Episode 20: Revolutionizing Indy: Leonard Hoops' Creative Blueprint for Convention Success

Travel with us into the visionary world of Leonard Hoops, the president, and CEO of Visit Indy, and the driving force behind transforming Indianapolis into America’s top convention destination. From his Trinidadian roots to his rise in Indianapolis’ growing tourism industry, Leonard’s creative leadership and strategic vision have not only elevated the city on the convention map but have also cultivated a vibrant ecosystem, contributing to a nearly $6B boom.

In this episode, Leonard shares his remarkable journey from a journalism and MBA graduate of San Jose State University and Santa Clara University to becoming a respected industry leader. We explore the pivotal moments and decisions that shaped his career and led him to Indianapolis.

Since joining Visit Indy in 2011, Leonard has led a dynamic team of industry professionals to shatter convention and tourism sales records. Discover the strategies and initiatives that positioned this team and Indianapolis as the #1 convention city in America according to USA Today, leading to accolades from The New York Times, Conde’ Nast Traveler, and more.

Leonard also shares how Visit Indy’s focus on positive workplace culture fosters team engagement and satisfaction, and he explains how recognition as a “Best Place to Work in Indiana” has bolstered team productivity.

With over 35 years of travel and tourism experience, Leonard’s influence reaches far beyond Visit Indy. We discuss his extensive involvement in community and industry boards, including his roles with the U.S. Travel Association, PCMA, and more. Leonard also offers insights into how these roles have enabled him to shape the future of travel, tourism, and community development.

Beyond his leadership, Leonard’s position on the Indianapolis Business Journal’s Indiana 250 list and the honor of being named an ‘Indiana Living Legend’ are celebrated, along with his vision for Tourism Tomorrow and overseeing Indy’s Destination Vision, which allows Indy to thrive as a premiere destination for conventions and tourists.

Finally, from receiving the Vonnegut Humor Award to being named one of the “Top 25 Most Extraordinary Minds in Hospitality & Travel Sales & Marketing,” Leonard reflects on his entertaining personality that highlights his creative and innovative spirit.

Transcript

Sarah Hempstead: Welcome to Illuminate Navigating the Unknown through Creative Leadership. I'm Sarah Hempstead, CEO, and principal in charge at Schmidt Associates. And today I am joined by my friend Visit Indy, president and CEO Leonard Hoops. Leonard is an innovator, a creative leader who's put indie on the map as the number one most connected convention city in North America.

Sarah Hempstead: With a background in marketing and corporate communications, Leonard has made his mark in the convention and US tourism space. Leonard has received far too many awards to list them all here, including being named one of the top 25 extraordinary minds in Hospitality and travel Sales and marketing. Being named an Indiana Living Legend and being named one of the 250 most influential business leaders by the IBJ, maybe most impressive to me and unsurprising, he's also received the Kurt Vonnegut Humor Award from the Vonnegut Museum and Library.

Sarah Hempstead: Leonard Chairs the Professional Convention Management Association and serves in the boards of the US Travel Association. Marion County Capital Improvement Board, indie Chamber, Indiana Sports Corp, the Immigrant Welcome Center, Connor Prairie Museum, and the Greater Indianapolis Progress Committee. He also volunteers his time serving the state of Indiana as Governor Eric Holcomb's appointee to the Indiana Protection and Advocacy Commission.

Sarah Hempstead: And this episode, we'll dive into his leadership journey and discuss his innovative approach to leadership. Leonard, thanks for joining. 

Leonard Hoops: Well, thank you for having me. That guy sounds way more interesting than I actually am. 

Sarah: You know, I had to cut out half of the awards on this list because it would take the rest of the podcast.

Sarah: Well, okay. Just to, 

Leonard Hoops: we don't want that. 

Sarah: No, we don't want that. We don't want that. So you've got the best team in the business and the best convention city in North America. And I'm not at all biased. It is the best convention city in North America. That is a really long way from Trinidad. 

Leonard Hoops: Hmm. 

Sarah: Can you talk to me a little bit about your journey?

Leonard Hoops: Yeah. Well I was born in Trinidad, what you're alluding to there. And, um, there's a handful of people, I think born in Trinidad, in India. I meet them every now and again. There was somebody who worked at the Omni Bar who told me that one time. And, uh, so you never know where you're gonna wind up meeting in Trinidadian.

Leonard Hoops: But, uh, my father is a very long time American. Uh, I think I'm ninth generation on dad's side. Okay. Uh, he's English, Scottish, and Irish. And, um, he was in the US Navy and after the Navy he got a job with RCA Corp. Sure. And RCA, of course is a big name in local indie business over the years. But he worked for RCA in Trinidad in the 1960s and met my mom who's a East Indian, uh, in terms of ethnicity, Trinidadian by nationality.

Leonard Hoops: And, uh, they got married, they had me. And so from, uh, the ages of birth to five, I was in Trinidad. And then when I was five, my dad moved us to the Dallas Fort Worth area of Texas. That's kind of where he went to high school and, and grew up and that sort of thing. So he wanted to go back to where he was.

Leonard Hoops: But I typically describe myself as your typical, uh, ninth generation American English, Scottish, Irish Indian, uh, born in Trinidad. So, 

Sarah: so now this is why you can probably do accents, 

Leonard Hoops: uh, well, I can definitely teach you how to, to do both the Indian and the Irish accent by mastering the word potato. But maybe we'll say that for another podcast.

Sarah: So, um, so you moved in time for first grade? 

Leonard Hoops: Yeah. So first through, uh, fourth grade basically was, uh, was Arlington, Texas. 

Sarah: Yeah. And your dad was in the tourism industry working for No, 

Leonard Hoops: no. He was, so he got out of the Navy. He went to work for RCA, he was like a radar operator for RCA. And then when we moved back to Texas, he got a computer science degree and electrical engineering degree.

Leonard Hoops: And uh, for all intents, he was a rocket scientist. He was the engineering manager for the Titan, uh, rocket program at Vandenberg Air Force Base at the end of his career. 

Sarah: Oh, wow. 

Leonard Hoops: I used to always say, dad, you know, I mean, you're a rocket scientist, but you're no brain surgeon. So, 

Sarah Hempstead: so he didn't push you into rocket scientist world?

Leonard Hoops: He didn't. He was somewhat disappointed that I chose a non-engineering path. I was actually pretty good at math and like a 99% are on the math part of the SAT and all that sort of stuff, and I wanted to be a sports writer. So, uh, 'cause I wanted to be a professional athlete, but I nowhere near the skillset of anything.

Leonard Hoops: Uh, although maybe, maybe I could master pickleball. I'm gonna see how that, it's not too late, how that works out. Not too late. And so I thought, okay, the, maybe the way to enjoy sports is to write about it right Cover, go to attend Super Bowls and Final Fours, and all these sorts of things. And so I went to San Jose State for a journalism degree, actually covered some pro sports while working for the Spartan Daily newspaper there, and realized that it wasn't what I had in my mind.

Leonard Hoops: I loved going to the events. I liked writing the articles. I did not like interviewing the athletes. Hmm. Uh, the ones, I, I had a couple of situations just as a young reporter where I just felt, uh, very put off by kind of the locker room attitude. Okay. And I was like, man, what am I gonna do with this journalism degree?

Leonard Hoops: And so I ended up getting a job in corporate communications for a Fortune one 20 company. That somehow led me back down the road to this job at Visit Indy, where I still get to go to Super Bowls and Final Fours and Indy 500. So it all worked out in the end. 

Sarah: So how did corporate communications lead into the tourism industry?

Leonard Hoops: So using that journalism degree, I got a, a CorpCom job for this fairly large company, a billion dollar division of a company called FMC Corporation. Um, and. They, um, had a great tuition reimbursement program, so they paid for my MBA and at the end of the MBAI went to Santa Clara for that. And, uh, at the end of that, they offered me this wonderful opportunity, which I did not take advantage of, uh, to, uh, essentially do a kind of a rotational training program where they were gonna have me in operations for a couple years in Alabama.

Leonard Hoops: And then in, I think it was finance, uh, for a couple years would've been the next step in. South Carolina, and then I think marketing in, uh, uh, Fridley, Minnesota. So it was like the six year rotation where you do three different divisions, three different types of jobs, and at the end of that six years, you're very well cross-trained for some sort of executive leadership job somewhere in the world.

Leonard Hoops: And at the time, I think FMC was in 16 countries, and so you could, you could pick lots of things, but I did not see myself as an operations guy in Alabama and a finance guy in South Carolina. I just didn't see it. And so, um, I'm old enough to remember the days where you would find jobs in the Sunday newspaper.

Leonard Hoops: So back in that day, uh, somewhere in that process as I was contemplating this offer and having a decision deadline come, coming up soon, I found a job for the director of Public Relations San Jose Convention of Visitors Bureau, and that's how CorpCom the four Q1 20 wound up being in the tourism space.

Sarah: All right, so you're in California and you. I worked a lot, a lot of different places there kind of moved your way up the ladder, right? In the tourism and hospitality industry. And then one day you woke up and said, you know what? I want Midwest. 

Leonard Hoops: Yeah, 

Sarah: that's exactly how that happened. 

Leonard Hoops: And it's, I mean, there, we don't even need to finish the podcast.

Leonard Hoops: So what ended up happening was I found that this was a good fit for me. This industry. I, it, it, it spoke to me in terms of my energy and passions and things like that. And so somehow or another. I was director of PR and two years later I was VP of marketing and two years after that I was the EVP or the SVP running, uh, sales and marketing.

Leonard Hoops: And so I was in the classic fake it till they make it. I was about 34 years old, I think, when I was an SVP and I made some missteps. I mean, one of my favorite stories that I tell people sometimes when they ask for advice is I give an example where I just become SVP and I was in a meeting. With a whole bunch of hotel general managers and directors of sales and marketing, and one of the GMs of the biggest hotel in San Jose said, uh, in the meeting, Hey, you know, now that you're running sales, I really want you guys to refocus on your markets.

Leonard Hoops: And, you know, we, we, I don't like all this, this low rated, uh, trade show business. You're bringing me on the weekends. I want you to bring corporate groups. That meet on weekends. Mm-hmm. And if you are in this industry long enough, you know that that is doesn't exist. And so my 34-year-old self responded in a room full of this guy's peers while we're done hunting for unicorns.

Leonard Hoops: What else do you want us to look for? 

Sarah: See, that's where the humor Yeah. People don't always get it. Yeah. I mean, I 

Leonard Hoops: thought it was funny. 

Sarah: No, right. It is funny. 

Leonard Hoops: So it didn't go over well in that room. I was lucky, frankly, that I was still the SVP the next day. Um, and that was a quick life lesson on, you know, you can know that that guy's wrong.

Leonard Hoops: But that's not the way you approach it. The way you approach it is say, thank you for that, you know, suggestion and, uh, let's, we'll work on that. And then after the meeting you say, that doesn't exist. Right. But you don't say it in front of 20 of his peers and, and embarrass the guy, uh, like that, because that, that doesn't do anybody any good.

Leonard Hoops: Yes. So anyway, long story short, um, I, I kind of, uh, ascended more rapidly than maybe I was prepared for. I then ended up getting recruited to Sacramento, which is my wife's hometown. Worked there for a couple of years. We had a, a son Cannon, who's now 19. And somewhere when he was around two. 'cause I thought we just went, we'd stay in Sacramento.

Leonard Hoops: That's her hometown. Happy wife, happy life. And uh, somewhere when he was around two, she said, I think you should look at other opportunities. You're too young to just sit in Sacramento at the bureau for the rest of your life. And then that led to a job offer in San Francisco where I was their EVP for five years.

Leonard Hoops: And then finally we get to the point you ask about the Midwest and um, there's an, uh, one industry recruiter in particular who, who typically, you know, is the guy who's placing. Uh, the candidates around the country for jobs like the visit indie job, and every time he had approached me about an opportunity, I'd come home and share with my wife, whatever city, and she'd say no.

Leonard Hoops: It was always a quick no. One day I came home and I said, the recruiter called me about Indianapolis expecting a quick no, and she said, I think you ought to interview for that one. I was like, you do? And she said, yeah. When I went, she went to grad school at University of Michigan. She goes, I loved living in the Midwest.

Leonard Hoops: I thought the people were really wonderful. And I thought the quality of life and you know, our son is, you know, at that time I think he was six and, uh, this would be a great place to live in. Maybe we'll even have another kid. I said, really? Wow. All from just this comment. 

Sarah: She's very wise. Yeah. 

Leonard Hoops: She, well, and you know her.

Leonard Hoops: She is, uh, she's wise in many things. Her, her judgment in men is questioned. 

Sarah: Well, yes, 

Leonard Hoops: but the, the, uh, uh, so, and she will tell you, if she was here right now, she would say, the moment it came out of her mouth, you should interview that job. She knew we were gonna be moving to Indy. Really? She just knew it was gonna happen.

Leonard Hoops: Uh, she had that sense and so, uh, it did end up happening, got the opportunity, took it, and that was 13 years ago. 

Sarah: So what about it, uh, has surprised you? What was like you thought it would be and what's been different? 

Leonard Hoops: I think what's surprised me is the fact that my passion for the city has grown. To the extent to where I, I don't wanna leave.

Leonard Hoops: I mean, there was an opportunity to interview for my old boss's job in San Francisco last year, and I said, no, thank you. And, um, you know, didn't even do the interview. And so I think that would've shocked people, including myself, 12 or 13 years ago. You know, I thought, Hey, you know, maybe I could be here five, six years.

Leonard Hoops: That would be a nice run. But it's, but I, I feel this is one of those places, and I've always kinda identified a little bit with the. With the underdog. I think I'm, I'm more of a, I'm more of a let's, let's do something special in India than take care of the place that everybody knows about San Francisco.

Leonard Hoops: Sure. That, that's my own kind of where I lean. And so, um, it, you know, Indy just, I feel we're so close to doing, we're already a special city, but I think we're really close to being, uh, as I said in our own state of tourism for visit in India last week. The next big thing. Mm-hmm. I think we really are on that cusp of a Nashville, Austin, like emergence as the next big thing.

Sarah: Well, so wanna talk about one of the next biggest things, which is the expansion of the convention center and the hotel. Um, but I also wanna talk about how we got to this point. 'cause in the last decade or so, there have been some really high highs like hosting the Super Bowl and there've been some really low lows, like the pandemic and, and you got to lead, uh, a great crew of people through, through both of those things.

Sarah: Is there a, is there a through line? 

Leonard Hoops: So one of the things that. I had heard and started using myself during the pandemic is the, you know, the typical comment you heard from people about, well, we're all in the same boat. And somewhere along the lines, somebody had said something that caught my ear, uh, where we're not all in the same boat, we're all in the same storm, we're in different boats.

Leonard Hoops: And I think the indie boat. Is quite the craft. Uh, it's, um, the way that people come together in Indianapolis is very different than my experience. Uh, in California, it's maybe a little bit similar to Sacramento, um, but not, you know, San Francisco's very different. I feel like Sacramento and San Francisco had a baby.

Leonard Hoops: It'd be India. Because we've got, you know, we've got those big city professional sports and our convention center in Indie is actually bigger than San Francisco's, and I've got a thousand room hotel we get to sell here and, and, and more coming. Um, but the quality of life and, you know, the relationships where you could hang out with the Sarah Hempstead and the Joe Hogstead and Eric Holcomb and, uh, the leadership of the pace throughs and the Colts all in the same week.

Leonard Hoops: And it's all like, there's not a whole lot of difference in how, uh, how those. Drinks or meals or whatever feel is very unique to India, I think. And so I think we are in a special boat and that boat got us through that, that storm. And it, you know, we ride high when the waves are nice and we can get through the choppy waters when they're not.

Sarah: Your team was able to pull off a hosting convention business in the pandemic earlier than most cities in the, in the country. What do you, what do you credit that to? 

Leonard Hoops: Well, it starts with Andy Mallon, who runs our convention center. He was relatively new on the job. He started in 19 and in March of 20, obviously, you know, once, once Tom Hanks got COVID, we knew it was real, and that all kind of happened in early March.

Leonard Hoops: He and I started talking about what can we do? 'cause this is our bread and butter. This is what, this is, the life sustenance of Indianapolis is all these groups downtown. And so he and I started talking to the health officials, to the, to the government officials and essentially got them to give us a chance to reopen the building under safety protocols.

Leonard Hoops: We weren't gonna be. The Sturgis motorcycle rally, right? So, so there were masks and things like that, but it all started with youth sports. The one folks who wanted to be traveling even during the pandemic were the parents of athletes. They wanted their kids to do basketball and, and, and gymnastics. And cheerleading, and.

Leonard Hoops: Volleyball and things like that. And so that happened and that was really the vast majority of what we did from July of 20 all the way to the Final Four or the entire NCA tournament in early 21. But that was kind of a proof of concept for a couple months for the NCAA to see that we could do what we were doing.

Leonard Hoops: Uh, but it definitely, and then some other groups started to notice, we had a group, uh, the National Confection Association, sweets and Snacks Expo, they had met annually for over two decades in Chicago. Under the protocols there, they couldn't meet. And so they started looking for other cities. They put it out, a bunch of cities bid, we want it.

Leonard Hoops: And again, they looked at us and said, Hey, you've been hosting some things, you know, we'll try you for one year thinking it was temporary. And darned if that temporary has it now turned into a 24, 25, 27, 28, 30, 31 contract. That's awesome. 

Sarah: So we've come out, we've come out on the other side. We are positioned stronger, I would say, than when we, than when we went in.

Sarah: So. Talk about the next big thing. 

Leonard Hoops: Yeah. And, and one of the things about coming out of that pandemic is people, it's easy to think now about how, it seems like everything's back to normal and all that. And, and everybody saw that was coming. But if you remember, like in the fall of 20, people didn't feel that way.

Leonard Hoops: And that's when we were initially voting at the council mm-hmm. To build the convention center expansion. So the, the expansion part of the, of the combo Signia Hotel with the expansion, that part was fall of 20. Mm-hmm. Vaccines weren't out. Um, people were like, the industry's never coming back. We're never shaking hands again.

Leonard Hoops: We're never gonna meet again. And at the time, I, I ended up doing a video, uh, for, um, I forget. We, we just distributed to our customers and a few others that I sent. Uh, I came up with my own little four Cs of why people gather, and I said three of the four are things you just can't do virtually. The first is, is content.

Leonard Hoops: That was the one thing. Whether it's a podcast or a Zoom or whatever, you can share content digitally. Sure. There's no question about that. Um, whether it's engaging content's, another story, but you can definitely share content. The second C is connection, and there's just no way a chat box or a zoom is gonna ever capture the connection of even when the three of us sit around a table for a podcast.

Leonard Hoops: It's a different thing than if we were zooming this. Sure. Um, and when you go to a conference and you're, you're, you get that the, the late night beverage where you get to know somebody, um, and they talk about their kids or they, or they tell you about the struggle that they overcame that maybe you wouldn't have got.

Leonard Hoops: On the Zoom, you definitely wouldn't have gotten on the Zoom, right? That sort of thing. That connection isn't there. The third one is commerce, the third C, and we have shows like the fire department instructors convention that. People will literally write purchase orders for tens of millions of dollars.

Leonard Hoops: You're buying giant fire trucks. You're not getting that on Amazon. 

Sarah: No. A if I wanna touch it, right? 

Leonard Hoops: You wanna touch it, you wanna talk to the sales person, the service people get to understand who you're working with and, and so commerce had really ground to a halt as far as the trade show aspect of it.

Leonard Hoops: And then the four foresee is competition. And that didn't end. That was the thing that reopened the convention center. That's the thing that got us through the NCA tournament. It was so one of them never ended. One of 'em can be done virtually in the two, in the middle. Um, just can't be done well. Uh, so anyway, those four Cs kind of, uh, proved to be true.

Leonard Hoops: And so we, we made that argument behind the scenes with counselors in the fall of 2020s that this industry will be back to exactly what it is. And then some, in fact, you might argue it might be stronger in the sense that. Because there was clear that there was a trend that maybe working from home mm-hmm.

Leonard Hoops: Would stick. Right? So the OR or, or some level of hybrid, um, people are gonna be just aching to get on the road and see people at conferences and shows and things like that, because they're not even necessarily getting that on a weekly basis in their office. That's a very roundabout answer to say the next big thing.

Leonard Hoops: We got that approved in the fall of 20 20, 25 to zero, which was just crazy. People saying, you're gonna commit $200 million to an expansion. In the fall of 2020, this industry's not gonna come back. And I, I just told you, you know, some of the reasons why then fast forward a couple more years later because the hotel tower part of it, the Signia is a, was a privately owned parcel.

Leonard Hoops: And, uh, so Chi Realty was developing that. But in the interim, between fall of 2020 and summer of 2023, there were 10 federal interest rate hikes. And all of a sudden the pro forma that worked for the developer in 2020 doesn't work in 2023. So the city had to pivot again and said either we dropped this project or it's publicly owned.

Leonard Hoops: And so they looked at what Atlanta had done. The Georgia World Congress Center, O owns the Signia by Hilton. There we have a Signia by Hilton. They said, Hey, if they can do it, we can do it. And that ended up bleeding to an announcement it was gonna be publicly owned. The city purchased it from the developer and sold some bonds.

Leonard Hoops: And then it turned out the bonds were oversold nearly four to one. So the demand was huge. The belief in this project was huge, that it would work. 

Sarah: One of the things that I find really interesting watching you do what you do is you have to build such a diverse coalition. You have a lot of clients. A lot of clients, the city county council, and the state and the board and the actual clients talk about communication, and you're a really good storyteller, and I think humor is, there's a reason you won the, uh, the Vonne award.

Sarah: Tell, talk about that in your leadership. 

Leonard Hoops: Some of my, uh, teammates, uh, sometimes joke that I can find some connection with anybody. Oh, my aunt was the, that religion, or, yes, I also have six toes, or, you know, whatever it might be. There's something, uh, and they find it odd and humorous. I will pull something outta the recesses to try to connect with somebody, but I, that's just kinda my nature.

Leonard Hoops: The one of the things I tell people a lot is that visit indie lives at the confluence of what. Customers want what our for-profit stakeholders want and what our kind of government public stakeholders want. And those don't align. That is not, um, a Venn diagram with a lot of crossover, right? The customers want as much as possible for as little as possible.

Leonard Hoops: Like, you know, give me all your rooms for a dollar a night and free food and whatever else, you know, sort of thing. And then the owners of the hotels and the restaurants are like, I would like them to pay as much as possible. And whatever else, uh, whatever, you know, how, how can I maximize my revenue, uh, with minimum investment and effort.

Leonard Hoops: Uh, not that they don't want to just, you know, you're just looking at it from an ROI perspective and then the public stakeholder is like, I want all this economic benefit, this tax revenue, these jobs for as little public investment as possible. Mm-hmm. If I don't have to be build a hotel, I won't. And, you know, let's let the market drive that.

Leonard Hoops: And so again, there's this. This Venn diagram that comes together where this little overlap, and that's where Visit Indie operates, is in that little overlap of, uh, getting everybody to go, okay, that deal's good enough for you, that deal's good enough for you, and that deal's good enough for you. 

Sarah: Making everybody equally happy.

Leonard Hoops: Yeah. Or equally unhappy. Either way works as long as they all agree on it, 

Sarah: moving everyone at least to the same goal. Yeah. 

Leonard Hoops: So, 

Sarah: so, uh, I, I think one of the challenges in, um, leading an organization like yours is getting inspired by, uh, best in class all over the, all over the world. Um. One of the ways it appears that you're doing that is in your new role as chairman of the 

Leonard Hoops: F-C-M-A-P-C-M-A-P-C-M-A.

Sarah: Thank you. Yeah. Can you, uh, talk a little bit about why you are choosing to spend time that way? Because I know it's a huge time suck, but also of value. 

Leonard Hoops: So, PCMA, uh, it technically the letter is don't stand for anything anymore, but it used to stand for the Professional Convention Management Association and now they just kind of just go by the.

Leonard Hoops: The acronym and uh, it has been around since I think 1956. It's an association of people who plan conventions and trade shows and the organizations and people like Visit Indy that support those planners. So it's been around now for 70 years and nearly 70 years, and it's an organization that in the late nineties when I first got that opportunity to move from PR to marketing to sales and marketing that I came to discover and it just.

Leonard Hoops: They were my people. Mm-hmm. I found that this to be kind of my tribe in the industry of, of, uh, some of my best friends over the last 30 years have come from that side. And at some point I had the opportunity to serve on the board 2017 to 2020 and thought that was gonna be, it served one term and then I got renominated a couple years later for the executive committee.

Leonard Hoops: And that has led, uh, this year as of, you know, a week and a half, two weeks ago to be the chair of the board. And it's a global association. We have. We have people in, I dunno, 50 something countries and 8,400 members, but they're in Asia, they're in Europe, they're in the Middle East, they're in South America, they're in Canada.

Leonard Hoops: And I'm at the stage of my career, I'll be 59 next month where I start literally thinking, you start thinking like, if not mortality, career mortality, and, and so you start thinking, I've only got a few more years to do this in this organization that's given me so much. And so. It's time to give back. And, and I was fortunate enough to be given that opportunity, but in the meantime, there is a huge side benefit.

Leonard Hoops: I mean, I'm not gonna discount or, or say it's not true that, uh, having such a public position in an industry association where everybody tends to know you. I mean, I was at an event in Atlanta on Saturday for their Signia Hilton. So they just opened theirs and I was just one nighter. And, um, one of my colleagues in indie was supposed to go with me and didn't.

Leonard Hoops: So I was solo low and, you know, you're like, oh, I'm solo. And. Whatever. Well, I was never left alone simply because of the PC MA chair job. I had people, uh, coming up who I didn't know, people who I hadn't seen for a long time, who were, you know, just wanted to catch my air and give me, Hey, I saw you in San Diego on stage for the PCMA thing.

Leonard Hoops: Congratulations. It's great that you know, a visit Indie DMO type of destination management organization, uh, is now on the board and they're now the chair of the board, et cetera, et cetera. And it, it, uh, uh, and then people started asking me about, well, what's happening in Indy? And I started telling 'em about our Signia.

Leonard Hoops: And so. Yeah, there's definitely a side benefit that that exposure means something's gonna translate into real business for us too. Sure. But that wasn't my prime motivation. It's a nice side benefit. 

Sarah: Sure. So what else do you do to get inspired, new ideas, kind of sharpen this all? 

Leonard Hoops: Yeah. The, well, and you know, because you happen to be part, uh, the, the vice chair of our Tourism Tomorrow Indie Board and Tourism Tomorrow.

Leonard Hoops: Indie. Unlike Visit Indy, visit Indy is really the governance entity, uh, to, to make sure we spend the public's money. And our partners funding, um, to maximize our return on investment tourism tomorrow. Indy is how do we make India must visit destination? And I get super inspired by that because I think we have, um, we're, we're, you know, again, this next big thing concept.

Leonard Hoops: I think we're on that, on that, the cusp of that. But we've got a little bit of work to do. One of the things that I'm famous for, I guess locally is comparing Indie to Paris, uh, which some people find absurd, but I think is not absurd at all. And I, and I mean that sincerely. Uh, 'cause I got here, you know, I moved to Indy from, in 2011 from San Francisco.

Leonard Hoops: People are like, well, we don't have oceans and mountains and no beaches. And it's like, eo. Everybody's eo. And um, and I'm like, well, you know, who doesn't have oceans and mountains and does just fine. It's Paris. It's a flat city with a river. Uh, there are hundreds of miles from the Alps and the Pyrenees.

Leonard Hoops: There are hundreds of miles from the Mediterranean. The Atlantic, they're in the. Relatively center of, of France. They're actually slightly north. If you look at latitude on a map, uh, you'll, you'll see that they're slightly north of us. And if you've been to Paris in the Four Seasons, they are similar four seasons to Indianapolis.

Leonard Hoops: It can be wet in the spring, it can be hot and humid in the summer. It can be beautiful in the fall, and it can be wintry and blizzardy and the, in the, in the winter. And that's pretty similar to what we have right now. They've got a 2000 year headstart, so we'll give them that 2000 years you can build a, a tower and collect some art and perfect the croissant and all these sorts of things.

Leonard Hoops: So I give them that. But uh, to go back to kind of the original quest about what really inspires me, then I look at a place like Singapore. Singapore got that. Independence in 1965 or 63, I think, and then into kind of another independence in 65. And it's a city state that is 90 square miles smaller than Indianapolis, with 6 million people.

Leonard Hoops: That has become a borderline global superpower through share will and and urban strategy and planning and and focused investments. So when you think, uh, you know, Orlando and Vegas are good examples too. A hundred years ago, Orlando's a swamp. A hundred years ago, Vegas is a desert and they're arguably the two most visited destinations in America now.

Sarah: Oh, that's a great, uh, that's a great comparison and I wasn't gonna let you leave today without pulling out the Paris, just so you know. Yeah. That was absolutely gonna happen. So you've got, you've got two kiddos, just like, just like I do. Um, and thinking about career ending in the future, uh, what do you want the legacy to be?

Sarah: What do you want them to hear about? What you did. 

Leonard Hoops: I would love for Indy to be a place at the end. Uh, so I have a contract and my contract got extended a few years ago and it goes to 2030 and that's, I'll be 65 and 2030 and that's kind of my, like, let's let somebody else take the reins there and still be part of the community, but not the guy every day.

Leonard Hoops: Sure. Trying to, to push the rock up the hill and, uh, I would love for them in 2030 to go. Why would anybody ever wanna leave this place? You know, we, we talk about the Indiana brain drain or the indie brain drain, and people go on to other places. But I would, I, I, you know, you look at it again in Nashville and in Austin, those are good examples of cities that.

Leonard Hoops: 15, 20 years ago. We're not seeing the way they're seen now. Mm-hmm. Uh, Austin was a sleepy college town and Nashville was kind of country bumpkins, for lack of a better description. If you went to Nashville for a convention, you went to the Opryland Hotel, you didn't go to downtown Nashville. Right. Um, you know, you had kind of the tootsies in the Broadway area, but they threw placemaking.

Leonard Hoops: Have built and, and, and, and kind of cultural development along the way and embracing who they are with the country music. Mm-hmm. Uh, have turned that into a, a positive. And Austin, I think they benefited greatly by South, by Southwest and Dell computers and some other things. So there's some external things that can happen, but then you take advantage of them when they present themselves.

Leonard Hoops: And so when things present themselves to Indy, we need to. Do the same thing. And again, we have a little bit of a geographic, um, disadvantage to some of these. We're not in the Sunbelt. Sure. But if you look at growth, I was, you know, you and I were both at an Indy Chamber meeting recently and they showed within the Midwest who's growing and it's Indy.

Leonard Hoops: Mm-hmm. Uh, you know, Columbus is a little bit behind us, but we're way outgrowing Chicago and, and, and, uh, you know, other cities at Cincinnati and other cities in the Midwest. And so within the context of the geography that we all share, we're really. Showing that, that, that we're taking that next step. 

Sarah: So two, two more questions, final questions.

Sarah: One just for you and one that one that I ask everybody. So the first one, and I know this is hard, it's like picking your favorite child, but of all the events you've been to participated in, is there one that sticks out as something that changed how you thought, um, about what you do or where you are in the world?

Leonard Hoops: Probably the safest answer and, and it happens to be the true answer as well, is the Indy 500. I, I think we take for granted that the world's largest single day sporting event is here every single year, and somehow we get 300,000 plus people inside the gates of the Indy Motor Speedway and then get 'em back out of the gates, uh, before the day is over, or at least most of them, uh, before the day is over.

Leonard Hoops: Uh, I think it's really a phenomenal event, and having been to it every year since 2011, except for the. 2020 race where they did it without fans. It is a marvel to me each year. It feels new and real every year and the uh, and the emotions you get and all the. Pre-race traditions, uh, the back home again and the, and the flyovers and, and the patriotism that you feel there.

Leonard Hoops: And my favorite moment of all is when they are on the final turn of the pre-race lapse and they get that green flag and all 33 cars hit the gas at once. That sound. It is like no other sound in the world. It, it, it, it gives, it is like sending chills up my spine right now because it's, it's, that's what I, that's what I wait for.

Leonard Hoops: I wait for that sound of 33 going at once and the crowd roars and all 33 make one sound. Um, it's just a remarkable event and we have it and we own it. And, uh, we've had some great, uh, caretakers of it and, and Roger Penske and his Penske Entertainment Group is, are now taking it to the next level. Mark Miles and Doug Bowles Super Bowls been multiple Super Bowls, multiple final fours.

Leonard Hoops: They're all incredible events, but we own that one. They're, it's called the Indy 500. It's not the Indy Super Bowl. It's not the Indy NCA Final four. It's the Indy 500 and nobody else has it. 

Sarah: That's a 

Leonard Hoops: great answer, 

Sarah: and we do take it for granted. Alright. Final question. What are you currently reading or what do you recommend that everybody reads?

Leonard Hoops: I had somebody ask me this the other day, and from a business book perspective, uh, I would recommend Freakonomics. Ah, great book. I think that it has really influenced how I process business decisions. Mm-hmm. You really understanding that fundamental, uh, basic human action of behaving in a way you're measured and evaluated really makes you think through.

Leonard Hoops: How you need to approach certain situations. If I think Sarah is gonna behave this way because this is what motivates her, then I probably need to. Try to convince her, you know, to do this versus that. Sure. So, I, I, I tell people, you know, you re the wor you read the real world examples in there of like how a teacher might teach at the test or why they might do that, or why a realtor might sell their house differently than your house.

Leonard Hoops: Um, is very insightful into the human psyche. Mm-hmm. And is very helpful for business decisions. In terms of what I'm reading that has nothing to do with that. I. Right now I'm in the midst of reading the Harry Potter books with my daughter. Nice. And she, for whatever reason, started me on book four, the prisoner of Ban.

Leonard Hoops: So we haven't read one, two, or three. I've seen all the movies, but so we do that if I'm home, uh, and I travel like every other week, but if I'm home we generally will read a chapter and, um, I don't really have a British accent, but I have kind of an Irish accent. So I'll be reading like Harry Potter with her the whole time in this voice and I'll be, you know, Dumbledore.

Leonard Hoops: Mm-hmm. Went to Potter and said it's the quidditch final tomorrow. Harry, are you up for the match? And Harry says he's not, you know, he's concerned. And so at the end of every chapter she's like, why do you read it like that? And I'm like, because it's Harry Potter. It's, you've got to read it. Something like that, even if you know it, it's not an American accent.

Sarah: That's fair. That's fair. It might've been better if it was set in Ireland, you know? Yeah, 

Leonard Hoops: I, well, and that's, it's the one I can do so 

Sarah: well, this has been absolutely delightful. Thank you. Thank you for your time. It's so nice to talk to you always. Um, to learn more about Visit Indy and all the ways Leonard and his.

Sarah: Team are moving Indie Forward. Please go to visit indie.com and thank you for listening to Luminate Navigating the Unknown through Creative Leadership. We hope this episode has inspired you and has supplied valuable insights into the world of creative leadership. We'd love to hear your thoughts and feedback, so please feel free to reach out to us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn at Schmidt Associates.

Sarah: Until next time, keep navigating the unknown with creativity and confidence.