Karl Bieberach, SVP & Head of Global Development, Belmond, interviewed by Lan Elliott

Karl's reflections encourage listeners to embrace opportunities that stretch them, even when uncertain, and to trust that growth lives just beyond comfort. He reminds us that failure is temporary and should not define our sense of self, and that preserving relationships matters more than winning every negotiation. Above all, he urges building a reputation rather than a resume, because character, not titles, determines which doors stay open.

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

Lan Elliott 0:02

Hello and welcome to It's Personal Stories. My name is Lan Elliott on behalf of It's Personal Stories, and today I am delighted to have my friend Carl Bieberach on with us. Welcome, Carl.

Karl Bieberach 0:16

Hi, Lan. It's great to see you. It's

Lan Elliott 0:19

always great to see you. I'm always so happy when I see your name pop up on my email, and now to have you on the show is really wonderful. Yeah, thanks Lan. I've had the good fortune of working with you in the past, so I know you've had a very interesting career journey. Could you share some of the inflection points in your very successful career? And if you think there was a particular factor or factors that contributed to your success

Karl Bieberach 0:48

What a great way to start. I think when I look back, I would say, there, there was no big master plan or anything. It was more a result of saying yes to opportunities that I thought would be cool, interesting, somewhat uncomfortable. And that is more or less, have how it, it has all evolved. In terms of inflection points, I think there's been a couple of things that have brought me to where I am. And I think one of them was really to do with my, let's say, curiosity to have an international career. I always thought of myself working abroad and visit, in different cultures and part of that is because of my upbringing. I come from a, multicultural family, and so f- I was always open to exploring all of that, all of the world. And I think one of the other things was when I was a, an intern I was already in the, in, i- in, in the hotel school at Cornell, but I was an intern at the Four Seasons in Mexico City when it was opening. And at that moment, I realized that actually I w- didn't really wanna manage hotels. I didn't wanna run hotels. I actually wanted to stay in hotels. So I started to explore what would be the jobs that would make me stay at hotels like the Four Seasons. And that took me into the path of development, which was, has been always what I've done since I graduated from Cornell. And it has been a wonderful many years now that have taken me to where I'm currently at, at Belmond, which is a bit of a, let's say, culmination of not only my academic training and hospitality, but also my interest in history and preservation art preservation and art international issues and all of that.

Lan Elliott 2:48

So you grew up in Mexico. I know you've worked in the US with Marriott. I don't know who else you've worked with. HBS HBS, great training ground for- Yep for development, hotel real estate. And you also worked at Starwood, which is where we got to work together, and you were a big part of my husband and me coming to Brussels and working in the office with you, and that was one of the joys of being there, was getting to spend time with you and your partner. you've also gone on to live in Asia, and I do wanna dig into that, but I loved what you mentioned about saying yes to opportunities, putting yourself in uncomfortable situations. It wasn't just that the jobs were cool, but you thought they might stretch you. You mentioned curiosity, and I wanted to unpack that because a lot of leaders we talk to say curiosity is a big part of their path. And that's how we learn new things, how we advance our careers. Is there a leadership skill you wish you had learned earlier in your career, and if so, how did you develop it?

Karl Bieberach 3:56

There's many things I would have liked to have learned earlier in my career. I think one of them would be, delegation. I'm pretty good at delegating now, but at the start of my career I wasn't. And I think, at the start of my career I had this idea that, leading or being a leader meant that you would have all the answers and you have to... And this all leads after many years realizing that actually that's not really what leadership is about. It's more about creating the environment for people to find those answers and for you to also be mature enough to realize that many times what you think is the answer is probably not the right answer. So yeah, I would say that, that aspect of, building tru- trusting in others and developing the capacity of just delegating and understanding that it really is about the team and the people that are around you, how you're gonna build something. It's not just, what you think and whether you have the right answers or any of the answers.

Lan Elliott 5:04

Yeah, I think that's such an important call-out, that leadership isn't about having all the answers and creating that environment. But it is really hard when you go from being a high performer based on the work that you've done, that you've executed, to then, as you mentioned, develop that trust and let other people do it. And maybe they'll come up with a way that you hadn't thought of doing it that could be great, but that letting go piece is hard, I think, for a lot of successful people

Karl Bieberach 5:37

I think it certainly is, but I, in my case, one of the things that have taught me to let go has actually been this the fact that I've had to live in different places, right? A lot of it by choice. So when you move to a new place and a country and a company, you're basically starting from scratch. And so you need to learn thing, or you need to unlearn a lot of things that you've learned that, aren't necessarily going to work in that environment. You have to learn to be adaptable and you have to understand what things are really universal and what things aren't. Processes and those things that you learn aren't particularly universal. It's more about the principles, right? So the principles of being fair, of integrity, being f- th- those things are universal, and those can help you adapt easily and, achieve things in different environments. So I think that, that has been a big part of... That has helped me let go and this trial a- and error every time. So I've been fortunate to have that opportunity.

Lan Elliott 6:48

I love that, but I also think you've put yourself in the positions to have that opportunity as well.

Karl Bieberach 6:55

Yeah, I agree. And- I agree because I think some of it is also projection, right? You have to think about what do you imagine that your life is gonna be like. What are you... What are the things you wanna be doing? And there's never really, a, a right or wrong answer. It's, but it's really just about having that vision of yourself and, yeah, what you want things to be like.

Lan Elliott 7:22

I love that, of having that vision. Sometimes we don't see it ahead of us. Sometimes it, comes upon us. In your career you've done so many interesting things, and you don't get to where you are today without taking some risks like you have taken, calculated risks. But how do you prepare mentally to take a chance on something, whether it's moving across the world or going out on a limb on behalf of your company to do a deal that you think is important? How do you think about that?

Karl Bieberach 7:56

There's, a- admittedly, there's been times where, things have been pretty uncomfortable or scary. I think one, one thing that helps is to ask yourself whether, will the experience help you grow? How are you gonna... How is, how are you gonna feel about something at the conclusion of that thing? So you're gonna make a decision about something that, might entail a lot of risk or be super uncomfortable. But try to project ahead of that and think, what are you gonna learn? How are you gonna be better after taking that decision? So I think that, that helps when you have to make these decisions and dealing with risk in general. Because otherwise I think if you are risk-averse, especially in this field of development and this isn't a career where you have to be fearful of risk. Risk is gonna be, with you all the time. And in all of these decisions that you make, the investment risk and all of that. That's what I mean to say. But if you don't make those decisions and if you, then, I don't think that you're gonna, you're gonna, you're gonna miss a lot of fun things,

Lan Elliott 9:06

yeah. You had mentioned development, that area of the industry, investment. You do take risks. You're standing in front of your committee saying, "I think we should do this deal. I think the company should spend this money." And you're risking your company's money, but also a little bit your personal reputation within the company if it doesn't go well. Do you think it gets easier the more often you do it? Where should someone start if they're just not-

Karl Bieberach 9:36

Th- it's a- open to

Lan Elliott 9:36

risk?

Karl Bieberach 9:38

I think it's a good question. I think, naturally the younger or the less experienced you are, the more risk-averse you're gonna be. I think over time with a career and even with life, we all start to understand that we can separate the individual or the identity of somebody from the actual result of something. And, a- and that's, it's something that I think is important. It's a skill or it's a learning that is important because it helps you deal with failure. If if you always s- if you take everything so personal and it's always so y- you feel so, tied to all these decisions or all these things, so every time you fail that's gonna be an absolutely terrible thing for you. And the reality is that in any long career, there are gonna be many times where you fail. And you just cannot let that define you.

Lan Elliott 10:37

It's so true because, even super successful people, we all have setbacks. And it's been said that you learn more when things don't go well than you do when things go perfectly to plan. And I'm curious if you've experienced a setback that taught you a valuable lesson. If you could share that.

Karl Bieberach 11:01

So I've experienced many setbacks, many failures. There's many deals that we don't sign or deals that we sign and never happen for many reasons. I think, you have to y- you have to learn to listen to and read what's happening around you, to surround yourself with good peers. So to, doing a deal, for example, isn't just yourself. You have a team working with you, and you have to learn how to work with them and, have a great lawyer with you or a great architect or a great analyst and have that h- have that ability to have a, a team work together. I think that, it's it, there is a saying that says that, the... What is it? Failure is not forever or, that- And neither is

Lan Elliott 11:52

success.

Karl Bieberach 11:53

Neither is success. So I think you just have to learn that is really how things are gonna be and to surround yourself with the best teammates that you can have and try to learn as much as possible from them and be considerate of what they're thinking, balance it with what you're thinking, and really, hope for the best. So it's, And it, and if it works out, great. If it doesn't work out- Doesn't work out it's often something doesn't work out because of factors that are really, that are not really within your control, and very often those opportunities will come back. So what's important is really that you preserve your relationships with your teammates as well as with, the counterparty, the other owner you may have been discussing something with. And at some point, it's pro- it's possible that s- same opportunity might come back and you'll pursue it and the conditions will be more conducive to success. That, that does happen. I think Richard Branson says that opportunities are like buses. If you miss one, another one is coming around the corner.

Lan Elliott 13:02

I love that sentiment. And I think what you were saying earlier really resonated with me around maintaining the relationships and that being the important part, especially when you do a lot of negotiations, and sometimes it can get pretty tense. But part of it is also remembering that in the end, you want to have a relationship coming out of this, that you might do another deal together. And sometimes fighting to the death is not the goal. Absolutely. This idea of how you handle setbacks, it took me a long time to realize that you're not really judged on the things that happen to you that you can't control. People look at how you handle adversity and how you react to it as sometimes more important than the thing that's happening to you.

Karl Bieberach 13:54

Absolutely. I think that is very true for negotiations, but it's also especially true in, in your i- in the way, let's say, that you behave in, in a work environment in your career. I think this idea of preserving or nurturing relationships is really important because over a long span of a career, we're gonna cross paths with many different people and people will remember how you handled something or how, what you did for them, and that is ultimately one of the most important things that you can do to build your career, is to create that- Network of support that, somebody who may have worked with you or that you worked for years past, you might be meeting again, years in the future. And if that relationship is healthy and it's strong, then that will, that is a tremendous asset to have for your next, your whatever next goal you have to achieve.

Lan Elliott 14:58

Absolutely. Something I could have learned a lot earlier, would have served me well. But it's never too late to learn new things. I wanted to talk about mentors and champions, and how important is it to find these people, how does one go about it? How have your mentors and champions helped advance your career? Because I think when I was younger, I thought my fairy godmentor would come down and find me, and that's not really how the world works. So I'd love your perspective on this.

Karl Bieberach 15:34

I think mentors are essential to a career, and actually not only to a career. Can... We can have mentors in also our personal lives. I think that when it comes to careers, it is essential to form a network of, coaches or mentors that you're gonna look to or that you're gonna rely on as you build your career. I find that most of the time mentors usually appear when you've been... when you demonstrate that you are interested in something or that you're good at something. They don't just... It's not like a fairy, like you were saying. N- it doesn't just appear. It's because you've been investing in something, inv- investing in yourself or a skill or something. And that's when they will come, and that's when that opportunity will arise. And then I think, those p- whoever is gonna be a mentor is gonna be far more inclined to help somebody that they see is investing in being something or in acquiring a specific skill or one of those things. So I also think that for me, mentors, I've had a number of them throughout my career. Most of them have been instrumental in helping me see things I wasn't seeing. So- It wasn't that they found me a job or they opened the door. Actually, to be quite frank, none of them really did that for me. None of these mentors, helped me find my next job. However, they, I have a very specific example. When I moved from Marriott to Starwood I found the job on my own, but I did have a mentor within Marriott. I was nervous about taking the job and leaving a, a job I was perfectly happy with at Marriott to go to Starwood. But this particular mentor made me see how crazy it would be if I wouldn't take the job, just because, he kept saying, "You're gonna move to Europe, you're gonna travel through Europe, and they're gonna pay you for that." He he's like, are you-" If

Lan Elliott 17:36

you wanna stay in hotels, if that was your original goal- Right that's perfect.

Karl Bieberach 17:40

Mentors give you that little push or that, that, that clarity that you may not have because, of all these other things you may be thinking. So yeah, they're essential part.

Lan Elliott 17:52

I also wanted to touch on champions who are a bit different than mentors because these are the people that speak up for you in those rooms that you're not in, where opportunities or promotions are discussed. And I know you've had a number of champions because you're so wonderful to work with. Could you touch a little bit on champions?

Karl Bieberach 18:13

I think that... first of all, I would like to thank all of the people that would have been champions in my career. It is, it, I think it comes down to that relationship bit that we're talking about. So they will be your champion because you've been able to build that relationship with them of trust and, appreciation and sincerity. And it's true, they do become instrumental because if somebody's, is, having your back when a discussion comes around behind closed doors about, promotions or the like, of course that, that can really have a significant influence.

Lan Elliott 18:50

Yeah. Absolutely. We had touched on working internationally, but I wanted to dig a bit deeper into that. And you had mentioned the need to unlearn a lot of things when you go and live in another country. It's not just about cultural competency, it's also about learning how to do business differently and maybe your leadership skills land differently. Are there lessons you learned from working overseas that stick with you today in how you lead?

Karl Bieberach 19:28

I think yes is the answer. And, I have I can think of, in particular for me a big eye-opener i- was working in Asia. So when I moved to work for Rosewood at the time and I had to move to Hong Kong it was a complete transformation of how I, thought of things should be. Not only because of the cultural differences and understanding, all of those subtleties but also understanding in this particular case how a, a private hotel company works how important it is to be, authentic and truly discerning. I was moving from, from a... I, I moved from Starwood to Rosewood and I have had, I've had a great career with Starwood and, learned a lot of things. But I think my m- the first time that I really s- started to grasp what luxury meant was when I moved to Asia. And it came because of the, of not only the company culture at Rosewood, but also the environment in Asia, and the service levels that you have and the cuisines and all of that. And so that has stayed with me and, we've... even though it's a few years now that I moved away from Rosewood, I think it, it was an enormous, opportunity for me to understand how a private company works, what true luxury means and, all of the subtleties of working in a very different culture than your own.

Lan Elliott 21:00

Yeah

Karl Bieberach 21:01

so yeah, that has something that, that I still carry with me.

Lan Elliott 21:06

And I'm sure that understanding, that deep understanding of luxury that you gained also serves you really well in your work with Belmond today.

Karl Bieberach 21:15

Yeah I hope so. I d- And, I've continued to learn, 'cause Belmond is also very different to Rosewood. M- and but I have to say, I, for me, the, my, Let's say if I was to talk about in terms of education, I think my education into luxury really started with Rosewood, and then over time now at Belmond has evolved and, become what it is now. But it's... I'm grateful that I had that opportunity, with Rosewood before I went to Belmond 'cause it, it made it much easier to understand.

Lan Elliott 21:49

Absolutely. Staying with working internationally, what advice would you offer someone who's considering something that feels out of their comfort zone if you were in the shoes of that mentor that you went to see when you were thinking about moving to Starwood?

Karl Bieberach 22:06

I think that it's almost like when when you exercise, and I don't exercise enough, but there's that area of slight discomfort where growth is happening. It's the same when you have an international assignment. So if you f- have some amount of discomfort or doubt about the opportunity, that's exactly what you should be doing. So I'm not saying, say yes to something absolutely crazy that you are completely scared to do. But there is gonna be that opportunity where, you kinda know that maybe, you can do it, but you're not so sure. And that's where I think that, that's the right place to go where I think you're gonna grow without, w- without really e- ending up with something negative. Which is the same with exercise, right? You cannot do something that is gonna tear a muscle. But you have to do it at a level that, it's a slight discomfort, and that's where, where growth is gonna happen. So yeah, if somebody, young w- has that opportunity, more often than not I'm gonna say consider taking it if that's how you feel about it, if you- Yeah if you have that slight discomfort in making the decision. Yeah. Don't wait for everything to be perfect and everything to be ready, 'cause actually that's never gonna happen

Lan Elliott 23:31

that is really true, and I think this idea that we say when we're working out, if it doesn't challenge you, it won't change you- Yeah that is really true when it comes to careers as well.

Karl Bieberach 23:44

Absolutely.

Lan Elliott 23:46

Wanted to move on to self-care because you've had a number of global roles and it requires working in lots of different time zones and flying around the world. And I think for a while when you were at Rosewood, you were commuting from Europe to Asia pretty regularly. What are some of the things that you do to ensure you're performing at your best? And any advice on flying internationally? You need to arrive and be productive.

Karl Bieberach 24:18

So a couple of things. I think understand that traveling west is always better than traveling east. So that is something that will help you cope with with jet lag. But understanding that is not always a choice. I do think that it's important not to overschedule yourself and to leave time to to keep that curiosity alive throughout all that travel, because otherwise it will become tedious. So what do I mean by that? There's gotta be something that, that that interests you beyond just the work that you're doing there. So it could be history, it could be architecture, it could be the cuisine, it could be religion. Whatever it is that is of interest to you beyond the actual business activity should be part of what you do in those trips to keep that curiosity alive and that interest alive so that j- those trips are not tedious, so that you are excited and looking forward to, traveling around and doing something. And by the way, and it's a very enriching it's personally very enriching to do that because you obviously gain so much more knowledge. And it's not just about the work, but it's also about all of the experience that comes with it.

Lan Elliott 25:39

Absolutely. That brought to mind the very first time I was over at your place for a dinner party. You have the most unbelievable collection of serving pieces and platters and bowls, and I asked you about that. I remember, this was decades ago. And you collected them on your travels, and I thought that was such a great expression of embodying all the various places you had been and bringing back a piece of that. And I love the idea of finding a way to memorialize that and the way you did that. Now I'm curious, are you a good sleeper on planes?

Karl Bieberach 26:19

No, I am not. I'm a terrible sleeper on planes. I rarely-

Lan Elliott 26:23

Okay, we share that.

Karl Bieberach 26:26

I rarely fall asleep on a plane. They're... I don't think the seats are well-designed. I think in a... if I could, I would take a career in designing ergonomic seats for airplanes. But I do have to say that I, I've found... I do take a lot of long-haul flights, and one of the things that I started doing to help me cope with the, what can become really boring is re- u- use the time on the plane to do the things that I normally don't have time to do. And I don't mean work. If you need to do work. If you wanna watch a movie. But it's a great t- space to meditate, so I do a lot of that when I'm on the plane. I will meditate. I will think about, different things that are important to me about being... it's a time for me to be grateful or think about, you know- All of the, you know, different people that have done things for me, et cetera. So I use that time to to meditate. It occupies several hours when I'm on a flight. And since I cannot sleep, it is I think, the next best thing that I can do with myself when I, when, while I'm aboard.

Lan Elliott 27:40

I love that. That is great advice. If you can't sleep, to meditate. You're there anyways and-

Karl Bieberach 27:45

Yeah you

Lan Elliott 27:45

have space. Unless you hook up to the internet, you don't have the emails continuing to come in, so it's a great way to do that. Karl, I've so enjoyed our conversation, but we are coming to the end, and I'm wondering, after all the great advice you've shared with us, if you have one final nugget of advice for our audience. Keeping in mind that our mission is around empowering personal success, what would you share with our audience?

Karl Bieberach 28:12

I would say that we need to treat our careers not like a, like a series of quarterly statements where you have to achieve this or that thing. I think the key to having a fulfilling career is to focus on building a reputation. That I think is far more important than building a resume. And why I say that is because, all of those decisions you're gonna make, all of the things h- how you're gonna treat, other people that you work with, all of that is going to be remembered m- much more than, your specific job title or whatever specific deal you may have signed. So I think, yes, the skills that you have are gonna open doors, but the character is gonna determine how many of the door, of those doors will stay open.

Lan Elliott 29:09

That is beautifully said. Great advice I could have used much earlier in my career. But thank you for sharing that with me and with our audience. And thank you so much- Thank you for being on. Wonderful, inspiring interview. I so appreciate you, Carl.

Karl Bieberach 29:25

Thank you, Lynn. It's been a pleasure. Come by and visit.

Lan Elliott 29:29

I plan to, definitely. All

Karl Bieberach 29:32

right.

Lan Elliott 29:33

And for our audience, if you've enjoyed this interview with Carl, I hope you'll go to our website, it's personalstories.com, where you can find many more interviews with hospitality industry leaders.