Leadership Series: Radical Mentor with Cindy Novotny, Managing Partner of Master Connection Associates

Continuing our Leadership Series, we spotlight Cindy Novotny, who earned the “Radical Mentor” moniker for her no-nonsense approach to delivering results in the areas of leadership, sales, and customer service excellence. Having traveled more than 10 million miles over the course of her career, Cindy helps emerging professionals to CEOs to fly past their comfort zone of “we’ve always done it this way” habits and soar to greater heights of success. Get tips and actionable advice from Cindy who wrote – and lives by – the title of her book, “Living with No Balance... and Loving It!: A Simple Guide to Thriving in a Real World of Life and Work.” 

The “Distinguished” podcast is produced by Boston University School of Hospitality Administration.

Host: Arun Upneja, Dean
Producer: Mara Littman, Director of Corporate and Public Relations
Sound Engineer and Editor: Andrew Hallock
Graphic Design: Rachel Hamlin, Marketing Manager

Music: “Airport Lounge" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0

Transcript

Arun: Welcome to the Distinguished Podcast, produced by Boston University School of Hospitality Administration. I'm Arun Upneja, Dean of the School, and today, my guest is Cindy Novotny, also known as Radical Mentor. She's the managing partner of Master Connection Associates, a global consulting firm. Cindy is also the author of Living with No Balance and Loving It! a simple guide to thriving in the real world of life and work, even as a road warrior, and has written a forthcoming book, My Secret to Stamina, on which she also hosts a podcast. So get ready for a high-energy conversation on selling, service, and leadership techniques. Welcome, Cindy, to the Distinguished podcast. We are looking forward to learning from you. 

Cindy: Well, thank you. I'm thrilled to be with you today. 

Arun: Fantastic. Now, I love the Stamina, the simple guide to thriving and balance particularly. We're going to get into that. But to begin with, tell us about Master Connection Associates, your consulting company. You help companies improve their overall performance and increase revenue. So where do you start with new clients on this journey to make changes necessary to improve their sales outcomes? 

Cindy: So, our philosophy is built on the foundation of sales, service and leadership. So build it and they will come does not really work. So you have to know that you have a good foundation in place for whatever product or service you're selling, but then you have to deliver service. So 40% of our business is outside hospitality, 60% is in hospitality. And we build our non-hospitality business based on winning the Ritz-Carlton Malcolm Baldrige Award, working with them during that. And that helped us with that non-hospitality. So if you have the right sales approach, you've got great service, but you have leadership that is able to take it forward. That's how we begin. We do a whole needs assessment and we figure it out and we go in and we help people improve in exactly those three areas. 

Arun: So let's go a little bit deeper into this. What do you find are common themes? What's something an individuals and companies need to undo in their thinking and training to get on a more productive path to achieving their goals? 

Cindy: Well, some just have to get out of their own way. So I find that, you know, there's a double-edged sword here. We love longevity of employees and leaders and, you know, low turnover. That's great. But in some cases, that causes complacency, and it's like, oh, well, we don't have to really change. So what we see as one of the biggest problems is, well, we've always done it this way. This is the way it works. We've always done it this way. And that's what I love about hospitality schools or universities in general is like, even coming out of high school, you know, because I'm working with a lot of high school people to go into being a, you know, plumber or electrician. You've got to open up ideas to get yourself where you want to be three years from now, five years from now. And much of that is stepping back and looking in the mirror and saying, really, whatever got us here today may not take us into the future. That's one of the biggest hurdles we face. 

Arun: Now we have a contrast here. Is there a way that we could fight this and sort of have people there a long time but not be stuck in their ways? 

Cindy: Absolutely. Because again, that's why I called it a double-edged sword. I have people that have worked for me for many, many years and I love that they stay with me because I'm a big believer in people don't leave companies, they leave people. I want longevity. What I don't want is complacency. So I think any organization that has long term people, you have to keep training, you have to get them out of their comfort zone. Maybe they take a course, maybe people like us come in and we tip it upside down a little bit and what we don't want is leadership that says, you know what, we've got this. We've got this, we don't need any help. That's where I find it to be a problem. And that's when people get a little bit complacent because the boss says it's okay, we just keep going that way. Long-term employees are phenomenal. We want them as much as we can. What I don't want them to do is stop learning. Lifelong learning is a must to being innovative and creative. 

Arun: Now you call yourself a radical mentor. Whatever does that mean and how did you get there? 

Cindy: So, I got that name a long time ago. I went to school at University of Iowa and then I started working and I worked for a Weston Hotel way before the days of Starwood and Marriott. I was a young salesperson, and I worked with a team of a toxic, mean girls, they weren't very nice. The boss wasn't that great. I commuted. I was in Southern California an hour on the 405 every day and I was there only nine months, and they all got everybody together and said, we really need to go to the GM, and we have to figure out a way to get rid of this director of sales and marketing and not a good idea as a 23-year-old. So I went along with them, but they all backed out of that meeting, and I was the only one that showed up. The general manager looked at me in the face and said, she's good and you have a personality conflict, so you can either change or leave today. And I said, well, then I'll resign. And he said, well, you can go today. And that was the moment I made sure never would anybody be in charge of my destiny. And so I began to take charge. 

The good news is I got a job immediately with Disney. It was probably the best thing that ever happened. But the best ending of that story is a few years later, they both were gone and Weston brought me back as the Director of Sales and Marketing, and all those same people were there that caused the toxic environment. And I changed that place around to the point that I got Director of Marketing of the Year. And I did it because I was no longer going to just play games. I was a mentor, but I was tough. And that's how I got it. I just believe that you have to be in charge of your destiny and you have to tell the truth. You have to look at each other in the face, give feedback and be honest. And so it's not radical that it's so radical. It just means that very few people have enough grit and guts to do it. 

Arun: Did you change the team? So the team, the existing team was still there when you were appointed the Director of Sales and Marketing. Did you do a lot of turnover and bring in new people or did you manage to change the existing team and they suddenly became much better than what they were before? 

Cindy: So this is the best part of the story. I came in on the first day, the big flowers on the desk, the welcome home, all the same people that caused so much angst, right, were all there except one new person because I had sales, catering, conference services and reservations. So the one person that was brand new that I didn't know, I said, if you don't mind, I'm going to take the rest of the team, go to a meeting, you can handle the phones, you know. And I got him in a room and I said, okay, guys, I've been gone, I've learned, I've grown, you haven't, you haven't made your numbers, I've looked at everything, but we can start over right now. But I'm going to tell you right now, it ends right here and now. There's a today team and a tomorrow team, and we're going forward. So if you play games, if you don't make your numbers, if you don't seriously contribute to this team, you're gone. Every single person except one person on that team stayed, all became top producers. The one person that left was the biggest issue. And all of them went on to become VPs with hotel companies, unbelievable careers. And they were all good people. They all played into it, and I changed that and changed their direction and their course.  

Arun: I think that is the hardest thing to do, which is to change an existing team, the culture. Sometimes the culture becomes so ingrained that it is very hard. I'm glad you were able to do that. We hear a lot about person branding, and that's one of your signature areas of expertise. The branding has to be personal as well as professional, so is there a connection between a person brand and a professional brand, and how does one go about developing? 

Cindy: Not everybody agrees with me on this, but my personal and professional brand are one, because I am walking the talk, and I'm living this life, and I'm doing what I do. I'm at work, how I live, my honesty, my feedback, everything is my personal side. People do, my husband and I work together, our daughter, we have one daughter, she graduated from college and runs our sales team, does an incredible job. I don't blame people that want to have their personal life on social media separate, because there are people like that, which is totally fine, but they still need to have that professional Instagram, LinkedIn, that branding. As I talk to young people, I say, your brand is not just your social media, which by the way, you need to look at and need to understand that everyone's looking at it. But it's how you conduct yourself. It's when you meet your parents' friends and how you shake a hand and, you know, I believe the world lost its manners, I swear, over the last few years. And you know, personal branding is showing up, being on time, being early. It's how will you be remembered? So, there is a personal and professional brand, but I don't... I just never understand how they're separate, because what you see is what you get. I just live a very positive, good life. 

Now, does that mean I don't have issues and problems? I don't post anything political, I don't post anything that's like craziness, I don't get into anything that's going to cause any harm to anyone. And I don't do that. I wouldn't do that in my personal life either. So I think that the branding is how you conduct yourself. And if you own your own company, it's extremely important. But our company is not named Cindy Novotny, it's Master Connection Associates for a reason. Because I have as many great people on my team, just as good, if not better than me. So that's another thing we really focused on. 

Arun: So you talked about social media and how people present themselves. So personal brand is more than the social media. And you alluded to that when you were talking about it, how you conduct yourself. By the way, I think this present generation, they will obviously differ with you, that they've not lost the manners, they just have a different way of behaving. And a different concept of what behavior is, which is at odds with the way we think people should be behaving. But going back to the person branding, so social media is one thing, but then how you behave and how you write memos and emails and letters. So the entire thing is your person brand. Then you also talked about work-life balance, and we're going to get into that. But here you have a brand that is your professional and then a personal brand. So things are getting a little bit, you know, let's talk a little bit more and clarify. Work life, so you have, you know, work and then brand. So are those interlinked? 

Cindy: Well, for me, they are. They're not for everyone. So that's why my book, Living Without Balance and Loving It! I might as well just chat about that at this point, because I believe I have incredible balance. Now, people could argue, I've flown 10 million miles. I haven't been home to California in three months. I've been on the road, but I have a farm in Iowa. I've been meeting up with my husband and daughter on the weekends at our farm instead of going all the way back to California. I choose to live on the road because I can't do my job without being on the road doing what I do. That is a choice. Now, remember, I have a lot of people that work for me that have that same choice. But the way I describe the branding is what I do, I let everybody else do. 

So, for instance, when my daughter was young, I took her on the road. I pulled her out of school one week a month. She traveled the world. My team can do the same thing. They're not in the classroom with us. There's a nanny watching the kids. So, I try my personal brand and my professional brand is I am like genuinely authentic to how I work with in the field, my training, the development, the teaching, to how I am even with my friends and family. I think, and like you said about the manners, I'm not talking just about the younger generation lost their manners. My aged people lost their manners, okay? 

I'm saying we have lost sight of nobody understands that the presence, the touch points you make is part of your brand. So my team knows they do have to send personal notes, thank you notes to clients, a little welcome note. It can't all be just texting. Even though we text and WhatsApp and we chat to all of our clients, the personal touch points are part of the branding. The people you meet, the follow up, how many times do you know people that you meet yourself and, oh, okay, I'll follow up and you never hear from them. That's part of the brand. So I think it comes together with how you are recognized and when someone is sitting on a bench without you hearing them, what do they say about you? That's the brand. 

Arun: And you use the word authentic in there. So I'm assuming you strongly believe that the brand that you're projecting or that you're trying has to come from within you and you have to be true to that brand, whatever it is, or the brand has to be true to yourself and not just a facade that you're putting out in front of people. 

Cindy: Now that I think is huge. And so I'm lucky because I created our brand. I worked for Disney for many years, but I loved it. I was never in costume. I was always in character. I lived that brand. Ritz-Carlton, I bled blue. I was like, oh my gosh. Ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen. I mean, that's who I was. And at Weston, I was part of the heavenly bed team. I was so committed. So when I haven't worked fortunately for a company that I didn't believe in their product, I think that that would be really difficult to actually be authentic. Probably I could do it and I'm sure a lot of people have to do it. I think that would be harder for some and I'd work through it and if I had to, I would. But I've been so fortunate that all the brands that I've worked for, I have believed strongly in and that made it easier for me to be authentic. 

Arun: You know, we kind of recommend to all the students that when they're looking for full-time positions, they make sure that there is a culture fit between themselves and the organization they're going to and don't worry about a few thousand dollars here and there. If you really, truly are aligned with that company, then it's going to be so much better and comfortable for you to work with and give your best rather than trying to chase the highest paying position. 

Cindy: Oh, I mean, that to me is like drop the mic because how many people do we know, all of us, including the generations getting out graduated from university, that take that high paying position in a job they're miserable and they only last a short time and it causes problems in their personal life, it causes problems and they end up quitting. And so your advice is so spot on. The cultural fit is a big deal and asking the tough questions while they're interviewing you, I believe you should ask the questions and interview them. Like, how do you treat your employees? How do you reward people? Those things are important. 

Arun: So let's talk about this book, A Simple Guide to Thriving in a Real World of Life and Work, Even as a Road Warrior. 

Cindy: Well, that's not the name of the book, but it's a subtitle. 

Arun: Living with No Balance and Loving It! 

Cindy: Exactly, but that's what it is. So as I said, when I decided that I was going to start this company, I was leaving a director of sales and marketing, very great job I had with Weston, and I was going to go out of my own, and I would be traveling. And so my husband, he now, we work together, but then we didn't. And so he had the big corporate job that could help fund us getting this started. But I also had a one-year-old daughter. And I said, you know, the only way to do this is you have to travel. I have to go to all these hotels, I have to go to all these places. So we decided right there and then that I would take her one week a month. Well, that was easy until she was five and had to go to kindergarten. So I had a nanny and she did travel with me on that week. And we'd go somewhere fun and she'd be with, you know, while I'm working in the hotel. So by the time my daughter was five in California, they have, I don't even know if they still have it, but it was an independent teacher agreement. It wasn't homeschooling because I would have been a terrible homeschooled teacher. So it was a contract that said legitimately I was pulling her out of school and it was legal. And it gave me, and she went to a public school. It gave all the homework for that week, okay? So she would pick, I want to go, you're going to Disney, this month I'll go there. Next month I'll go with you to Singapore because we have a huge map in the office and where I would be. So I pulled her out of school and I took her on the road. And that's where I showed that living with no balance and loving it works. Because I had, while she was young, she had a nanny. 

Once she became 12, I started going with her on her own. But she would work in the hotels. Like once she became 12, she would be like in the GM's office. She never left the hotel. I was always in the hotel. But up until 12, she always had somebody with her. She saw places, you know, when she's learning the pyramids, everybody else is learning them in books, she's with me in Cairo. I mean, the ability to travel like I did with her showed that you can have all the work that you love and still raise a family and still be happy. And we did it. And, you know, my husband and I are not together all the time. We're married. We've been married for a very long time. We run our business together. We are partners in a restaurant in Orange County. I'm not there as much, but I do everything on Zoom because I know that it's not just the way I was raised, which my mom and dad, you know, my mom was in education, so she was always home when we got home from school, had our little snack, played. It's not, not life is always just like that. And I made it work. And so my book gives tips and tricks to a lot of young men and women that are struggling because I think you can have it all. I don't think you have to give up work to have a family. And I don't think you have to say I'm never going to have kids because I want to rise to the top of the corporate ladder. So that's what the book's about. 

Arun: Amazing. I need to read the book. 

Cindy: We'll send you a book. 

Arun: Fantastic. So what is your advice to students as they graduate? And you've been referring to all this. But as they come in contact with the real world, what would you tell them? 

Cindy: So I think they need to now, as freshmen and sophomore and junior, start writing a journal of what they're good at and what they love and where their passion lies. I mean, they're taking all their notes and learning, and that's all important. But to start making notes of that, then I think they need to start their reach out all the time, even as a freshman, through your parents' companies and who you meet and how you meet, and build your book of context. You know, I did a graduation speech not too long ago. I do a few for the hotel schools. And I made the comment about the bigger your Rolodex, the better you are. The dean looked at me and said, Rolodex? Like, are you kidding? I went, oh yeah, yeah, okay, I forgot. So, you know, the bigger your contact list, the better off you are. And so when you think about it, the more people you know, the easier it is to get some better influence. Because sometimes it is that resume getting pushed forward because of somebody you knew. 

I mean, I do that all the time with people that I know. I don't just randomly do it. But if I know people and they've done a great job, I will send an email to a VP and somebody and say, look, you really should just at least look at this resume because there's a stack of them. And so everybody writes good resumes and makes sure it looks good. But the advice is now the touch points. Start making sure you're relevant. I think they need to be up on current events. I think they need to be aware of what's going on all the time. I think they need to recognize that the world's a much bigger place than just where they live and so that they have more talking points when they're doing that. 

Arun: Yeah, one thing I really don't like when people are trying to build their network of people is they'll just send me, they have no idea who I am or they've looked me up on the internet and they will send me a LinkedIn request with no accompanying message. 

Cindy: Terrible. 

Arun: How do you want to connect with me? Do I know you? Do I want to know you? 

Cindy: Let me comment on that because this is what I tell all the salespeople that I train and the students. I just mentioned this. So what I do, because I have thousands and thousands of connections, but I know them, and I'm connected to them for a reason. But I get, because I speak in front of thousands of people sometimes, I get a lot of those, but I never discount any. So what I do, and I enjoy this, I send a message back for every connection and say, thanks so much for reaching out, Bob, whoever. I appreciate it. I'm wondering how our connection will mutually benefit one another. 70% of the time I get no answer and then I dismiss. 30%, because we track this, I get a response. Sometimes it's like, oh, I just saw you, I thought it might be good. I'll say, well, I'm not really interested, but thanks. But out of that, there's always gems. Like one said, oh, my dad works for Mercedes. He heard you speak. I work at Jiffy Lube. My boss is looking for leadership training. Imagine if I just would have hit delete. So doing this has become quite fun, because I agree. You need to always send a note. Why are you reaching out to me? Because all the ones that I just told you had no note, right? So the ones that reach out that they want to sell me marketing, I'd say, no, thank you, I'm not interested. Appreciate it. But I at least respond, because I never know when I'm going to bump into that person. But I couldn't agree more. 

Arun: So I want to now go into service. Your company partners with, and you mentioned, the Ritz-Galton Hotel Company, providing training in service excellence on par with Ritz-Galton's universally recognized standards for non-hospitality clients. And I think this I've seen very frequently these days that hotel, particularly Ritz-Galton and other big hotels, a lot of non-what we traditionally define as hospitality companies are now understanding that the world of hospitality is very important. So my question is, how do you define extraordinary service? 

Cindy: Okay, so I define it and then some. So as an example in our restaurant, we now are very busy. So we stayed open during COVID because we had outside seating, and so we added a bunch of parking stalls, so we have like another 100 seats. And so we're reservations only in Orange County. That's like unheard of. And so we're very busy seven days a week. So when people come to our restaurant and we don't have a seat because there's no availability, we give them a $10 gift card and say, we're so sorry, we really do want you to come back. Please try to make reservations, but here's a $10 gift card. Now, that is extraordinary. We don't need to do that. Not everybody uses that gift card, but it's the action. It's what it says. Automotive. We work with an incredible company, Capital Auto Group up in Salem, Oregon. We've been with them for 10 years. They're one of the best Toyota dealerships in the country. They do things like they see a car that comes in for service and the gas is down to a quarter. They fill it up. They're not charging the customer. In Barclays Wealth Management, another one of our non-hotel customers, they are making sure that everybody in the call centers in Manila, which is where we train, speak incredible English, but it's British English and American English. And so they learned like, you know, they can talk about football and talk about it in the US and then talk about football with the Brits and talk about it there. So they, so, but it's not hospitality is such a foundation of life because honestly giving a little bit more and then some helps you in any way. It's like I do this and then I'll just add that on. I do this. It's not just doing the service. It's like when you check somebody in at a hotel. That's very standard. All the people with kiosks, I like people. I call it H to H, human to human, right? I like to talk to people and have them check me in. But it's when that server says, now, do you have plans for dinner? Or not the server, I'm sorry, but the front desk, right? Do you have plans for dinner? And I say, no, not really. Well, let me ask you, what are you looking for? Not just trying to sell the hotel restaurant, which we want them to do, but then saying, well, here's a list I printed out. You might like this. They don't have, it was not the concierge, but there might not be a concierge at every hotel. So it's, that's how I look at that extraordinary, doesn't have to be blowing people away that this is over the top. It's just the little tiny things that make you pay attention. 

Arun: Okay, so operations versus sales. Are these two different teams or are they the same team? And how do you cross the divide that exists in companies between sales and operations? 

Cindy: To me, it's the same team. And the divide, we work all day long closing that gap. Sell the dream and service the nightmare is out of style. Okay, we can no longer live like this. And in any industry. Okay, so hotels, automotive, I can't sell and then, right? So what we look at is that we really do train in operations. We're doing so much upselling. Everybody in luxury, especially luxury, we have to teach them how to upsell. So upselling suites, upselling in food and beverage. So they get sales skills and they learn to appreciate how difficult it is to sell. The kitchen, the chefs, they cannot do their job effectively if we are not communicating right from the sales or catering standpoint. So what we're trying to always do is save time and save money. Up until probably five, six years ago, we now do so much menu engineering classes for catering because so many catering managers have no clue about profit or cost or profitability. They don't know low cost, low labor, high cost. 

Nobody ever told them, here's just the menu. So now we're training on, I call it green, yellow, red. If it's really, really low, low food cost and low labor, that's fabulous. But if they're doing a lot of red, high cost, then we want to sell them something in the middle. So if you have to have four cooks doing this decorated piece of something, then you want to try to get a green in there for the salad. And it's that sort of thing that's bringing sales and operations together, and we're doing that in a lot of the hotels, because it does make a difference, because it's closing that gap. It is the same team, always has been the same team. But there's always been so much, oh, well, I'm not in sales, I don't like sales, I never want to be in operations. Well, you are, because you're selling something that has to be operated. 

Arun: I want to talk about where gratuity fits into the equation. So true hospitality is giving without expecting anything in return. The problem is we work in the business of hospitality and expect to generate income in exchange for our labor. So what components of hospitality experience, for example, as a server or a botender, Uber driver or tour guide, can lead to earning higher tips from guests? 

Cindy: So this is a big conversation. And minimum wage where I'm in California in the restaurant is over the top. So what we're having to do is really look at... because offsetting... people are going to... we want people to tip. And yet some tip really well and some don't. I mean, it all depends. You could give the best service in the world and there's just some cheap tippers out there. They just don't tip. I have found that... you have to, as an Uber driver...let's just go with that for a minute. I'll come back. Like, my Uber driver bringing me here today dropped me off a block away from the school. Now, I was here early, nice weather. If it had been pouring rain, I'd have been over the top. But as he pulled up, I said, this isn't the address. He goes, oh, it's just down at the end of the block. Well, we passed it coming. So, do I really tip him for that? Now, remember Uber rates you, they rate you on the kind of customer you are. So, my mind goes to, wow, if I don't tip this guy, the lowest I'll tip him. But then they'll put down, they'll start taking away my stars. Isn't that right? So, which blows my mind, but it's what we have to use if I can't find a taxi. Right? 

Same thing. In hospitality, there's many people that feel a housekeeper shouldn't be tipped. They're being paid, because they don't know, like, why bother, okay? But when I get a person, and I tip because I'm a hotel person, but when I get a personal note, which I do, written, and you can tell it's their writing, and they say, I saw that you used a new shower cap every day. I want to leave a few extra for you. That means a bigger tip. But I, because I'm a hotel person, try to find out that housekeeper's name, and I go to the front desk and put in an envelope and put their name on it. Because I do want to reward behavior I want to see more of, but I know people that think it's ridiculous I'm not tipping, because that's their job. So whatever's going to go on with minimum wage right now is going to be a big deal because we can only pay people so much money to work in restaurants unless we yank up that price is going to keep going higher and higher. So it's a lot of controversy on that. But I just like to tip when they really are. I mean, I tip all the time, but I really like to tip when they're outstanding. And I say, and I let them know, because I believe in reinforcing positive behavior. 

Arun: You know, tipping is a huge, big issue right now, and you mentioned California and the minimum wage. Did you, I'm sure you noticed the increase in the minimum wage for chain, quick service chain restaurants with, you know, over 60... that to $20 an hour starting next year. 

Cindy: Yeah. Yeah. And the thing is, we don't really ever tip at McDonald's. Maybe you do. I don't know. I don't go through the drive-thru and tip at the Taco Bell. So it's kind of like, wow. 

Arun: Yeah, that's why they're increasing. I guess I'm assuming that's why they're increasing the minimum wage to $20. 

Cindy: Which is going to mean all that, all those entrees, all those French fries are going to go way up in price.  

Arun: Exactly. Well, for a little fun, we wrap up this edition with a speed round of questions to learn more about you. So, quick questions. You travel quite a bit. What's your top recommendation of places to visit? 

Cindy: So, I always say, I get asked this every day, and I always say my next spot because I just love everywhere. I do love Prague and Budapest. I go there a lot. I mean, I'm in London and Paris. I love Asia, Thailand. But if I were to pick a place that if I didn't have to go for work, it would be probably Prague or Budapest. I just was in India, loved it. I hadn't been in India. I have a person on my team that is from there, so we are doing a lot of training down there, so it was fun. I always just say my next spot. 

Arun: Fantastic. If I were to ask your daughter the same question, she traveled with you one week a month, which is absolutely amazing to have that kind of a childhood. So when she was a kid, let's say, you know, between the age of five and ten, what are some of the places that she really enjoyed? 

Cindy: So she also loved Europe, and she loved Paris. I think there was so many books and things about Paris and she loved it. And then when she was old enough to go, she went to Texas A&M and on one of her summers, she and a girlfriend, you know, saved their money. And, you know, I did help them with miles, OK? But they went over to Paris on their own, which, you know, they're like all of, I think, 20 and I was a nervous wreck, but they loved it. And so I would say, I think that was one of her favorite spots. She now, too, is much more of a homebody because she traveled. She is living on our farm, helping manage. We have a working farm, so she works for us from out of home because she can because it's in sales. But she's also managing that massive farm. So she loves being home now because I think we took her so much. She's like, I'll stay home for a while. 

Arun: Excellent. Now, since you travel so much, I'm sure you watch a lot of movies on the flight. So which is the movie you've enjoyed recently? 

Cindy: So Elvis. I love Elvis. But I had no idea that whole Colonel Parker thing blew me away. I just thought, oh my gosh, you pretty much ruined the poor guy. And so it was the last one I watched on a plane and I loved it. I never see movies in movie theaters. So I think seeing them on a small screen is actually fine because that's why I see them all. 

Arun: And you travel so much, you don't have a choice. On a flight, I love window seat. 

Cindy: Oh, always aisle. 

Arun: Always aisle. Good answer. Name one person, past or present, you would like to meet. 

Cindy: Well, Elvis is one of them. I know that sounds kind of like, really? But I am not kidding. I've been listening to Elvis music since I was a kid. And I love the fact that he was so close to his mom and his dad. And kind of I was in, you know, I never got to go to Graceland, but you know, I think about how unbelievable his story is. So, I would have loved to meet him. Or Frank Sinatra. I'm big into the music stuff. Because I think Frank is another one. Because he, like his life, I mean, whether he was in the mafia or not, I don't know. But I just look at how he just kept going and going and going and going. And so, whenever I feel like, oh, I'm tired, I think, oh, he'd just go out and sing my way. So, I'd like to meet him. 

Arun: Least favorite word or phrase? 

Cindy: My bad. I cannot take it. 

Arun: And to wrap up on a positive note, favorite word or phrase? 

Cindy: Thank you. 

Arun: Now, that's an absolutely appropriate conclusion to our podcast. Thank you, Cindy, for joining us for this podcast. Your boundless energy as you spend your day as a guest speaker at our school. It has been an absolute pleasure to talk with you. Thank you for joining us today. And special thanks to the team who produced this podcast, Mara Littman, Andy Hallock and the entire team at Boston University School of Hospitality Administration.