Wrapping up TEN season 2
The Tenant Experience Network Podcast has wrapped up its second season of thought-provoking conversations with leading CRE professionals and industry experts that each had something to say about experience in the built world, and the impact that technology is having on the largest asset class in the world, commercial real estate. Hosted by HILO’s Co-founder & CEO, David Abrams, each episode covered topics that matter now more than ever, including prioritizing the human experience, flexible working solutions, designing healthy and sustainable spaces, best practices for building culture and community, emerging technologies, and the future of buildings in a post-pandemic world.
Episode 1
Features Caleb Parker, Founder of Bold on his experiences as a founder and executive in the flexible workspace industry. Here, we tap into his thinking around controlling the entire customer experience as one of his keys to success. Listeners will learn about his entrepreneurial journey and gain insight into why he thinks people should be at the center of the universe, when it comes to thinking about commercial real estate.
Words of wisdom: “The question is, what do your customers need to be successful? Tech is an enabler. The best tech, you don’t even know it exists because it’s there and it makes your life easier. But tech is just one piece of it. There’s also hospitality and service and the technology should free people up to be human.”
Episode 2
Features Jaime McKenna, Managing Director, Head of Real Estate at Fengate Asset Management on why sensors and data are worthy of technology investment. Hear her journey from humble beginnings to working in Real Estate and taking her company through an IPO. Listeners all also gain insight into why the office will continue to have a major purpose in our future.
Words of wisdom: “I think humility is really important because when you have these mentors, and I’ve had mentors throughout my career, you listen, and you take the feedback, and you self-reflect, and you’re probably harder on yourself because you think oh my God, I’m going to fail and I can’t afford to fail. So I think a lot of those things just formulated who I was early in my career and has stuck with me.”
Episode 3
Features Steve Simoni, Founder of Bbot on his entrepreneurial journey and how he achieved success by learning from failure. Hear how Steve combines his experience as a nuclear engineer in the Navy and a first-time founder to his current role at Bbot. Listeners will also learn why he thinks commercial real estate has an opportunity to reimagine how human interactions can create new social networks.
Words of wisdom: “How could we repurpose the CRE building for different human interaction? Maybe it doesn’t have to be with your coworkers. Maybe it could be with other people in your community.”
Episode 4
Features Becky Hanner, BOMA Fellows Chair and Principal of Commercial Asset Services on providing expert asset management and tenant services. Listeners will learn about Becky’s journey to her current position, tap into her thinking around offering boutique expertise to smaller asset owners, the importance of health and wellness in commercial real estate, and the customization of tenant amenities.
Words of wisdom: “Never turn down an opportunity. It’s just a situation where if somebody asks you to do something, you know, it’s not a situation of gee, that’s just more work. It’s like, oh man, let me just try that out, and see what I could do, and see what I can do with it.”
Episode 5
Features Glen Felson, author of PropTech and the Future of Real Estate on exploring CRE tech. Learn about Glenn’s journey to his current endeavors, where he combines his experience from working in residential brokerage, with his learning from the building access and flex space industries. This episode gives our listeners insight into the Commercial Real Estate industry and beyond.
Words of wisdom: “I’ve learned from people that I’ve worked for, I’ve learned from people that have worked for me, I really just try to spend as much time learning as much as I can from everybody.”
Episode 6
Features Haniel Lynn, CEO of Kastle Systems on how he brings his engineering, consulting and startup experience to building out a platform company. We will tap into his thinking around operating in the grey and taking advantage of opportunities to drive creative solutions as one of his keys to success. Listeners will hear how Kastle is redefining touchless experience and gain insight into why he thinks we have to focus on the end user experience.
Words of wisdom: “You cannot play the symphony until everybody understands how they fit in. And so then you start thinking a lot about what motivates people to get excited about where they are, what their ambitions are, what matters to them wherever they are in their own journey, whatever the reason is that they are part of our organization. And how do you connect that to the broader set of things that we aspire to do as a company.”
Episode 7
Features Dave Cairns, Senior Vice President at CBRE Canada and Founder of CBRE Forward on his journey to the brokerage industry and straying away from tradition in Commercial Real Estate. Listeners will learn why the end user experience needs to be center stage, the importance of brand in Commercial Real Estate and the opportunity to deliver uniquely tailored tenant experiences.
Words of wisdom: “If you asked me whether I would rather have like, you know, millions of dollars or a really, really deep network of people that could further my cause, I would pick the people every time.”
Episode 8
Features Michael Mintz, CEO and Founder of MD Squared Property Group on building tenant relationships to improve engagement. Learn how hard work led him to achieving his goals and hear his views on why surrounding yourself with the right people can make a big difference. Listeners will also gain insight into how creating opportunities to build relationships between residents can impact retention.
Words of wisdom: “I would strongly encourage anyone who is starting off in any industry to figure out where their interests are in the industry world, whether it’s philanthropic, whether it’s just general industry organizations. Get involved, network, meet people, those relationships really drive so much of our success.”
Episode 9
Features Joanna Frank, President and CEO of the Center For Active Design, operator of Fitwel on how healthy buildings drive ROI. Joanna is our first guest that was featured on Commercial Observer’s 2021 Power 100 list of Commercial Real Estate’s most powerful players. Hear about her diverse interests and passion for learning that led her to her current role, where she advances design and development practices to foster healthy and engaged communities.
Words of wisdom: “I think anybody who’s working within buildings, whether you’re a facility manager, whether you’re a building manager, whether you’re the asset manager on the investment side, you are actually impacting people’s health with the decisions that you make. And you can do that in a way that’s informed and a way that is going to have a measurable impact on their, not just the health of the occupants of the building, but also the way that the building itself performs financially, because we know that employee satisfaction results in tenant satisfaction, tenant satisfaction, stickier tenants.”
Episode 10
Features Craig Leibowitz, Executive Director, Innovation and Insight Advisory at Avison Young on humanizing the real estate story. Listeners will learn about Craig’s journey to his current role, where he designs custom data analytics products that enable occupiers and investors to solve their complex real estate strategies. Gain insight into the importance of transparency with clients and the variables that must be considered in the transition back to the workplace.
Words of wisdom: “We have just as many clients, if not more, who simply want us to distill the message into a way that’s more humanized. And what we’re delivering is exactly that, opportunities to refine some things like site selection, to make it more simple, more dynamic and easier to interpret, because ultimately if we’re not doing that, unfortunately we’re not doing our job all that well. And, we don’t have to be the smartest people in the room, quote on quote, but we should be the most approachable. And we should be those who are trusted advisors.”
Episode 11
Features Linda Foggie, Executive Vice President at Turner & Townsend, Head of the East USA on designing human, safe, healthy and sustainable spaces. Hear how Linda, our second Power 100 guest combines her love of architecture, design and real estate in her current role. Discover how she’s always challenging herself to grow and why her passion for people drives her forward.
Words of wisdom: “There’s a move towards designing space in a way that’s very human. In addition to coming out of this pandemic, I like to remind people too, we came out of not just a health pandemic, but also a social pandemic, a racial reckoning that happened in our country and all of this, believe it or not, changes the way that people think and what they desire and demand from employers and alternately, from space.”
Episode 12
Features Daniel Tropp, Founder, and President of AEBOV, Industrial Real Estate Brokerage on innovation and Tenant Experience in the Industrial sector. Named to the Commercial Property Executives List of Stars to Watch, Daniel is a true entrepreneur. Listeners will hear his views on the future impact of AI to predict market trends and gain insight into Daniel’s thinking around how industrial space can utilize Tenant Experience technology.
Words of wisdom: “I’m a big believer that there’s no loss in any experience. So even if it’s not clear initially, something I picked up in the past 10 years kind of planted a seed that, hey, this would be a good idea to evaluate properties this way, or, you know, what the market would really appreciate seeing this in the reports as opposed to this. So it was like the combination of all those ideas. And now I have my own platform, I’m fortunate to have this platform where I can integrate all those things.”
Episode 13
Features Susi Yu, Principal, Head of Development at MAG Partners on connecting residents to their community. In this episode, learn about Susi’s journey from architect, to building developer, and now entrepreneur. Susi will talk about the combination of design and development, expand on the notion of nature being a critical element of design, and how touchless access is the way of the future.
Words of wisdom: “Connection to nature needs to really occur from the moment that you step into your building and throughout, so I’m a huge proponent of using natural materials, natural light, lots of our greenery, landscape outdoor, opportunities, to really, like orchestrate a person’s procession from the moment they enter, the building.”
Episode 14
Features Sheila Botting, Principal and President, Americas Professional Services at Avison Young on the art of the possible in Commercial Real Estate. Listen to our discussion about the shared responsibility to create workspaces and human experiences that people will want to be a part of, and the opportunity to include BIAs and municipalities in the conversation to help revitalize downtown cores.
Words of wisdom: “I think for anybody in their career, you almost have like a mini board of directors, you know, people that you bounce ideas from, and you say, “Is this a reasonable thing to do? Is this the right thing to do, and am I completely out to lunch thinking about A, B, C?” And so I think having that backdrop is really important, and of course, those people will change throughout your own journey as well.”
Returning in January, TEN Season 3 will highlight the industry leaders and innovators who are shaping the future of Real Estate and the workplace. Until then, all of us at HILO and the TEN Podcast want to wish you a Happy Holidays, Happy New Year and continued success in building community where you work or live.
