many years in the industry, how would you like to be remembered?"  I paused as I had not ever been asked that question before.  It's a good one to ask ourselves, both about how we'd like to be remembered by the people in the industry we've served and by those people who know us simply as ourselves, which can also be one in the same.  

Final note:  A friend recently recommended a book to me:  "Necessary Endings:  The employees, businesses and relationships that all of us have to give up in order to move forward."  It's a good read.  My summary of it is pretty extensive (it's my way of both absorbing the stuff that strikes a nerve with me and having a 'permanent record' of it that I can refer back to).   Here are just a few things I'd like to share with you:

• Getting to the next level always requires ending something, leaving it behind and moving on
• Endings are necessary when there is no hope
• There are three types of people on earth:  The Wise, The Foolish and The Evil
• If you are a leader sometimes you have to lead, even when no one wants to follow
• Part of maturity is getting to the place where you can let go of one wish in order to have another
• The longest-lasting and best relationships, as well as the best businesses, are the ones in which everyone involved sees and loves the whole picture, positive and negative.
• For the right tomorrow to come, some parts of today may have to come to a necessary ending

Please accept my best wishes to you for a special holiday season and happy 2012.  For those that are in a cold climate I hope you get snow; for me there's nothing more perfect than snow on the ground for Christmas.  I will not be getting snow where I live but it is pretty chilly in the mornings (remember everything is relative!).  

Steve

On the road...

Jan. 17-20:  Laguna Beach, CA to attend IMN's Ninth Annual Winter Forum on Real Estate Opportunity & Private Fund Investing 

Jan. 24: London to attend the INREV UK Winter Seminar 2012 

Jan. 25:  London to attend and moderate a panel at the Fifth Annual Thompson Reuters Global Property Outlook 2012 (Invitation only)

Jan. 30-Feb. 1:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend IREI's VIP Conference 

Feb. 27-29:  Scottsdale, AZ to attend the NCREIF (National Association of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries) Winter Conference 

March 29-30:  Philadelphia, PA to attend and be a judge a the Villanova University Case Challenge

April 25-27: Vienna to attend the INREV annual meeting

Movie of the week:  The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.  I'd read the book a while back.  I saw the movie yesterday.  I highly recommend it.

Music club of the week:  Silo's, Napa, CA.  Recently, I was given a 'backstage' tour by the owner.  It's a real 'nightclub' whose calendar offers a very eclectic mix of music and other types of entertainment. And, they have a beautiful grand piano which I'm going to be allowed to play from time to time!  

These are my views and not that of my employer.