The GM who builds future GMs

when you prioritize the human capital side and really trying to earmark a portion of your operational spend towards your team right and i'm not talking about like the pizza party stuff like just having a an investment and being able to do things as a as a group together off property that's always been just like a non negotiable is like welcome back to the future hospitality this episode is part of our special series unscripted hospitality where we really just talk honestly without filters and about the industry and also the people behind the scenes and today's episode is powered by aohigh leading global sales organization representing the world's finest luxury hotels and resorts and this episode is really special to me because today i'm joined by dieter schmitz and someone that i've known for a while and someone whose journey is pretty unique right from laguna beach the rio orange county 20 years ago to building a real career very successful career in hospitality where there is a lot of beneath the surface that we can you know really excited to unpack so dieter really appreciate you being here what a cool conversation especially knowing you for a while and i'm sure i'm going to learn a lot about you that we never had the opportunity to discuss yeah man it's really really nice to see you and it's been a couple years so i was really excited to get a chance to catch up and chat it's a crazy time right now and thanks for having me yeah of course and he always keep looking better and better try to try to beat your hair which is it's a looting proposition but i try that's funny and it's it's interesting dieter because as we you know we've been talking about connecting for a little bit and just happens to align nicely with your 20th reunion and i was watching some of the interviews on the red carpet with you and some of your you know fellow cast members and so 20 years and like when you look back at that time in your life you know like what parts of that experience you know help still shapes who you are today and perhaps what part event you had to kind of let it go yeah i mean i think you know it's it's it's a it's a crazy experience because they came when we were 18 some younger really and we really just thought you know it was something fun to do in high school no one's going to watch this and you know we got like i think we got like $2,000 for it and we were like haha look at us we're we're rich and i think you know what happened immediately after i think was nothing that we were prepared for and you know the the first episode aired my first week of college and i think it really changed the trajectory of having a normal college experience but also you know we we were lifelong friends from first second grade so you really started to revert towards each other and that was like your safe space you had these relationships you got through it you know i filmed for three years for two seasons and it was it was just like an amazing experience i think there's pros and cons right but for me it was like my safe space was hotels like i started in hotels at 15 when the show was on i still worked in hotels when the show ended i still worked in hotels and it was like that was where i could go to to to have a career i loved people that i think like this hospitality has always been just an amazing fit for me because you know it's a social business and i love leading and i love culture focused leadership and so i think i really like leaned in hard to the hotel space and saying like look this thing's going to pass i want this career there's people from our show that did an amazing job you know doing other shows after and still doing shows today but for me it was like it was a fun experience but i was really really eager to get out of it so when when this opportunity came it was it wasn't like a shoe in like let's do it i think it was like a lot of thought put into it you know obviously we have families we have you know i have a great wife and kids and the only way you would really do it again is if you could close that chapter and do it right with the right people and everyone had to do it the producers are lauren conrad and steven and kristen from our show so knowing that they're producing and they can do this the right way i think was was really important but it just like it felt like the right time it's been 20 years and so it was a great experience we filmed for like three three four days and then friday it airs for the world and i think it's you're consistently kind of blown away by the base that that show had um you know when when the reunion came up i was like would anyone even watch this thing and then when we did the premiere there's 3 400 people there and you know you're seeing like millions of views on the trailer and you're like okay well i guess they will so yeah it's a it felt like a really cool way to close that chapter and officially close it because there will never be another time that whole crew will do this again i can guarantee you so it really felt like a cool closure of the chapter and how was because i know many of you are pretty close and you never really lost touch and you kept the relationship going to your point a lot of i think even going through the journey even if the distance having each other to relate and connect with but how was to get together 20 years was he kind of fairly natural and he kind of became fluid right away or i don't know anything unique yeah it was you know they were really smart because they brought back they brought back one of the cameramen who was our original cameraman so like when i was getting ready and i turned around i was like sham and he's like dieter i'm like oh my god from 20 years ago the creator of laguna beach came back as an executive producer so she was there so you you were like immediately surrounded by like a lot of comfort zones which was really smart i talked to steven trey lauren probably numerous times a week so like going back with them was totally normal but then there was people like you know i hadn't seen for 20 years and so i think that was the first hellos were a little interesting and awkward and then you just kind of dive right back in but i think we all said like we were so surprised how quickly you dive back into it and it was it was kind of like how we felt when we were 18 1920s it was the first show that was like a reality concept but we never acknowledged the cameras you know we didn't do confessionals i think confessionals can be like a really lazy way of like telling a story where you're talking about other people we never did that and so this was the first time where we were kind of like sitting down and on a stage setting which was different but i think you know i think everyone's going to see it was really it was really just a light funny there's some really good stories and then you know like there's it gets really emotional there there's like since the show aired a lot of our parents have passed away and you kind of can see them on the show still so i think it was it was a lot heavier than i was expecting as well but i think everyone stepped back into it really really quickly but i think that's the important part is that we're all united that this was it and we're not going to do it again ever because then it can be like well what's next yeah that is that is interesting you know you were 18 right at the time filming yeah how i don't know how did you stay grounded because to your point you guys became pretty well known pretty famous it was you know the beginning of kind of reality this genre that now is so popular there are so many shows but it was really a captive audience and i recall from our previous conversations years ago you know you used to go and you're hired to do appearances in clubs or whatever else so at that young how do you how you don't lose yourself how how did you stay grounded i think that's where the the friends came in good anytime any of us started getting a little you know a little inflated we would knock each other down quite hard and then i was like you know it's it's a it's a reality show you're not you're not famous for being an actor or anything and you keep yourself modest on that and you know the appearances were that was that was a very crazy thing to go through but it was also like you know there was it's pretty lonely you're like out on the road by yourself and you're going to these random cities and everyone's celebrating you because of a tv show nothing to do with yourself right so i think you kind of you kind of there's there's this weird thing about it where you know you you couldn't really date you couldn't do much of anything other than just like do these appearances have your friend group and then stay focused on the career i think for me it was like hotels was you know if it came up i would talk about it but it it was like just earn your own career earn your own destiny but you you also like you can't ignore that this was a huge part of your life and i think for me i really like this reunion because it's like the first time like on linkedin or anything i can even acknowledge it but i could also you know kind of say like hey this is a cool chapter and we're we're closing it yeah yeah that's exciting and and you know and it's kudos to you i think perhaps being hotels you mentioned you started at 15 and having that exposure having that the real life grounding was that what also help you to have the realization that hey i need to keep building something that's real perhaps that's something that's more lasting than what this you know and these opportunities could have led you to yeah i think i think so i and i and i always loved hotels so it was like even you know when you were being able to travel it was you know i i noticed like as a younger traveler you were kind of treated differently and i always just wanted to like have a great guest experience for all all the guests but i think i got really lucky that i fell in love with the business like i followed my uncle around when i was six seven he he was in vegas at caesars and then he opened montage in laguna and bakara up in santa barbara so like i remember just following him around at a really young age and thinking how cool it was that this business entity couldn't work without all the different departments and like for whatever reason i just thought that was so cool as a young kid and then i love service like i loved delivering service and you know i like started as a pool boy and a beach attendant hammering in umbrellas at my beach which was probably like the coolest job ever you're getting like 20 tips to hang out at your beach you know i was like this is this is a dream and then you know i did i did guest services i did f and b i did sales and then when i first started with ihg was my first opening of the indigo in san diego and then openings became you know i became like addicted to the fun and the pressure of like building a culture from scratch and how you can really just create this amazing team and experience from from nothing right and you know i did that one when i think i was 21 22 and i've done nine now in a row so it's become really my career but yeah really fortunate for the hotel space hospitality space i mean i i when the show was big i tried to do a couple acting gigs and the reviews were atrocious and it was very clear that was not my calling so i was like yep that's not for me i am really not good at this and kind of just ran away from that one oh that is funny that is funny i didn't see those reviews i'll check it out don't watch them they're bad okay all right and you know and when we met you were at ihg you know in new york where you are today and you know running a couple of hotels and i mean you've been very successful from a very early age when you look traditional the age in our industry when people get to a general manager level and at the time i met you you had a couple of assets you run an amazing you know property that you can share about a transformation that he just completed and oversaw and relaunched so it's pretty impressive to have you know you're 40 now right i think 40 yeah you're a pretty young guy and you know and he already has to your point of many openings being gm in several hotels so it's pretty impressive how would you describe for anyone listening you know clearly you didn't get these opportunities because someone saw you on tv and say hey right this guy is famous let me give him a shot you had to show your potential deliver so how did that came about and what do you think differentiate you from most people out there i mean i i think this is probably now more than ever like the best industry if you want to write your own ticket from an operation side right like i think when i when i started unfortunately and it's not the case anymore like hospitality was like a really cool major and it was attracting a lot of kids in college and it was one of those things where it's like look if you can understand you have to sacrifice weekends and holidays and all the things that are hard to do in your young 20s you can move up pretty quickly if you if you're willing to just to go all in which i did you know i would move anywhere i was all about the career i wanted to try like branded and independence and do anything i could to just get the best experience possible but i think like and the recipe for my success has been just like from the very beginning just prioritizing culture and not compromising about it and just making sure that everyone on this team loves being a part of it like i think what i'm most proud about about my career is there's six now number twos of mine that are gms or area gms or some vps and like i take a lot of pride of like mentoring people to to grow in this business because i think now more than ever it's like we need leaders that still have that passion i will say it was all like the first 15 years were a lot more fun than the last five years have been with everything happening in the world thrown at us but i think probably because of that right the door is now more open than ever for talent and people that really want to grow in this business and it's it's a great business that i i i always feel it rewards hard work and if you're a leader that like genuinely cares about your people but inherently like this business is about just making lifelong memories and if you love doing that and you can really differentiate your hotels i think from all the scripted cookie cutter brands of the world like you know at ihg right like we got to number one of 500 hotels in new york and that was like 150 room hotel with very little amenities compared to the others but it was just the right team delivering a differentiating guest experience and so that's always just been my my key is like personality hires you can train anything but if you hire the right people you know you can you can build a pretty rock star team and i think until i fail at that that'll be my my recipe for for success and i'm too social man i like i love like morning standups i i i think i'll always be an on property person for a while i just i if i'm not i just miss it so much and i'm lucky that i still love it yeah yeah it's true and i got to see you in action you know not only the hotel but conferences and engaging and to your point right i think you have a very natural and you know servant leadership aspect that i think helps to build culture and on your experience now there with sofitel where you went through a major property transformation anything kind of that's different from kind of a new hotel opening from your experience or kind of somewhat the same foundation to be successful any i don't know any new learnings i guess i mean this one was so this is the ninth time i've done this but this was the first time i ever did it in an open environment so that's just a different level of challenge right i mean we did a 400 room renovation while open with all public space lobby front desk the gym we did a brand new restaurant we did every single guest room while fully operating right so that took just like incredible execution from the team i will say like this team here our executives here like their fight and their pride for this thing is it's insane i mean that that summer last summer as you can imagine was was a was a a it's a rough year to go through that and i think you know when you get on the other side of that i think any opening you have these really great bonds because you went through hell and back together but this one i think was the biggest challenge hands down and so proud of kind of the finished product because we really had to reset that culture in an open environment we wanted this guest experience to be re energized otherwise it's just a physical renovation anyone can do that and it will fall flat quickly so this is a company with ramazan and starting with our ceo that mobailey is just the most inspiring person that comes in and truly prioritizes the people it's not words and so i think when it starts at the top down and you have the whole company believing in you we're now the new flagship of north america i think it's just like there's so much pressure but there's also this high that we have now we had the highest guest satisfaction scores in 25 years in this quarter and we're kind of cruising up the rankings and you're starting to see people that have been here 20 25 years really see the light which is really really cool you know this hotel is really unique we have 50 plus employees that have been here since day one for 25 years and they've been hearing about this renovation for years and years so like to see them see these new rooms and to see the new hotel it's just been really fun to see that kind of transformation from their pride and their culture and then also for our guests and obviously the brand i think i love sofitel i really want to hopefully see us grow a lot in the us and i'm sure we will now and it's just it's exciting to bring this thing to life yeah yeah for sure and you know great i don't know think you guys done a great job to i don't know rebirth is the right word right but to your point of flagship you know amazing property amazing market you know very high profile so i think yeah that's gonna keep getting a lot of momentum and keep building on that and then you know dieter to your point you mentioned a little bit about culture about the pride of the team you know in your hotel many have been there since opening and hotels nowadays you know this very well they're very challenged about flowing the profitability you know even though some markets are doing extremely well from a top line you know costs from labor insurance you name it has you know have gone up substantially over the years how how do you you know build that health culture while also being you know fiscally responsible and you know i don't know are there any any thoughts or way you look at things that okay it's not every time you know investing financially to recognize people per se but really building that health culture some other way that may not necessarily have a cost attached to that yeah i mean i think you know there's there's there's really creative incentivizing you can do that i think um i've always wanted to have that be like a constant but also constant in that we offer it but inconsistent in that it changes a lot so that it keeps people engaged and i think you know we this whole team here is really really invested in in our soft metrics right and i hate that term by the way because it's like the soft metrics probably control the hard metrics more than anything so i i we really prioritize those cause that's what our team controls you know they don't there's certain roles that have zero control on our flow right and that that kind of falls on our ac so we we've found ways to continually keep this team incentivized engaged like caring about our goals and seeing that whoa i actually control delivering on these you know i think growing up in brands that like are a little more nimble has been really beneficial because versus traditional luxury structures where you have like 30 layers of managers right and the gms kind of just like this royalty role i don't operate like that i i'm we're lean and nimble and i want the right leaders that are hands on i'd rather have great leaders of you know 15 than average 30 right so we have a pretty nimble leadership team that really is there to support and drives and and i think like the last thing is like no one's better than helping another department right i mean this is like an all in proposition here and if you can do that and set that as a team you're obviously naturally going to flow better but i think nothing hurts flow more than just turnover and people being unhappy so if you can as a gm it's kind of like your duty to make sure people love coming to work they stay you know we've had the same core here and you know what i loved about our time with atlantis hotels and ihg is we had that same ec for five years and we were able to just expand as we opened new hotels with that same ownership group and the longer you can keep those those people those great players engaged the the better off obviously you are so i always just like to pulse check that thing and make sure that everyone is really really driven really united and i you know i think once you have that your number two is ready to be a gym then great done your job yeah yeah as you mentioned right it's great too when you see people that you you worked with that they evolved they grew that that means that you did a good job and you know it's great to see that that paying forward and seeing progress yeah it's fun it's fun and i mean i think like for the for any of like the youngins out there listening to this thing i think you know you don't don't let anyone set a timeframe for you right like i remember when i started it was like you can't be a gym until you're i think it was like you can't be a gym till you're 40 or something crazy and i was a gym at 26 and um timelines are meant to be evolved and shifted and if you're the right person you earn these roles and i think but i do think the industry you know it was a stubborn industry but it's definitely like it's shifted obviously like we were brought to our knees during COVID and i think still trying to find its new place forward and i think what i what i always say what i hope that the industry can do a little better of is like we need to recruit kids again out of college right and our benefits are just like we're not quite there right it's like you're you're asking everyone to sacrifice you know normalcy socially and all these things but we need to we as an industry i think have a huge opportunity to like reshift how we're how we're thinking about recruiting and like who's going to be the next gm except tomorrow if no one's going to school for hospitality or even wants to be in this business right so i think i think as years go by and covid kind of subsides and then people can operate again prioritizing guest experience i think hopefully that'll ship but i mean i've never seen such a disparity in interest in coming into hospitality than at any point in 20 years which is kind of scary yeah yeah and you probably see that a lot firsthand and i see a lot from my side as well it was much different when i began this journey a few years ahead of you age wise turning 47 but like you i got into the business just you know i got a great job as a room service assistant waiter in brazil at a hotel that just opened and i enjoyed the environment the people the energy and then it just kind of carried over and i think that's one of the benefits we have as an industry the opportunity to really engage with different cultures different type of people and the things you learn i think you're a great example of this i think if you were to leave hospitality today you probably could survive very well in many other industries just because what you learn operating a hotel you have you know you run a business in its entity right in its entirety you know you know financials you know management you know leadership you know human psych you know psychology you know everything that applies to many things and i think that's what i agree with you we got to do a better job to you know showcasing the opportunities you know you don't need to be the smartest guy on the planet to do well in our industry just you know being street smart kind person a great leader will get you in many places that you know and i don't think we tell that story enough yeah no we don't and i think we're going to need to tow it aggressively right i think you know now i'm kind of i feel like i'm on that well now i'm 40 i'm viewing it that's the second half right so it's like i want i want i wanna i wanna keep developing leaders and i want to keep growing like hospitality i think like what always bothered me was the perception of us hospitality versus global right and it's like we're cut cut cut we're bottom line driven which parts of that is obviously true but like i want the us to be in line with like the the service cultures of other markets right and i think it's if we're being open it's it's viewed not as such and i think you know there's a great opportunity to just like keep pushing hospitality in the us and and i think you can do that with developing the light leaders and there are great ownership groups that that know that investment in human capital is going to drive their bottom line and those are the groups i love working for yeah yeah and talk a little bit related to that has your definition of success evolved over time let's say from your first gm job to today as your career evolved or not not necessarily i think i think so for sure i mean i think you know starting in the business i was just like so career focused on you know that title growth and growing and growing and growing and i wanted to be a coo by 40 and you know i followed that career pat path and the titles right and i think when you chase titles you're oftentimes making the wrong moves for for the groups you want to be a part of and i think i learned pretty quickly like you know there's companies i loved being a part of like ihg that i did for 10 years between two stints and you know you you you value like the companies that you you loved being a part of and i love being a part of a core and i think now i prioritized being a part of a company that shares those same values and culture and like i think for me now it's like i need to know the ceo the ceo and the leaders i work with sharing the same beliefs as i do i think it's just so important because if you could care less about the culture side of things and i'm a horrible leader for you and that's just the bottom line and i think i'm a lot more picky of who i pursue partnerships with i could care less about titles now so i think that's a huge difference right you start and you saw man can't wait don't care i care a lot more about just like being happy growing the teams right being part of like properties you can be really really proud of i think that's that's the most important part for me and if you know growth comes and then fine but i think the awards and the titles that used to like wake me up in the morning put me to sleep now and i remember from your time at hg you cleaned many of those awards several years i think i was i think it's safe to say i was probably like the most hated gm in our little group because i would have the awards and like take pictures with them and yeah lacking a little modesty there for sure yeah don't don't don't don't care about that anymore yeah that is funny just just remember now yeah you clean up all the things year after year yeah we had like three years in a row and then i remember just everyone rolling their eyes and being like no one's clapping anymore yeah they know it's coming and like when you look about your your growth you mentioned you know all your successes and and now to your point is more of fulfillment you know other than necessarily title or anything like this but regardless of how you look at growth have you had any non negotiable or any kind of discipline that you stuck with it throughout your life that supported this trajectory yeah i mean i i think the the the part of the way i run properties and i think for owners that aren't used to it is like when you prioritize the human capital side and really trying to earmark a portion of your operational spend towards your team right and i'm not talking about like the pizza party stuff like just having a an investment and being able to do things as a as a group together off property that's always been just like a non negotiable is like you know turnover costs x amount of thousands of dollars give me a portion of that i will save you money our team will be happier and we will deliver results and like i think when when i did those the hotels at ig like we had an owner with lance that was all about it he's like do it because he saw the returns he's like whatever you guys are doing i don't care just keep going and so i think when you go into groups that have never done that that's really like it's like i just want to be open it's important to me and to be able to do things with my team to get them out of here for a bit it's not gonna you know break the bank by any means but i think it can be it can be like this weird conversation when they've never done that before they're like well you get you know 500 for a pizza party it's like no okay this is why your turnover is very high so i've that is one non negotiable i think making sure that like you're able to really control your culture and your team and having owners that respect that like we have here where um we have a great relationship and the conversation is is through me and we obviously have meetings but i think like being able to really like be the driver of being protective of that team and how you get to that place you want to be is is really important because i think it's it's just a really really really competitive time right now more than ever of just making sure that the people you have that want to be part of this business you keep them here and you keep them wanting to be so yeah i think the non negotiables have always been the same for me of you know let me let me have that ability to really make this culture special yeah yeah and the you know like what has been harder for you you know it's kind of and that's reflecting back a little bit on you know laguna beach is like navigating the public perception early in life and dealing with you know either if it's fair or not assumptions or what people believe you to be or building something meaningful kind of behind the scenes to where you are now i mean i think the because i've just been fortunate in this career and finding out kind of a good recipe for success i think that that that becomes something that you can duplicate right and it's never the same thing but you always got to keep that hunger i think this show is always it's always in the back of my head so i think it's it's always a little more challenging where you can tell if people are talking about it and not telling you you can tell if you're like prejudged right you know there's been times where you're in a new company and you can tell people have googled or whatever and it caught there's something you can do and you don't bring it up but like if it comes up then you just you know you have to deflect like what people may probably go to which is like oh he was on a show and he thinks he's so and so it's like oh make fun of myself don't think it's anything actually and haven't you know ever thought it was anything better than what anyone else is doing it was a reality show but i think you know when it comes up you you almost have to work that much harder to show your real side right you're and that's what reality tv can be really dangerous because you're playing yourself you're not playing a character so anything someone sees they're perceiving it as like dieter schmidt's and in reality you're prompted to say things you know it's it's it's real but you know we're we have a purpose and so i think that can be hard where you're you have who you know you are as a person and i mean listen i i have nothing to complain about from laguna they they edited me as the nice guy friend there's people that had it a lot lower so i had no i had no gripes but it is more the deflecting against the perception of someone on tv right and i think frankly that's what kind of like i thought a lot about doing this thing and talked to my wife a lot about it and at the end of the day it was everyone's going to go close this chapter of something special we did in life they could either close it without you or you could be there and just close it together and tell the story yourself so for me it was like sure there's stories that come up from 20 years ago you watch like oh man but find me an 18 year old kid that doesn't have regrets and so yeah for me it was like look i know that it's going to kind of reignite this flame a bit but i almost like it because it allows us to close that chapter in the way we want to versus people talking about it and closing the the narrative themselves so yeah i think it was it's definitely always been the show it's it's always in the back of my mind of making sure that you work that much harder to create your own true narrative but again like laguna was special because these aren't people trying to get followers and trying to create drama laguna was lifelong friends that just happened to be filmed so there was like a there's a portion of that show you just can never recreate again because that was genuine friendships there was no social media like we didn't have to deal with half of the crap that everyone deals with today like and some of the interviews they asked us like would you do it today and i was like absolutely not like i've like gotten down to some of the comments it's like dieter got old look at his gray hairs i'm like oh my god i cannot do this stuff i'm not built for this it's just a different world when we did it there was nothing there was there was flip phones in myspace so i think that's been the one big change for all of us doing it this round is like the social media aspect we never went through we're going through it now i'm like oh man this is like there's a mean people out there yes i believe that i believe that and by the way i'm pretty sure your your gray hair looks good man you know just just a reflection of all your knowledge well it's like it's like some of the comments are like well they aged it's like it's been 20 years we aged what the heck yeah that sounds about right and you mentioned you know you mentioned your wife you have two beautiful kids and i don't know if this was your first and only kind of i don't know first and only wedding not saying the right way but you had a pretty unique wedding right in vegas so tell about that how did that came about so we like the getting married in austria is far less of a big deal as it is in the u.s. like there's you know a lot of people that spend their lives together have kids it's just not like a big thing you need to do and so we were like you know we wanted to make it official in the us and but we just wanted to do it with a small group so we called in lauren from the show this guy named ben who's a good friend a couple other people just flew into vegas and we did a drive through without anyone knowing and it was the coolest experience and it was it's still like probably the funniest story today because it cost you like order like a number nine special which is like the photo and the it's like 1999 so it's like got out of a whole wedding for $20 but then i was like i want to do the beach wedding i need to do the beach wedding i want to i wanted to do something bigger with my dad was older at the time and we really wanted to have those memories so we didn't tell anyone for two years that we were legally married only those four people knew and they kept it a secret and then we at the intercon in monterey we had our our big wedding with 200 people and i finally told my mom i think like five years ago like we were already married there but it was beautiful you know it was really unfortunate my dad passed four weeks before the wedding and so it was like a really crazily hard time but we're so glad we did it because everyone came from austria and it was just like this really special event but yeah we we technically had two weddings so i get confused with the anniversaries because sometimes my wife wants to celebrate both and all power to her yeah that's funny that's funny when you're talking about the the package that you bought at vegas brought back to the hangover scene on the high roller pac yeah it's like guy friends are always like you had a wedding for $20 you're the only guy we know that wanted then a beach wedding that's awesome that is awesome wow you know dieter you know thank you so much man what a real pleasure to connect with you and be able to you know relieve some of these moments learn a lot about your journey congrats on you know living i guess a life right that is is is you know of high impact you know you touch many lives you help develop many leaders and you know it's always respected how you you know you're a real guy you're grounded you're humble and before you close like i don't know where did that come from right because you're you know you you come across many leaders that are very capable but are not humble per se and you have everything right not to be humble how i don't know how did you sustain that or where did that come from first i'll say before i answer that i've had a lot of respect from you from the day we met you always treated everyone so amazingly and so genuine and i think you know everyone always had just every time you would come to the property or we would work with you you were you made people want to perform because you you had that genuine care and you know that's hard to find in a lot of these roles right and so you know i want to give you a lot of kudos you're you're a great person and great family man but also just just such a genuine dude so always had a huge amount of respect for you so kudos um and yeah kind of it's to your point you i was fortunate because i had some really not great examples of leadership i think where you know you you grow up and you see like the royalty gm that is above talking to the team and you know above and i and i and i saw some leaders treat people really poorly that were in layers below them and i saw that when they left the property the team probably actually wanted to fail and i was just like you know you you're treating your team horribly and you think somehow this is going to help the business and i just learned really early on like if you can treat your team well and more than anything if your team knows you're like in the in the trenches with them and you're willing to fight with them you know if something goes wrong it's on you that's that's you're the gm if something goes right you so let them take that win right but i think you know it's it's not a it's not an easy thing but i think the respect factor that any human being has for someone that has their best interest in mind but has their back and genuinely cares about them that's been like that doesn't fail you in life and anything you do if you're a self serving leader and you know you're only caring about yourself and you're going to be by yourself eventually so i think um that and like the fact that you know i always get worried like one day i'll wake up and it's just like i can't do this anymore um but man maybe i have one more opening and i'll call it at 10 and i'll retire at 45 there you go that that'll be pretty cool 10 openings 45 yeah and then you have enough to go your second round right do something else drive my wife crazy yes yes and listen i think that's a great plug as well as an industry to have someone like you where you had exposure to you know being on tv and you still want to be in the industry hopefully that speaks to you know how how cool how fun it can be and that's definitely a worthwhile career to consider and at least give it a shot right there's no downside i think it's like a very rewarding industry if you're willing to stick with it yeah so dealer thank you man really appreciate it what a pleasure and i sure hope we connect again sooner this time awesome thanks so much man all the best thank you