Market Crash, Meaningful Leadership + Resiliency with Ayumi Otaki (Part 1)

Grief and grit sit side by side today. We start by remembering Dr Molador and the imprint he left through his work, his humour, and the community around this show, then we turn to a story that captures what “reignite resilience” looks like in real life when the ground shifts under you.

Our guest, Ayumi, is an executive managing director at Corcoran, supporting agent success across Brooklyn and Queens. Her journey starts with a global family story, growing up in San Francisco after being born in France, then taking a leap to New York City in February 2008 with a suitcase and $1,000. The timing could not have been tougher: the market crash, layoffs, and the sudden feeling that the “city of opportunity” had gone quiet. Ayumi walks us through the mindset behind her pivot into real estate, how mentorship changed her confidence, and why moving toward what your heart wants can unlock momentum you can’t predict.

We also dig into leadership and personal growth: imposter syndrome, managing people with more experience than you, and the surprising strength that comes from admitting what you don’t know. Then the conversation gets even more real as Ayumi shares burnout after the post-lockdown real estate surge, the grief of losing her father, and an early breast cancer diagnosis. She explains why finishing treatment is not the finish line, how healing and integration unfold afterward, and the small daily rituals that helped her come back to herself. If you care about resilience, burnout recovery, women in leadership, real estate career lessons, and mental health tools that actually fit into a workday, you’ll take something practical from this.

The Quiet Gift: A Journey of Self Worth and Resilience is now available for download as an audible.  Check it out!

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:06

All of us reach a point in time where we are depleted and need to somehow find a way to reignite the fire within. But how do we spark that flame? Welcome to Reignite Resilience, where we will venture into the heart of the human spirit. We'll discuss the art of reigniting our passion and strategies to stoke our enthusiasm. And now here are your hosts, Natalie Davis and Pamela Katz.

Welcome Back With Natalie And Pam

SPEAKER_03 0:41

Welcome back to another episode of Reignite Resilience. I am your co-host, Natalie Davis, and I'm so excited to be back with all of you today. And of course, joining us is the co-host Pam Cass. Hello, Pam, how are you?

Remembering Dr Molador

SPEAKER_02 0:53

I am good, and I will share the sad news with our listeners because I believe on our last podcast we asked everyone to send uh prayers out for Dr. Molador, who was going through cancer, has been going through it for a while, and he did end up passing away last week. So just yeah, just kind of a bummer. I mean, he's been in my life for a couple of years, and he was such, he was one of my favorite podcast guests. I mean, it was, I think it was like a it was like a four-parter. I think we were with him for a couple of hours.

SPEAKER_03 1:25

We went on for a little bit, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:27

A lot about the brain and and all of that. And he just had such a great sense of humor all the way up until the end. So he will be missed, but he he left his little imprint on everyone. And he's yeah, and he's going to live in our podcast and other things that he's done that are going to be out there for forever. So yeah, pretty well.

SPEAKER_03 1:49

Absolutely. It's so interesting. He's one of those individuals where my only connection to him was through the pod. And then my Facebook feed was like just flooded with people that were just sharing memories and their condolences and their thoughts to the family. So our condolences going out to his wife. I know that she's kind of navigating everything, it sounds like, and and those that that were close to him.

SPEAKER_02 2:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:12

Yeah. Thank you for giving us an update on that.

SPEAKER_02 2:14

And yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So not not fun, but so grateful to be here because I love what we do because we do get to create these moments where we're leaving little imprints, you know, sharing people's stories, inspiration, uh, tools and tricks and all the things, and building a community that's bigger and bigger. And what I know you've learned and I've learned over the years is the bigger your sphere is, the more people you know, you have more of these things that happen. Because sometimes we have little little bubbles of people, but once you start to meet more and more and more people, it does happen more often. But so blessed that it is uh continuing to grow because I have benefited from all of these incredible relationships that we've gotten to have over the years.

SPEAKER_03 2:58

Exactly. Exactly. Oh my gosh. Well, changing directions. Um joining us. I know that's okay. Well, I like to say, so today has been like my day of take twos. I keep saying, I'm like, we're gonna just do take two because, like, what is happening? Just in terms of how the day started. But I don't think we need to take two. I definitely want to spend some time and spend a few moments remembering Dr. Marlover and his impact. But we do have a guest that's joining us today with an amazing story that I'm excited to dive into and hear. So why don't you tell our listeners who's joining us?

Introducing Ayumi And Her Work

SPEAKER_02 3:31

I am too. Okay, so today I'm so excited. We have Ayumi. She is the executive managing director of Corcoran, overseeing growth and agent success across Brooklyn and Queens, including the Williamsburg and Long Island city offices. With 14 years at Corcoran Group and over a decade in management, she is known for her collaborative leadership, hands-on mentorship, and holistic approach to helping agents build thriving, value-driven businesses with a global background and a foundation in hospitality. Ayumi brings strategic insight, heart, and entrepreneurial expertise to everything that she does. So excited to have you with us today. And I'd like to kind of hand it over to you because I'd love to hear. I know you were born in Europe. And so you've come to the United States. And where did you grow up and what brought you to the New York area? And all right.

Moving To NYC In 2008

SPEAKER_01 4:30

Well, first off, thank you for having me, ladies. Very honored to be on your podcast. I hope that I can bring something that I can share with everyone today. And thank you for fostering this kind of community. I think it's so important that we have a place to speak and to share our stories. So, yes, I was born in France. Both my parents were immigrants. My mother immigrated to the United States from France, and my father from Japan. They met in San Francisco, where I was then raised. And after college, when I was 25 years old, I packed a suitcase, took$1,000, and moved to the Big Apple in February of 2008, which, if everybody remembers, 08 in New York, shortly thereafter Lehman Brothers happened and the entire collapse of the market. So, needless to say, it was a very fascinating, fascinating time to land in New York City.

SPEAKER_02 5:22

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_03 5:23

Yeah, that's that's quite the descriptor for it. I'm sure everyone had lost it at that point.

SPEAKER_01 5:29

The whole city, like literally just fell into a depression. And even if you weren't from New York, you could feel it. You know, as a 25-year-old college graduate, I was like, great, I have a diploma in hands, I'm gonna find a job after having worked in hospitality to pay for school throughout my college years. And it was very bad. There was no work, people that I knew that had master's degrees couldn't find jobs. I mean, it was a real test of resilience, I think, for New York in that moment. But you could feel just the cloak across the city because so many people unfortunately had been laid off. The restaurants that I was working in at the time, I had two jobs, went from two jobs to no job, kind of hit a crossroads of okay, what do I what do I do next?

The Pivot Into Real Estate

SPEAKER_02 6:17

Yeah. So how did you survive that? So you move across the country, not like just to the next state, like country.

SPEAKER_01 6:25

It's ultimately how I pivoted into real estate. You know, I kind of went back to the drawing board of just okay, what do what do I do next? This wasn't the the landing that I was expecting in New York, because you know, you always hear about New York City from anywhere in the country, and it's the city of opportunities and dreams. Um you're a new graduate, you're invincible, right? Like it's against your degree, you're like, okay, I studied liberal arts. Hopefully that'll get me somewhere. And I thought about going back to school and getting a master's, which even that seemed kind of daunting because people that I knew at the time that had a master's degree were not finding work. And then I remembered this young man in San Francisco who had moved to San Francisco and in our French community and in a year bought condos and opened a nightclub. And I remember being 21 years old and running up to him being like, What did you do? And he's like, I got my real estate license. So that was kind of the seed idea that then turned into me doing my research and seeing, oh wow, I could go and take this license course. It's only a few hundred dollars. What's the worst thing that can happen if it doesn't work out? And you know, I think when you move towards something that your heart desires, things tend to start falling into place for you. I also believe that when you're moving away from what is your heart desires, you get a lot of obstacles. So, all of that to say I got my license. I was with a friend one day dropping off a Vespa in a garage, and the owner of the garage said, Oh, what do you do? And I said, I just got my license. And he said, I work around the corner at Corcoran. I'll send your resume to my manager. And ultimately I walked into Corcoran with you know all my hospitality experience on the resume and was so nervous. And the manager at the time was from San Francisco, and he looked at my resume and said, You're from San Francisco. I'm from San Francisco. The rest is kind of history. I've actually been at Corcoran now, going on 16 years this April. And yeah, I really I was determined to see if this was for me. And so for those first two years, I just gave it 111%. And then I told myself I would give myself two years to see if this was for me, and I found that I loved everything about this industry. So that started my long, my long chapter here at Corcoran.

SPEAKER_02 8:52

Yeah. Well, and I love it because you started in real estate when the market was like 100%. Everyone told me I was crazy.

SPEAKER_01 9:00

Yeah. The worst time to get in, are you crazy? You're getting into real estate. You know, I think you and real estate in particular is dynamic in that sense. It really gives you back what you put into it. And I believe that wholeheartedly with all things in life. Like it's the energy that you show up with, it's how you come to the table, and it's, you know, if you are passionate about something that you want to try that you don't even know, or something that you want to do, you anchor into that energy. And that then shows up daily in how you show up. It's definitely an engaged, active way of being versus just passive and giving 50%. We all have, you know, I think from zero to a hundred percent our abilities. So it's tapping into, okay, I I want this. Let me give this a hundred percent and then see where I land. But I was blessed to find Corcoran. It's a phenomenal company with phenomenal people. I got a lot of support and training. I was taken under a lot of people's wings in the beginning, which I'm very grateful for.

SPEAKER_02 10:05

That's lovely. I love what you said about when you're moving towards something that your heart desires, things happen for you. And when you're moving against what your heart desires, all these obstacles, almost like signs, like start coming in front of you. So I love that.

SPEAKER_01 10:20

Yeah, I I believe that. And I think it's about, you know, finding your flow and kind of connecting. I think we all have intuition inside of us that knows what our heart desires, something that we want to accomplish. We might sometimes be afraid to reach for that or afraid to even acknowledge that intuition. But you're, I think your your body, your spirit, your mind knows the things that you want on some level. And so it's getting quiet enough to kind of tap into that and think about what it is you really want and creating a roadmap then to get there.

Mentors That Change Your Path

SPEAKER_02 10:54

Now, when you were doing the real estate, did you kind of have this passion for leading people, or was that something that organically happened over time, or what did that look like?

SPEAKER_01 11:05

That was definitely something that happened organically over time. So I started as an agent with the company and was an agent for four years. My San Francisco manager moved back to the Bay Area, and I was trained by Lee Guadwin, who was my mentor, my right hand. She really helped me see beyond my own beliefs of what I could accomplish, because we all come into things with insecurities and our own, you know, self-limiting beliefs, so to speak. She really helped me believe that I could be successful and that I could create success. And that belief factor was a big part of it. She was then promoted in 2014 to headquarters and suggested at the time that I fill her very big shoes. So, four years in, I stepped into a leadership role with the team that for me they had been my mentors and the people that I had looked up to. And I was kind of thrown to the coals with a new amazing mentor, Frank Priseppe. He was my mentor after that. So the leadership was definitely something that evolved over time and was even that year of my life, and I know we're kind of talking about resilience here. In 2014, my family had gone through some health issues. And so it was a time where I was very uh emotionally disconnected from work. I was, you know, like when we have someone in our family that's sick, you just you kind of emotionally tap out and check out from your work. You're there, but it becomes more mechanical. And I got to the end of one of my family members being sick, and I was like, okay, I'm gonna take some time off. I I need to go reset, I need to figure out what I'm doing, where I'm at. I just had my best selling season while having my most heart-wrenching experience at that age, and the management position appeared. And it was like, okay, I had to call my best friend. She's like, just do it. You can always change your mind later. So it kind of appeared for me and was everything that I had been looking for intuitively, but at the time wasn't totally connected to and didn't realize that I wanted to build something, I wanted to create something. I always knew I wanted to help people, but it came at one of, you know, it came at one of the most unexpected moments and completely unplanned. But again, sometimes I think there's also, you know, energies out there that want you to go in a specific direction and the doors open and you have to decide in that moment, okay, do I walk through the store or do I hesitate and I'll thank my best friend for this? She was like, just jump. Do it. So I jumped. Best decision ever. But it was definitely, you know, I just gotten acclimated to sales, and now I was kind of back to the drawing board of being green again and learning from the ground up. But again, had amazing mentors and support around me that really helped me.

SPEAKER_03 14:02

That's fabulous. Ayumi, you talk about like have graduating and having this liberal arts degree and going to the big Apple, right? And you're and you're living this life. And then you step into the world of entrepreneurship and all the while, and like building this business, right, as an entrepreneur, as an as an independent practitioner, and life is happening along the side. I think that's the important piece that people often dismiss is that life is happening parallel to you building, you growing, and then you step into leadership, which is a whole nother change because now you're working for the organization and going back into the structure of systems and processes and actual goals, not the, you know, the creative goals that independent contractors often set for themselves. So, what was that transition like for you going back into like the structured role of being a leader versus, you know, kind of the free will of an independent contractor?

Asking For Help As Strength

SPEAKER_01 14:55

It's a great question. They're very different, but I think they're also very similar because I learned through one when I was an agent as an entrepreneur, so much of your mindset and where you're at in your own personal growth are a big part of the work. You can come in and you can learn, for example, in real estate, you can learn the transaction side of the process, you can close deals. But what will actually get in your way is any limiting beliefs that you might have of yourself, any insecurities that you might have. And those can go back decades from something you were told as a child to something you experienced as a teenager. So I think being an entrepreneur really asks you to work on yourself and to do that deeper work of understanding where you're at in your own growth journey. And then management for me, I had always attributed asking for help as a weakness. One of the ways that I've gone through my life was always being hyper-independent, and in my own inner wiring, asking for help or leaning into support was something that subconsciously I connected with being a weakness. And in stepping into management, all of that had to go out the window because I had real seasoned people that needed my help or or that whose trust I was gonna have to earn. And I had to be honest with myself that I didn't know how to manage it, and that the only way I was gonna learn was through my mentor Frank at the time and giving myself permission to lean into the support that he was giving me, and that was a big moment of growth for me in my life of connecting that now to actually being a place of strength, of acknowledging what you don't know and acknowledging the support that's available to you, and that actually leaning into support is absolutely coming from a place of strength and not a place of weakness. And that was a big, big shift. And I was also 30, I think it was like 31 years old at the time, so also very young in the business, young in who I was. But it was a very it contributed to a lot of growth for me of just realizing that there's help around me and that you don't have to do everything on your own. And I think that's something even as women, we also naturally take on. We're like, I got everything, I can do it all. But learning to delegate, learning to lean into support, realizing that there's all this support around you that's there and wants to support you. That was, I think, the biggest significant change that I underwent at that point in my career. That's huge.

SPEAKER_03 17:44

Are you a September Virgo by chance?

SPEAKER_01 17:46

I'm a rising in Virgo. I'm a Libra.

SPEAKER_03 17:48

Yes, you are. Welcome to the club. Welcome.

SPEAKER_01 17:51

Welcome. How did you know?

SPEAKER_03 17:56

We we recognize and accept you. You are welcome here. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 18:00

I am arrived. I am here.

SPEAKER_03 18:03

Well, you know, I think when we talk about leadership, that's an important piece, like recognizing and being honest enough with yourself to say, I don't know what I don't know. Like I have no idea what's in store, especially when you're leading other established individuals and practitioners that have the knowledge, have the expertise, but they still need a leader. And so you're the person that's going to step into that role.

Building A Collaborative Office Culture

SPEAKER_01 18:27

Yeah. Absolutely. I had to really defer to my team. And that was also, I think, one of the paramount things that I learned, at least within the scope of real estate, was coming in so young as the youngest manager on the management team, the youngest person to become a manager after such a short stint in sales. I approached my team more from the angle of let me learn from you. Teach me how you do your business, what's important to you. And I still operate from that place as a quote unquote leader. I actually don't even, I think, in my mind, identify as a leader. For me, I have a team, and we are a team, and we all bring something to the table, and I value every person's opinion and want to know their opinions and know how they do their business and know what matters to them because everyone brings a unique lens to what they do. And there isn't a one roadmap or one way to do things, and I think it's when we collaborate that we actually are more united and are stronger, and that's been one of the pillars that I built this office on was the sharing of information, the collaboration amongst the agents, that we will together. There's a great quote that I love. It's individually, we are a drop, together we are an ocean.

unknown 19:51

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:52

And it's one of my favorites. And I used to send it out to my team all the time because they're independent contractors, so there's a little bit of competition, but truly each one of them brings something amazing to the table. And I figured out early on, like I couldn't be everything to everyone, and that's actually not what people wanted. I'm more of the I think of myself more as like the facilitator in bringing people together, getting them to share the information. And I think it's that concept of just every everybody brings something amazing to the table, and if you can make space for that collectively, we grow. And that's like this podcast, right? Bringing people together and sharing information and sharing knowledge, we can all tap into something that feeds us in some level.

SPEAKER_02 20:36

I love that because you know, at you know, 31 years old, stepping into a leadership position with realtors that have been in business seasoned probably for many, many years, you could easily step into that with that imposter syndrome, and I gotta prove myself, but you stepped into it in a totally different capacity and just like a just let me learn as much as I can from you, which in turn made it a safe space for them to do the same. And yeah, you truly leading by example, which has been wonderful. It was humbling.

SPEAKER_03 21:09

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:10

It probably done is so very humbling. Wow. And you know, you also like, I think as someone who's hyper independent and also driven, you want to know everything. So that's also the humbling part of acknowledging, okay, I don't know, and that's okay. How do I step into learning? How do I commit to the learning? How do I lean into all of that support? And then you got to deal with your own impatience. I've always been impatient. It's like, I want to get there, I want to know it all. But it's I've learned to focus less on, I think, what is the end goal, or as they say in golf, like the eye on the whole, and really just there's beauty in the process, and you can enjoy the process. And actually, if you just focus on the end result, well, then what happens when you get to the end result? You're looking for the next thing versus anchoring in and enjoying each step of the process, even if it means, okay, this is something I don't know. Well, let me enjoy that. Let me put on my discovery hat and be passionate about going to figure this out and learn about it and understand. So I've tried to also anchor into I think being grounded and present in the journey itself.

SPEAKER_02 22:20

Yeah, yeah. Now we know you had a health scare as well during your leadership, I'm assuming. Share with us that story because you know, here you are leading a new team and then you have this come. How did you how'd you navigate that?

Burnout Grief And Breast Cancer

Healing After Treatment Ends

SPEAKER_01 22:36

So I started in management in 2014, and in 2020, as we all know, we went through the pandemic and the lockdown. And we came out of that with the busiest real estate market we have ever seen. I definitely burnt out in 2021 and was just the volume that we were doing, what was needed from my team. I was, you know, not grounded in present. I would say I was overworked. And I also lost my father in 2021, who's living in Japan at the time, where the borders were closed. And a year later, where I had kind of decided I would grieve him once I had a moment to breathe, which I was imagining that would be August 2022, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Unexpected, I will say time is your best friend in any diagnosis, at least that one in particular. We've made amazing leaps in medicine and research. And for all the ladies out there, check, check, check, check yourself, get to know yourself, go and do your mammograms. The timing on that can really make the biggest difference. And I was lucky I caught it very early. And because it was August in New York, I went through the system. I went from getting diagnosed, having surgery, and completing radiation in 98 days, which was like unheard of. I kind of felt like the universe was just like, here, we're gonna push you through this. It was an interesting time. There just, I think because it was August and summer and people were away. And yeah, I also worked through all of that, and that was an interesting it was a decision that I made because I didn't want to personally be too mentally and emotionally in what I was going through. And work was kind of my salvation in that moment. It kept things normal. And I remember finishing radiation and being like, Oh wow, this is done. And a week later going, Oh, it's actually just starting. The process of healing and the process of integration, while the like logistical part was very fast, there's an entire part of healing that comes after. And I think you have to recognize that and actively make space for that in your life. One thing I've learned from I think all the difficult, challenging moments is that I've always found a gift waiting for me on the other side of an obstacle, on the other side of something challenging I went through, on the other side of grief, health issues, reinventing yourself. You know, when you're in the mud, you feel like you're in the mud and all you can see is the mud. But I think what actually gets you through the mud is you believe that there's something amazing waiting for you on the other side of this. You believe that this is, you will learn something from this, you will grow a certain way. And I think when you have that mindset, it then opens you up to whatever it is that you are going to learn from that experience.

SPEAKER_03 25:48

Ayumi, when you say that when you completed the treatment, you realized, oh, this is when the healing actually begins. Is that physically, mentally, emotionally, all of the above? Talk to us a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_01 25:59

For me, I think it was all of the above because there's something about you just go into fighter mode when at least I did. Like you get diagnosed with something and you're like, okay, what do I have to do? And you just put on this, I put on this like warrior coat and was like, okay, I gotta go to this appointment, I gotta do this thing. My radiation treatments, I asked for the 7 a.m. slot. So I was going at 7 a.m. and then coming to the office every day and then going to the bathroom with like, you know, half my chest on fire and putting creams, but it, like I said, the work kind of kept me sane. So you're kind of in this go mode. It's like, I've never run a marathon and I would love to, but I know that you know, people when they run the marathon, they're in marathon mode, and then you have the post-marathon and the how the body feels and the release of everything. You know, it happens so fast, also, you kind of go through something that you weren't anticipating, you weren't expecting. You never think something like that's gonna happen to you, right? We don't walk around the world thinking like that, and then it happens, and there's the aftermath, which I think is the integration. I did have physical changes in my body that I had to deal with that was very challenging. The emotions of it, I kind of went through it all, and I had this six-month period where I was like, wait, everything in my life is still the same. I hear about people going through things and they make all these life changes. What's the message here? And I went through this phase of, am I missing the message? Like I was trying to find the message and I couldn't find it. And, you know, I was very inflamed from all the radiation. I had gained a lot of water weight, and I was just going, like, okay, what's the message? What's the message? I couldn't figure it out. So that was like the emotional kind of mind part. And then I kind of just said, okay, I'm gonna surrender, stop being so controlling. It's that part of us that wants to control, and I'm gonna do the things that I can can control, which is I shifted into creating rituals in my day. Let me add little things to my day that make me feel better, that you know, eating on an alkaline diet, starting to take my time more, and little by little, what I think I personally needed to learn or what I did end up learning unveiled itself once I kind of let go of that need, like to what's the message?

SPEAKER_03 28:22

Okay. First of all, taking the 7 a.m. appointments so that you can get right back into the office to show up for everyone else. I I wish I could say that I'm surprised I'm not, just because we've already connected from the Virgo sense. Did the people around you know what was going on? Did they know that you were in treatment?

SPEAKER_01 28:40

They did. And that was when I called my CEO to ask her to tell her what was going on. That was the first question. Are you telling your team or are you not telling your team?

Final Takeaways And Subscribe

SPEAKER_00 28:49

Thank you for joining us today on the Reignite Resilience podcast. We hope you had some aha moments and learned a few new real life ideas to fuel the flames of passion. Please subscribe on your favorite streaming platform, like or download your favorite episodes, and of course, share with your friends and family. We look forward to seeing you again next time on Reignite Resilience.