Transcript: Episode 166: Lead Yourself

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[00:00:00] Susan Barry: This is Top Floor episode 166. You can find the show notes at topfloorpodcast.com/episode/166. 

[00:00:14] Narrator: Welcome to Top Floor with Susan Barry. This weekly podcast right up to the top floor features tangible tips and excellent stories from the experts and characters who elevate hospitality. And now your host and elevator operator, Susan Barry.

[00:00:32] Susan Barry: Welcome to the show. Mike Schucht is a hospitality industry veteran whose career began at age 15 as a dishwasher. He studied hospitality and restaurant management at Penn State before launching his career with Marriott and then advancing to key leadership roles within Hilton Hotels, including Director of Sales and Marketing, like me, and eventually Vice President for the Southeast and Latin America. After years in corporate, Mike pivoted to consulting, also like me, founding Leading North, where he worked with hotels transitioning to independent operations. As president of Teneo Hospitality Group since 2016, Mike helps connect independent hotels and unique brands with the group business they need to succeed. Today we are going to talk about the importance of group business, but before we jump in, we need to answer the call button.

Call button rings 

[00:01:35] Susan Barry: The emergency call button is our hotline for hospitality professionals and anybody else with a burning question. If you would like to submit a question, you can call or text me at 850-404-9630. Today's question was submitted by Kendrick. This is such a hard question. Don't get mad. Are attrition and cancellation completely dead? I can't get any of my clients to commit and sign those two clauses and contracts. You look skeptical, Mike, so tell me everything you think.

[00:02:10] Mike Schugt: I'm not sure exactly what type of hotel Kendrick is working with, but probably 90 percent of the properties that we work with and the actual groups have attrition and cancellation in them.

[00:02:23] Susan Barry: Oh, that's good news. I'm glad to hear it. 

[00:02:25] Mike Schugt: Yeah, I think it's very market specific. If in, let's say, and seasonally specific. So if, for example in the dead of winter in Boston in January, that's one thing in the same month in Palm Springs, California or Arizona or Miami, it's going to be something different. So, we find that that's, during these times that hotels are protecting themselves and clients understand that. 

[00:02:53] Susan Barry: I'm really glad to hear that because I feel like there was a trend to the other direction for quite some time. It may be Kendrick that you need to role play or think about those objections before you go into a negotiation so you've got some good things to say in terms of like supply and demand and all that stuff. I don't know. Do you agree? 

[00:03:13] Mike Schugt: Totally. And again, it could be, it's hotel, it's market, it's seasonally dependent. And not knowing that the actual hotel, but yes. I mean, I think role playing and looking at different solutions and thinking about, how to engage with the client and figuring out, okay, what's most important to you, what's most important to me, trying to put it all on the table and come to a compromise. 

[00:03:40] Susan Barry: That makes all the sense in the world. Can you tell us about your journey into the hospitality industry? What initially drew you in? It could not have been the dish pit. 

[00:03:51] Mike Schugt: Well, I am glutton for punishment. I'm a hockey player too. Interesting enough. I was washing dishes at the age of 15. My dad thought that would be a good idea for me. And it was actually at a place where my friends were playing tennis and racquetball, I was in the restaurant. And they would come in at least once a week, five of them each order two bowls of French onion soup, and eat very little of it, put it back and watch me as a dishwasher, try to scrape the cheese off. Okay. So… 

[00:04:20] Susan Barry: Oh my gosh! 

[00:04:21] Mike Schugt: That was my first orientation from my friends. But anyway, I'm just kidding around. But funny enough, I watched the Hotel TV show in the eighties and the mid eighties hotel. And I just thought that it was so romantic and very cool. Just so many things happening. And I was always looking for maybe some career that was very unique had a lot of variety to it. And something where I could really engage people and that, that just came about and here I am. 

[00:04:55] Susan Barry: I wonder how many careers were inspired by Hotel. I've heard more than one person say that before. Maybe we need a new like Hotel TV show to draw people back into the industry. I don't know. We'll make a little side deal about that later. So in addition to your corporate experience, you've taught hospitality courses. Can you talk about how your experience in hospitality higher ed has shaped or impacted your approach to hospitality in your career?

[00:05:29] Mike Schugt: I'm a Penn State graduate. I live in Orlando, Florida. I have an opportunity to go up to Penn State usually once, sometimes twice a year, and talk to the students in different ways. Sometimes, I will teach kind of an entrepreneurial class. Sometimes there's something called The Colloquium when all the students get together on a Monday and they're in an auditorium and I'll talk about something else. But what I talk about and what I do are very similar. And the key for me is to talk about leadership, okay? Is to talk about how to be a leader and that you only need to lead yourself and others will follow.

And, I quote something in my mind all the time by Colin Powell. It says, “Leadership is the art of doing more than the science of management says is possible.” And that just basically means that you're pushing, and encouraging the team. But at the end of the day anyone can be successful if they lead themselves, because that leadership that you're putting out there and the things that you're doing, people will take notice and follow. And then the people that you're working with around you or the positions that you wish to get in front of you are within your reach because those people are seeing your leadership as well. So it has to me, a tremendous message for students and it's something that I do on a daily basis and I've done for 35 years. 

[00:06:55] Susan Barry: I think you need to write a book about that, leading yourself, and I will be the first person to read it, FYI.

[00:07:01] Mike Schugt: I'm writing that down.

[00:07:02] Susan Barry: Excellent. Excellent. So how did your time as a consultant play into or inform your role at Teneo? 

[00:07:13] Mike Schugt: I haven't told many people this when Teneo was first created and people got together to create a global sales organization that would support independent hotels. I thought to myself - cause at that time I was more in the branded space all my career - I said, boy, I would love to do that, because it's global sales, it's independent properties. It just came into my mind, but but I had a consulting business basically from 2011 through 2016. And we actually kept that consulting business going as a arm of Teneo…

[00:07:48] Narrator: Ohh.

[00:07:48] Mike Schugt: And we still have that today. But what it was all about was, for example, I helped the [unclear] in Naples convert to the Naples Grand back in 2013, 14, 15. And I had similar projects like that. So what was happening was, getting these independent hotels that were coming from a brand, how do we get them global sales support? And I ran into Teneo by chance, I met the owner of the company in San Francisco, we were there at the same time and the rest is history. 

[00:08:21] Susan Barry: As someone involved in global sales have you observed big shifts or key shifts and group business trends in the last few years that may have gotten overlooked?

[00:08:34] Mike Schugt: There's some that are overlooked and there's some that are not. Obviously, from a volume perspective, we've never, ever seen anything like this post COVID. And I think within hotels, it's been a challenge to be coming out of coven from a staffing perspective. We all know that but some things that have really come About I think are things that you haven't seen before. So no longer are the days that everybody wants a two per six foot or three per eight foot. And they want, they want to be in the unique spaces. They want to engage. They want to be comfortable. They want to have more creativity brought into the event and it's — I use this comparison to my, she's now 20 years old, but when she was 16, my Mia, who would go to Starbucks and order a double frappuccino a large in an extra large cup with a domed lid, extra whipped cream, a little bit of cinnamon. She wants a paper straw, not a plastic one. And if you don't get it right, God can only help you.

And I think that's a microcosm of what everybody wants, what attendees want. Or what they've wanted to shift is they want everything. They want what they can get in the rest of society, they want it in a meeting. So they're expecting great culinary delivery a cool brand — even in a brand they want a cool brand. And that's why I think independent hotels on the side are so popular today. They want that unique experience. They want the culinary delivery. They're looking for sustainability, wellness, all the things that 10, 15 years ago really didn't exist much as far as in the meeting, they want to network more. It's more about a two way conversation versus a one way conversation, and that is across the spectrum. So I think it's been a massive sea change, and it's only going to continue. 

[00:10:34] Susan Barry: Independent hotels face unique challenges compared to larger brands, just in terms of distribution and loyalty and all that stuff. What are some of the biggest hurdles, do you think, and how can they overcome them?

[00:10:47] Mike Schugt: Well, I think number one from a revenue standpoint and all those good things, obviously distribution and the call centers, the website, the loyalty program, the points program, on and on — is 1 thing that can make it very difficult for a hotel to compete on a day to day basis. In many meetings, clients are just looking for that cookie cutter solution, because that's the nature of the meeting. And so sometimes that's viewed by, just put it into a brand. Makes it easy.

The other disadvantages, with many of these companies, they've signed these, master services agreements on the group the brands at the top. And so if you're the individual hotel, you, you don't necessarily have that opportunity. And they're viewed for this very consistent approach, but at the same time the independent hotel can be a real powerhouse. Most of the time, I think, in an independent hotel, when you have that level of flexibility, you can create, because there aren't as many rules. There's not the S.O.P.S. There's so many things that you can do.

The other part of it is that great independent hotels have a very unique brand voice. The other part of it is things like wellness and sustainability many properties, for example, like the One Hotels brand, they're all about sustainability and wellness. And that brand is highly successful, especially as a new brand because of it. And I would put that brand up against any major brand for a group meeting professional. 

[00:12:27] Susan Barry: Do you think that there are misconceptions about the global sales process that you should address? I'm thinking about myself — now, this is many moons ago, right? So I'm sure things have changed a good bit, but I'm thinking about myself sitting in a hotel and frequently feeling like these guys don't even know my hotel. Why are they making me fill out this form? That kind of stuff. What misconceptions about global sales are out there that you want to address?

[00:12:58] Mike Schugt: There's a big difference between the branded component and the representation space that we're in. And the reason being is in the branded world, it is a more of an automatic process through technology, through automatic leads, getting sent the properties from the brands. And yes, I'm sure the global sellers have great relationships, but because of that process, sometimes they’re a step removed. Now, the other part of it is when you look at the big brands like Marriott, some Hilton sides, they're now in centers in cities, complexes, sales complexes. And that can get really tricky from the client sending that lead through global sales into an office. Now that's representing 20, 15, 20 different properties.

In the independent space, our job is we only work with let's say in North America, predominantly 200 independent, small brands, unique brands. And each lead, we really have to provide the value. And in our world not everybody wakes up in the morning says I need an independent solution. So we have to create that need over time with our clients and introduce them, suggestively sell all the virtues of it. When we're engaged in a lead, it's because we're, we have that relationship with the client. And look, it's not perfect every time, but I think the misconception can be that can't speak so much for the brands, but I understand your point, but I think in the independent space, it is different and if that were the perception I don't think it's a valid one. 

[00:14:39] Susan Barry: That makes a lot of sense. I wasn't thinking about the fact that you have to go up and drum up your own demand. It's not necessarily a push of a button for the independent hotels. 

[00:14:50] Mike Schugt: In our world like just just in our company the average sales professional has been doing this for over 20 years. Many of those relationships are that long if not longer. And it's really leveraging that relationship. And I think properties see that. And that's why that's really helped our growth because our sales professionals have those relationships and that's what it's all about. 

[00:15:15] Susan Barry: We like to make sure that our listeners come away from every episode of Top Floor with some practical, tangible tips, ideas that they can try in their businesses or maybe in their personal lives. What advice would you offer to independent hotel owners who are trying to attract more group business and get a competitive edge against well known brands? I mean, of course, besides engaging Teneo to help them. 

[00:15:44] Mike Schugt: Yeah, it goes back to to really creating the ultimate experience and developing a reputation as a world class hotel and understanding how to deliver that and how to put that message forth. So it's going to start with great visuals, telling the story. And then as you're telling the story you have the features in the hotel. So it's going to be world class group service, it's going to be a tremendous culinary experience. Back in the day or even these days, at the Venetian they sometimes have banquets for 7,000 and they go farm to table on those sometimes.

[00:16:25] Susan Barry: What?!

[00:16:26] Mike Schugt: Yes. Yes. We did a piece on that a couple of years back, how they're able to really take such large events and boil them down to a unique one on one experience and building that reputation of service delivery. The other part of it is, I go back to, mapping the attendee experience from A to Z. What does the attendee experience look like, or the guest experience, when you first get onto the website till you check out. Is that congruent with what your brand is all about? And you want to make that a world class experience. In addition to that, having a, a brand voice that a cookie cutter brand cannot do. Such a unique brand that brings in the census, unique opportunities things that they normally wouldn't see or do. And then, the customizable service where any hotel can create a service culture that is well above any brand. It's just a matter of commitment and how you want to be positioned. So whether you're a three diamond hotel or a five diamond hotel is figuring out the brand and delivering that in a way that is consistent and that attracts those planners because they know that attendee is going to have a world class experience. That's how you can be.  

[00:17:54] Susan Barry: I love what you said about this story, and I think there's also something there for independent hotels about their ability to tell their own story, create their own story, but also to execute on it quickly because they are their own corporate office, right? So they don't have to go through tons and tons of layers of approvals and bureaucracy to quickly change to meet the needs and the expectations of a customer. That's another huge bonus to me about independents. It's also true on the technology side. Like they can quickly get the latest and greatest software because they don't have to deploy it across thousands of guest rooms. 

[00:18:40] Mike Schugt: Absolutely. 

[00:18:41] Susan Barry: For newer professionals who are aiming for a career in global sales, which 50 percent of all hotel salespeople are, I know. What advice would you offer about positioning yourself for that kind of a job? 

[00:18:56] Mike Schugt: Well, if you hadn't started yet and you were interested in getting a hotel business and then getting into global sales, my first piece of advice is to get into operations first and really see how a hotel works. And then, do what I just mentioned before, which is lead yourself. Show everybody around you that you're a leader, show people that your energy, your vibe, your commitment, the way that you want to help this property is elevated. Spend some time, take initiative to get into the sales department, go on a few site inspections, show people that you have the personality, the interest, the drive to do that.

Now, if you're already there and you're a sales professional at a property, you want to get into global sales, to me, it's the same thing. There are no boundaries for us in life. There's just zero boundaries. If I'm a sales professional, an EMM at a hotel or whatever, how do I deliver a world class site inspection? How are my proposals really creative? How is my engagement with my clients and my current global salespeople world class How am I working with the operations team at a hotel to share what's going on with a client so that event goes really well? What ends up happening is the global salespeople of organizations start sending leads and opportunities to that salesperson. Let's call it me. And then I executed such a high level that now my name is being circulated as, “Well this guy at this property level is doing a great job. We got to get them into global sales.” So it's all based on you. Nothing is holding you back. Albert Einstein says, “Everything is energy and that's all there is to it.” That's the frequency of the reality you want and you cannot help but get it. This is not philosophy. This is physics. So whatever it is you want, you can get, you just got to go get it. 

[00:21:01] Susan Barry: I feel like I just got the best pep talk in the history of my life. I don't even know if I can continue this interview because I want to run out and do something. That's awesome. So what is the most surprising lesson you've learned in your career?

[00:21:17] Mike Schugt: That's easy. No one cares what you know until they know you care. Okay? So when I started as a leader like many of us, there's no manual. No one's teaching you things. They don’t just say, “Hey Mike, go handle this six or seven people.” And at the beginning, I thought, boy, okay I've always been a hard worker and led by example and there's merit to that, okay. That'll get you so far, working with people and showing them, helping them, et cetera. But when you start to really care about people and not because you have to care, but it's because who you are. One of the things that I love most about being a leader is getting to know my team on a personal level.

I ask everybody, what is your middle name? Cause that middle name will tell me something about you.

[00:22:08] Susan Barry: Okay. What's your middle name?

[00:22:10] Mike Schugt: It's Karl with a K. Both of my parents are from Germany. I have a twin brother. His name is Steven Werner and I have an older brother, David Wilhelm. So now someone knows, okay, a little bit more about me and maybe something, but it's that like focus or, “Hey, how’d go this weekend?” or “You're with your kids. Did you have a good time?” “Curious, is anything stressing you out? It can be tough to be a mom and be at work and do all these things. How's it going? Is there anything I can do to help?” And again, it's not because. You have to, and it's not that you're trying to be everybody's best friend, and it's not because you're trying to dig into the personal life. It's because you genuinely care about people. And if you don't genuinely care about people, you're not going to be a leader. 

[00:23:00] Susan Barry: Truer words have never been spoken. Well, we have reached the fortune telling portion of the show. Now you have to predict the future, we will come back later and see if you were right. What is a prediction you have for the future of group business and maybe the next five to 10 years? 

[00:23:20] Mike Schugt: I think that artificial intelligence will be massive. I think it's the use of technology and I would say to start with the attendee experience, okay? And planners are going to evaluate hotels based on their based on the properties creativity with AI. So for example if you're at home, no longer are you or at the hotel, no longer, you're going to be talking to a concierge, okay? You're going to go through a chat box and get everything you want, before you get there, there's going to be so much AI that you're going to be walking in knowing exactly what your experience is going to be like and how you can adjust it or do things. When you start talking about the check in experience, the door is going to open for you as you walk into your room and within your room, there's going to be everything unimaginable that makes life convenient for you.

When you start talking about the actual experience during a meeting I think you're going to start to see robots throughout hotels doing different things. And that's an interest to people. And then I think that going to see a huge shift or enhancement in sustainability and the choice and a more of a choice of why people are choosing hotels. Today it's a nice to have, in the future it will be a need to have. And so hotels on that front right now, One Hotels brand, at the One Hotel Brooklyn Bridge, they have a composter in the basement that composts everything. I think that's fascinating. At the Venetian they have a green meetings concierge that can tell you your carbon footprint when you have a meeting at the Venetian.

[00:25:08] Susan Barry: Oh, that's so cool.

[00:25:09] Mike Schugt: So I think those types of things. I also think that mental wellness and physical wellness will continue to be — Caesars is putting a lot of effort into that, that part of it and, getting meeting professionals together and looking at how they can program that into events and so forth. So I think those really are the key things. 

[00:25:32] Susan Barry: If you could wave a magic wand and change one thing about global sales in hospitality, what would it be? 

[00:25:41] Mike Schugt: It would be the process, I think. Today the process is a little bit rigid with, the global sales professional is connected with a great relationship with a client, and then, we try to work that through the process to the properties and sometimes — Obviously technology plays a role in that and whether it goes through any type of technology or an email, that sometimes that personalization and that understanding is lost. And is there a way to create a better process through that, that is maybe more personalized, provides a greater understanding of what clients are looking for? And so forth. Because today there's just so much volume coming through. And when you're sitting at the property, it's tough to triage which leads you want to have. So I think slowing down this process and having it such that it's, it becomes more personalized. Not saying I have the answer for it, but you told me if I wanted to make it happen…

[00:26:46] Susan Barry: Yeah, it’s the magic wand!

[00:26:48] Mike Schugt: That's what I'm doing! I just wish there was a little bit more personalization and that opportunity for the hotel to truly understand on a different level what that planner is thinking and talking about as if they were in the same room together. 

[00:27:00] Susan Barry: Makes a lot of sense. What is next for you? And what's next for your company? 

[00:27:05] Mike Schugt: For me personally I'm fortunate enough to be a Big Brother in the Big Brother's Program. And so I it's a labor of love. I'm now empty nester of two beautiful daughters, 20 and 23. And I also have a a nonprofit organization called Innclusivity, I-N-N-dash-Clusivity, and it's we're coming up on 2 years and our mission is to expose special needs adults to the operations of hotels with the eventual goal of hiring special needs adults and allowing them to be included that I think everybody can be included in. We've had some success. We've hired a couple of people in property here in Orlando at the Wyndham Orlando Bonnet Creek. We just had a wonderful immersion at the Kareem Royale with 6 special needs adults. My good friend, the managing director there called me yesterday and said, he'd like to hire somebody. So to me that's really important from a personal standpoint.

As it relates to Teneo we're getting through 11 years. We have a long way to go and our future is very bright. We're going to continue to grow the team to hire the best and brightest. And at the end of the day, it is 100 percent about relationships with our company. It's the relationships we have with our meeting professionals. It's relationships that we have with our members, our DMCs, et cetera. And in addition to that, we're going to continue to provide more services through our marketing platform, events platform, digital platform that gives more value to members, allows them to connect better to our client audience and at the end of the day to put more business and to have a greater ROI. And in the meantime, to give our clients, our meeting professionals that we work with, the greatest independent and small branded options in the world. That's our goal. 

[00:28:55] Susan Barry: Okay, folks, before we tell Mike goodbye, we are going to head down to the loading dock where all of the best stories get told.

Elevator voice announces, “Going down.” 

[00:29:09] Susan Barry: Mike, what is a story you would only share on the loading dock?

[00:29:14] Mike Schugt: Wow.

[00:29:15] Susan Barry: I mean, I know you're pretending like it's tough to think of one. And I also know you probably have 750,000. So spill it. 

[00:29:25] Mike Schugt: I don't know that I would do at the loading dock. I might do this in different places. But I was sitting in a, I was sitting at 7:00 PM at night on Friday night at the Westchester Marriott, where I was recently promoted from the front desk manager at the Stanford Marriott to this position. And I was so excited. I was working my butt off. Someone knocks on the sales window the door, which was a glass, and his name was Dave Coughlin. And this is circa literally 1991, okay. And to make a long story short, Dave came in and I was the only one in the sales office. We started talking. He was with IBM Palisades. IBM Palisades was a conference center that was located near the hotel. Make a long story short, we put together this program where I was actually over a year or two walking individual guests up on Sunday night when they checked in, we were an overflow of this facility. People from all over the world came. It was literally tens and thousands of room nights that were booked. And it was just because I was sitting there, late at night. 

[00:30:34] Narrator: Oh, wow. 

[00:30:35] Mike Schugt: And, what ended up happening was people said, “Boy, this guy knows a lot about IBM.” So they gave me a promotion to Marriott at the global sales office. It's just to me a story about when you put your energy and your mind in the right place and you do the right things, great things are going to happen for you. And that's my story. And Susan, I'm going to stick to it. 

[00:30:59] Susan Barry: Mike Schucht, thank you so much for being here. I know that everyone listening feels like they can do anything now. And I really appreciate you riding with us to the top floor. 

[00:31:11] Mike Schugt: Wow. Well, it's been awesome. And I learned a lot too. So Susan, thank you so much for having me.

It's a total honor and I'm grateful to you. So thanks a lot. 

[00:31:22] Susan Barry: Thanks so much for listening. You can find the show notes at topfloorpodcast.com/episode/166. Jonathan Albano is our editor, producer, and all around genius. He even wrote and performed our theme song with vocals by Cameron Albano. You can subscribe to Top Floor on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you like to listen. And your rating or review will go a long way in helping us give you more of what you like.  

[00:31:58] Narrator: Thanks for listening to the Top Floor Podcast at www.topfloorpodcast.com. Have a hospitality marketing question? Reach us at 850-404-9630 to be featured in a future episode.