From Vision to Execution: Our Framework for Hospitality Success | Mike & Nate E15

Do you feel like you’re always busy but never really making progress? In this episode of The Hotel Investor Playbook, we explore how to transform your vision into reality by cutting through the noise and focusing on what truly matters.

Join Mike and Nate as they share their proven four-step process for executing your 2025 goals: from crafting a clear and compelling vision to creating accountability structures, setting measurable objectives, and tracking progress with a weekly scorecard.

Whether you’re just starting out or scaling your hospitality business, these practical strategies will help you eliminate bottlenecks, empower your team, and move forward with confidence. Stop working harder and start working smarter—tune in now!

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Transcript

Michael Russell 0:00

Is being busy killing your business? I sure as heck know that it's easy to confuse activity with progress. But in today's episode, we're breaking down why busyness is actually the enemy of execution and how you can finally focus on what really moves the needle. We'll share how to build a powerful vision for your business and turn that vision into actionable objectives and create the systems that keep you on track. Whether you're working solo or leading a team, these strategies will help you execute with precision and crush your 2025 goals. If you're ready to stop spinning your wheels and start scaling smarter, let's dive in. Welcome to the Hotel Investor Playbook, your guide to building wealth and freedom through boutique hotel ownership, hosted by Mike and Nate. Get in the game. On this episode, we are going to be discussing the path to executing our 2025 vision. And I think that this is really important. Contrarily, we picked the beginning of the new year to set goals and set our vision. And quite frankly, I am blessed to have Nathan as a partner because one of the things where I maybe don't excel at is always having the ability to have that vision. And Nathan is an incredible visionary. I'd like to uh refer to ourselves as the two-headed dragon because he often gives me credit as being an excellent executor. But before you can execute, you got to have a path, you got to have an understanding, you got to have a vision of where you want to go. And Nathan has has consistently in his career demonstrated that in order to be successful, you got to have a vision to start. Um, I feel like your expression was if you want to share, it's where uh focus goes, energy flows. How does that go, Nathan?

Nathan St Cyr 2:14

Yeah, where focus goes, energy flows, and where energy flows, results follow.

Michael Russell 2:21

Great. So this is so important, it's so pertinent, and I think it's relevant again to the beginning of the year. So, Nathan, I'd like you to walk us through. We just finished, we just completed our 2025 uh vision. I'd like you to walk us through what are what are the components of executing a vision? Not just the planning part of it, but all of the other components that uh ultimately are required to develop in order to execute that vision.

Nathan St Cyr 2:49

Yeah. Okay, so first of all, I want to address the first thing that you said is that that the new year brings this arbitrary moment. I think that that's really important, at least it has been for me, because I truly believe that the person that attacks every single day, as if it's the most important day, because that's all that we have and that's all we're promised, is right now that ultimately they're gonna get the best results. So I've always had this little bit of a challenge with you know goal setting and what it really means. And when you get to the new year, all of a sudden you set your, you know, you set your goal. So um for me and my life, what what really I look at is the end of the year on our calendar year, it's really a time to reflect, right? Like, okay, let's slow down, let's reflect. What what did we learn? What do we need to learn? And then then it's like we're re-steering. It's like it's our opportunity to go, okay, this is where we currently are in the present. And when we get through the end of this year, right, how do we want to feel? And to me, that's where vision starts. Um, it starts with that concept of how do we want to feel at the end of this year when we're reflecting again, right? At the end of 2025 as a reflection point, the end of the calendar year just came. How do we need to feel? And not just me personally, but how does everybody within our team, how do we need to feel to say, holy crap, that was that was a successful year. I feel unbelievable about the work that we put in and what what we accomplished. So that's the kind of the start of the vision creating. Um, but ultimately, a vision is only a vision. There has to be action to go with that, right? And I think what we've gotten really good at is that we can now cast a very powerful vision together as a team as step one. And then we put the pieces together of then there's a very specific way that, and there's very specific steps that anybody can apply to take their vision to what it's gonna take from a plan of execution to make that a reality. Um, and we'll go through that today. Those really those four four steps of starting with a vision and then coming up with the uh the functions and accountability structure of everything that it's gonna take to actually accomplish that uh within your business, to creating your year-long objections and then objectives and then breaking them into quarterly chunks. And then lastly, to have a scorecard that really breaks it down to, hey, what daily actions should we be grading ourselves on when we come together each week in our weekly meeting to say, hey, here's a scorecard, here's the action items and the KPIs that that we know that if we're putting attention into these. So we go from this big broad thing of feeling and emotion to breaking it all the way down to the daily granular action steps that it's gonna take, that we're gonna hold each other accountable for as a team in a weekly scorecard. And and that's what that's what I'm excited to discuss today is like, okay, now there's a there's a plan. And I think that it's important to state that like we're documenting our journey, right? So, you know, where we are right now is gonna be different than where someone else is. But this process of going through these four specific steps, whether you're brand new and just getting started and may have the goal of of owning your first hospitality asset, or if you're own 10 and now you're gonna go and create a fund and you're gonna really go amplify and scale what you're currently doing, this process is relevant to absolutely anybody in their journey wherever they are.

Michael Russell 6:53

Yeah. So you you you identified there's there's four steps to this process. There's creating vision, there's uh an accountability structure, there's developing objectives and then the scorecard. But help me understand a little bit. This is where I sometimes struggle, is differentiating between what a vision is and what objectives are. Because at a high level or very surface level, to me, it's like, okay, objectives are these are the things that I need to get done. And then sometimes I struggle with, well, isn't the vision what I need to get done as well? What's the difference between the two?

Nathan St Cyr 7:32

Yeah. So for me, the vision, it's the starting point. It's the starting point of saying, first of all, why the hell am I doing this? Right? Like, what is it that I'm trying to get out of this from an internal standpoint? And, you know, you can everybody is gonna be different and a little different here, but this is like for me personally, if I go through to the end of this year and I say, here's the vision, I know that I'm I've got some really strong why behind that, right? Let's say it's, you know, I need to make sure that we saw $300,000 of net income for me individually to feel, you know, stoked about what we're doing in this area of our life. And the reason for that started with my vision of the way that I see my life playing out. Okay, what does that mean to my life and to my freedom and to my travel and to all of the things that really matter to this time in my life with my daughters and my wife and where we're currently at? So that that number is really about not necessarily the number, but what that number is gonna give me from what I really care most about. And that's where vision to me gets gets started, right? Is like, okay, what is it that I need to feel? What do I need to be doing? What does my day need to look at look like for me to feel freaking unbelievable about where I'm at? And so so vision to start with doesn't have the how. It is specific to that end game of this will fulfill my emotional needs that I have as a as a goal. And when I do so, I'm gonna be freaking pumped and exactly where I want to be.

unknown 9:19

Right.

Michael Russell 9:19

Okay, so that's you use the word why, right? You developed your why. I think that's really important. And a lot of times people talk about vision boards, and then there's all these exercises on how to create vision. You you've just described something that comes very natural to you. But if someone is trying to develop and curate their why, they're really trying to identify, well, what are the emotional triggers that are going to make me make me feel satisfied? I mean, how do you do that?

Nathan St Cyr 9:43

Well, I think first of all, you need to slow down enough to freaking recognize and reflect on why it is you're wanting to go in a certain direction. Right? Like, that's just so critical. Sometimes we're we're chasing something and then we don't slow slow down enough to be like, damn, that's not even what's important to me. Like I'm going down this path, but I'm going down this path just kind of like because this is what other people are doing, or this is what I think I can do. I think I'm chasing money, or I think I'm chasing this or that, but we haven't slowed down enough to actually go, wait a minute, what do I really want for myself and the people around me that really matters most? Like that's such a critical component because that can right, because then that can help us create then the direction.

Michael Russell 10:34

I just had this thought. I mean, oh my gosh, what you just said that, right? So I'm thinking about we're wired to just go and freaking do. We're just like these horses that just go and go and go. But when we went through this exercise, and I don't know if I verbalize this to you, but when we were creating our vision, you were very much um you know, you were very focused on developing the team. And the team was is designed so that you and I can remove ourselves from a lot of the responsibility of growing the organization so that the organization can grow independent of us. And for me, when you went through that, I had this epiphany of like, well, why am I doing this? Because I I actually don't want to just work all the time. I want to be successful. And so I'm motivated and I'll do whatever the heck it takes. But the why ultimately was I want to have enough freedom in my life to spend time with my family and to do hobbies that I enjoy. And I also want to have something that I can reflect on afterwards and be like, I created something, you know, that is that is tangible, something we built something like that to me is fulfilling. But it's it's not just like I gotta accomplish a financial goal. It was a little bit about like my why is the freedom of what I want for myself and my family. And so I don't know, that that's a little bit of a nuanced point, but man, it it really is important that we you just said, you don't just go and do something because others are doing it and you come up with this arbitrary justification of why you're gonna do it. You gotta really think what's important to you. So our our vision when we created it actually had components of team building that incorporates and it relates to these other things. Now I'm starting to get it a little bit more. Like the the objectives that we ultimately came up with refer back to the vision of what we're trying to accomplish. So, no, that that makes sense for me. Hey there. This is Mike and Nate jumping in with a quick favor to ask. If you're enjoying this show, would you just take a moment and go ahead and leave us a five-star review? Your reviews really help us grow our listener base, which in turn allows us to bring on even more high-qualified guests who share their actionable insights and strategies to help you succeed in your hospitality journey. So if you've gotten value from this episode or any of our past episodes, we truly appreciate your support. Tap those five stars, follow the show, and share it with someone you know who's looking to up their game in hospitality or investing. Thanks so much. And now back to the show.

Nathan St Cyr 13:03

Yeah, and look, it because this is, I believe, maybe one of my strengths, right, is understanding the emotional components of what makes people tick in the developing of the vision. This was a critical part. Like as I'm developing this vision, I'm not just thinking about myself. Like I know you, and I know that you are, you're you're gonna go down a rabbit hole and then you're gonna freaking figure out this system, this process, this thing, whatever it is. And if you start going on it, it's like blinders, right? You're freaking going on it. So, but I also know what what means the most to you and what means the most to you has always been time and freedom. And, you know, I know that when you have the freedom to go and surf, and when you have the freedom to go and get on your freaking dirt bike and go ride and to connect with friends and go do that fun stuff, go on a sail, go on a surf trip. Um, when when you're out there and just with your with Laura and your wife and and with your kids, and I'm watching you in your videos, and freaking Jacob's cruising around on his freaking scooter and his little bike, like, like, okay, that's that's the important stuff. But I also know that you're not gonna just, you're not someone that is just gonna be settled with, all right, well, that's all I do. I know that building something for you is also really an important piece to just your spirit. Like, hey, I want to reach my full potential. So as I'm creating the vision, my vision of what's important to me, I'm also, it's really important to weigh out that I know the other people within the organization, what's important to them. Part of building a vision as an organization is making sure that that vision is aligned with the things that are most important to each of the people that are within it. And that it's a large enough vision that everybody will be abundantly happy with what we've accomplished. And so, um, yeah, I think that that's a really important part of vision building for an organization is it's not about one person. It's not about one person's idea. It's about how can we come together as a group and fulfill all of these things. So the team part for me in our vision is the biggest difference between this year and last year. Um, and and that's an really exciting piece of the puzzle as we as we go to grow.

Michael Russell 15:33

Yeah, I think that's great. Okay, so can you walk us through a little bit about our our vision and then you know, maybe through demonstrating how we develop that, it can be relatable to others that are that are working on their own.

Nathan St Cyr 15:47

Yeah. So look, we we came together, you know, obviously after reflecting, um, I knew things that I needed to feel like at the end of this year to feel like this is freaking, we're building it right, we're doing it right and accomplishing the right things to fulfill my why. Right. And so uh we flew everybody out here. So we got together as uh to Maui. Obviously, we're we're here in the island of Maui, which can make it you know unique and challenging. We wanted to do this in person so we could sit down with each other, look each other in the eye, feel each other's spirit, and say, okay, like what is it that you feel like you need to accomplish? So I already had an idea of what we needed to do, but I really wanted to get the input from the team on what they felt like they needed to make sure that I wasn't just assuming something that was um wasn't what was most important to them. Um but at the end of the day, we sat down and we came up with together, okay, this is what each one of us needs personally and professionally to feel like we've fulfilled and had a successful year. From that, we really developed um some categories, right? Um the most important category to us was net income, right? So we we determined that we needed to have, as an organization, $840,000 of net income. That was like primary, number one, top of the chart for us to feel what we need to feel like, and everybody had succeeded in the way they needed to. That was the number. And so then it just kind of comes to reverse engineering a little bit of that vision is like, all right, so cool. If that's how much net income we need, what are the different sources that we're gonna go and gain this from? And then looking at the business from, well, what do we currently have? And then what would we need to add in order for us to feel like, okay, that's gonna drive that number of net income. We're not getting to the how yet, but we're we're starting to create the, all right, here's some of the indicators that are gonna show we're on the right path. We also had some goals as a team. Look, we've um we've done really well with a specific asset class within hospitality with our hostels. And but we know ultimately as we create this $400 million company that we want to expand into hotels. And so we have one of the things as a, hey, this year we're buying a hotel. Like it's happening this year. It's one of our, we're gonna create that as in our vision. Damn, we got done at the end of the year and we're like, yeah, now we have hostels and we have hotels. That's an important feeling that all of us want to feel successful, right? And that's gonna set us up for the future to be able to continue to grow in more than just one area. Um, so that was important. We also just had a goal of, all right, here, here's our goal of acquisitions. You know, we put together a team now and have have a massive amount of infrastructure strength to go and handle acquiring properties. So let's create a minimum must of just an acquisition total. And we created that at $10 million. So look, that's a little bit arbitrary because ultimately if we finish the year with $840,000 of net income and we didn't have $10 million of acquisitions, would we be that bummed? Probably not. If we had a hotel that we bought and we had $840,000 of net income, dude, we're gonna be freaking pumped. But we did provide ourselves within our vision, all right, here's the things that we want to go attack and we want to go and hit.

Michael Russell 19:24

Yeah. And so to me, when I'm I'm listening to this, you know, one of the one of the things that I try to distinguish then between vision and objectives, right? To me, vision is vision to me is like it's kind of fun. You just get to paint the picture of how you're gonna feel when you accomplish uh whatever this this goal or this vision is. It's there's nothing like there's in my mind, there's no like there's no consequence for just having a big vision. And you don't have to worry exactly how it's all gonna happen. You just know like if what I'm focused on, if I know that's what I want to accomplish. accomplish, then I can work backwards, B to A thinking, and figure out all the ways where I can get that. But this is like back to my days when you know uh I worked in sales and and you were sales leader and and you were mentoring me a lot in in creating this vision from month to month or year to year. I mean I would write down in my journal what my vision was and it could be you know these things that we've just kind of described personal fulfillment and and you know time as family and all and hobbies and vacations, whatever. But man, you could just be as like creative as you want. You can just you can read like no one's judging you. So with your vision you can cast as wide and as big as a vision as you want. I mean obviously you want it to be somewhat realistic so that it's achievable, but it's just so much fun because what ultimately I recognized over my career as a salesperson, which applies for anything that anyone's doing is when you put it down and you ride it, let's say in your journal or it it's actually documented somewhere, it it's it's hard to describe and it's a little foo foo and I don't totally get it or understand it, but it's hard to argue with the results. When you do this practice of creating that vision and documenting it, the universe has a way of organizing itself to bring you what you have a vision for the first step is identifying where you want to go and what you want to achieve. And I again I'm reiterating I don't know exactly how this works but the term vortex we use often because we're describing that when you start thinking or you start believing in something that it's just things come within a vortex. They start circulating around you and the universe just brings you the things that you have a desire to achieve. So to start I think it's just fun. It's a fun exercise but it's it's kind of miraculous how oftentimes it actually works.

Nathan St Cyr 21:51

Yeah well okay so what I'm gonna say to that is I could do a 52 week podcast on what you just said because my entire life the disciplines and practices in my life all revolve around what you just called a miracle and I I don't want to go too much into that because it gets it's a lot but the bottom line is you are you are exactly right like I have uh I have my three year three year vision meditation that I do and in that meditation man I can see what Lauren is wearing and what dude we're in freaking tuxes and we're high five in each other I can see the people it looks like we're in um little italy little Italy and San Diego and we're celebrating just taking down a $50 million property. And so there's all this emotion and excitement and color and all of these things it's a meditation that I do because ultimately I know for us to have a $400 million company we first need to get to $150 million. How you know there's all these different things that go into that but the more that we can you can create that exact feeling your subconscious mind does not know the difference between it doesn't know time. So if you can live in it in the present then it's gonna solve all of these things to make that happen right now. So anyway um I could like I said this is we're gonna you could get me on 52 weeks an hour a an hour podcast every single time because this is my life passion. Okay but real quickly what was the book that really inspired you Mike Shogun uh uh referred you to this book what was it called yeah so the first one was thought that I studied a long time ago was Thought Vibrations right and then um the that book was written like 100 years ago or something but then um Mike Shogrin recommended psychocybernetics he also recommended in his 2025 books to read the genie within and I think that reading those two books back to back because the genie within actually gives you um it gives you at the end of chapter its own like meditation. So it's easier because then you don't you know it kind of it's kind of plug and play and makes it easier. So getting the understanding of all of the technicalities through psycho cybernetics um and then following it up with the genie within that gives you the actual freaking meditations it's that's the freaking money combination.

Michael Russell 24:33

Yeah so well I'm a reader you know that so anytime that someone has a a good book they can recommend that they they feel like hey you're gonna learn something I'm all over it. So dive into that um all right let's let's transition then okay we've got the vision next thing that that we are working on or that we have worked on is the accountability structure.

Nathan St Cyr 24:54

So that is the next one though I want to finish with one last point. You said sometimes you have a challenge between the vision and and um objectives the objective right but objectives are remember they're gonna be step three in the process they are a derivative of your vision. So right now we're gonna get into the how so there is going to be similarity at the end because your objectives you derived from the vision that you created to start with. So they end up being very similar but the important part is well how do you start and the starting point is the vision and you don't need to know the how. Objectives start getting into the how right how we're gonna do this and here's the objectives but the objectives really were pulled from the vision but they're just they're further down the further down the steps.

Michael Russell 25:46

Okay cool. So the the vision we've established now the second step being the accountability structure in my mind a quick description of that is the who who is responsible in our organization for all of the functions that need to occur and what are the roles required to fulfill those functional components.

Nathan St Cyr 26:09

Okay so I would expand on that one bit and I would say that the second part which is called the accountability structure is what and who you're answering the what needs to take place in your business right to accomplish these things. All right if I'm gonna go in and and purchase $10 million worth of acquisitions if I'm gonna buy a hotel if I'm going to um have eight hundred and forty thousand dollars worth of net income then what needs to happen at a granular freaking level in every area of our business so it's first of all line iteming what all the way through your your your business and and that's the functions right that's the what of it this for for our listeners though give give us just a couple examples. So what um one of the things that needs to happen here would be um like on our accountability structure the first one is marketing for investment arm right and then it would be like all right well for us to do this we're gonna need to um we're gonna need to raise capital and we're going to need to have credibility and we're gonna need every you know people to know what we're doing. So how do you go do that? Well that's gonna happen through marketing. And so then it has all of the functions that are going to happen through marketing. You know this podcast it's gonna have um you know getting there's gonna be different parts of the podcast right we're gonna have guests that come on plus we're gonna go on podcasts. There's gonna be all of these different things that have to do with editor for example someone's got to edit the podcast to a granular level right like all of these things need to have be you know thought through okay well to have a podcast and to have it be successful and to go on grow your podcast what needs to happen? Social media all of these different platforms LinkedIn you know so strategy there's all of it right we you could go through and there's I don't know there's 15 lines or something under our um you know what's what needs to happen from a marketing standpoint.

Michael Russell 28:22

Yeah well let's use our four pillars just as like a a a structure right four pillars of a hospitality business are acquisitions financing marketing and operations let's leave out the operations and focus on if you wanted to go and buy a hotel just to buy a hotel right what's involved with that well we know acquisitions and financing you got to be able to source a deal and you got to find a way to pay for it.

Nathan St Cyr 28:48

So just that alone if you had two columns right there and you looked at well what's in acquisitions someone's gonna be like okay got a broker outreach would be a function um you know in the finance section it might be you know obtaining you know a loan like so going through the lending process like there there's all these functions right yeah we've got like stacks of them under each one of these different functions um because what we've learned is all right well if we go through acquisition what are what are all of the different components and then there's you know from acquisition to acquiring a property is not just finding the deal right once you find the deal and you get a secured LOI that moves into a purchase and sale agreement now it's okay first of all people think okay a purchase and sale agreement but damn now to even get the purchase and sale agreement we need to get attorneys involved we need to get like we need to make sure that the PSA is freaking structured correctly and that takes who's going to do that right and we'll get into that part but that it needs to be identified that to acquire a property um is in itself even the creation of an agreed upon purchase and sale agreement is a huge undertaking right we've done I mean we've negotiated a PSA back and forth with you know attorneys on both sides with us the way we view things sometimes that process can take you know it can take weeks and urgency and freaking emotion and bandwidth and all of that. So that's it's important to be like all right so if we're gonna acquire multiple properties then we're gonna have to go through this process multiple times and it's a it's a big one. From there, due diligence. And then it's like holy shit then you get through a due diligence like what needs to happen through due diligence? What are all of the components? And we started going through and we got more granular this year on this piece because we're like look as we go into this here's the due diligence things and now we're you know we've outlined our okay somebody's going to need to do you know from working with independent contractors on from design to tenant improvements to all of the different things that we need to do to actually stabilize the property so that then we can make it profitable. All of those components need to be worked through as it's shit that needs to get done. Yeah. And we you know as you're going through this you're like oh well we're gonna acquire a property and then we're gonna operate it and we're gonna hire no there's a lot that goes into this. And I think the reason that it was really important for us um this year to really dial in and get more granular on everything that it takes is because then the next step of the process of having these different functions is who owns them. Right? So now that we have all of these functions it was determining who's gonna own each one of these functions and then the function components that fall within it. And this for you and me was a big difference maker remember we came up with the had the decision to you and I were not going to own any functions this year. This is a huge this is like this is freaking nuts. Like we're not gonna own them all right here's the functions and we could go through and read them right from marketing to acquisition to due diligence to all of these components funding capital raise all of this stuff we're not gonna own them from a function ownership level we are going to we are going to oversee them as C-suite leaders and um this this just shows the growth of um and the intention that we're putting into growing a team versus just doing all the shit ourselves because if we have to do all the shit ourselves we're not gonna be able to move fast enough to create a $400 million company.

Michael Russell 32:57

Yeah and I just want to add if you're listening to this and you're struggling to visualize how we organize all this information, we have developed an accountability chart, I guess you would call it uh a spreadsheet and within this chart um we we just itemize vertically based on what the category is and what all the subfunctions are underneath it. And then below that we have identified well what are the individual roles so basically who and if you're struggling a little bit to figure out like okay if I were to develop this on my own, kind of how would I organize this information, we'll go ahead and put in the the show notes a link to a template that we use to develop this accountability chart so that you don't have to try to create this on your own and you can see it, visualize it and then ultimately just fill it in for your own purposes. And you know what we're doing might not apply like every function whether you know hosting a podcast might not be your thing but certainly if you're looking to acquire property there's gonna be a lot of overlap there. You can use that. So just click on the link in the show notes and you can download this template.

Nathan St Cyr 34:03

Yeah and I want to that's great Mike freaking I think visually it does make sense and it is a template. But like you just said although the podcast might not be necessary it falls under marketing and marketing is going to be necessary no matter what right marketing is going to come into play in some way in your freaking business of growing your business. So yours might look different than ours because we we may have more components or you may be further along than us and you have a freaking lot more components. So um but ultimately the structure visually can be used as a template.

Michael Russell 34:38

Cool. Okay so we've got the accountability anything else you want to add to the accountability structure? Yes.

Nathan St Cyr 34:47

So there's two things number one every function has one owner number that's really important right so somebody's gonna own that function meaning that look they can involve everybody in the organization in executing it but somebody at the end of the day is going to own each one of these functions. So that gets determined on the top of the function right like okay this function is owned by so and so and that way there's always a that's why it's called an accountability structure.

Michael Russell 35:20

Secondly from the who standpoint as you look through your list of let's say I own um or let's use let's use let's you want to like here's an example and you could pick one but like I'm just looking at our chart so we've got deal acquisition due diligence raising private capital to name a few those are like the top header. So someone would own that function and then underneath that there would be the components broker communication underwriting analysis you know co-star searching market research deal finding etc okay what what did what was that listed under acquisition so deal acquisition.

Nathan St Cyr 35:58

Okay who owns deal acquisition for our company yes Bryce okay and then so Bryce is a function owner so does that mean that Bryce has to do everything that falls under that function no so underneath that function that column we have roles so we have a head of acquisition we have an acquisition virtual assistant we have deal finders those are people that we will pay a referral fee for finding us deals bringing us deals off market deals we pay a you know commission or a finder's fee um and then you know perhaps independent uh contractors that can do underwriting analysis for us okay so the point though is that one person owns it and then there's several roles that are going to accomplish it so ultimately Bryce now is in a position where he's gonna have to work with those different roles to accomplish that function and then who oversees because there has to be a C-suite leader that oversees the owner who oversees Bryce that would be me. So although he owns it you are going to audit Bryce and ultimately in the beginning stages here there's gonna be much more involvement as a C-suite leader of helping grow Bryce and Brandon and the guys you know that are within our team but it's an important distinction for them to know that they own that entire function.

Michael Russell 37:32

Well and also I I want to add here that our accountability structure this year looks very different than last year. We're we're giving ourselves credit for this shift that we've been able to accomplish to moving towards the team. But when you get started obviously you know you might not have the budget to go and just hire all these people. So there's two things I want to say number one, if you've got a partner, this is where you kind of divvy up the workload and it's really important that you set expectations because a lot of times people are like look we were guilty of this before we hired a business coach. We were uncertain who was responsible for what and it caused a little bit of friction and paralysis because we're like well are you working on that? I don't want to overstep my boundary if that's like what you want to do. And it was just constantly like even if it wasn't spoken it was like we were uncertain on who should be doing what and when you put it all on paper and you match what are the functions and what are the expectations and who owns that even if it's just you and one other person, then you don't necessarily need this whole team, but it's gonna make accountability and and it's gonna increase the efficiency of your operations by having someone own each and every function. And you can't have two people to own the same function so important. This happens all the time you got to stop that one person owns it one person is responsible. So that's the first thing I wanted to say about that. The second thing is when it comes to roles again you don't always have to do everything yourself. Like I said you can partner but you can also sometimes hire specialists for specific tasks. So it's the inclination that you're gonna learn and do everything yourself, which if you're like me, that is my natural instinct thankfully for Nathan he constantly reminds me that look if we can exercise um you know if we can go and and hire someone that can go accomplish this task, what's the highest and best use of our time we will evaluate that. So simple things like low level on the on the the the ladder the delegation ladder is hiring a VA for you know under $10 an hour or somewhere in that you know eight to $13 an hour range. Well is your time worth eight to thirteen bucks maybe you hire someone to do some of this maybe it's a specialist we had on our podcast previously a property manager that for roughly $10,000 they'll do due diligence for you so that you don't have to become an expert in this. These types of things so hiring the right specialist or outsourcing the work even if there's a cost To it, you got to evaluate in the big picture and make that determination. And so, in this exercise, as it relates to the accountability chart, the roles of who's doing these functions don't always necessarily mean that you have to have an in-play. It's either a partner or you can hire a specialist. Team? Partner.

Nathan St Cyr 40:23

Hire a specialist. That's right. Yeah, I love that. That breaks it down, that makes it really simple. And as you go through these functions, you're like, okay, where am I vulnerable? What are the areas that I'm and that helps you determine in the beginning, oh man, I could potentially I could, if I could find a partner that has strengths in these areas, man, that might be a great partnership where we don't have to put out capital. We just partner. And then, you know, you're you're making less equity long term. Um, but it allows you to accomplish that goal of purchasing that hotel or whatever it is. So I love that.

Michael Russell 41:00

That's that's and I'll add to this too, when we first our first go at this before we had a team. I mean, let's just be honest, what happened was we started doing this accountability structure, and holy crap, my name was attached to freaking like 90% of it. And then we realized, okay, we need to make some adjustments. We need to figure out how to disperse the workload and identify areas where Nathan has the ability to go and and and contribute, but not necessarily do it himself. This goes back to this idea where he can be the um function owner, but the role may involve finding someone else to do that work. And once we identified that concept, that the function owner is not necessarily the person executing it, it's just the person responsible for it. That led to us constantly thinking about ways to find partners, ways to hire people, you know, like we just talked about, but it had to be documented first, identify well, what the heck are we all responsible for? And we need to split this up because the expectations were not, you know, in alignment for the ultimate success of our business.

Nathan St Cyr 42:13

Well, it just it just created bottlenecks. Yeah. This is why we're constantly bottlenecks, bottlenecked, and this is why you're frustrated, and this is why I'm frustrated, and we're freaking at its stand. We're not moving at the speed in which we could. So documenting this process has been a game changer in in our our business growth. Cool.

Michael Russell 42:37

All right, so we got accountability. I think we beat that one to death. Should we move on?

Nathan St Cyr 42:41

Yeah.

Michael Russell 42:42

Okay. Objectives, right? That's the next one on the list. Let's talk about that.

Nathan St Cyr 42:47

Yeah. So the first step in tying this back to we're creating our 2025 vision, and then the how starts getting built out. All right, here's all the stuff, here's the who's, here's the roles. Then it moves into, okay, now let's let's we're gonna start to get what are the big freaking boulders that if we know that we are constantly focused on what's the most important things? What really are the objectives that it objective is like the outcome. If we achieve this outcome, then ultimately we've achieved our vision. And so on our yearly objectives, if we go and look at that, right? We just we took the big ones, right? Boom, buy a hotel, boom, eight hundred and forty thousand dollars of net income, ten million dollars of acquisitions, buy a hotel, right? Like those, those are the big things, those are the big objectives, are those are the outcomes that need to happen in order for us for our vision to be to us feel the way that we want to feel at the end of this year. And that's important because there's a lot of shit to do. But how can you keep focusing? This is like keep the main thing, the main thing. Simplify as much as you can, is what I'm doing, moving the needle on freaking getting closer to we always need to know what that direction is. Instead of just being fucking busy, can we know exactly? Okay, what I'm doing is going to move this big ass boulder, right? And so you take these yearly objectives. If we can go and accomplish these outcomes or objectives, well, let's go break that down into the quarterly objective. How can we get closer? We can't just go, we're not just gonna, there's too many details to just go attack at once to accomplish that. So, how can you go? Okay, this quarter, what big boulders will align with that? And then we went through the process of saying, okay, well, where are we right now? And to hit that objective, what are the most important things that we need to focus on this quarter as a team? And then they align with if we accomplish that this quarter, we are closer to the end of year objectives and outcome. And so that's what we're doing.

Michael Russell 45:15

The reality is it's so easy for us to be busy. But being busy is a form of laziness in a sense. Because if you just default to be like, well, I'm just gonna start working on stuff, then you know, are you really moving the needle? What are the things that are gonna move the needle? And if you have on your annual objective what the big boulders are, what are the three, four, you know, maximum, what are the big things you're trying to accomplish? That is your North Star. That's your compass. That tells you when you wake up in the morning what you should be working on. Are you moving the needle or are you just staying busy? Because if all you're doing is busy work, you're not gonna, you're not gonna achieve those, those, those big um objectives, those, those rocks. And for those of you listening that may have figured this out, obviously we're using the template of of EOS, right? This is a variation of it, but these are the core principles of EOS, which is a proven system for so many businesses to be successful and efficient, particularly if you're gonna have a larger organization. This keeps everyone in alignment on what they should be doing. Is number one, if what you're doing on a day-to-day basis or week to week basis is aligning with the objectives, then that's the direction you should be going. If you're just answering emails for the sake of being like I'm working, then maybe question yourself and be like, is this the most effective use of my time in this moment?

Nathan St Cyr 46:40

Yeah, absolutely. And same thing with like, you can go down the rabbit hole of researching something, right? Like, oh, I'm putting all this work into figuring out how to do this. But it's like, okay, is figuring out how to do X and freaking taking, man, because you all of a sudden four hours are gone. Like, yeah, you know, you start researching and then shit starts popping up on your freaking social media because you're researching, then it goes down the next, you know, it's like all of a sudden, whoa, well, was this thing even in alignment with what I'm really supposed to be doing? And that's this big old boulder. And so I think that it does provide that. I think the the boulders are what you call the North Star. I think that's that's really good. Like, hey, consistently making sure that we're focused on the right thing.

Michael Russell 47:32

Right. So, you know, in our our case, do we want to walk through, like you mentioned, okay, what our big boulders are acquiring a hotel, acquiring $10 million in assets, for example, achieving X amount in net income after debt service. Like those are big boulders. But then on a on a 90-day basis, you break it into smaller chunks, and that's where you're like, okay, in order to secure X amount in in assets, well, what do we need to have done this quarter? How much of the needle do we need to have moved by this quarter? What's specific, what's measurable, what's achievable, what's relevant, what's timely. These are these are the SMART goals that I feel like um you really got. This is where you can be a little more granular and detailed. And we don't need to go through specifically what we're doing, but I think this is an important point that you've got the big boulders, and then per quarter you've got the the different quantifiable steps that are moving the needle. And if you can stay on track with each one of these, then ultimately at the end of the year, uh ideally you've reached your objectives.

Nathan St Cyr 48:32

Yeah. So let's go through them. Just list them. List our seven or whatever they are. Yeah.

Michael Russell 48:37

Uh for the for our initial quarter one 90-day objectives? Yep. Yeah, okay. So um we are currently in negotiation to secure another property. So the goal is to secure that property quarter one. So in order to do so, we're performing our due diligence, we're planning um and identifying for tenant improvements or you know, things that just modifying the the um the space so that it's it's ready for our operating company, our hostel business to be functional.

Nathan St Cyr 49:08

So secure property, right? Secure property, there's some additional details that make it more specific and timely and relevant and all of that. But if we go secure that, we know that there's net income that will be earned from that, that's gonna feed into the yearly objective. We're not gonna make any net income off of that this quarter. We might not make any net income off of that second quarter. But we know that if we secure it first of all this quarter, that that's gonna end up by the end of the year feeding into that $840,000 year-long objective.

Michael Russell 49:41

Yep. Okay. In order to acquire this property, we need capital. So we're gonna raise a certain amount of capital to pay for this investment. So that is something that we have got as an objective for this quarter.

Nathan St Cyr 49:58

Raise X amount of capital. Get these commitments so we secure it and we raise the capital so that we can do ultimately what we want to do so that we can be profitable.

Michael Russell 50:07

Yep. We're gonna document and publish the development of our investment company, which is Malama Capital. So things that what that really means is we're gonna document with on you know, on LinkedIn, social media, we're gonna implement a regular weekly newsletter. But this is all marketing-related stuff. In order to document our journey, um, this this goes, it feeds, it goes hand in hand with uh being able to acquire and and acquire an asset and raise the money to do so, they serve each other.

Nathan St Cyr 50:36

Yeah, the more if we're gonna go and acquire $10 million worth of assets, we're gonna need to raise more capital and we're gonna need to have more deals. And so by marketing and documenting what we're gonna do, it expands our network and our opportunity to do those two things. So it needs to be an objective. That quarterly objective will feed into our yearly objective.

Michael Russell 50:55

Yeah. And look, there's a few more. I'm gonna skip to number seven, which is systemized deal acquisition. I think this is an important component that is applicable. So if we you want to go out and buy hotels, and that's great. Okay, that's a vision. But now it's like, well, what are the specific and achievable objectives that you're gonna lay out in order to do so? Like in our case, we're developing an acquisition template. That's really about our thesis. Like what each property, what boxes need to be checked for this property to fit within um the parameters of what we're looking to buy. So systemizing the deal acquisition, sourcing and identifying um properties is part of that is is creating creating a system for that. So we we've got a number of details associated with that, but but those are some examples, right?

Nathan St Cyr 51:50

Love it. Okay, good. So that's that's objectives, right? Objectives tie into the vision. Here was a vision that didn't have the how, but now we're freaking building out the how. And again, we've got these functions and function owners. Now we have objectives. Now it's like outcome, right? Here's freaking the outcome to achieve that. Let's make sure that we have the right focus points. We are focusing and rowing in the right direction. And again, with an objective, it ties into the same thing where only one person will own that quarterly objective. It's important so that now I know that okay, my role, I own raising capital. So that we have to raise this amount for this quarterly objective. So I'm gonna wake up every freaking day knowing that every week I'm gonna go to you guys and I'm either gonna be on track or off track with this objective when we get freaking, we go into our meeting. Nate, hey, are we on track or off track? And because of that, because we're accountable to each other, we're a team, we have ownership of something, I'm gonna make sure that I'm doing the action steps because that that's gonna tie into the last and the fourth one, which is the scorecard. And the scorecard is if I own this, right? So Nate owns raising X amount of capital. Okay. Well, what do I need to do on a daily basis that can be from a data standpoint tracked? How many freaking networking calls do I need to make? How many um weekly newsletters need to go out? How many X, Y, right, LinkedIn posts, social, how like I'm gonna think through on this is gonna be when I wake up in the morning. This is my objective, I own it. Am I getting, am I on track with that or not? And if everybody in the organization they own one of these 90-day objectives, or they own two or three, or whatever it is that they actually own, they're gonna wake up and know that I need to be focused on these things. And our scorecard breaks down to accomplish that. We know that these action items are the actions and the behaviors that if we go do, we'll have the most likelihood to then accomplishing and executing the objective.

Michael Russell 54:26

Yeah. Well, so often people have a vision and they have a goal, but how do they go and execute? And this scorecard component, this is the week-to-week um uh component that allows you to keep track of whether or not you're executing. It's a reminder. And when you break down all these different functions that are that you're gonna need to be responsible for if you're gonna go purchase hospitality assets, there's a lot. And so presumably our listeners are contemplating partnering with someone or a group of folks, which to me seems like the most effective way to go and leverage a diverse array of resources, like personal skill sets, and go and execute faster. Well, again, relationships or partnerships can be challenging unless communication is effective. And this is a simple way to communicate with each other on what the expectations are and then measure it where it's not so personal. It's either you're on track or you're off track. And if you're following this, each one is gonna be accountable because instinctually, inherently, as humans, we're not gonna want to disappoint the others in the group. So this is such an effective way of making sure that the partnership continues to be in alignment with expectations. So in recognizing this, I feel like this is such an important detail of developing uh an organization that you're gonna actually go out and be able to go and build something and execute by following these guidelines. So, you know, again, big credit to the business coach that we hired. Uh, we didn't come up with this, but that again is just testament to the fact that when we're talking about hiring the folks that could help us to develop this business model, this was an independent contractor that was critical. That's just one of many that you can put into that kind of accountability structure of who are the people that are gonna fill the roles that are necessary to complete the functions.

Nathan St Cyr 56:26

Yeah, shout out to Rick English, Up Advisors. Rick, you're the man. Uh, thank you. So, yeah, you're right. This is we've come a long way.

Michael Russell 56:35

We've come a long way. And I'm excited. So, for us personally, recognizing that we're at the point now where we are transitioning away from doing this because our business has grown to a point where it is we're able to sustain uh personnel and staff that are now excited. It is beneficial for them, I believe, so that they have a clear understanding of what they should be working on. And so they're not used to use the term bottleneck. Man, bottleneck, golly. We read this book again, referred by Rick, our business coach, which was the the monkey book, right? Which was who's the one minute manager meets the monkey. The one-minute manager meets the monkey. I always call it the monkey book. I can never remember the name, but man, that is so critical. If you feel like things are not working as efficiently, then you recognize that maybe you're the bottleneck or you don't even know that you're the bottleneck, read that book. It is terrific to help uh develop the mindset of why having structure in organization is critical for a business to thrive.

Nathan St Cyr 57:39

Yeah. And we've now built an accountability structure that empowers others by giving up, you could say control is another word for ownership, right? So now I'm giving up control of this function by giving ownership and empowering someone else to go and execute this. And I can oversee them and I can support them and I can help get this thing done, but at the same time, they own this and I get to empower them and then they become the expert, and then they can do that the next time to the next person, and that's how our organization is going to grow.

Michael Russell 58:16

Awesome. Well, this has been an excellent episode. Um, I think that we've really dug deep into the the the details of this organization, and hopefully our listeners are finding that this is valuable as they go and plan their 2025 vision as well. So, Nathan, thank you for taking the time to explain all of that. Shout out um to our team and everyone else that is helping us to accomplish this goal. It's a team effort, and we're just stoked. So 2025 is gonna be a banner year for us. We've got some big, big goals, and and this is how we're gonna go and accomplish it.

Nathan St Cyr 58:52

They're in the studio, Mike, right now with me, and they both had freaking victory arms up, so they're freaking pumped.

Michael Russell 58:59

Sweet. All right, thanks for listening, guys. This is Mike and Nate signing off with another episode of the Hotel Investor Playbook. We'll catch you next week. Aloha. Aloha,