Robert Mandelbaum, Hotel Researcher and Consultant, interviewed by Lan Elliott

Robert’s career shows what happens when passion, self-knowledge, and service converge over time. He found his niche in hotel data and leaned into it fully - building tools that transformed how the industry benchmarks performance. His advice: follow what energizes you, surround yourself with people you can learn from, and show up for your network the way you hope they will show up for you. Do that consistently, and the rest tends to take care of itself.

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

Lan Elliott 0:00

Hello and welcome to its Personal Stories, the podcast dedicated to empowering personal success in the hospitality industry. Today I am very pleased to have Robert Mandelbaum here with us. He recently retired from an incredible 40 year career in our industry, and he continues to make huge contributions. I am delighted to have him on. Welcome, Robert.

Robert Mandelbaum 0:27

Thank you so much, Lynn. Happy to be here.

Lan Elliott 0:31

I know you've had a very interesting career journey. You have done so many things in our industry. Could share some of the inflection points in your career and if there was a particular factor that contributed to your success.

Robert Mandelbaum 0:45

Yeah. Three things come to my mind. I guess the first was, getting into Cornell University to be able to study hotel administration. I grew up in a family that traveled and it became a passion of mine and then I learned, hey, you can actually get a degree in this. Having the opportunity to spend four wonderful years, getting my college degree in hotel administration was certainly started me off on the right foot and a great foundation started off in hotel operations, but say the next inflection point was. My college roommate gave me a call three years after graduation and said, you're in Memphis and the company I'm working for, panel Ker Forster needs a new rookie consultant in the Memphis office. It is something you're interested in. And so I got the job with Panel Ker Forster, and that was my first exposure to the real estate and finance side of the industry, learning about hotel ownership. When you're in operations, you're. So focused on revenue generation and food cost and labor cost, and, making a gross operating profit. But, below GOP there's things like property taxes, insurance, and debt service, and I didn't know anything about that. So that was a great exposure and spent the majority of my career thereafter dealing with clients on the, owned and operated hotels. Then that third inflection point was, again, during my journey within PKF. Yeah, I started out doing as a consultant, doing feasibility studies. Appraisals, had a great appreciation for the data provided by our research department, and in 1993, an opportunity came up to. Head up the research department within PKF and manage all the databases and the wonderful annual trends in the hotel industry. Survey of hotel p and l statements. And I think at that point in time I found my true self of being a hotel data nerd.

Lan Elliott 2:36

And we're gonna talk a little more about it, you have done so much in your career. What do you think was a secret to your success?

Robert Mandelbaum 2:47

Two things. Number one, a passion. Like I said before, our family traveled a lot and we just, grew up staying in Holiday Inns and Howard Johnson's and Quality Inns, and I thought those were the coolest places in the world. So I just always had a passion for it and I think when you follow your passion and you just. Succeed. And then the second is developing a network. Along the 45 years I was in the industry, I just made so many connections and friendships, either people, I went to school with, people I worked with clients and they're all in the hospitality industry. And as hotel people are just people. And so there, there's a warmth. There's the shared passion, there's communication. There's. To be of service to others and you know that being of service to others, I did it for my network contacts and in turn they did it for me and I think that helped me be successful in my career.

Lan Elliott 3:48

You touched on the importance of the network, and one of the things I really love about this industry is that people tend to stay in hospitality for. Maybe their entire careers for me, for you, our entire careers, and the people that you work with end up becoming friends. They're not just colleagues, and because hospitality is such a relationship business. Could you talk a little bit about how you built your network? Because your network was a big part of what made the trends report so powerful and you spearheading building the trends report into what it's become. But that couldn't have happened without your network and I wonder if you could share how you developed it and any advice for people looking to build a strong network.

Robert Mandelbaum 4:40

Yeah. As I mentioned before, the, it came from sort of buckets of places I either went to school or worked with. My Cornell Alumni network, my Holiday Inn Network, my P-K-F-C-B-R-E network. And then, we'll touch on later, but the trade associations and other philanthropic organizations. Become active in just meeting people, talking with them, becoming friends and as I mentioned before, it's being of service. They were my clients, they were my colleagues. I would assist them with data or knowledge or market information. And then when I took over the trends in the hotel industry survey in 1992 and I, knock on people's doors and pick up the phone and ask them would they contribute to the survey, would they share with us that confidential e and l data? And, it was like, okay, you did a favor for me, I'll do a favor for you. But there, there are also favors with benefits, that I think. The services we provided at PKF and CBRE to our clients were of great value to them. And they, in turn saw the value of participating in the, voluntary complimentary survey, which, did provide the industry with an opportunity to benchmark hotel revenues, expenses, and profits. It's just, it sounds so simple, but it's just being kind, being of service to your fellow colleagues in the hospitality industry.

Lan Elliott 6:04

Yeah, it does take some intentionality to maintain friendships, right? It's one thing to meet someone at a cocktail party or at school, but it's quite something different to continue those relationships rather than just waiting until the next time you run into them.

Robert Mandelbaum 6:20

I was a bit old school. Yeah, I'd come back from the conferences with amount of business cards and the very next day I'd either write a letter, make a phone call, send an email. Follow up with them, Hey, we discussed this, do you have a need for information on this market? Happy to provide it. And a year later, I need something and I feel free to call them up. And most people in this industry are happy to reciprocate.

Lan Elliott 6:45

Yeah. I love that idea of coming back with the business cards and. Did you take notes? How in the world do you remember what you talked about with everybody? Give us the strategy, Robert.

Robert Mandelbaum 6:57

Yeah. I don't know if people on this blog could cast, could conceive my gray hair, but it was back in the day when I would literally write on each business card or on the back thereof. This person needs information on the Memphis market. This person needs information on labor costs. And that's, how I remembered what the connection was. It was a little bit old school back then. We didn't have cred business card readers that would automatically put it into a a formal database where you could sort and such. That obviously came about later in my career. But it was just, being a people person. And a lot of us in the industry are people.

Lan Elliott 7:33

Yeah, I still use that technique actually. There's still some business cards floating around. I do think that's one of the downsides of just digitally downloading someone's card I love making notes of this is where I met them, or something to follow up and just have a conversation point.

Robert Mandelbaum 7:50

Along those lines, it's funny how you offer someone a business card these days. And they don't know what to do with it because, send me your LinkedIn or let's tap our iPhones together and share network information. So it's a, it's different, the basis is still the same. Get their information, but the importance is still following up.

Lan Elliott 8:09

I love that. Let's talk a little bit about personal brand, because people talk about it a lot these days. And you've had a very specific way of developing your personal brand, which you touched on which is being helpful and connecting people. How would you describe your brand and how did you create it?

Robert Mandelbaum 8:30

Yeah, it's funny 'cause in general I think I'm a humble person, but hey, we all have an ego. I think it really started again when I got into the research side and the data side. I was given more opportunities to present at industry conferences or in classrooms and write articles. And I, wonderful opportunity. I had 35 years of a monthly article on lodging magazine. Focusing on the data in our trends in the hotel industry database. And, for 35 years I was writing about revenues, expenses, and profits, and that was not as ubiquitous as it is today. Back then it was still OC a DR, rev par. Now people are talking about GOP and ebitda, which I think is great. So yeah, I think through reading and through listening to me, it presented conferences. I developed a reputation of knowing something about hotel financial statements. I had the great honor and pleasure of serving on. The committee that developed three different versions of the uniform system of accounts. So I developed another strong network there and knowledge base. So I think if you combine all those factors it just led, to my brand being someone that knows about the hotel financial statements and I'm very happy with that. And again, I'm passionate about it. So I think that comes through and it's something I enjoy. Boy, you really need to enjoy your job.

Lan Elliott 9:53

Yes.

Robert Mandelbaum 9:54

So I was very fortunate.

Lan Elliott 9:56

It makes it a lot easier if you really love what you do and the way you've impacted how I've worked in my career between the trends report and. I'm gonna date myself, but when I started, there was no data to go pull other people's occupancy in a DR. You had to go interview general managers and the world has completely transformed now and also. When you're building a proforma, trying to figure out how much is a hotel worth having other similar hotels, p and ls is really important, but everyone does their numbers differently, slightly differently, unfortunately. So having that uniform system of accounts, which says, this is the way we present numbers in the hospitality industry, and having that. Baseline for everyone to do their numbers in the same way, at least most of the big companies really has helped all of us in the industry be better at understanding how are we performing against others. And none of that would've happened if it wasn't for you others who've been so passionate about this work and continuing to evolve the industry over time. So thank you so much. You're welcome for doing that. Welcome.

Robert Mandelbaum 11:10

Thank you.

Lan Elliott 11:12

I wanted to move to navigating change because one of the things I love to do is talk to people that are at a pivot point in their careers, and you've shaped so much of our industry over the years, and now that you're in a new chapter, what are you excited to focus on next?

Robert Mandelbaum 11:33

Yeah again, I keep on using that one word again, passion. And as we were talking before this, now that I'm, in retirement mode I get to intentionally choose what it is that I focus on. And for me it. That inner hotel data nerd comes out again. So I'm still very active with things related to hotel data and information. I'm active in the HFTP organization, which is the owner of the uniform system of accounts for the logic industry. I serve on the communications subcommittee with some very talented people, and right now it's our mission to educate the industry. On the implementation of the new 12th edition of the Uniform System of Accounts. So that, that takes up a lot of my time, again, working with others to answer questions from the industry. I'm still passionate about our shared alma mater Cornell University and universities in general. To date I. Updating someone today. I've presented at three different universities so far through the first quarter of my retirement. I always enjoy speaking to the next generation and the students. I benefited so much from professors and mentors and I just love giving back from that perspective and teaching. I think educating, teaching, sharing some of the knowledge I have. That's I get to focus on, and again it's something I enjoy and it keeps me in the roots of the industry. I, I still wake up, read a lot of those online industry newsletters to keep current and then, shape or share with the industry that knowledge that I do have regarding a hotel p and l.

Lan Elliott 13:07

Yes, we are very lucky you have the bandwidth to be able to do that and also to share with the next generation. So thank you. Thank you for doing that. I wanna dive deeper into giving back. Because as we've touched on, you've been evolved in a myriad of industry related groups. Donating your time, your connections, your expertise to better our industry. Could you share some of the advantages or lessons that you've learned through that work?

Robert Mandelbaum 13:37

Yeah. First and foremost it is the notion of giving back. I benefited so much from my college education. I benefited from having a boss that encouraged me to get active in the Hotel Convention and visitors bureau and the hotel association and organizations like HFTP and H and la. And you do that and you learn. I think you need to get out of that routine and that's why I love going to conferences and, hearing other people and other opinions. You learn, I have a wonderful, or had a wonderful database to look at every day and, develop my own thoughts. But you need outside perspectives. And I think, conferences and learning meant a lot to me. I'm happy to in turn share that. And the other is just, philanthropic need. I'm thinking about, shad, she has a deal group of which CBRE was a supporter. I was able to work with some of the. Young women who are learning how to develop and own hotels in terms of how to formulate that pro formula. They were given the challenge of doing market analysis and had to do financial projections and that, they were given access to our database and I would guide them in terms of how to forecast revenues and expenses and profits going forward. I'm involved in another group now that's intentionally work or working with universities to intentionally diversify their student bodies, just, with more diverse student bodies and more diverse people graduating with degrees in hospitality, that just opens up the potential pool for future leaders, and then we'll diversify the C-suite. Later on with people that have education and degrees in hospitality. I enjoy those. As much as I enjoyed my professional work. Sometimes those extracurricular activities and philanthropic work provided just a little bit extra in terms of joy.

Lan Elliott 15:27

I love the extra joy and also the idea of it gives you an opportunity to. Cast a wider net and learn from more different people. I'm curious, in one of the areas that you work in, you work with high school students talking to them about careers and hospitality. I'm gonna throw you a curve ball and ask you what's something that surprised you when you've spent time with the high school students?

Robert Mandelbaum 15:54

I, I think, and the industry in general does suffer. From people perceiving hotels as a bit of a service industry. And you know what? Not all people are cut out to be service people, and that's fine. I think, one of the things, I always guide people on is know yourself. Know what your strengths and weaknesses are. I don't wanna wait on tables, I don't want to carry bags, and that's fine, but you know what, there's still some students that come up to that booth and go. Boy, our family travels a lot and I love staying at that resort hotel. Or we always go skiing in the winter or when we visit my grandma, we stay at this little motel and they have a kitchen and we could cook in it. And, flow with that passion, you can actually have a career in that industry and it's a wonderful career and it. It's, I know there are a lot of high school students that maybe they go up the food and beverage route, they'll have a job at fast food. They get a hankering for the f and b side of it. They watch tv, they see celebrity chefs. So I think, there, there are some students that before age 18, like myself, possibly decided that this is the industry I wanna be in, and they're fun to talk to. And then you can sit there and say again I found. There's many opportunities for you to get a college degree in the area, and then recruiters come on campus and you can have a wonderful, professional career in the industry after that. So it's, you sometimes can convert a high school student, it's really finding those that, ah, I didn't know I could actually get a college degree in this and making sure they have the opportunity to follow that path.

Lan Elliott 17:30

Yeah, that's wonderful. I wanted to stay on working with younger people, but also building high performing teams because in your career, a big part of leadership is developing high performing teams, and you've done that quite a few times over the course of your illustrious career. What is one thing you look for when you're interviewing a potential candidate?

Robert Mandelbaum 17:54

Yeah, first of all, lemme take one step backwards, and I don't know if it was at Holiday Inns or when I was with BKF, I attended a management training program and they really said, again, know yourself, know what type of manager you are, and I'm not a person who can beat people with a stick. In fact I had a six month stint as a food and beverage director at a small Holiday Inn. And I was horrible 'cause I needed to sit there and, make sure people punched the clock and didn't waste food and, served people properly and followed rules and regulations. I just wasn't good at it. So then they put me back in the accounting office and I started to flourish. So I know when I'm building a team, when I'm hiring people, I need. I guess what are called mature workers and that not aged, mature, they have a good work ethic, they're self-starters. They'll tackle a problem, but they'll also know when to stop and ask for assistance. Because, and again, people that are passionate about it and that's, those people I'll manage better and those people will thrive in my team and. I've been very fortunate that working at PKF and CBRE there, there were a lot of people that I worked with for 10, 15, 20 years and we, we built a good team along the way and, we, we adapted to change when needed and we advanced careers and some people left the team, but they left for good reasons to, move on to bigger and better things. So I think it's, again, just knowing yourself what type of manager you are. And surrounding yourself with people that you know you can bring the best out of, and they'll thrive under you, and your team will thrive together as a whole.

Lan Elliott 19:40

That is really incredible advice to really start with yourself and know who's going to work well with you and who won't. And being honest about, you can't manage every single kind of person and looking for that right team member. Thank you for that. Yeah,

Robert Mandelbaum 19:56

and also, the old cliche is surround yourself with smart people. Especially in an area of technology I've been fortunate to, with data, we've needed strong technology professionals on our team and, I listened to them. I feel like sometimes I report to them, but I have confidence in them and they've succeeded. And I did not feel compelled to be the person that had to approve everything they did. I had a confidence enough in them to take their advice and go with their decisions.

Lan Elliott 20:24

I particularly love being the person in the room that can learn the most from everybody else. Yes. That's one of my favorite things is just being surrounded by people I can learn from. So I love that call out. I wanted to switch over to talking about champions and mentors and how important is it to find these people? How does one go about it? Have they helped your career?

Robert Mandelbaum 20:51

Yeah. Mentors have been very important to my career and career growth and if I think back, most, if not all have been bosses and I think they're bosses that, it's the reverse of what we just talked about. Being a team leader, they're a good enough team leader that they let me thrive and build. They give me great knowledge, but they also let me sink or swim, and I think I fall into that category of a mature employee with a strong work ethic and a self-starter. And they just let me run with it. But I learned from their knowledge like I said, my first boss at PKF strongly encouraged me to get active in the local hotel association and Convention of Business Bureau, which is, where I started to go, my professional network making presentations. I've had other bosses who are industry. Leaders and showed up at all the conferences, and I'd see them on stage and, I'd follow their route and say, okay I need to be on that stage eventually, someday. So I think it's, I've been very fortunate to work with some very knowledgeable, passionate bosses. That I proved myself to them. They gave me the leeway to do things and experience things and. Client contact too, it was from Hamilton. Be in the room where business is getting done or they let me sit in the room with the clients, attend that hotel association board meeting attend that business administrative board meeting and get exposure. So I think they, once they trusted me, they gave me access. To environments that then prepared me for growth in the future.

Lan Elliott 22:35

I think it's so important to give younger people a chance just to be the fly on the wall, to be in those rooms to see how it's done. Yeah. So that one day when it's you that's in the room, you have a sense of how it's supposed to go. And just watching the more senior people, how they're operating, how they're handling things. And I think that's such a gift when you can do that for younger people who are coming up and really get a sense of where they could go in the future.

Robert Mandelbaum 23:03

Yes.

Lan Elliott 23:06

I wanna talk about what it takes to distinguish oneself. You've hired a lot of young people in our industry who are now out there working. What do you think is required for a young person to distinguish themselves in advance in their career? And it could be a mid-level person, it might not be, just young people. Yeah.

Robert Mandelbaum 23:28

I hate to sound like we're repetitive, but. N knowing yourself, knowing your strengths and weaknesses, knowing what you're passionate about, because as you said before, when you're passionate about something you tend to work that much harder and your output is, higher quality. My advice when I go back on campuses or counseling people mid-career is you're gonna spend a lot of time at work. So you better enjoy it. I've been fortunate I worked the, 43 outta 45 years in the industry with one company. Along the way there've been different environments and people's and offices that were less enjoyable than others. And during those times when it wasn't as enjoyable, it dragged down the rest of my life outside of work. So for me, enjoy the people you work with. Enjoy the, tasks that you're given. Enjoy your clients. And that's just gonna make life in its entirety better. So to distinguish oneself, again I, I wasn't very good at food and beverage, but boy, when I went into that hotel accounting office and got to play with my 13 column spreadsheet and 10 key and play with data, I was, high on the hog, as they say. And it just fell from there. When I, any chance I had with data I just performed better. And I think that's what led to that distinguishing characteristic.

Lan Elliott 24:54

I love the finding your joy. That's wonderful.

Robert Mandelbaum 24:57

Yep.

Lan Elliott 24:58

Well, Robert, we're coming to the end of our conversation and I've got two final questions that I like to ask all of my guests. And the first one is probably my favorite question at its personal stories, is what advice would you give to your younger self? What would you want? 22-year-old. Robert graduating from the hotel school to now.

Robert Mandelbaum 25:20

Yeah. It probably goes even earlier than 22 years. I always tell myself, if you had to live life over again, what would you do? And I'm very fortunate that for most of my life I've had a lot of joy reading, my mother was a librarian. My sister and my father would check out library books and I wasn't never a big reader. I'd read periodicals. I read every hotel newsletter that there is. But I, yeah, I think broadening my reading would've broadened my knowledge about things outside the hotel industry. Maybe I was a little too hotel centric in my life. Other personal things being more mindful, within the moment. You are, as you mentioned before, there's a lot of conversations that go on in the industry and, rather than thinking ahead to the next question or. Where's this gonna lead? Or I need to get to that four o'clock appointment. Be in the moment now and pay attention to the person that's talking to you. 'cause you're gonna learn from them more and you're gonna remember their name. And in this industry, boy, remembering the name is so important. And I think anything to remember names I would've loved any tricks and trades that, that people would've come up with and helped me there. Reading being more mindful and better name retention,

Lan Elliott 26:41

that is wonderful advice I would've loved that advice when I was 22 as well. Robert, you shared so much of your amazing wisdom and I so appreciate. You sharing how you had this amazing 40 plus year career in our industry. Do you have any final advice for our audience who are looking to advance their careers?

Robert Mandelbaum 27:08

Do what you like, know yourself. What is it that you enjoy? And as we said before, you're gonna spend a lot of time at work, so you might as well enjoy it. 'cause when you're enjoying. Work, then everything else seems to fall in place. I think the hospitality industry is wonderful and it's all about the people and it's having relationships. It's having a network and boy, what a great opportunity. It is to succeed in hospitality and travel and have fun.

Lan Elliott 27:40

Absolutely. That is wonderful advice. So thank you so much, Robert. Thank you for not just this interview, but for everything you've contributed to our industry. Your time and hospitality is not over yet, but in the time you have spent, you have transformed the way we think about our industry, the way we look at our industry, the way we look at the future in our industry. So thank you for all you've done and all you continue to do for us.

Robert Mandelbaum 28:09

You're welcome and thank you for the importation to participate.

Lan Elliott 28:13

Absolutely. And for our audience, if you would like to see more wonderful in interviews with industry leaders, I hope you'll go to our website. It's personal stories.com.