#2 :: Three Tools for Getting Through Times Like These, with Mike Thakur - WorkLodge

Optimism, deflecting uncertainty, and agility - learn about these three attitudes and strategies and how they help WorkLodge CEO Mike Thakur get through the tough times every leader faces. And why who you have around you matters on this journey of entrepreneurship. 

WorkLodge: https://www.worklodge.com/

The Gabriel Project: https://mikethakur.com/Gabriel/

The Mike Thakur Show: https://mikethakur.com/show/

Recorded on 10.28.2020

TRANSCRIPT

[Music & Intro]

Laurie Pillow: Welcome to the 100 CEO Project Podcast

So hi guys welcome back to the 100 CEO Project - we're super geeked to have Mike Thakur, who has his own podcast, by the way. I want to start off with something a little personal, it seems to me that you are also a Dr. Suess fan...

Mike Thakur: A very, very small bit but yes we did quote him in a recent podcast.

LP: That's one of my favorite quotes so I'm going to give it back to him, right. “Today you are you, that’s truer than true; there’s no one alive more youer than you.” And I think that's fitting in doing this interview because looking at your professional trajectory, you are somebody who's been true to yourself, and I believe in doing so, has achieved great success, and been able to help others by honoring who you are. So, again, super excited, and I'm gonna let them know who you are real quick and then we'll dive in. 

MT: Yeah. 

LP: Okay, cool. So, Mike Thakur is the chief executive officer of WorkLodge, an office workspace company that provides beautiful private offices and co-working solutions in Houston, Dallas and Tampa. If you haven't seen them they also have cool slides on the inside. WorkLodge also directly benefits your nonprofit which is the Gabriel project, or the Gabriel project as we say in English right, sorry about that, a little Spanish involved… which is focused on providing homes for orphaned kids and support for victims of human trafficking, and also serving families who are in need. And as I mentioned earlier at the top you've got your own podcast, it's called The Mike Thakur Show, so people when you jump off of here, head over there. And you're hosting conversations around the intersection of people, profit and purpose.

Andrea Spirov: Well, I'm buckling my seatbelt because we're about to talk about commercial real estate, and that's been like, an ewwww for everybody this year.

2:51

LP: So Mike, we want you to tell us about some of the ongoing challenges that you're facing this year, right 2020, and some of the tools and strategies that you're using to guide WorkLodge through all of this turbulence.

MT: Yeah, so I think obviously commercial real estate is one of those industries that clearly has cycles and goes up and down. When it’s going well everybody wants to lease space and life is great but when it's not doing so well the inverse  is also true. And so I think as an industry we're probably. We're probably in the, you know the worst of it in some ways. I sure wish I was in the residential real estate market right now, because that's booming and going. 

But that said we’re slightly nuanced because it's not just real estate but there's also these aspects of our spaces that are very flexible. And so they're very scalable which, which is a little bit more immunity for a small business, compared to the traditional seven year lease, five year lease, 10 year lease that kind of thing so we've definitely seen some challenges and we've definitely taken some hits, but I don't know it's been quite as bad as a traditional commercial landlord, would be experiencing. And so, I think, as we look to the future and everybody's got different ideas about what the future will look like, we're supremely excited that we're in this space because we built a very conservative business. We have no debt; we bootstrapped from the beginning and we were purposefully not raising venture capital and that kind of thing... so we can go as long as the piggy bank stretches but at least we don't have the added pressure of, you know, debt payments and balloons and those kinds of things that sometimes people have to deal with. 

But I think we're most excited about the fact that for us COVID has proved our model. And it's proved our business. And so, you know, we were, we were evangelizing years ago, why would any small business want to go sign a five year lease or a 10 year lease? Why would you want, you don't own the space anyway, nobody really owns commercial real estate, even the big boys don't own it. It’s the banks, the lenders, the guys with the real money. And so, why lock yourself in -  how can you project where your company is going to be in three years time? In this day and age, with the internet, with the speed that business moves, I don't know, I can’t predict where I'm going to be in three years and you know what I've been doing this for awhile. How does a newer business deal with that? And so we've been evangelizing and singing the song that this kind of flexible model makes so much more sense. You don't put yourself at risk, you don't put yourself in a position where you rent space you don't need because you think you might need it in the future when you grow, and the opposite obviously is true as well. You don't buy too little space, and then you’ve got nowhere to grow because the rest of the building is full, the landlord can’t sell you any more and now what do you do? You separate the team and all the other kinds of things. And then you've got the challenges that, you know, I think people, the longer this goes on, are going to be more accustomed to not wanting to commute. Our very first location was built in the suburbs. We don't actually like downtown locations particularly. We'd rather get away from them. We've got one that is downtown, you know, a couple that are in the ‘burbs, but we're big believers in giving people some time back. It's the thing money can't buy so give them the corporate campus amenities, give them the environment that’s professional. But, but do it, do it close by. And so, as painful a year as 2020 has been for us, it’s really the first time we haven't seen growth, you know we've seen some kind of shrinkage. And at the same time we're so excited about, you know, 2021, 2022, because if this didn’t prove to most small businesses that they should not be going signing long leases, then I don't know what will. This is the absolute epitome of why our space makes so much sense.

6:11

LP: So have you guys seen some increased growth at your space here in 2020?

MT: Yeah, so I think I think overall we're probably negative. When I look at the occupancy rates, you know, thankfully, not many of our companies actually have failed and shut down. We've definitely seen a few folks say hey we're gonna cut the budget. We need to shrink the space, we've got, or you know we're gonna go work from home for a while and we're going to duck out of this, but only, only maybe a handful of us have actually completely folded and that was our big worry just because of the relationships we’ve built with these members and these folks that were around everyday serving. But yeah, overall I think we're probably you know a little, a little down on revenue compared to previous years. But again, compared to, I think, others in our industry, commercial models in general, I think we've, we've fared pretty well so, I've definitely seen quite a few co-working spaces close the doors. I was with somebody yesterday in Dallas, who was tearing out a space and she's the last one left in her existing co-working space; everyone else has gone, they've shut the doors and, you know, she basically got a couple of weeks to kind of scoot out and find a new home. So I feel terrible for folks who are dealing with that because that's their dream. That was their baby that they were building. And so when I look at that, it makes me feel bad, but even a little bit of negative is still positive.

LP: Andrea it looks like you have a question, I see you over there…

7:36

AS: Oh, I was just thinking about, how do you stay optimistic in the face of that because we're not the end of this thing, right so, what personally keeps you so optimistic?

MT: Well it’s funny you say that, so the three things I’ve got because we’re talking about the tools that we're leaning on to get through this, and the first one I've got is that optimism. I don't know that I'm actually an optimistic person. I think it's something I've had to learn and develop over time, but I think as a business leader, or as a CEO, if you're not optimistic I don't, I don't know how you can run a business. You've got, you've got to look for something to be optimistic about, and I was reading a major book by Andy Grove, who was the founder of Intel, and he wrote this book called High Output Management, which apparently is like a legendary book and I'm a little behind the curve because I only came across it a little while ago on my bookshelf. And one of the comments that he makes in that he was interviewed by somebody after the dot com bust. And they asked him a question, Andy, why did all these CEOs not see this coming? How are all these guys running all these kinds of multi hundred million dollar businesses, how could not one of them see this happening? And he said, look, he said, as a CEO, you're, you're trained and you're expected to see the optimistic future. The rose-tinted spectacles live and exist if you like. And if you don't see it that way. How are you ever going to run a company because you're going to be second guessing everything you ever did when you can, you're not  going to take a risk you need to take. So it's understandable that they would see it, or rather they wouldn't see it because that's the blind spot of a CEO and a leader. And I just thought it was a really interesting comment, because as a small business owner, that's what I'm trying to live with now. And look, I, you know definitely don't have great moments every moment of every day, plenty, plenty of moments they're quite the opposite. But we've got to train ourselves to recognize, we believed in the business in the beginning, we believed it made a lot of sense. You know, we're in a situation now that, in our opinion, is proving that we were right with what we've been saying, so we ride out the wave or whatever we want to call it, and we make sure we're well-positioned for the future and if, if we did it right then we really did build something that has some value and has some meaning to people, it's going to flesh itself out the right way and we're going to come out in a whole lot stronger on the backside So time is going to prove it.

9:46

AS: Well, it's that vision that you have as well, I think as a CEO it’s your responsibility to create a vision that people can live into for your team because you can't have everybody working on just whatever they think it should be, right, so what vision are you creating right now for WorkLodge?

MT: So, I think for us, you know fundamentally theDNA hasn't changed. And I think the outcome hasn't changed where we really were headed. You know we set out to build a business that could fund a nonprofit and make a difference in the world and so our tagline is Workspace Changing Lives, and it often has changed. We're still working on projects, you know, the staff and I, we still talk about ways that we can do something meaningful - we may be doing a little bit less this year. Just practically because obviously there's investment involved, but, you know, overall, for us, I don't know that our vision particularly changed because of COVID or not, it's not like we've had to pivot and completely change our business model. We've definitely had to adapt and accept a few things that maybe we wouldn't have done in the past. We're trying to be a lot more helpful to folks looking for some short term temporary solutions, which is not really what we were built around because it's hard to make this investment and pay it back. You know, on that kind of a business model, but, we also want to recognize a lot of folks are having a tough time and we want to try and help them as much as we can within the parameters of still running a healthy and profitable business where possible.

11:17

LP: So I'm going to back us up just a little bit to that list - you were talking about some tools and strategies that you're using to get through this, to navigate the turbulence. Optimism being first - do you have a couple more nuggets to share with us.

MT: Yeah, I do. So I think if optimism is the first one, then I think learning to deflect uncertainty is the second for us. We're definitely in an uncertain time because we don't really know. Is there going to be a vaccine? Is it going to work, you know, is this going to be how life is for, you know, for three, four or five years we just don't know. And so again, where I try and develop and train this kind of mindset is seeing the optimistic output that could happen in the future if everything goes the way we, we hope and expect it to. I'm also going to develop and train a mental kind of agility to say, I can't allow the uncertainty to come in and start shaping decisions. Definitely, again, we need to adapt and evolve to make the business make sense but it can't come from a place of fear, where we're so scared of the uncertain future that we're letting fear start to dictate what we do, because I think at that point, we're not guiding the ship anymore, the storm is. And that's not going to get us where we want to go, it’s going to get us to where the storm wants to take us. I don't know that I want to go where it's going to take me. I want to go to where I'm supposed to be going. And if I can't get there at some point, I have to make a decision. Okay, but maybe this isn't the right business and maybe it's not for today, I'd rather do that where I'm still in control and I'm still leading and making a choice, rather than letting that choice be made for me because, you know, fear and uncertainty took me down a path that still ended up being catastrophic to the business if that makes sense. 

And then the third one, I think is you know a word I've used a couple of times is agility. And again, we're a small business, you know, we don't have this figured out, we're still working super hard every day trying to figure out how to do this well, how to be a better, but I think as any business will probably relate to being able to be agile, being able to evolve, to be able to adapt, being able to tweak and kind of polish as you go along. I think in times like this where we just don't know and even now, it's so different than three months ago. So even the things we were trying three months ago now we're trying something different because I think a lot of people are in a different place, mentally, and ultimately I think that's that's the reality is, I don't know that COVID is causing as much damage as the mental state of the customers we serve. Really, that's, that's the thing we're trying to overcome, because some people think it's all hoo-ha, it's conspiracy theory and it is, you know, just fine. Other people think, no, you know, it’s a pandemic and the world’s going to end and I can't come within 25 feet of you and three face masks anda shield, and somehow we’re going to need to serve all those people and make them all feel great, make them all feel like they want to do business with us. And obviously keep the business moving forward. And so, a good friend of mine here in Houston, owns some restaurants, and they're kind of, I wouldn’t say they're high end dining but they're definitely more than casual dining and, you know, kind of on the higher end side. He was very quick to pivot and go from in restaurant dining to food delivery, which they’d never done before, prepackaged meals, and they got them into the Kroger and HEB, a grocery store pretty quickly. And I think that was a, you know, that was an incredibly prescient move for them. Obviously they’ve still got the restaurants, they’ve still got the leases and everything else, but to go from that, that mid to higher level dining experience to something completely different, you know, very, very quickly. They obviously felt like they needed to be able to keep things going and keep as many staff as possible and I think that's a great example of their core business is the same, they cook great food for people, they’re just now delivering it in a very different kind of environment.

15:10

LP: That’s fantastic. So, up till now, we’ve got three tools, or strategies: optimism, deflecting uncertainty, and agility. 

AS: I’m curious about what makes entrepreneurs able to be resilient. Is it just that innate thing that makes you be an entrepreneur in the first place, that allows you to pivot so quickly? Because I think some restaurant owners, they’ve said they’re going to close and so that was a really great example...do you just have an innovation loop going all the time or, how do you pivot so quickly? To be nimble?

MT: I don’t know if I’ve got a good answer for that or not. I think one of the things that I think about a lot, and we did an episode recently on the podcast - I’m going to plug my own podcast there for a second...My wife and I did an episode on the podcast and we talked about support and how valuable it is for an entrepreneur to have a support network and support infrastructure around them as they go on this journey. Even pre-COVID. Forget the crazy pandemic and everything else. Just going and leaving a regular paying job to learn something from nothing and maybe self-fund it, maybe get some money from somebody else; that takes a certain personality, but even then it takes people behind them. I think Jeff Bezos is a great example. Mackenzie did pretty well through the separation and the reason for that was that they recognized that he couldn’t have built Amazon without Mackenzie being there with him. Whether she was officially titled in the role or not, you know, she supported him when they moved across the country and he had no paycheck coming in and that kind of thing. And I think many entrepreneurs have stories similar to that and we talked about it a lot on the show because I think people underestimate what it takes...You know they say to raise a child takes a village, well I think the same is true to raise a business. You’ve got to have people around you. So I think some of the agility and some of the adaptability comes from the kind of people you’ve got around you or where you get your inspiration from. 

So one example for those of you who’ve maybe not looked at my history; so I’m a person of faith and so I used to be a preacher in years gone by. So some of my inspiration comes from the faith that I have. And I’ll lean on that when I’m not sure because it’s part of who I am. And obviously not everyone believes the same as me and that’s their choice, but the question is always the same. Okay then what do you lean on, what do you believe in because there’s gotta be something else that keeps you focused, and I think when you don’t have that focus, you don’t have that support or you don’t have some of the things like the people around you...I think those are the first ones to say, you know what? This is too hard, I’m packing it in and I’m giving up. Because they can’t see past that negative and are letting some of that fear, some of that uncertainty come in, and now that’s driving those decisions for them. Where I think the folks that have got the encouragement, they’ve got the support around them to say, you know what? It’s going to be ok, we can still do this...what else could we be trying? What else could we be thinking about? You know you look around you and you see your friends and people that influence you in your life - hopefully you’ve got friends that can encourage and inspire and keep you motivated, rather than a lot of debbie downers who are having a pity party with you because that’s not going to get you anywhere, right? And I think we all know that.

18:30

LP: So talking about people who are in your corner, who are supportive and belief system that also serves as a backbone for you when times are very tough, right...I think we read a little about your wife, Linda, and as I recall she was quite the support and has been on a number of changes you guys have made, one of them being your move over here from the UK to the US. Can you describe a little bit about how she was a support to you guys when you first moved to the US?

MT: Yeah for sure. I think, well, Linda and I were babies when we got married and so, we joke about this a lot, but I think we both really appreciate that we’ve been able to grow up together and live life together. So for both of us I think what’s unique and nice is there’s not really any memorable life experiences that we haven’t shared or been around in some way, shape or form. And so that’s been great from a support perspective because then if there is some doubt or there is some uncertainty creeping in or there’s questions in the mind, and maybe there has been some experience that has helped prepare me for that situation or helped shape or guide my thought processes that maybe I’m not thinking about, because Linda has been around me for so long she can help remind me of those things and we can kind of work together.

Obviously we’ve moved countries - we’ve actually moved countries twice - we moved the first time in 2001 for a couple of years and then we moved back to the UK and then we moved back in 2007...it wasn’t just my idea it was something that we both discussed together and kind of thought about but I think probably it was me that was more in favor of it, definitely the second time after we had a couple of babies. And maybe the first time, I don’t know, it was a little while ago. But I think one of the great qualities Linda has is she’s managed to understand me very well from an early stage so she knows if I do have these crazy ideas or these crazy business ideas depending on what it is, there’s usually a lot of thought and intentionality that’s gone in behind it. And so she’ll give me that benefit of the doubt to think through that with me and together we’ll work through it. And I think some people don’t have that. Certainly that’s been my experience here. And again it’s something that I talked about in one of the episodes. I know one of the folks that works out of one of my locations had the complete opposite where he and his wife ended up getting divorced because of the business. Because she gave him an ultimatum to drop it or she was going. And for me that’s just so far removed from anything I’ve ever experienced or would think about. But for him, that was his reality and he’s moved on from that and rebuilt his life and everything but there’s a very broad spectrum there for sure.

21:49

AS: Mike, you recently joined the Guinness Book of World Records, is that right?

MT: It is right, correct. 

AS: I have to hear that story.

MT: It is genuinely a funny story, right. I’ve had this podcasting bug for a little while and have been putting it off. I’m very happy to be behind the scenes….anyway so we’ve had this idea for a podcast for a year or something and then things started to fall into place. And then we had a podcast production company move into my Dallas location. We got friendly, we got talking, and Keith, he’s an awesome guy and I mentioned my podcast. He said, yeah you should do it...let me help you. And so we got it all going and then we started to do a couple of recordings and then a group held a podcast conference out of one of my Houston locations back in February/March - so I got to meet a bunch of folks there in the podcasting world, one of who called me up - she was hosting the event. So we fast forward and [she] reaches out to me and says, hey, I’m involved in this upcoming conference called Podfest and it's a big expo and they’re looking for speakers and she was doing a faith-based track and so I spoke at one of them. And [they] were going for a Guinness Book World record to have the most attendees at an online podcast event or whatever it was. They got through by three, I think...And so because of that I was able to get a little certificate; I’ve got it in my office there, and yes, I think I’m officially a Guinness World record holder...that’s what it said. It was pretty cool.

24:30

LP: Are there any early experiences that shaped how you approach business or work culture?

MT: That’s a big question. I’ve had a pretty varied life from a professional perspective. Sales manager for a billion dollar company. Boutique security in the world of very successful people and wealthy people. Kidnap, ransom and all that other kind of fun stuff. It’s hard to pinpoint a single example of this that helped shape that. But I can tell you that in my days as a sales manager, I started off with that company just as a regular sales guy on the floor and did pretty well, got promoted a few times. There was one manager who definitely stands out - his name was John - I think he saw something in me, or I saw it in myself; but he was willing to give some time and give some energy to help kind of shape that and mold that. None of us are islands. We don’t get here on our own. We all have people who pour into us. We all have people who, whether advertently or inadvertently,  have helped to shape the direction that we take ourselves. And I think for me, he’s probably one of the earlier ones I can remember in a professional capacity. He was very good at what he did, he was very successful and so it was easy for me to listen to him and try and learn from him. We were chatting today on LinkedIn, so 20 years later we’re still in touch, so it was pretty cool. 

26:11

LP: Would you like to share anything about the Gabriel Project before we wrap?

MT: In a nutshell there are people, groups who really can’t help themselves and we want to focus on those. So kids are an easy one. Specifically, orphans - we’ve built some orphanages, and in India and tried to think of some better ways we can help beyond that. The clean water wells obviously help with that as well. And human trafficking was the second focal point for us. People in abusive situations. It’s hard because we’re very small and we want to be very impactful so we stay very narrow and focused and try to deliver projects that let us get the most bang for our buck if that sounds correct. We really want to make a tangible difference. So we don’t really get involved in education or activism, we’d rather be rolling up sleeves on the ground. How can I help this person get from here over here as safely as possible, as quickly as possible, and then encouraged and inspired into a better life? And that’s what we’re still working on. 

LP: Is there anywhere people can go to learn more, not only about you and your work at WorkLodge but also about the Gabriel Project?

MT: MikeThakur.com 

From there you can link to the Gabriel Project, you can link to the podcast, it’s all in one place so that's probably the best place to go.

LP: Mike Thakur, bazillion thanks to you. Thanks for taking time out in your day. I want to remind everybody of something that I believe is a tremendous piece of wisdom that you shared on The Mike Thakur Show, and that is to learn from others, and that’s why we’re here on this podcast. So that you guys, the leaders, can learn from others so as you say you can not want to become somebody else. Be who you are. Tremendous example and again, it was a pleasure to learn from you and to talk with you. 

MT: Thanks so much for having me on the show. You guys have been awesome.

[Music]

Hey guys we hope you’ve enjoyed this episode. And if you did, please share it with your friends and colleagues who also have to navigate this leadership stuff. As you can see this project is about to be a mini masterclass in every episode - best part? It’s free. So if you like it please do us a favor and take a screenshot, share it on social with the hashtag #100CEO that we can say thanks and share it in our stories. And finally, if you’ve got some insights to share and you’re a CEO we’d love to hear from you. You can find us at 100ceoproject.com or on LinkedIn at 100 CEO Project. Until next time, keep leading by example.

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Hosted by: Laurie Pillow, Andrea Spirov

Writing and research: Laurie Pillow, Andrea Spirov

Edited by: Laurie Pillow

Produced by: Laurie Pillow, Andrea Spirov