Innovating Leadership:
Co-Creating Our Future

Resources:

Learn more at InnovativeLeadership.com and RedRoof.com.

The pace of change in the world is rapidly increasing, and there’s no slowing it down. VUCA – a program developed by the U.S. military – is a way of identifying the disruptions of change…and, more importantly, of being ready for them.

We’ve talked about the theory of VUCA before (see our interview with Chris Nolan posted September 6, 2022). In this episode, George Limbert talks about VUCA and its antidotes practiced in the real world. George is the head of Red Roof Inns. The COVID pandemic presented a sudden onslaught of Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity for the entire travel and hospitality industry worldwide. Yet Red Roof emerged from the pandemic with some of their best financials ever.

How? George and his team were VUCA-ready. He shares his experience and business-tested VUCA antidotes in this episode so you can prepare for the uncertainties to come, too!

Other episodes you’ll enjoy:

Guest(s):

Guest(s) Bio:

George Limbert is the President of Red Roof, an award-winning leader in the lodging industry with over 670 properties in the United States, Brazil and Japan. George joined Red Roof in 2013 as the company’s in-house counsel. Recently, he led a financial and strategic transformation of the business and was appointed President in 2021. George guides an organization that serves millions of guests each year, delivering enhanced experiences and unmatched value. He is the cornerstone in driving long-term strategic planning, improved operational and financial performance, and greater value for Red Roof stakeholders, business partners and guests. George fosters collaboration in communicating brand values, driving business growth and profitability.

George is an Ohio native. He received a degree in business from The Ohio State University and earned his law degree at the University of Dayton. George is also an adjunct professor of Franchise Law at Ohio State University, Moritz College of Law. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the American Hotel and Lodging Association and the Ohio Hotel and Lodging Association, as well as a member of the Ohio Bar Association. In 2021, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine appointed him to the TourismOhio Advisory Board. He lives in Lewis Center, Ohio, with his wife and daughter.

Transcript
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Maureen 0:07
Maureen, welcome to Innovating Leadership, co-creating our future. I’m your host, Maureen Metcalf, founder and CEO of the Innovative Leadership Institute. I am delighted to again be with George Limbert, the president of Red Roof, and we’re going to be talking today about how Red Roof is navigating the VUCA, or exponentially changing environment, to help them be ahead of the curve and ahead of their competitors. For people who don’t know VUCA, it originated with the military and is talking about the environment that is volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous, which I think most of us agree we are facing. There’s a VUCA antidote, which is create a vision as an antidote for volatility. Uncertainty goes to understanding, complexity goes to clarity, and ambiguity goes to adaptability or agility for folks again who are navigating a world that feels particularly out of control or chaotic, there’s a way for us to rein it in in our sphere. So, George, what is Red Roof doing, and what are you doing as leading red roof to help people understand the volume of change.

Speaker 1 1:25
Thank you again, Maureen, for having me on this podcast. I think this is our third time, and hopefully you in the audience aren’t getting sick of talking to me, but I’m thrilled to be on again, and I’m really honored to be here, and, and, yeah, let’s talk about VUCA and what’s happening. We have, I think, probably experienced the probably biggest roller coaster of our lifetime. We came off of a pandemic. What that did to the travel industry, we all know it decimated the travel industry, but then we experienced a level of pent-up demand in 2021 where people said I don’t care the cost, I don’t care where or when I need to get out, I need to travel, and so we all sort of rode that great wave in 2021 and we experienced a bit of that in 2022 as well, so far this year, but we’re starting to see the signs of economic headwinds that are coming in and that are putting us in a different position as an industry, and so how can we prepare as a company? We’re not quite there yet. 2022 is still a great banner year for Red Roof. We’re still hitting numbers that we’ve never done in the past, but we’re starting to see signs of some economic headwinds, and so what can we do to be VUCA ready as a concept we talk about quite a bit, and understanding this constant change, always preparing for what can happen, always being in a position to take on what may come next. That’s, I think, a lesson we learned the hard way during the pandemic, and something that we plan on being ready for, for this next set of challenges,

Maureen 3:07
so volatility goes to vision, and when you took over a little over a year ago, you recast the vision post pandemic to help the team, the partners, the community members, the franchisees, all be clear on who is Red Roof and what do you stand for going forward. Can you give people just a few minutes on why was that important?

Speaker 1 3:33
Yeah, yeah, I mean, a ship that doesn’t really know where it’s going is a ship that you don’t really want to be on, and very shortly after I took over as president of Red Roof. I realized that there was a need for a vision, a need for a roadmap, something that folks can rally around, something that was simple, that made sense, something we can think about as we go through our day-to-day lives at Red Roof. How can we epitomize this vision? And so we sat down with you, Maureen. We sat down with our senior team, and we rewrote the vision of Red Roof. Now, part of the vision of Red Roof was a evolution of its original mission by its founder, Jim Truman, a Columbus native, Columbus, Ohio native, was the founder of Red Roof Inn. He was a real sick guy, saw the need for a clean, comfortable, no-frills hotel as he was traveling the country doing real estate deals, and waited, maybe a little bit, to see if someone would form it, and nobody did, so he said he’ll do it himself, and his mission was always to provide clean, comfortable hotel room with exceptional customer service and charge less for it, and so we sat around as a senior team and said, hey, you know, these elements still stand true today. Red roofs and economy lodging brand, we still want to provide a clean, comfortable room, we still want to provide a value, and all these kind of things. So, how can we take what we’ve got now that we have new stakeholders? Investors in this business, and incorporate those new stakeholders, such as franchisees, such as our communities, and we talked about this in the past. I mean, COVID taught us how important it was for us to ingrain ourselves in our communities. Hotels have always been part of their communities, but never before have we been more a part of our communities than through COVID, when we were housing first responders when we were housing doctors and nurses who didn’t want to go home, those kind of things. So, how can we incorporate all that? So we took all of these stakeholders and we said we need to call them out in our vision, and so we’ve changed our vision to provide the best experience and value in the lodging industry to our guests, which stays true to Truman’s original mission, to our owners, which includes our franchisees, to our partners, which is our vendor partners and other consulting partners, to our team members. We wanted to call out all of our employees, whether it was a housekeeper or someone in the corporate office, and to our communities, and it’s just of the utmost importance that we understand that these are the stakeholders that have a stake in our business, and we want them to feel the experience, the best experience, and the best value in our industry, and so that’s how we started the antidote to VUCA, the vision that was step one in this evolution of our organization,

Maureen 6:23
and from my side that provides such clarity when people are making decisions as you are leading any number of conversations. How do we respond to this or that? What position do we take in in various situations? How do you deal with floods in Florida or any number of other housing people during a pandemic that vision is infused with the values,

Speaker 1 6:48
absolutely, and it’s such a guiding light, and what I try to do as the leader of this organization, and what I think others are trying to do now within the organization, is to ask themselves, does this take away, does this not help towards the best experience and value for our guests? Let’s take a very simple example. In April of 2021 we redesigned the new construction prototype for our extended stay brand called Hometown Studios, and one of the things that we did is we looked at the room that we had. How can we make it easier to clean the room, but not take an amenity away from our guest? So, how do you not harm the guest experience, but you provide a better experience to a housekeeper, to a team member? And so we’ve taken this approach, and all the things that we’ve done, and I think we’re a better organization for it.

Maureen 7:42
Well, and again, that level of nuance thinking, because often I think people over index on one stakeholder and completely discount others, and that you are balancing that, I think, is crucial. The other thing that strikes me is a lot of organizations go through vision sessions, and they, you know, they go off to fancy hotels, and the executives play golf, and they somehow get around to talking about vision, and they come back, and the organization has no idea what it is, or it’s the wallet card, or it’s stuff on a bulletin board somewhere, or in the lobby. Your organization lives this vision. So, can you talk about what you did a few months ago, I think, to bring everyone in and get their input on how they operationalize these words on paper.

Speaker 1 8:28
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, for the first time, I believe in the history of Red Roof in, or at least in the last 15 or so years, we had an all hands, all company meeting. We brought every single employee that could travel to Columbus. We sat, I don’t want to say, in a fancy hotel, but in a hotel for a few days, and we, we asked every single employee, we had them break into groups, every single team member, we asked them, How can you bring this vision to life? What can you do to enhance it? And we got exceptional feedback from everybody, we’ve taken that feedback, we’ve broken it down, we’ve looked at it, we’ve analyzed it. Many of the ideas that came out of that all-hands meeting were already being implemented, which was really a good sign for me, because it meant that we, as a senior team, were not out of touch with our team members, that we weren’t out in left field, and everybody else was not even in the ballpark, right? And so that was very reassuring, but then we also got some great new ideas that came out of it, and so we’re harnessing many of those, trying to figure out how we’re implementing them. We just had a virtual meeting with the company a couple of weeks ago, and we expressed in that meeting, hey, here’s our follow-up. Here’s what we’ve done. Here’s the things that are already in progress. Here’s the things that are on the roadmap, and here’s the things that are maybe a little farther off. To me, it was a great experiment in a lot of ways, because one, it taught us that we weren’t too far off, but two, it showed our team members that we want them. To have the best experience and feel valued and feel value at Red Roof by really listening to what they have to say and understanding some of the things that would help them do their job better, that would help make this environment better, that aren’t going to take away from the other stakeholders. I used to have a football coach that talked about the KISS concept, keep it simple, stupid. And this is maybe too simple, but, but it works. We just listened to what our team members had to say,

Maureen 10:31
you know. I’ll say it sounds simple, and lots of people listen. What lots of people don’t do is then create the feedback loop to take action and to report back that action.

Speaker 1 10:43
Yeah, it’s interesting to me. I don’t know how organizations can run without accountability.

Maureen 10:50
It’s disempowering when someone asks you, what do you think, and then they say, yeah, but and go on to tell you why you’re wrong, or just ignore it,

Speaker 1 10:58
or ignore you. Yeah,

Maureen 10:59
so that you are measuring and reporting back, I think, is logical, but often it’s the part of the loop that people just don’t get around to.

Speaker 1 11:11
Yeah, again, I thought it was a simple concept, but it is more complicated. But to me, accountability should be ingrained in everything that you do, and being held responsible to me, I guess, as a fairly new father of a three and a half year old daughter, I realize how precious time

Maureen 11:30
is,

Speaker 1 11:30
and sitting there and talking to the team, and asking for their ideas and thoughts, and then just doing nothing with it seems to me to be a colossal waste of time. So, why are we going to do it without holding ourselves accountable, without making sure that we do the follow up, that we do the education, and again you tie it back to the vision. If we would have just sat there and done nothing with the information, that would not have provided the best experience and value for our team members. It would have been the opposite.

Maureen 11:59
So let’s tie that back then to VUCA, and through my lens, that you have clarified the vision that you have then defined the actions sends a strong message that you are expecting change.

Speaker 1 12:12
Absolutely,

Maureen 12:13
that there is an evolution of the organization to respond to your ecosystem.

Speaker 1 12:19
Absolutely, in an ideal world, and I think I epitomize this, and I hope I think many of the senior team members feel this way too. We should be waking up every morning thinking to ourselves, what can we do today to epitomize the vision and help those stakeholders feel a better experience of better value? What can we do to enhance customer experience, guest experience? What can we do to make our franchisees their experience better? What can we do to enhance our team member experience? What can we do with our communities? What can we do for our partners? Yeah, I mean it’s something that that I think most of us in this organization think about on a daily basis. The

Maureen 12:56
other thing you said as you talked about redesigning the rooms, going from an either or to a both, what enhances guest experience, and the housekeeper.

Speaker 1 13:06
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And in that case, the franchisee, because in this particular example, there were cabinets that no guest uses that were over. This was an extended state hotel room that sat over a sink, and they were very rarely used, if ever, and so they’re difficult for a housekeeper to clean, and they’re an expense to an owner, to a franchise owner, to put in. So, let’s just remove them. The guest doesn’t need them. It’s hard for the housekeeper, and it’s an additional expense. Why do it? Why put it in there? So we want to think. I challenge the team to think through every decision we make, how it affects all the different stakeholders. One

Maureen 13:50
of the components of VUCA is adaptability or agility. Everything you talk about, I hear this just like it just makes sense. Why don’t we do the stuff that just makes sense,

Speaker 1 14:01
right? Yeah,

Maureen 14:03
and yet brand standards and all kinds of reasons that people don’t change.

Speaker 1 14:07
Yeah, I gotta tell you, I mean, this is probably a very common concept that folks talk about on your podcast quite regularly when somebody goes into a meeting, well, but we’ve always done it that way, you know. And to me, that’s a red flag for, well, let’s talk about why we’ve always done it that way, and let’s talk about why we shouldn’t do it that way anymore.

Maureen 14:25
Post Covid, it seems like there should be an impetus to evaluate, not to change everything, just to change, but to evaluate our opportunities. Where did that give us opportunities?

Speaker 1 14:39
Absolutely, I think COVID, for many of us that were in affected industries, and of course you know there were quite a few that were not affected or were enhanced by COVID, but the travel industry was not one of them. We were severely affected by COVID. I think it gave us an opportunity to reset and to look at our organization and. Say, boy, this was something we’ve done, and it just didn’t work. And I think it’s actually helpful to be able to say that this was a failure. This thing that we did, this initiative, it didn’t work. It failed. We all agree, nobody’s trying to point fingers, but let’s figure out why it failed, and let’s figure out what we can do to change it, to change the process and make it better. We have a chance, we have a fresh start in a lot of ways to really fix things,

Maureen 15:29
and again, that the mindset of that with VUCA, the understanding, the proactivity, and the mandate, so that ties into then the next one, anti-fragile resilience, and I know you’ve done a lot of this, and so let me define anti-fragile. So, resilience, I can respond to change and bounce back. Antifragile is creating systems where I actually get stronger because of the pressure, so you’re creating an environment that takes those experiences, whether it’s a COVID experience or a weather-related experience or staffing shortage experience. How do you then strengthen the organization so that you’re better because of that stress, rather than you just have to get through it and hope you don’t?

Speaker 1 16:16
Yeah, yeah, right. I mean, I mean, this is this is the time, right? This is sort of the, in my opinion, a little bit of the calm before the storm. So, what are we doing as an organization to what I call pressure test the fragility of our processes and procedures? One of the things that we’re doing, and this was an interesting conversation we had prior to my tenure at Red Roof, we never really shared total company results with all of our team members. I said that doesn’t seem like the right idea. And our senior vice president of revenue management and revenue generation, Alex Cisneros, reached out to myself, reached out to our chief marketing officer, Marina McDonald, and said, Hey, why don’t we start sharing this? Why don’t we start creating contests and trying to get everybody to celebrate when we hit these certain measures and marks and stuff, and so I absolutely said yes right away. Then I thought through it over time, and I said, okay, now our results aren’t coming in the way they were last year, we’re still doing really well, but not as well, and we’re so we’re not hitting some of the similar marks, and so is there a fragility to this? Is this concept going to harm the organization, or is it anti-fragile, and is it going to strengthen us? As I pressure tested it with the team members, I realized that sharing results is absolutely an anti-fragile concept, and it’s absolutely going to pass this test, because we will know as an organization how we’re doing. We will know, okay, yeah, here’s a little bit of a headwind, here’s a little bit of a challenge. How are we going to come together to pull through it, as opposed to everybody being blind, or as opposed to everybody, it’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine, when it’s really not, you know. So think it’s the pressure testing of the fragility of the various processes that you have in place. I think it’s of the utmost importance that an organization does that, for sure.

Maureen 18:18
You know, the other thing it does is pressure test the fragility of people.

Speaker 1 18:22
Yes, it’s right.

Maureen 18:24
Trusting that if folks are insecure about results, and we all want to win, we all want an A. There’s times that’s just not going to happen. There’s inflation, there’s supply chain issues, stuff is going to go wrong, and building that inner strength and fortitude, which you support by not crucifying people when something goes wrong, not punishing, not firing. I mean, you have to do something worthy of exiting to get exited. It’s not making a mistake,

Speaker 1 18:55
right? No, we’re not afraid to fail, you know. We’re not afraid to fail as an organization, and, and if you don’t like that concept, if you don’t like the concept of transparency, and you don’t like the concept of learning from your failures and trying to not do your mistakes again, then you probably, well, I think one, you probably don’t need to work at Red Roof, but two, but two, you probably don’t need to work anywhere, because I can’t imagine a place that, that it’s all maybe Disneyland, but, but all sunshine and rainbows, right? I mean, it’s not all positive, it’s not always going to go your way, and when it doesn’t, it’s about what you do about it.

Maureen 19:36
Folks do come into the workplace expecting everything’s going to be positive, so you’re educating in some cases. I’m not calling out generations or any of that stuff, but there are groups of people who have been in environments that were less feedback friendly.

Speaker 1 19:57
Yeah, absolutely, but I mean, I think. That this goes back to the VUCA concept of creating an understanding, you know, I mean that we’re creating the understanding of how an organization works,

Maureen 20:08
and this is

Speaker 1 20:09
just with the corporate office, this isn’t with franchisees, employees that are housekeepers and front desk folks, but this is with our corporate team from top to bottom, you all know how we did the last five days, every Monday we publish what we did the week before, and you all know, but what the anti-fragile aspect of that is, and the creating the understanding of it is that gets you VUCA ready is that from the top down to this organization our team members are asking themselves what can I do to help you know, and it’s a, it’s a mentality where everybody is working towards a common goal, you know, and I think that’s a very powerful thing.

Maureen 20:54
And then the other bit of that is the common term now is grit.

Speaker 1 20:58
Yeah, yeah, you got to have grit. I don’t know why we’ve talked about this in the past. I came from an environment where you had to earn everything, you know, nothing is given, everything is earned. I think that’s what Lebron James talked about when he talked about Northeast Ohio, and that’s where I’m from, and that’s exactly how it was. You know, I mean, you didn’t get anywhere in life just, you know, holding your breath and hoping things would happen for you, you know. You had to make it happen. I wouldn’t be at the helm of this organization today if I didn’t have grit. If you didn’t give it your all and really want to make things happen for yourself and for those around you. And it’s a foreign concept to me to think about people who don’t want to be in an environment where the good and the bad is shared with them,

Maureen 21:39
because you do that, it sets the tone, it sets the tone that it’s safe, you admit you make mistakes, if the top executive doesn’t own their mistakes, it’s not safe for anyone else to,

Speaker 1 21:51
yeah, and that goes back to accountability, I don’t know how to describe it in a sense that would, that would resonate with your audience, but I mean, it’s.. it just seems so basic to me, you know, that if you say you’re going to do something, you ought to do it. If you’re going to try something, if it doesn’t work, then you admit it didn’t work.

Maureen 22:13
I think part of this, and as we’re talking, I’m thinking of assessments I’ve used, and also just age. there was a period of time in leadership and management where if you made a mistake, you hid the mistake, because you would get punished, and VUCA is supporting this, that if I make a mistake and I hide the mistake and it damages the organization, I’ve now produced a big failure if I make a mistake and own it, but that’s not traditional leadership. I

Speaker 1 22:43
don’t understand why, and I think we talked about this last time. I mean, you’ve got to get to a point where you really try to do what’s right, and I think what’s right is admitting when you’re wrong, and I think that’s a difficult thing for people to grasp, because I think out of fear, people lead out of fear, or from a place of fear, and it doesn’t seem to be the right thing to do. And I think that maybe I’m too young. I don’t know. I’m 41 maybe I’m too old. I don’t know. I’m not sure. For

Maureen 23:17
what?

Speaker 1 23:17
I don’t know the answer to any of those questions, but or maybe I’m, maybe I’m just not aware, but to me, I just think that you can’t be afraid to fail, and you can’t be afraid to admit that you failed, and if the consequences you lose your job, well, then it’s a lesson you learn for the next job. I just, I don’t, I don’t understand being afraid of, of those leading, leading from a place of fear, I don’t understand it.

Maureen 23:42
It’s interesting that if we think of arc of history, the point in time where change happened less often, so there was the probability of failure was lower if you were planful and you did your research, compared to now, there’s so much change in an interconnected world where something can happen in Pakistan, or right now the energy implications across the world. You have to be willing to experiment. You can’t survive without a willingness to experiment, and that means learning and changing. Admitting it didn’t work

Speaker 1 24:21
well, isn’t Henry Ford who said that if you always did what you’ve always done, you’re always going to get what you’ve always got,

Maureen 24:29
and I think Einstein has a similar, like, definition of insanity as continuing to do what you’ve always done, and thinking this time it’ll be different. Yeah,

Speaker 1 24:36
yeah, I mean, yeah, absolutely. This world that we live in today is like nothing we’ve ever been through as a society, in my opinion, and it’s ever changing. We’re more connected than we ever have been. We know exactly when an uprising in Iran is happening and why it’s happening and where. It’s happening, and there’s 24 hour news, there’s podcasts, there’s all kinds of different avenues to learn to get information, to get data, and we see it all unfold in front of our eyes, and that I don’t think has ever happened before in society, and I think that necessitates the requirement that you do show grit, that you show adaptability to change, because you don’t know what may happen tomorrow that will completely throw, I mean, none of us in March of 2020 ever expected that we would be at home, at home offices, and running companies and trying to keep the world going. Nobody expected that, and here we are. We did it, and now we’re sitting here facing global uncertainty. We’re facing uprisings all over the world. We’re facing all kinds of different things, and I think, what was it? What’s the phrase? Expect the unexpected, you know. And that’s what being VUCA ready means, you know. I mean, that’s that’s what it is. That’s where we’re at. I don’t think there’s any other thing we can do except try to, in whatever way we can, be VUCA ready.

Maureen 26:21
So that brings us then to the idea of flipping the script, that peak performance, maximizing performance, how we get there looks different, and so age.. I don’t know if it’s helpful or not helpful. You’re probably past the age of being a gymnast, probably perfectly suited for what you’re doing, because you’re in touch, and as I say that, I also recognize that there are people who are 70 who are in touch, and there are people who are 35 who are out of touch. It’s as much a mindset as it is an age, and you happen to have the mindset associated with the maturity that goes with flipping the old script in a lot of different ways, because what got us here won’t get us there. Those kind of phrases, it made Red Roof a successful organization, and next level means adapting differently than you did two years ago.

Speaker 1 27:24
Yeah, yeah, I think this concept, and why we were successful at doing this, and flipping the script, and asking the questions, it stems maybe from my experience as an attorney, and my upbringing with a father who’s a federal magistrate judge, I mean, we talked about this in the last podcast. I mean, being around a judge your whole life, you start to understand judicial temperament, and you try your best to implement that in analyzing processes and procedures, and you get to ask the questions, not in an angry way, not in a demeaning way, but why,

Maureen 28:03
in discerning way,

Speaker 1 28:04
right, in a discerning way. Why did we do that? What can we do to make it better? How can we change that? Is that really a good process? We have a franchise advisory council, and it’s made up of franchisees all across the country. Think it’s 12 franchisees, and we bring them in three times a year. Half of them are elected by their peer franchisees, half of them are appointed by our operations team. And I told them at my very first meeting as president with the FAC, with the Francis Advisory Council, I said, this is not to placate. I can’t sit in these meetings and just do placations. I can’t sit in these meetings and go through the motions. I said I am here to hold everybody in this room accountable. We’re here to learn from you as our franchisees the labor shortage that we’re undergoing. I always tell our FAC, I’m really sorry that you have a labor shortage, but I’m really happy at the same time, because now you all are working the front desk, so when you come to this meeting three times a year, you get to tell me what you’re actually experiencing, and we get to make real-time decisions to try to make things better, and we just had our Franchise Advisory Council meeting last week, or second of the year, and many of our franchise members on the council came to me and said that was the best meeting we’ve had yet, and when you ask them why, it’s because we were productive, because we got things done, because we made decisions, because we made decisions in past meetings that got followed up on, and you reported on those decisions, it’s just an example of how we’re trying to do things a little different at Red Roof,

Maureen 29:43
and this comes back then to that adaptability part, that it is a culture of consistent change, and again, being led by the President, you haven’t delegated this to your franchise people to go do things, you’re there, you’re leading

Speaker 1 29:59
it, yeah. And it’s funny because I actually moderate the entire meeting, so I actually, when a franchisee says something, what I do is I actually take their comments and I reformat them into a question to the Red Roof team members that are sitting in the room, so I actually sit in some ways as their advocate, but also as the president of the organization. So it’s a funny place to be in, but I can’t tell you how much productivity comes out of it, because we really give credence and really try to understand the root of the question that’s coming from our franchise advisory council member, and then we put it to the team members that are in the room and say, okay, Aspen is asking this question, what are we going to do to solve it? It’s a valid question, how can we fix it, rather than just letting them talk, letting a franchisee advise, and then just moving on.

Maureen 30:58
That ties back to your vision, then,

Speaker 1 31:00
yes,

Maureen 31:00
and it’s a good example of where the vision informs the structure and the culture and the process.

Speaker 1 31:06
Absolutely, and going back to our team and our senior team and the entire Red Roof corporate team, these meetings have completely transformed because everyone in that room wants the same result, they want information from the Franchise Advisory Council members about what’s working and what’s not working. We want ideas, we want thoughts, we want to understand everybody in that room has a voice. We want to understand everybody’s concerns, everybody’s positive things, and we want to amplify the positive and fix the negative,

Maureen 31:42
which hits then another one of the VUCA points. It’s the understanding and clarity.

Speaker 1 31:47
Yes,

Maureen 31:48
I’ve got clarity on what my franchisees need, and they concurrently have understanding of what your corporate team needs.

Speaker 1 31:55
Yes,

Maureen 31:56
because there are times I’m assuming that they want something that isn’t practical or reasonable or doable.

Speaker 1 32:03
Yeah, absolutely. It happens on both ends, and recognizing that, and what we do is in the Franchise Advisory Council meetings. I joke with our franchisees, and I say that I spend the next two days stealing your ideas, but what I really mean by that is we’re going to listen to everything you have to say, and what’s good about it? What’s a good idea? We’re going to implement what’s not so good idea, we’ll talk about why we can’t implement it. Maybe it’s a great idea, but we don’t have the technology yet to do it. You know, so everybody has a seat at the table, everybody has a voice, and we are there to learn as much as we are there to communicate and talk about what’s going on within the organization,

Maureen 32:49
and presumably the franchisees learn also.

Speaker 1 32:51
Absolutely, it’s exceptionally mutual. It’s, and again, I’ve been in these meetings in the past, and prior to becoming the leader of this organization, they felt like sort of a placation, and now when I reflect back on that time, I say to myself, this is like a free focus group. How could you not take advantage of that? You know what I mean, like this is this is such an opportunity for us as leaders of this organization to really figure out what some of the pain points issues are, and how we can fix them, and I mean, it’s like I just, I can’t imagine operating these meetings in any other way.

Maureen 33:34
When I listen to you, you seem so practical, and yet these are new.

Speaker 1 33:40
Yeah,

Maureen 33:40
so, yeah, it’s new things were different before for any number of reasons, probably.

Speaker 1 33:47
Yeah, yeah, and I think our franchisees realize that as well, and and they even tell me the same happens at other brands. The meetings that they’re on, advisory councils, they’re on with other brands, feel like placations as well. They say the only brand that actually remains accountable to the Franchise Advisory Council is Red Root, and that’s a big point of pride for me.

Maureen 34:07
That’s pretty amazing.

Speaker 1 34:08
Yeah, I think it’s crazy.

Maureen 34:10
And the partnership, you know, I think of terms like shared mutual purpose. We get through challenge because you and I share the same objective, and with the franchisees, you also have aligned financial benefits.

Speaker 1 34:24
Absolutely, we’re partners in this. Now, look, as a lawyer, I have to tell you, we’re not partners in the legal definition of partners, because that’s implements all kinds of other things, but we’re partners in this, because if the franchisee does well, we as a brand do well, so there’s no reason why I wouldn’t want our franchisees to succeed and maximize the value of their property.

Maureen 34:47
Back to this, it’s such an important point for me, just because of conversations I’ve been in recently, where folks are saying, but we need the legal agreement to make sure people behave well. Okay, important. Right, and I can have any number of legal agreements. We look at the divorce rate of 50% People have the legal agreement of marriage, and yet if they don’t have shared mutual purpose, and in many cases economic alignment, then they get divorced, because life is hard. Just life is hard, and those are people who choose to be together, not everyone chooses these folks on the other side of the table. That ability to align purpose, culture, feedback loops, accountability, that whole structural piece, cultural piece, and mindset piece is magical, because it doesn’t happen so often.

Speaker 1 35:41
Yeah, my grandfather, who I think we talked a little bit about in previous podcasts, I had the good pleasure of living with him after law school for five years, and he used to tell me when you partner with someone in a business, you ought to pick your partner as carefully as you pick your spouse. Throughout his lifetime, he was, you know, 9099 years old when he passed away, and I lived with him when he was in his early 90s. So he had a lifetime of experience to draw off of, and he had many partners all throughout his business tenure, and he said the said two things: one, pick your partner like you would pick your spouse, and he would also say the best partnerships, the best businesses that he’s ever been in with his partners were ones where they never had to look at the agreement, and as a lawyer, I shouldn’t say that, right, because I, I’m taking away a lot of business from my friends when I say if you’re in a partnership where you don’t look at the agreement, but it is a really wonderful thing when you’re not worried about the terms and conditions, you’re worried about how can we excel, how can we do better, and make this partnership work even better than it already is. Yeah, no, no, no, no. Yeah, absolutely. Have agreements, there’s,

Maureen 36:56
and these other things keep us from having, from my guiding principle being I’m going to look at the agreement,

Speaker 1 37:02
correct.

Maureen 37:03
My guiding principle should be my vision and values.

Speaker 1 37:05
Absolutely, yeah. But when that gets misaligned,

Maureen 37:08
yeah, then

Speaker 1 37:09
you start looking at your agreement,

Maureen 37:10
and to me that’s a sign of lack of health.

Speaker 1 37:13
Yeah, absolutely.

Maureen 37:14
And then the question is, how do we realign,

Speaker 1 37:16
right? And I think, you know, I mean, I’m in business partnerships outside of Red Roof, mostly in real estate, and I’ve implemented the same thing. I mean, and when you pick the right partner, or in the franchisee, franchisor case, when you, the franchisee, pick the right franchisor, you’re not worried about the T’s and C’s. You have shared purpose, you have a shared vision, and you’re moving forward together,

Maureen 37:41
and that comes back to again being VUCA responsible.

Speaker 1 37:45
Yes, right.

Maureen 37:46
I can’t adapt unless I feel trust with my partners.

Speaker 1 37:51
Yeah, and you know, a large part of our business at Red Roof is asking potential franchisees to punch our dance card, right, to become a Red Roof franchisee, and if you, as a franchisor, think that it’s pre-COVID, and the environment we live in is pre-COVID, then you’re probably not the right partner to punch the dance corner. If you’re the head of a franchise brand, and you’re praying and hoping that the economy goes down, so that more people are out of work, so that fixes the labor shortage in your industry. You’re hoping for the wrong thing, you know, you’re the wrong partner. You’re not VUCA ready, you’re out of touch with what’s going on. But if you’re trying to solve the labor shortage using creative ideas, bringing different thoughts and things you wouldn’t have ever thought of pre-COVID, but you’re bringing them to the table, that’s being VUCA ready, that’s a partner you want to partner with, that’s someone whose dance card you want to punch.

Maureen 38:46
How do you identify who’s VUCA ready?

Speaker 1 38:48
Well, I, I think you can tell, I think you can tell necessarily by talking to people. I have the opportunity to talk to many CEOs, and it’s interesting to me, the ones who just want to go through the motions, so you can tell right away they’re just going through the motions. They’re going to say the same things that everybody else says, same buzzwords, and they’re just going to try to get, get through. Or you’re talking to the CEO. I just had a conversation on Tuesday of this week with a great CEO here in Columbus, and I just kept asking him questions, because he was letting me, which was great, and you could tell he was VUCA ready. I asked him, “What you know, what keeps you up at night? How do you surround yourself with the right team members? All this kind of stuff, and he just systematically told me all the things that he was doing. I should have, maybe, for purpose of this podcast, you know. Said, ‘Aha, you’re VUCA ready. You know, I didn’t, I didn’t do that. I didn’t do that, because we ran out of time. But certainly, as I was talking to him, I kept saying, ‘Wow, he is epitomizing every element of being VUCA ready.’ Talking about expanding the business, he’s talking about acquisitions, he’s talking about how he finds acquisitions, he’s talking about his team members, how he finds team members, how he delegates appropriately to team members, empowers his team members, you know, all the things, all the concepts of being ready, and he also talked about he’s in a business where what he sells is necessary. It’s not that you go out, can pick it out, and say, ‘Oh, I want this today. He’s in a business where if what you have breaks, you need

Maureen 40:35
it, like refrigerators or something. Well, I don’t know this. Yes, but

Speaker 1 40:38
roofing. Okay, so your roof breaks, you need a new one. So he’s VUCA ready, I think. You know this about me by now. And if I was lucky enough that any of your listeners listened to podcast one and two, you realize that I’m a guy that doesn’t just sit back on my laurels, like I love to meet people, I love to talk to people, I love to get their stories, and and now being in a CEO role, I like to talk to other CEOs as much as I can to learn from them.

Maureen 41:04
That’s part of the adaptability is continuing to expand your mindset, because even a CEO who isn’t as adept as you still have stuff to teach.

Speaker 1 41:14
Yes, and I still have tons of stuff to learn. The best part about being a new CEO is you get to say to someone who’s been around a long time. Hey, what do I need to know? You know, I’m new at this. I don’t know what I’m doing. Tell me, what did you think I should do? Been pretty great to hear all the thoughts and ideas, and but to your question earlier, when you’re doing that, when you’re going out there and asking questions, you could tell very easily those who are ready and those who aren’t.

Maureen 41:39
I assume also with hiring that that’s becoming more crucial.

Speaker 1 41:43
Absolutely, if you’re not up for this, then you know, stay home, right?

Maureen 41:47
I

Speaker 1 41:47
mean,

Maureen 41:48
or go elsewhere,

Speaker 1 41:49
or go elsewhere. Yeah, I don’t know, not much more you can say about that.

Maureen 41:52
So one of the next things in the VUCA playbook is this idea of foresight or future back thinking, something else we did during the strategic planning session of I look at the scenarios of where the world is likely to be, and then I create the story. So, story has a different way of motivating us, and I think of early on in the change management maturity of that as a field. We talked about the trains pulling out of the station, the busses pulling, whatever thing you use, nobody’s motivated by a platform burning. They’re motivated by a future that’s better than what they’ve got. And the stories that your leadership team came back with were brilliant, and I think that for them was then the planning backward to how do we get there, the same thing that you did with the listening tour with everybody.

Speaker 1 42:43
Yeah, you know, I think we’re very fortunate, and I’m very fortunate to be in this position, because you have a brand that is pretty iconic. People know from the day it was formed. Red roof, in, is, by the way, is turning 50 years old next year, and so this brand’s been around for 50 years, it’s going to be around for 50 more, maybe 1000 more, and the one thing that’s unwavering during this entire time is that there is such an enthusiasm within this organization for this brand, and that I inherited, and trust me, that’s not lost on me, that the gravity of having this, and so in a lot of ways asking team members, and in this case the senior team, What do you see as the future for this organization? How do we get there? There’s such an enthusiasm for it, there’s such a special feeling that this is something special that we have in our hands, so we’re not going to let it slip away, and we’re going to take it down the right path. And I think that was as important as it was for our organization to try to try to focus and scope out what our future looks like. I think it was as important for the team members who participated in it, because that gave them the enthusiasm for what can be, and I think that’s part of this VUCA ready and various concepts, is that we’re showing our team members that there is great opportunity in front of us, but we just need to make sure we’re crossing the t’s and dotting the i’s to get us into that place. One

Maureen 44:25
of the stories I remember was one team came back and said we want to be listed on the Forbes, whatever list of top value brands. I don’t know what the Forbes list is, I don’t remember, but we want to be listed there. That sets a really one quantifiable, but also visual image of we’re a top brand, and something to strive for that’s inspirational, not just we’re going to make it through the day and make our owners happy, but we’re. Brand that is getting stewarded forward. You talk about it being an iconic brand, and having worked with big brands, but also just names that nobody cares about, other than their founders. It’s a difference, the feeling of being in an organization that, when you say, I work here, people are Ford Motor Company, and I assume Tesla, although I have not worked with them, that people are proud of these brands, and they want to protect that

Speaker 1 45:29
absolutely. I mean, you know, brand equity is, is that feeling you get when you see that brand as you’re driving down the street, you know, the golden arches, right? You see that iconic trademark, and you feel that equity, you feel that warmth for when you see it, and, and what’s amazing about Red Roof, and you know what, I, I have a sister who worked for McDonald’s corporate for a number of years, so I think it’s probably true of McDonald’s as well, is that it’s not only do the customers have an affinity towards the brand, but the team members do as well.

Maureen 46:03
My dad’s favorite restaurant is McDonald’s, so you know it could be a nice steakhouse or something. It’s McDonald’s, so every Sunday they go to McDonald’s for breakfast, and we periodically will take pictures and send it back and forth. You know, we’re on a road trip at McDonald’s. Just as a kid, our family didn’t go out to fancy restaurants, we went to McDonald’s, so the funny Ronald McDonald character, and it evokes an emotion, which is what brands are supposed to do.

Speaker 1 46:34
Yes, and as a girl dad and father of a three and a half year old, when we’re traveling and I see the golden arches on the highway sign. The emotion I get is relief. Thank God, there’s some McDonald’s, so we can calm the little one down, but absolutely, that’s that’s maybe the difference from a company that, yeah, does a great job, makes lots of money, but it doesn’t have the type of brand equity that that a franchise brand would have, such as a Red Roof, and such as a Holiday Inn Express, such as a McDonald’s, you know, all the, all these different, all these different brands, and that brand equity is special, and to your point, it is held very sacred by those employees, and I think that again is something that’s been around from day one for Red Roof, I think that’s something special, and, and really something that you cannot take lightly. It

Maureen 47:26
was interesting to me that in this foresight process, that was the thing people picked.

Speaker 1 47:31
Yeah,

Maureen 47:31
and it epitomizes the vision that employees are happy, customers are happy, owners are happy, because your financial supporters influence the brand as well.

Speaker 1 47:43
Absolutely, yeah. We just did a franchisee survey. We asked them every single one of our franchisees. We had a great response. I think it’s like 95% of our franchisees say they’re exceptionally satisfied with Red Root, and they would recommend us to a friend, I mean, that’s pretty solid response.

Maureen 48:04
It’s to me astounding working with surveys that I think 75% is good, because you just can’t please everybody,

Speaker 1 48:11
right? Right, 95% is pretty amazing. It’s a point of pride, and that’s up. I mean, so again, to show you what I inherited, we had not done the survey since 2019 and in 2019 it was at 90%

Maureen 48:26
Okay,

Speaker 1 48:26
so it’s up 5% which I take great pride in, but it’s always been high,

Maureen 48:30
and up 5% post pandemic,

Speaker 1 48:33
right?

Maureen 48:33
So I’m imagining that many people went down post pandemic because it, the disruption,

Speaker 1 48:40
yeah, and maybe, maybe the brand didn’t step up like Red Roof did and help the franchise owners and and try to deliver the guests and all those kind of things.

Maureen 48:49
So then the last one, and we’ve hit on this already, is the idea of helping people build courage during times of uncertainty, the empathy, willingness to take risk, the culture you’ve created, the grit that people feel that allows them to step up and say, you know what, in a different environment I would just sit down and not say this, but here, whether I’m a franchisee or a corporate staff member or a community member,

Speaker 1 49:20
yeah, you build an environment, you foster that environment, and you live up to that environment. As a kid, I was a wrestler, and I played football, and in Northeast Ohio, football is everything. And we had a saying on the football team, we had a saying on the wrestling team: we’ll play you any place, anywhere, at any time, and it’s the same kind of mentality. It’s like, all right, Red Roof, we’re going to take on anybody, any challenge at any place, anytime, anywhere. Does not matter, and we’re going to do the right things, we’re going to listen, we’re going to build an environment where you feel empowered, but you also feel like we all, we’re all in this. Together, and we have your back.

Maureen 50:01
That’s a brilliant point to end on, that you have created, and I’ll say the starting with the vision, you created processes for people to have understanding and clarity, and to step into that. So, I may understand things aren’t going well, but there’s also the invitation and the accountability, the expectation that if we miss our numbers, we are all going to work together to identify the opportunity that comes with that and make changes, so the adaptability, all of those creating a VUCA-ready environment, not that it will be easy, but the mindset, the courage, the grit, and who you are, that bring it,

Speaker 1 50:42
bring it on. I got to tell you, it was pretty exciting to hit record numbers in my first year as CEO of this organization, but what excites me more is the challenge ahead of us, and I can see that in the eyes of our team. It was easy, because there was pent-up demand after Covid, it was easy because people had money in their pockets and they needed to travel and they were willing to do whatever it was to get there, but now we got to go find our guest, and I’m excited for this challenge. We are VUCA ready in this organization, we’re ready for these challenges, and we’re going to pull every single lever we can to help us get through all these things, but to me that’s the grit, that’s the excitement, that’s the challenge in front of us, and I see it in the team we’re ready for, ready to go, bring it on.

Maureen 51:31
So to our listeners, as you’re listening to George, I would invite you to kind of tick off, what is he doing that might be an opportunity for you, because each of us has them. I have my own list of things I’m working on, and so if you want to learn more about becoming a better leader, about how to respond to VUCA, I invite you to check us out on our website, InnovativeLeadership institute.com or innovativeleadership.com and if someone would like to reach out to you, George, about any number of things: becoming a franchisee, becoming a team member, learning how you’re navigating VUCA for the next CEO who says, ‘I want to be like George.

Speaker 1 52:14
Yeah, absolutely. No, Red Roof franchising.com is the way to talk to our franchise team, if you’re interested in becoming a franchisee, but also it’s a great way to get, get a hold of me as well. And then, of course, if you want to stay on a Red Roof, go to Red roof.com

Maureen 52:29
And if you want to become a Red Roof team member,

Speaker 1 52:31
Red roof.com also has a careers link to it, so take a look. We’ve got some open positions today, we’d love to talk to you.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai