It's Personal Stories, A Hospitality Podcast

Dan Lesser, Co-Founder, President & CEO, LW Hospitality Advisors interviewed by Lan Elliott

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Dan shares the importance of taking risks, advocating for oneself, and learning to recover from failure.  Plus, he explains why people should send thank you notes.  Dan also discusses how being visual has helped him become a good critical thinker and an accomplished public speaker, his advice to his younger self, and why legacy drives how he thinks about his personal brand.

Lan Elliott:

Hello and welcome to D E I advisors. My name Islan Elliott on behalf of D E I advisors and today's guest advisor is Dan Lesser, the co-founder and president and c e o of L w Hospitality Advisors, which is an advisory firm that does feasibility studies and consults on investments, asset management and transactions. Dan has also co-founded three other companies. He wears a lot of hats, as you can tell. But if you don't know Dan already, I'd recommend you go to our website so you can learn more about him there. But Dan, welcome to the

Dan Lesser:

show. Thank you. It's so great to be here with you, and it's wonderful to see you.

Lan Elliott:

Wonderful, so to see you too. Now, I'm fortunate, Dan, that I've gotten to spend a lot of my career in the same area of the industry as you, which is the real estate side. So our paths have crossed several times, and I know you've had a really interesting career journey. You've also mentored a lot of people. That it has come up here. For example, Kevin Jacobs, who's one of the people that you gave him his first real estate job. So I know you've had a wonderful career. Can you share some of the inflection points in your career and perhaps what the factors or skills were that contributed to your success?

Dan Lesser:

That's a great question. I've had several inflection points. I'd say probably the the earliest one was in my very young days when I. Realized that academics were really not my thing, but that I had a strong entrepreneurial spirit and I knew how to make money. I was, I'm street smart. That's really what what I've been able to capitalize on. So I figured that out at a fairly young age. I came across a book When I was in high school called Your career in hotels and motels, because at the time there were motels as well, and that inspired me to get into the into the hotel business. And so I went to hotel school. All of these were inflection points and working for Hilton for a number of years in operations. I was the first hire when Steve Rushmore founded h v s back in 19 80, 19 81. So yeah, I've had several inflection points along the way and I have to tell you, I consider myself extremely blessed. If I had to do my career all over again, knowing what I know now I would do it exactly the same, and I'm not sure many people can actually say that.

Lan Elliott:

That's really wonderful and I know one of the things that you have that, that you live by, I believe is. Your life principles, I think you have a deck that's called life principles that have worked well for me, which I thought was really wonderful and I'm gonna refer to a number of them as we talk today. But two of them are that you read constantly and you learn something new every day. So I wanted to ask you, where do you seek out resources and guidance when you're looking to grow as a professional? Either to stay current on the industry or in terms of leading a

Dan Lesser:

team? Another fabulous question. Listen at the end of the day I'm offering professional services that obviously take time, but it takes knowledge and expertise as well. And the world moves really fast today. The lodging industry moves extremely fast today. I love the hospitality industry. Again, I consider myself so blessed to be in this industry, and I love what I do. It's not work. It's a hobby for me at this juncture in my life. I think I may be a little b little bit of a boring person because again, my work is my hobby, so I. In terms of reading, I am continuously, and let's face it, there's a tremendous amount of content out there, right? So I'm continuously reading online and I'm still a little old fashioned in that I read the Wall Street Journal newspaper, the paper itself. But just constantly staying tuned into. Not only what's going on in the hotel industry, which is obviously something that's near and dear and important for me to do if I'm gonna continue to offer the services. But candidly, big picture what's going on in the world because what's going on in the world is ult ultimately gonna affect what's going on in the hospitality industry. I'd like to read more books. I don't really have as much time as I'd like to read books. The books that I tend to read tends tend to be, inspirational, industry related. One of my favorite books is jobs about the life of Steve Jobs. It's a very thick book and I read every page of it. I was fascinated by it. Another one of my favorite books is only the Paranoid Survive by Andy Grove, who is the One of the founders of Intel and candidly, the book is very much about what the title is, right? Only the paranoid survive. So yeah, I I never really have enough time to absorb everything that's out there, but I do love reading and gaining knowledge and I do try to make a point every day of learning something new. I think it's important to it doesn't matter how old you are and how. How knowledgeable you are, right? We all don't know everything and always need to continue to advance ourselves. Listen, if you're standing still, you're really falling backwards.

Lan Elliott:

Yeah, agree. And I think there's so many leaders that have talked about this idea of continuous growth. You don't graduate from school and then you're done learning. You're always learning as you go along every day. Dan, you don't get to where you are today without taking a number of calculated risks. In fact, another one of the principles I saw was not being afraid to fail. Can you share an example of success and how you prepare yourself mentally to take a chance on something?

Dan Lesser:

Sure. The first thing I would say is that nobody and nothing is perfect. And failure is the great opportunities to learn. And I'm gonna answer your question, but I'm also gonna emphasize again, the aspect of embracing embracing failure. It's okay to, it is okay to fall down. I. I have two grown boys and my wife and I always, bringing them up had shared with them that as long as you can look in the mirror and say you did the best you could, right? Even if you fail, that's okay. And if you fall down, you pick yourself up, you dust yourself off and you go at it again. I guess now I've, I forgot the question. Preparing for success, what was the question again?

Lan Elliott:

How you prepare yourself mentally to take a chance on something I.

Dan Lesser:

Y I always look at worst case scenario, what's the worst that can happen? No different than if you were to make a economic investment in something. What's the worst that can happen? I put X number of dollars up and let's assume I'm gonna lose it all right? And that's how you have to look at it, right? So you mentioned calculated risks, and I do resonate with calculated risks. I don't resonate with just risk. Calculated for me is what works. And sitting down and literally writing down advantages, disadvantages, pluses, minuses, and then stepping back and saying, okay, now that I've mapped all this out for myself, is it worth the risk of all the downsides for the potential upside?

Lan Elliott:

That's wonderful. Along similar lines, I'm curious how you approach challenges or overcome obstacles because you do that a lot in your business. Just in terms of the business. We've been through a pandemic. We've had the great recession. You also have. Projects with clients that are establ, that are having issues that need your help to overcome them. How do you approach obstacles? How do you first process it? What do you look for first? What do you do first?

Dan Lesser:

I think the key is to really get a great understanding of what is the problem, what is the issue, what am I trying to solve for? And once, once you know where you're starting out and where you want to end up, right? Then it's just a matter of, and I learned this, I was not born to be a good critical thinker. I learned over time how to become a good critical thinker. I think you need the basics innately to do that. Not everybody necess necessarily has it, but I was blessed with that. But I still had to learn how to think critically and Yeah, that's, I'm very also picture and illustrative oriented. So I love writing things out. I love map, literally making pictures and mapping things out for myself. Actually, if you've ever seen one of my industry presentations, it's very animated with lots of headlines and colors and what have, yeah I'm very picture oriented. Very visual. Very visual. Yes. And I have a, yes, I'm blessed with a V. I'm blessed with a very photogenic memory. Yes.

Lan Elliott:

Wow. That is an incredible thing to have. I would love to have that, but I'm also very visual. You'll see if things are not going right, I'm gonna like clean everything off my desk and that helps to clear my mind. And then everything's color coded with me, which people laugh at when they see how

Dan Lesser:

O C I resonate with what you're talking about. And that is an, an organized mindset. And I'm of the same ilk. If my desk is a mess, I, it's no, I can't. So I definitely, I need to, okay. And now I'm gonna work on this project and everything else goes to the side. I'm the same way.

Lan Elliott:

Absolutely. Let's talk a little bit about developing relationships, because you have an extremely broad network in our industry. And what I love about the hospitality industry is actually much smaller than most people think it is in the end. But another one of your principles, going back to them is, It's not who you know, but who knows you. So how do you network in a way that's comfortable for you, because not everybody's comfortable with this idea of networking. It generally sounds scary if you're new to it.

Dan Lesser:

So interesting that you presume that I'm comfortable with it. I'm good at it. Again, I'm blessed. It's taken some it's taken some self-training, but it's I can't say I'm a hundred percent comfortable with it. It's like public speaking and, doing this with you. I do a lot of it and to this day, I, truth be told, I still get a, some butterflies in my stomach when I start, right? And the same thing when I walk into a room. I am fortunate now that I've been around the hoop now for quite some time, that generally speaking, when I do walk into a room I'm gonna know people, right? I remember early on walking into a room not knowing a whole lot of people. I think I mentioned earlier, I'm a I'm a street kid from Queens. And I grew up with, if you don't ask, you don't get right. And I was never afraid to, ask a woman out on a date for fear of being told no. What's the worst that's gonna happen? I'll be told no. So that's how I approach, going into a room and going up to people and introducing myself and saying hello. And I think today it's also become a lot more common and accepted that's the way, networking is where it's at. When I started. Long time ago. It was not as as prevalent. And let's face it it, for me it's really it's really one of my main assets is my connectivity, right? People who I know, people who know me. People like to do business with people who they know. They like and they trust, and I'm a professional services provider. It doesn't matter what professional services you're providing, you know what I do? Architects, engineers, whatever people like to do business. People who they know, they like and they trust. And so yeah, forming networks is incredibly important and it really doesn't matter what you do, even if you're not a professional services provider.

Lan Elliott:

Yeah I agree and I appreciate you sharing that. It wasn't easy for you, especially at the beginning, but it does get better. One, you get to know more people as you work with more people in the industry, so you're encountering them again and again. But also you have that feeling when you walk in the room. There's going to be a few people that I know when there it's gonna be okay to do that. And I always think of the scariest thing is walking into one of those large industry cocktail parties, and you're not gonna know anybody there. But it does get easier over time. Like most things, you keep doing it and it gets easier.

Dan Lesser:

It does, but it's interesting as you're talking I'm thinking to myself that when I started I didn't know anybody when I went into the room. Then I got to a point where I walked in and I knew everybody in the room and now I'm at the point where I'm back to knowing half the room. Cuz I'm a little bit older and there's a lot of whole young people, coming up and, but it's wonderful.

Lan Elliott:

Yeah, it is a wonderful industry and I do find a lot of people will work together on a project, but then they become friends later. And I think that's one of the amazing things about our industry cuz people stick around and they stay in it rather than moving on to another industry's. One of the great things about what we do is that we get to encounter the same people again and

Dan Lesser:

again. And you're so right too in that as big as the world is and as global as the hospitality industry is, it's amazing. Everybody knows everybody in the hotel business. It's

Lan Elliott:

so true. It's good to remember when you're encountering conflict. Let's switch a little bit to mentors and champions because you have a lot of people that approach you for advice and mentorship. And so you can't mentor everybody that comes your way. How do you select who you want to mentor and is there a right and wrong way to pr approach a potential mentor? What's your advice for people trying to figure that out?

Dan Lesser:

So when I was a young buck I found it a challenge to, to form mentorship relationships and can't say I really had a whole lot of them. I. Not for lack of effort either. I think also it was a little bit of a different era than it is today. The I do recall numerous folks who wouldn't gimme the time of day. Why? Because I was some young buck and had nothing to offer them, if you will. I also that without naming names, can think of some folks who then when I. Made something of myself. All of a sudden, they knew who I was, which was interesting. But I always made a point of to myself that I was not gonna be that guy or gal who the young person reached out and I didn't have the time of day for them. Earlier in my career as I was being sought after, I pretty much helped everybody that came around at different degrees, obviously, depending upon I. Who they are and how they got to me. I'm now at the point in my life and career where I can't possibly help everybody that comes around as much as I really would like to. So at this juncture it's really, it's all about relationships, right? People who refer contemporaries of mine, who refer young people, asking that I provide advice the right way to approach it is to. Be yourself. And candidly I resonate with with young folks that have my attributes, but are a lot younger than me, right? Again, street smart entrepreneurial aggressive, smart engaging, fun to, fun to talk with. And then I still find it amazing, and maybe I'm old-fashioned, but about how many people will be introduced and I'll have a meeting with them and no thank you. Note, I just I don't understand that I don't know what I was brought up. You, that's what you did, you, you said thank you and you wrote thank you notes. And I do find it amazing because you know when somebody doesn't write a thank you note and then they contact you again, somewheres down the line, it's really? How's that supposed to work? So thank you. Notes are really important and I don't wanna sound like an old man, but if somebody spends time with you, I, to this day, write everybody a thank you note.

Lan Elliott:

By email or a handwritten

Dan Lesser:

note. I know handwritten is nice. It's traditional. I, I don't have a lot of patience, so I have to acknowledge, not handwritten, but email. But email,

Lan Elliott:

just dropping an email to say thank you. It doesn't take a lot of time, honestly. So a

Dan Lesser:

hundred percent you could just do it in the subject line. Thank you.

Lan Elliott:

Absolutely. Should bring that back, more people doing it. Let's talk a little bit about public speaking, because that can encompass so many things. It could be speaking on a panel, a keynote at a conference, but also in a meeting. When you're presenting to a group, for example, how important is it to develop the skill of public speaking? In elevating one's career, regardless of what aspect of the industry you're in how do you go? You speak a lot at conferences. How do you go about developing the skill of public speaking and what do, how do you prepare and feel more confident in doing it?

Dan Lesser:

Public speaking and the ability to speak in front of an audience. Doesn't matter. What you do is extremely important. I would add to the list of what you just described I think, I do a fair amount of litigation related work and I testify as an expert witness and that is clearly a form of public speaking that you can add to the list. The number one thing is know your subject matter. You get up there and talk about something that you don't know backwards and forwards and in your sleep, that could be a challenge. And I would never feel comfortable doing that. That goes back to also staying in touch with what's going on in the sector and being on top of what's going on in the world. And in terms of preparing, again I would say just know the subject matter. Preparing for this meeting you and I had a nice conversation, gave me a brief framework of, what you were gonna be asking me. So I had some idea and I spent some time thinking about it and gathering my thoughts. When I give a presentation, I, again, I give a very visual presentation. So I tell the story as I'm going through that presentation here. Obviously, I'm not presenting anything in a litigation setting when I'm testifying. Many times there are no exhibits that I can present and rather it's just my explanation. And, sometimes that can be interesting because when you speak to a judge and or a jury who doesn't know anything about hotels and maybe barely knows anything about real estate and probably doesn't know anything about finance, right? And you're trying to explain not only who you are and what your background is and why you're credible. But what the problem was that you solved and how you got to the conclusion and why your conclusion is the correct one that's telling a whole story. And so yeah, it takes preparation. The way I do it is I just, I really just think about the the story that I want to tell, and then I just I map it out and I'm very visual again, so I will, I don't write out notes, but I'll write out bullet points of this is. Talk about this topic, then move on to the next one. And it's like threading a needle,

Lan Elliott:

yeah. So you don't write the whole thing out. You'll just write a few bullet points so that it will spark your memory of what you wanna talk about, and then you know your topic. So then you speak

Dan Lesser:

to that. In my younger days, I used to write it all out, and I used to have to fight myself. When I had it in front of me, me not to read it, because that's the worst thing you can do is get up and give a presentation and read maybe it's not the worst, but I don't resonate with that. It, it takes a while to get to the point where, now I, I don't have any notes in front of me. I just, I go and maybe it's also cuz I've done it for as long as I have and. And it is such a passion. But and that really, I think is the, for me at least, th those tend to be the best speakers, the ones who have no notes and they just get up there and talk. So I admire that. And again, I have to acknowledge that even after all these years and dozens upon dozens of presentations that I've made I still get butterflies in my stomach before I start.

Lan Elliott:

I think it's a good thing. It means you're looking forward to, it means that you're excited about it. I think part of it is just leaning into it rather than letting it defeat you. Exactly. And. I think, we've talked in the past about people getting imposter syndrome and speaking, and I know when some people have had to speak, some people who are used to speaking to groups, but then you step on stage, that big conference where you're gonna be in front of thousands of people at that, that imposter syndrome comes back. You get the butterflies. I think it's one of those things that never goes away. So I feel I. People need to learn how to harness that to their best advantage, cuz it's always going to be there. If you're always growing and you're taking on new challenges, you're always gonna have those butterflies. So I love the idea of just leaning into it and using it to your advantage. Agreed.

Dan Lesser:

Agreed. You have the challenge of doing this. What? Every week you do one of these.

Lan Elliott:

This is my third one this week.

Dan Lesser:

Okay.

Lan Elliott:

Some weeks are busier than others. When I get to have the attention of people, I will take it whenever I can get it. So I'm really happy to be able to do three this week. But yes, it's like anything, it gets easier with practice. Exactly.

Dan Lesser:

Exactly. And obviously I still aspire, you obviously what you're doing too, because I feel the passion through the through the video here.

Lan Elliott:

Thank you. I think there's not much better ways to spend your time than talking with people that you admire, who inspire you. So I think it makes it really easy, but I too aspire to continue to improve and to be able to speak without notes. Always more things to learn and grow. Absolutely. Moving on to personal brand, because we've heard a lot about developing a personal brand, and you're one of the people in our industry who's done a great job of establishing a distinctive personal brand. How would you describe how you think about your personal brand and how did you create it?

Dan Lesser:

It took time to create and took a fair amount of elbow grease I think I mentioned earlier, I was the first hire of H V S when Steve Rushmore founded the firm. And Steve was really a master at he found a niche. He wrote a book that became the bible in, within that niche, right? And then he took that on the road, if you will. And yeah, I learned the tremendous amount of of how to promote yourself as an expert, but obviously first you have to be the expert, right? You can't promote yourself on something that, that you can, but that's not gonna work out too well. And yes, always very focused on, on my name, right? And my reputation. Because if you think about it, that's all we really, that's all we all have, right? We have our name and our reputation, right? You go through life and. I don't know. For me, when I hear about, people that pass I, I tend to immediately have a reaction about what I know about that person. Good, bad, or indifferent. And When we're all gonna pass at some point in time. And it, in my mind, life's all about what's your legacy? What are people gonna think about, listen, there's no roof rack on the casket when you get lowered down, right? And there are some people who, move on and maybe the reaction is, oh. Nasty person, not a good person. Made a lot of money, not a good person. I resonate more with the notion of he was tough, but he was a good guy. Honest, respectable, yeah, I hope I answered the question. Personal brand is, that's really all I have, right? And let's face it I'm only as good as the last thing I did, right? And I've been doing what I've been doing for over 40 years, right? I can easily mess it up tomorrow. I can mess it up right now. And so personal brands are a challenge to build and develop and they're also a challenge to maintain. But I believe in transparency, honesty it's hard to mess it up if you are transparent and and honest, right? If you don't tell lies, you don't have to remember who you told what to.

Lan Elliott:

Yeah, that, that's for sure. And I always think, when I think about you, I always think about the people that you have helped bring into the real estate side of the industry. Like Kevin Jacobs, who was looking to transition into real estate, and you gave him that first job, like the young woman that I had who interned with me and I thought, Where she was headed, she had so much more potential and you gave her an opportunity to come into the side of the business. And so I so admire that about you by giving people a chance. And so that's what I think about you when I hear your

Dan Lesser:

name. Thank you. Thank you. It's important, again, I remember those that didn't gimme the time of day when I was young. And I definitely remember the ones who did gimme the time of day and I always resonated with, I wanna be that person I wanna be known as. Yep. He gave me the time of day.

Lan Elliott:

Absolutely. Absolutely. A common general generalization is that women don't do a good job of advocating for themselves, and this is something that holds them back from getting opportunities or promotions or things that they seek. What advice would you have for our viewers who might be struggling to find their voice to go after something they really want?

Dan Lesser:

Just do it. And I'm not really sure why there should be a distinction vis-a-vis men, women versus men. Listen you, nobody in life is gonna give you something, right? If you gotta go get what you want and you can dream all day long, if you don't go for it, you're never gonna get it. Now, obviously you need to do it in a logical, methodical, respectful manner, but, I do hear a lot, of of folks who feel entitled and, expect opportunities to come their way and nothing's gonna come your way. You gotta go out and make it happen. And I'll come back to something we talked about earlier, failure, right? It's like everything you go after is you're not gonna necessarily get it and you. Probably gonna fall down a couple of times, but if you really want it, then you gotta get up, dust yourself off and go get it until you get it. And I will tell you I've done that a couple of times in my life where I'm like, I'm just actually it reminds me I felt really good when my my older son. Had applied to Cornell University's ILR school. And he was he was, I believe he was turned down the first time he reapplied. And he actually, he came to me, he goes, I'm going up to Ithaca and I'm gonna meet with the director of admissions, whatever. I was said, good for you. And he met with the director of admissions and me. He said, I just want you to know that I am not gonna give up. Applying to the school. So if you reject me a second time, it's okay, but I'll be back a third, fourth, and fifth time until you accept me and when he. Told me he was gonna do that. I was like, wow, that's my kid.

Lan Elliott:

That's incredible. I think that there is a big part in asking for what you want. And I think there, certainly early in my career, I thought that you just do good work and your boss is gonna notice it and you're gonna get the opportunities, but that's not how the world really works. And so if you're not raising your hand when people say, who wants to do this? If you're not asking for that. Role that just became open. They're not gonna know that you want it. They're not gonna consider you for it. Maybe you're sitting at your desk thinking they're gonna think of you, but they're probably not. They got a lot of other things going on. So it's worth your time just to raise your hand. And like you said, even if you don't get it, at least there might be that thought of, oh, they asked for this one, this wasn't the right spot, but maybe I'm gonna think about them for the next one. Absolutely. One of my favorite questions that we ask on d e i advisors is what advice would you give to your younger self? So Dan, what advice would you give to your 22 year old self?

Dan Lesser:

I sit here a big shot talking about failure and getting up and dusting yourself off. And yet, when I was a young buck, I used to be frightened by failure. So yeah, I, I would tell my young self, Keep your nose clean, do the right thing, be a good person. Good things happen to good people. And ultimately everything works out. And so where I'm going with this is I probably wasted a bit of time with fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of change. But a lot of that comes with, with age and maturity. I think the Sooners one, the sooner one realizes that, again, if you do the right thing and you're good people, invariably good things are gonna happen. That fear equation will diminish and the quicker it happens, I think the better. I, in retrospect I wish I would've been less fearful day one. And I think that also has to do with the fact that I started with nothing. I come from a very modest home. I grew up three children in a two bedroom apartment. First house I ever lived in was the house, first house I ever bought. And that's the perspective that I come from, which is, different than if I had come from a a well-to-do family.

Lan Elliott:

That's wonderful advice. I think with things that are scary, the more you do them, the easier they get over time. And then if you just decided that you're gonna conquer that fear and keep doing it until it gets more comfortable, like public speaking, like a lot of things in life, you just set yourself to it. And I think. What you said about being a good person. And I think because the relationships and reputations in our industry last for such a long time, I do think that the good guys, you like to see the good guys win. And so I think that's a great part about our industry as well. Yeah.

Dan Lesser:

Not everybody's gonna like an individual. Not everybody's gonna like me, I'm. But there's nobody who, there's nobody in my career who could say, oh yeah, he's a bad guy. This is what he did. Unethically that's, life's too short for that.

Lan Elliott:

Yeah, absolutely. I suspected we would run out of time because I always learn new things from you, especially when you share those life principles with me, which were really helpful. But Dan, you shared a lot of really wonderful advice with our viewers. Could you share maybe one last additional nugget of advice that you might have keeping in mind that the mission of d e I advisors is around empowering personal success? What advice would you have? For women in underrepresented groups who are struggling and really want to advance their careers.

Dan Lesser:

My reaction to that is make sure that you have a definition for yourself as to what success means. Oh, that's such a good one. I grew up in a home success, with no definition attached to it. I presumed it had to do with money. And when I started to have a couple of bucks to my name, I was able to step back and say wait a second. I'm, this is not making me happy. And then I learned it took a while, but I learned how to define what success really meant to me as opposed to what I thought it was supposed to be.

Lan Elliott:

That is a wonderful piece of advice. I do think a lot of people chase this nebulous thing of success, and you never know when you get there, if you don't define it upfront, and then you forget to enjoy it because you thought it was something different and you've kept changing it. So thank you. Wonderful advice. Thank you very much, Stan, for being on our show today. Wonderful advice that you shared with our viewers and to our viewers. If you've enjoyed this interview with Dan, I hope you will. Find us on the our website@deiadvisors.org where you can find other interviews with industry leaders. Thank you.