Leadership Archives - Page 7 of 14 - Pacific Edge Magazine

Matt Barberi & James Murray

Feb 7, 2018

Matt Barberi was a bartender at Just Tacos Mexican Grill & Cantina when he met James Murray, who liked to unwind there after a long day of managing builds at his construction company. They got to be fast friends talking about life, Hawai‘i’s tricky business landscape and the ins and outs of entrepreneurship. Barberi left bartending and got involved in roofing sales, but the two stayed friends.

One night while walking around downtown after pau hana in 2013, Barberi suggested to his buddy that they combine forces and start a business. It made perfect sense—he had a knack for sales and would make a good front man, and Murray had the general contractor expertise. Murray agreed, and in March of the following year, they made the idea a reality.

Today the dynamic duo are managing partners at Ohana Construction, specializing in residential and commercial roofing. Roofing was an easy focus given the high profit margin, their prior experience in the trade and the appeal of helping people in a jam. Barberi focuses on overall business development, including financials and partnership opportunities, while Murray manages field operations and makes sure subcontractors are on the ball. Together they are shifting the paradigm for how roofing or construction businesses should operate.

“We’re not your stereotypical roofing company—we care about aesthetics and really push that with our sales reps,” Barberi says. “Our office doesn’t look like a construction office at all. It’s more of an open-space showroom with a good atmosphere, where people can come and hang out and look at roofing materials.” The company’s unofficial mascot dogs, Colonel and Beaumont, are also a hit with customers.

One thing really that motivates the pair is their shared commitment to helping others, from guiding homeowners through the notoriously challenging process of installing a new roof to helping subcontractors find work to combining forces with other roofing companies for the benefit of all. It’s their company mantra of “ordinary people doing extraordinary things” that has helped create a tight-knit community around their business.

“We’ve brought people in who had no experience in construction, and they’ve absolutely crushed it,” Barberi says. “We have ladies in their 50s who’ve been receptionists all their lives. They’ll come in and start slinging roofs like there’s no tomorrow because we’ve created a vehicle where anyone can enjoy construction and selling roofing.”

Barberi and Murray have built up a solid reputation for their incredible customer service and technology-based construction, with a good majority of their work coming from word-of-mouth referrals. They offer full drone inspections, where the drone actually does the measurements, and digital imaging to show homeowners what their new roof will look like. The team is excited for a big oceanfront roofing project, where they’ll be placing Arcadia Shake shingles from CertainTeed—“the sexiest shingle,” Barberi calls it—on 23 townhome roofs in Kaneʻohe. This quad-laminate design combines the traditional aesthetics of a split wood shake with the low maintenance, low cost and practicality of an asphalt shingle.

Working in close quarters for 10 to 15 hours a day, the balance of opposites is a true asset in Barberi and Murray’s quest to keep their operation running smoothly. “We couldn’t be more different—total yin and yang—but that’s why we work so well together,” Murray says. He’s the more grounded one, while Barberi is Type A, preferring structure, organization and a fast pace. Since Murray has seen a lot in his years of construction—he built his first house with his dad at age 10—his ability to stay cool in stressful situations has encouraged his friend to be more level-headed, too. “I think we’ve both grown a lot since we started by working together,” Barberi says. “We’ve really helped each other expand our horizons.”

What does success mean for Ohana Construction? “It’s not about the numbers,” Barberi says. “It’s more of a lifestyle thing. The big-picture goal is to create free time.”

Though mixing business and friendship may have pitfalls for some, Barberi and Murray have managed to grow a thriving company and remain the best of friends, squeezing in an after-work drink from time to time and the occasional joint vacation. In the same vein, as the work continues to pour in, they’re recruiting new sales team members and forming strategic alliances that are based on respect and camaraderie. “A lot of courtesy goes a long way,” Barberi says. “We look for people who are easy to work with. There’s no job worth any type of money if there’s no aloha.”

Ohana Construction

matt@ohanaconstruction.us
gc@ohanaconstruction.us
ohanaconstruction.us

John Bendon

Feb 6, 2018

Growing up on Maui, John Bendon spent most of his free time in the natural environment and felt a strong desire to protect the ‘aina around him. He followed that passion into his studies and parlayed it into a career that has positively impacted nearly every corner of the state. The more he learned, the more he became fascinated by the green building and energy efficiency movements. His desire to help Hawai‘i with these new, nature-friendly construction methods motivated Bendon to start his own green building wheelhouse. From teaching classes to local and international audiences, to the work he does at Green Building Hawaii, Bendon has led a number of firsts in the green building industry and he’s only picking up momentum along the way.

Bendon left Hawai‘i to seek higher education in fields that would ultimately allow him to minimize resource depletion. He earned an undergraduate degree in environmental studies from University of Colorado Boulder, then worked for a developer before heading to graduate school. In his first course in the University of Denver master’s degree program in Real Estate and Construction Management, Bendon’s “aha” moment came while writing a paper on green building. “I always knew I wanted to come back and do something good for Hawai‘i,” he says. “Working for the developer, I saw an incredible amount of waste being created during the building process. The phrase ‘green building’ was just starting to emerge, and a light bulb went off.”

Bendon returned to Maui and in 2007 founded Green Building Hawaii (GBH), a company that provides energy consulting and building performance testing services and guides projects through building certifications such as LEED, Energy Star and others. After becoming one of the first LEED-accredited professionals in the state, he facilitated the first LEED for New Construction rating on Maui with the Montessori School of Maui, the first LEED-certified home in the state and Hawai‘i’s first LEED for Existing Buildings resort, the Hyatt Regency Maui, which is the also the fourth of its kind in the world. In response to a heavy need for building performance and energy efficiency training, GBH co-created the first green-building classes for the University of Hawai‘i Maui College in 2010. “Once we hit a critical mass of people trained in Hawai‘i, we shifted back into consulting roles, and the folks we met through training ended up being our clients,” Bendon says.

With a team of two on Maui and two on O‘ahu, GBH still delivers cutting-edge efficiency and sustainability training to clients like the University of Hawai‘i and various corporate partners. Last year, they completed extensive energy auditing on all Kamehameha Schools campuses, totaling roughly three million square feet. Now Bendon is excited about the consulting work they’re doing with nonprofit affordable housing—assisting with projects for Catholic Charities Hawai‘i, Hawaii Housing Finance & Development Corporation and Coalition for Specialized Housing. “A lot of buildings have aging equipment, and the maintenance staff either don’t have the time or the training to realize the savings that are easily obtainable,” he says. “Since most of the housing projects require a green certification to qualify for various grants and funding, we’re helping them get certified and setting them up for lower operating costs down the road.”

One of his company’s major keys to success, says Bendon, is its ability to adapt as market conditions shift, combined with creative use of resources to achieve sustainable construction goals. For example, when Hyatt needed a LEED lighting retrofit, they created a college intern program that offered better pricing and manpower for the client and provided students with hands-on experience and college credit. “We make sure we’re staying one step ahead of what’s happening out there in terms of new opportunities,” Bendon says. “That piece of innovating and trying to be cutting edge keeps things interesting and provides a challenge, so we’re not doing the same things over and over.”

GBH just hired a new principal, Peter Stone, who will be taking over the management role for new projects so that Bendon can focus on high-level strategy. In addition to guiding two hotels through LEED certification, managing six different affordable housing projects, running commercial energy audits, performance testing for large home building companies and hosting ongoing training, Bendon’s constructing his own house and prepping it for LEED certification.

Moving forward, Bendon plans to continue to strive for excellence, both through his work with clients and by growing the employment opportunities in Hawai‘i’s dynamic green building industry. “The fact that we’re doing both is awesome and it means we’re already successful,” he says. “If we can continue to do this, then we’re on the right track.”

Green Building Hawaii
john@greenbuildinghawaii.com
greenbuildinghawaii.com

Duncan MacNaughton

Feb 6, 2018

A collector of contemporary art whose office overlooking Ala Moana Beach Park contains dozens of sculptures carved by part-time Hawai‘i resident John Buck, Duncan MacNaughton has made a career of creating indoor-outdoor experiences that tap local partners and expertise.

MacNaughton’s entrepreneurial spirit and local ties can be traced to the plantation days, when his father served as vice president of Dole Pineapple and headed up C. Brewer & Co., one of Hawai‘i’s Big Five sugar companies. Today, MacNaughton is still heavily invested in Hawai‘i, but as a real estate developer and philanthropist committed to shaping the built environment to support the needs of the local community.

Whether reimagining the movie theater experience at Kapolei Commons or bringing people together and supporting their passions through charitable giving, MacNaughton has long made a name for himself but isn’t done leaving his mark on Hawai‘i.

How did you get your start in real estate development?

I started my career at age 24. I interviewed with Dillingham Corporation—they developed Ala Moana shopping center—and they had a training program for people like me just coming out of school. They sent us through five or six departments in the organization, one of which was the development department. I enjoyed working with my hands, both on the design and financing side as well as the actual construction. Whether it be commercial or condominium products, I was developing something for somebody to use, and that’s been a theme I’ve stayed with my entire career.

What is the hardest lesson you’ve learned over the course of your career?

Making certain you can survive when the economy goes down and there’s no demand for your product. The retail sector is a little more resilient to economic swings, so I had a number of situations where I had shopping centers cashflowing during slow times and that supported my activities in the condominium development side. We’ve been through a number of dips, and we’ve been able to weather them successfully.

What is the greatest challenge of developing real estate in a place like Hawai‘i?

Understanding the market. I understand this market better than any other, and that’s one of the reasons I stayed in Hawai‘i to do my business. I grew up here and was educated here, and I had lots of friends both in banking and marketing who I could call for counsel if I needed it.

Development in Hawai‘i can be a controversial subject. Has there been any pushback from the community?

We’re members of the community ourselves, so we’re here for the long haul and would rather garner support than build something controversial. We still try to push the boundaries wherever we can, but the goal is always to cater to our community. It’s important that we attract the right kind of capital to build the right product for Hawai‘i and to ensure it’s managed in a responsible way.

It’s a team effort and a constant conversation. We have a network of real estate brokers who tell us what the market would like to see, and we work with elected officials and neighborhood boards to get a good feel for what people in the various districts want. So there are formal processes through which we get community feedback, but we also get feedback by being very involved in the community.

What was your vision for The MacNaughton Foundation?

We recently formed The MacNaughton Foundation to streamline our charitable giving. We make significant contributions on an annual basis, typically to organizations we’re passionate about or involved in as board members. The community here is small, so our contributions can make a big difference to the population that lives here.

About a year ago, we made a $1 million donation to the Hawai‘i Chapter of U.S. VETS because we had a partner who was really interested in the plight of local veterans who were in combat in Vietnam. We usually keep our contributions under the radar, but I was convinced to go public with that gift in order to raise awareness for the homeless veterans here. I don’t have an answer for Hawai‘i’s homeless problem, but we’re able to increase exposure about the issue through our gifting.

In what other ways is The MacNaughton Group involved in the community?

Education is something that I believe is critical to the success of Hawai‘i going forward. We have to get our children well educated and then convince them to stay here. There can’t be enough focus on that, in my opinion.

Many of us at The MacNaughton Group are involved in various school boards, and as a company we do team days where we’ll paint fences or volunteer our time in other ways at different organizations. I serve on the board of trustees for Punahou and Hawai‘i Preparatory Academy, two schools I attended growing up.

We partnered with the University of Hawai‘i West O‘ahu to fund an initiative within the digital arts program where students created a trailer that now plays on the big screen before every movie at the Regal theater we built at Kapolei Commons. Students were able to take the class for free and a portion of the proceeds goes back to the program. We’re always partnering with organizations active in the communities we’re involved in.

Another part of the reason for starting the foundation was to open a conversation among the team and our business partners about what causes we all care about and to make decisions about where to focus our charitable giving. The veteran homeless was the first area, and the next will likely involve the environment, agriculture and sustainability.

What qualities have gotten you to where you are today?

I’m a dealmaker. I pick my investors and friends carefully and nurture those relationships.

Any advice for young professionals?

For one, you have to be a student of the market. Spend time studying the challenges you’re going to face and bring the right people around to do some of the heavy lifting.

What’s your take on the real estate market today?

One of the big risks in this industry is that markets can change between the time you start a project and the time you finish. It takes four to five years to complete a project like the Park Lane residences we finished last year, so you have to be prepared for that. The stock market is one way of judging the market. If it has a correction, that’ll ripple through the sales potential for projects, but we’re cautiously optimistic about the market going forward.

What makes the Hawai‘i market unique?

There are a number of uniquenesses, but one of the things we came to understand is that we’re an international market, not just a Hawai‘i market.

What is The MacNaughton Group calling card?

We focus on projects that return something to the community. Bringing Costco here by building their warehouse lowered the cost of living in Hawai‘i in one fell swoop. When we brought Starbucks to Hawai‘i and operated about 65 of its shops, it was about creating an experience for Hawai‘i. Starbucks has done a lot to change the face of retail. In fact, that’s the future of retail today given the competition from the internet—you have to provide an experience in stores as opposed to just selling a product. Those are examples of how we’ve had the opportunity to bring something to Hawai‘i and make it a better place.

That also applies to the high-rise residential condominium business. In many cases we’re bringing in outside money to buy those units, which strengthens our economy to better weather the downturns. The economy continues to do well across the country, but it’s doing particularly well in Asia. In China, for example, we encourage investors to come to Hawai‘i and put their money to work here.

That being said, about half the people who bought units at Park Lane already lived in Hawai‘i. Many were empty nesters looking to get rid of their big single-family home and move to something smaller, and Park Lane fit the bill.

What was the vision for Park Lane Ala Moana?

I always dreamed that the big Sears parking lot that used to be there would someday support a residential experience. We envisioned a low-rise project that would serve as a halfway point between a single-family home and a high-rise. We wanted it to be design focused and provide an outdoor experience, so we built big terraces and brought landscaping up into the project. We fed my love for contemporary art and hired local artists to produce works for us, including Deborah Butterfield, whose bronze horse sculpture is one of the centerpieces at Park Lane.

What made you decide to build the Hokua building where you’re headquartered?

Nobody had the confidence to do residential components in Kaka‘ako, but we jumped off the edge of the table because we felt there was a market. We wanted to take cars off the road and bring residences back into town where the infrastructure was already in place. We built the first mixed-use project there in over 10 years, and that helped jumpstart the urbanization of Kaka‘ako that’s going on today.

What do you see for The MacNaughton Group going forward?

We’ve been investing in Waikiki for over 10 years, but we plan to invest more of our time and resources in hospitality going forward because of how important it is as an economic engine for Hawai‘i. It’s not just the hotels, either—the retail businesses in Waikiki are some of the most successful in the world. In order to continue to attract visitors, physical improvements need to be made, but there are other things we have in mind as well.

I’ve been fortunate to attract a great team around me, but what I’m really excited about is two of my boys, Brett and Ian, joining the company. I’m thrilled they’re returning in kind what they’ve been given by this community, which is what I attempted to do in founding The MacNaughton Group.

A Sense of Place

Dec 21, 2017

Travelers today are hungry for authenticity, from how they choose to fill their days to all the things that shape the guest experience before they even check in. Ahead, meet three experts in the field of setting the scene and get their take on the design trends gaining traction in Hawai‘i and beyond, including what those trends reveal about the contemporary traveler.

Molly McDonald

DESIGNER

Looney & Associates

How have travelers’ changing tastes impacted hospitality design?

In the last couple of years, we have seen a shift from standardization to customization in hotels, where design reflects the location alongside key brand attributes. In the past, you could have two hotels from the same brand in completely different locations, and both hotels would have the same look. Travelers still want the consistency of service and quality you expect from brands, but they want it alongside a genuine experience that only that destination can offer.

We maintain the high standards of the brands we represent, but we make each property unique, whether by sourcing work from local artists or incorporating local textiles to reinforce a sense of place. That’s something we’ve seen globally and even more so here in Hawai‘i. There is a deep appreciation for the land and the culture, and we enjoy showcasing that in a modern way.

My job as an interior designer is more than just decorating a space. It’s about doing the research and sharing stories that will influence the design and shape better guest experiences. Landmarks, maps or cityscapes may influence the graphics we use. A local legend may inspire the chef to create a new, locally inspired dish. The boundaries of where design begins and ends are changing.

What sets Looney & Associates apart from other design firms?

As a 22-year interior design and hospitality interior architecture firm with offices in Dallas, Chicago and Honolulu, Looney & Associates brings a broad perspective, deep experience and a spirit of collaboration to our award-winning designs. I’ve worked in all three offices over the course of my career, and there’s a sense of camaraderie and common purpose across all three. The collaboration between our design teams in each location brings a unique aesthetic to our projects. I’m proud of the work we’re doing, and I’m glad we can play a part in designing properties that bring greater depth and value to the wonderful lifestyle here.

Sanford Hasegawa

MANAGING DIRECTOR

87Zero

What sets 87zero apart from other firms?

Because 87zero evolved from a design and architectural studio into a product development and furnishing company, we understand the entire process of design, through fulfillment and installation. All of our manufacturing and products are produced with Forest Stewardship Council-certified and/or sustainable materials and production practices.

We are also unique in that we are multidisciplined. We not only produce furniture, fixtures and equipment for hospitality, but we also provide custom-fabricated products for high-end retail and other commercial projects.

Servicing is also a big part of our company’s DNA. We not only provide use-and-care and servicing for all of our 87zero products, we are also Authorized Service Providers (ASP) for Miele appliances as well as Studio Becker millwork.

Besides manufacturing custom industrial products and servicing, our calling card is our dedication to MQS, or Minimum Quality Standards. We take the time to study the MQS requirements to ensure our products last for the lifespan of the project.

What design trends have you observed in the hospitality sector in recent years?

Locally and globally I see a trend towards design-integrated technology for both vacationers and business travelers. Typical hotel guests have multiple devices, and there is a greater emphasis on charging stations and USB ports as well as wireless access.

As for local design aesthetics, I still see a moderate amount of wood finishes used in hotel room renovations for warmth and character, blended with modern details such as free standing vanities and glass shower enclosures. I also see the use of modern materials, such as engineered quartz, in lieu of natural granite and marble. We will also be seeing more rectilinear tile and flooring in brick patterns instead of square formats.

Mitch Zerg

PRINCIPAL

Mitch Zerg & Associates

What was your mission in starting Mitch Zerg & Associates and what are you known for?

What I did is bring residential comfort, relaxation and quality to the hospitality world, focusing on custom furniture and lighting.

How has the hospitality design industry changed over the course of your career?

Luxury doesn’t mean gold and silver anymore. It’s the comfort of the seats, your towel—anything you touch. People have gotten so comfortable with hotel amenities that now you can buy any of the furniture you find in the high-end resorts. So first it was bringing residential product into hospitality. Now you can have hospitality amenities in your home. It’s been quite interesting to see this evolution.

Why did you decide to expand your business to Hawai‘i?

We’re seeing a variety of design firms from the mainland doing environments in the islands. I try to bring new design to the islands and give local firms equal play.

My interest in bringing products to Hawai‘i wasn’t to make a killing financially. Hawai‘i has a spirit and a culture, and I was interested in learning to integrate and share that with my factories. The challenge for me during the last six or seven years of coming to the islands was learning what guests’ needs are, hearing what local designers want and bringing the right spices to the mix. I try to be jewelry to the industry.

A lot of properties want something outside of the box, but it’s important to integrate local flavor and local materials. The key is providing modern technology and modern products and still maintaining the charm that brings people to the islands in the first place. Personally, I don’t want to see a room that I can see in New York.

The Aloha Industry

Dec 19, 2017

Hospitality is a complex industry, particularly in Hawai‘i, where so much lies in the tenuous balance between culture and innovation.

“Sustainability, perpetuating native culture, protecting natural resources, embracing innovation, allowing tourism to thrive without impinging on a treasured way of life—these are topics essential not only to Hawai‘i’s future but to communities worldwide,” says George Szigeti, president and CEO of the Hawai‘i Tourism Authority.

Ahead, leaders from a cross section of the industry shed insight into the multifaceted engine powering Hawai‘i’s economy.

Gerald Glennon

General Manager

The Kahala Hotel & Resort
Chris Sbarbaro

Vice President - Hawaii

Enterprise, Alamo & National Car Rental
Jeff Dunster

Executive Director

Hawaiian Legacy Reforestation Initiative
Jonathan McManus

Founder

Hotel Wailea
Kelly Hoen

Area General Manager

Outrigger Hotels & Resorts
Kelly Sanders

Area General Manager

Marriott International
Mark Dunkerley

President and Chief Executive Officer

Hawaiian Airlines
Paul McElroy

Senior Vice President of Development & Construction

Highgate
Richard Fried

Chairman

Hawai‘i Tourism Authority
Tom Bell

President

Hawaiian Hotels & Resorts
Susan Bredo

Resort Marketing Manager

Mauna Lani Bay Hotel & Bungalows

Sukit Kanaprach

Dec 18, 2017

When Sukit Kanaprach first started The Orchid Lei Company in 2003, he was the company’s one and only employee. Kanaprach had to learn how to manage every single step needed to import and export orchid leis.

He dealt with local farmers on both O‘ahu and the Big Island, coordinated with farms in Thailand, handled the shipments, removed cargo from the docks, delivered the leis to customers and juggled invoices and payments.

It was a labor of love that Kanaprach has since expanded into a 12-employee operation out of Kalihi. The company provides leis for hotels on O‘ahu and wholesalers throughout Hawai‘i and the world. Now 40, the Bangkok-born business owner relishes overseeing a company that delivers flowers and “makes people happy.”

“Even today I don’t think I’m a president, I’m just one of the workers,” Kanaprach says. “We work together here—I can’t do it myself anymore. It would be impossible.”

The Orchid Lei Company formed as an off-shoot of ECAN, a Thai-based orchid lei company that Kanaprach’s parents purchased in 1992. Though he never intended to get involved in the family business, Kanaprach started putting in time while earning his master’s degree in industrial and organizational psychology at Hawai‘i Pacific University.

That meant 4 a.m. wake-up calls, full days spent surviving the rigors of being the company’s sole employee, full evenings of night classes, then studying and homework until at least midnight.

It’s a grind that Kanaprach assumed without question. Even now, with a dozen full-time employees at his disposal to distribute the company’s 300 unique types of leis, he’s still up at 5 a.m. working seven days a week. “You have to love it,” Kanaprach says. “If there’s something that needs to be done, it needs to be done.”

That determination is how Kanaprach handles all the stresses of running a business with so many variables. When perishable orchids are transported across the world, a delay of a day or two can mean the loss of $15,000 or more in a single shipment. A slight malfunction or miscalculation of the temperature of the shipping container can result in a box of rotting flowers on arrival. A storm can alter timetables by a week. Sometimes, the country’s customs office fails to inspect the cargo before it spoils.

All this forces Kanaprach—whose calm, soft-spoken demeanor is surely an asset in this industry—to be a creative problem-solver. “It’s a part of business,” he says. “What can we fix? What needs to be delivered tomorrow? What needs to be done? What needs to be fixed? The flower part is the last thing we worry about. We just need to fix the problem first.”

A small shipment of a dozen premium leis was once held up by customs in Japan and wasn’t going to arrive in time for the opening of a temple there. Kanaprach had three days to find a solution. So he bought a commercial plane ticket for one of his workers, who brought the leis on the plane and delivered them in person.

That kind of personal touch is Kanaprach’s forte. Over the past year and a half, he has provided lunch for his workers on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays knowing that this small gesture of appreciation makes his employees—the backbone of the company—feel valued and work more efficiently. Kanaprach figures that this way, they don’t have to leave the company’s Kalihi office to get lunch three days a week.

Kanaprach also had to learn the hard lesson that sometimes, he can’t fix everything. Recently, one of the company’s employees was experiencing myriad personal issues. Kanaprach did his best to accommodate him, being as flexible and understanding as he could. Eventually, though, after the employee missed weeks of work without notice, Kanaprach made the heartbreaking decision to let him go.

“I almost feel like I failed him because I couldn’t help him,” Kanaprach says, with tears in his eyes. His candid empathy speaks to both his humanity and the weight of managing a dozen employees who have their own personal lives and responsibilities.

“He’s all about people,” says Kanaprach’s wife, Rebecca, who also works for The Orchid Lei Company. “He hopes that they can grow at the same time as we are growing together. Leave no people behind, because it makes you feel connected and it makes other people feel successful. It’s part of his fulfillment. We’re really grateful for the staff who are doing their best every day to make it work as a team.”

The Orchid Lei
sukit@ecanrmsusa.com
theorchidlei.com

Corey Campbell

Dec 18, 2017

Like so many things in Corey Campbell’s life, putting down roots in Hawai‘i wasn’t part of some grand plan. On a whim, he applied for a student exchange program with the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa and spent his sophomore year here while pursuing a psychology degree from Virginia Tech.

“It’s funny, psychology is one of hardest degrees to plug into a job unless you go into psychiatry, but I’ve found that it applies to every single thing I do,” Campbell says. “All training is is reading a person and understanding what would motivate them to change their behavior, and then attaching that to what you’re doing.”

Campbell first fell into training during his years teaching English in Japan. While there, he picked up the Japanese language fairly well, a skill that helped him land a job as a guest services manager at the Sheraton Waikiki when he eventually returned to Hawai‘i for good.

Putting his plans for medical school on the back burner, Campbell seized the opportunity to lead internal brand training for the company his second month on the job. He discovered that he loved training others and, what’s more, that he was good at it.

Campbell took his newfound skillset with him when he went on to help open Rum Fire, where he managed daily operations and led employee workshops as its assistant manager. “Everyone should be forced to work in hospitality at some point in their life,” Campbell says. “It helps you bring a customer service approach to everything you do.”

When The Royal Hawaiian reopened as part of the Luxury Collection, Campbell mined a new role there as a learning development manager, developing the training program that would later inspire him to found his company Akamai Training & Consulting.

“I do a lot of empathy training,” Campbell says. “And it starts with identifying what real empathy is. People say to put yourself in the other person’s shoes, well that’s wrong. If I put myself in your shoes, I’m still looking at the situation through my eyes.”

“Everyone talks about the golden rule—treat others the way you want to be treated,” Campbell says. “But that assumes what you want is the same as what I want.” Real hospitality, he argues, is about making an earnest effect to get to know a person, learn how they tick, and ask the right questions to arrive at an understanding of what they want and how they want to be treated.

Campbell’s leadership development training is one of three arms of his business, spanning everything from Myers-Briggs evaluations to executive retreats. “I spend a lot of time on culture,” Campbell says. “Culture is everything in an organization.”

“Great leaders realize that water runs downhill,” Campbell says. “If your team isn’t performing as well as you’d like, the first place you should look is inside. What aren’t you doing to drive your team?” Even better, he says, take it a step further and just ask.

Campbell is an advocate of the start-stop-continue approach to seeking feedback from employees. He instructs his trainees to ask their staff to name one thing that drives them crazy that they wish you’d stop, one thing you’re not doing that they wish you’d start and one thing they love that you should continue to do to make their job easier. “When you ask people those questions,” Campbell says, “they tend to have an answer.”

He also believes the difference between good leadership and great leadership comes down to intention. “What’s your reason for doing for doing what you do?” he says. “People can tell if you’re only in your current role to get promoted. Whatever job you’re in, approach it as if it’s the one you’re going to have for the rest of your life.”

The other two arms of the business are executive coaching, where Campbell works one-on-one with people to help them achieve greater self-awareness and growth, and module training sessions that address specific areas, such as relationship building, team dynamics or emotional intelligence.

Campbell’s training sessions are deliberately experiential in nature, and they often force people out of their element. But Campbell says the frustration people feel during the exercises are key to their progress. “Anytime passion is involved, people start to listen.”

Dissecting your approach to the exercises are another important part of the process. Campbell says there’s often a discrepancy between how a person thinks they behave, and how others know them to behave. “So I ask them, ‘What would others say?’” Campbell says. “In other words, ‘Are you certain you’re the coworker or employee you think you are?’”

Campbell is adamant that the goal of his training programs isn’t just to make people better leaders and employees. He insists that when you improve yourself on a personal level, it will only impact your professional life for the better. “Life is a product of your most dominant thoughts,” Campbell says. “So what story are you telling yourself? If you can’t change the situation, why not change the story?”

Akamai Training & Consulting

corey@akamaitraining.com

Patrick Ahler

Nov 7, 2017

In 2005, Patrick Ahler came to Hawai‘i to catch some waves, but it wasn’t long before the avid surfer was making waves of his own as a digital marketing expert and entrepreneur.

Fresh out of Tennessee’s Southern Adventist University, Ahler was determined to put down roots in Hawai‘i. The islands had called to him ever since his early days of learning to surf with his father, who had lived here. With his computer systems administration degree in hand and an ambition to succeed, he was able to land a job within 24 hours of arriving in the islands.

This early opportunity to work at a web design agency and later a web hosting company proved to be an important stepping stone in his career. Over the next few years, Ahler worked as a systems administrator, project manager, developer and designer for more than 600 websites. This extensive experience allowed him to hone his skills and develop the expertise needed to succeed in the fast-paced and highly competitive web hosting industry. It was during this time that he met experienced revenue manager and his future Lights On Digital co-founder Will Song.

Capitalizing on his experience in one of the online world’s most competitive industries, Ahler went on to spearhead the development of a digital marketing and online strategy for Hawai‘i’s fastest-growing—and now largest—hotel chain.

After witnessing firsthand the impact that cutting-edge digital marketing and revenue management strategies could have for distressed hotels, Ahler and his co-founder knew what they needed to do.

“We saw a huge opportunity to reach an underserved but very important segment of the hospitality market,” says Ahler, now 35. “Many independent hotels, resorts and micro-chains don’t have their own revenue management or digital strategy team. We seamlessly provide that support. No one else in Hawai‘i was doing what we were doing with an all-inclusive approach to these services.”

It was this idea that inspired the ambitious duo to found Lights On Digital in 2014. By bundling revenue management and digital strategy, they would be able to provide the support those hotels needed in a way that no one else could offer.

In the few years since its founding, Ahler and Song’s company has become one of the state’s leading digital marketing agencies serving the hospitality industry. “Business took off quickly,” says Ahler, who now works with a team of 15 contractors, including revenue managers, data analysts, search engine marketers, designers, developers, content managers and copywriters. The company has doubled its client base in the past year and serves more than two dozen properties across Hawai‘i, the Western and Northeastern United States and the Caribbean.

The results have been a game changer for clients of Lights On Digital. One of the company’s original clients, Hotel Wailea on Maui, sought to regain traction in an increasingly competitive Wailea resort market following a $15 million renovation to the property in 2013. Lights On Digital worked with Hotel Wailea to implement strategies that helped the business surpass key benchmarks and reach historic levels of revenue.

Hotel Wailea is now the top traveler-rated hotel on Maui, and this success isn’t an anomaly. Lights On Digital has consistently provided support and delivered strategies that create measurable results for its clients. Whether they’re tracking revenue, average daily rate or revenue per available room, Ahler’s unique approach has an undeniable impact on his clients’ business. “It boils down to building close relationships with clients,” Patrick says. “That and pairing an in-depth understanding of the hospitality industry with technological innovation, particularly in analytics and digital marketing.”

Lights On Digital’s growing list of awards, achievements and recognition is a testament to just how effective that approach has been. Several of the company’s website redesigns have won awards, including the prestigious Adrian Awards from the Hospitality Sales and Marketing Association International in 2016, a Pele Award from the Hawai‘i chapter of the American Advertising Federation in 2017 and two Horizon Interactive Website Awards in 2016.

Where will Lights On Digital go from here after seeing so much success right out of the gate? Ahler has big plans to expand further in Hawai‘i as well as the mainland United States.

But they aren’t stopping there. “While Lights On Digital is grounded in the hospitality industry, we see potential for the growth of this model in other industries as well,” Ahler says, hinting at some exciting new plans in the works. The recent signing of new clients, such as ABC Stores’ Dukes Lane Market & Eatery and the Napa River Inn in California, continues to open doors in this direction.

As for the man driving the company’s growth, he will continue to make Hawai‘i his home. During Ahler’s 12 years in the islands, he has fallen in love with the lifestyle. “There is this incredible network of people that makes Hawai‘i an ideal place to innovate and do business,” Ahler says.

Patrick came to Hawai‘i with little more than a dream and a gut feeling that it was where he needed to be. In just over a decade, he’s started a family and grown a successful company—who knows what he’ll accomplish during the next.

Lights On Digital
patrick@lightsondigital.com

Sanj Sappal

Nov 6, 2017

Approachable, quick to laugh and with a background in women’s swimwear and parking management, Sanj Sappal isn’t someone you’d expect to find in the security business. But upon meeting him, it’s easy to see how his warm personality, infectious enthusiasm and high-touch approach to management has inspired record levels of employee retention in an industry notorious for its high turnover rate.

As it turns out, the skillset that brought Sappal success selling bikinis and managing parking lots has translated remarkably well to this latest chapter in his noteworthy, if eclectic, career. Still, Sappal himself would never have guessed he’d end up at Securitas, a global leader in electronic security, corporate risk management, and mobile, remote and on-site guarding.

As area vice president for Securitas’ Hawai‘i and Guam region, Sappal is responsible for overseeing one of the corporation’s largest North American outposts and rolling out a slew of proprietary security solutions pioneered by what is collectively one of the largest providers of protective services in the world. Here, he discusses the challenges and intricacies of managing a network of more than 2,000 employees as the largest security company and eighth largest employer in the state.

What did you do prior to your career at Securitas?

I owned and operated retail stores for a good 12 years. My mom first got me into it—she’s run Cosmopolitan Sun Shop, her store at Koko Marina Center, for 40 years—so after graduating from Chapman University in 1987, I came back to Hawai‘i and borrowed the funds to open two women’s swimwear shops in Kailua.

During that time, I was simultaneously involved in parking management. At one point I reported to Sidney Kim, a hotel security chief and retired inspector for the Honolulu Police Department. He introduced me to a lot of other retired police officers working in hotel security, who I eventually started golfing with. The golfing led to more relationships and friendships, and I later met Securitas’ former area vice president Ray Romero. When Ray decided to retire, the president at the time convinced me to step in. I didn’t know anything about security. I was selected based on my relationships in the industry.

HOw would you describe your leadership style?

I’m definitely not management by fear. If that’s your approach, your organization is just going to have a revolving door. My style is management by motivation—and maybe a little fear!

How long has Securitas been a contractor for the state?

We’re on our third term of providing security services for the state’s 11 airports. Each term is about five years, so we started in 2004 and currently employ about 1,100 airport security employees. It’s a $43 million-per-year contract, and it accounts for about half of our business.

How do you maintain a positive brand reputation when handling complaints or other incidents that could result in negative publicity?

I think the most important thing is to be honest, humble and as transparent as possible. We share what we can with the media, but we also have to respect the individual’s rights in terms of labor laws and HR rules and regulations.

What qualities have helped get you to where you are today?

Being caring and compassionate with people has allowed me to build trust and friendships with people I wouldn’t otherwise have relationships with. Internally it’s allowed me to gain the trust and loyalty of my staff.

Managing a company that serves as the first responder in a lot of challenging and sometimes life-threatening situations, nothing ever surprises me. I’ve built a thick skin and learned not to react when provoked. That’s a useful skill when conflicts arise. It’s important to respect others’ opinions and deal with things in a professional manner.

How have current events affected the work that you do?

Current events and even social media have changed the security industry dramatically. We’ve all become very vigilant of our surroundings. As a result, our company is using technology to create force multipliers. Cameras can cover more area than one guard with two eyes. Security is definitely a fast-paced industry, and it will only continue to grow, fortunately and unfortunately.

What about cyberattacks?

Securitas purchased Pinkerton in 1999 and Burns Security in 2000, two of the oldest and largest guarding companies in the United States. We do cyber security through our Pinkerton acquisition. There’s a lot of fraud taking place, so we’ve been involved in corporate risk management as an industry leader this whole time.

What has Securitas been involved in lately on the national level?

Securitas recently acquired Diebold’s North American electronic security business—it’s now Securitas Electronic Security—so we’ve created a lot of proprietary technologies involving cameras triggered by motion or sound. A lot of home security systems are equipped with this feature. So if there’s an intrusion in your backyard while you’re away, your security system captures a ten-second clip and sends it to you wherever you are.

In California, we teamed up with a Silicon Valley technology company to deploy about 25 robots capable of license-plate recognition, and they’re moving into facial recognition next. We’re also teaming up with Microsoft and another tech company to explore applications for augmented reality.

These are all developments within the past year or so, so we’re just out of the gate. We’re currently working on getting up to speed on a new remote monitoring center, which we have here locally. We’re learning a new industry, really.

Technology is really changing the way we’re driving our business. I would say 90 percent of our 300-plus contracts utilize SecuritasVision, a proprietary smart phone and tablet-based platform that streamlines officer walk-arounds and incident reports. Other companies have their own technology, but we think we’re driving most of it.

In what capacity is Securitas involved in the hospitality industry?

We have guards all over Waikiki, especially now with our mobile patrol service. We’re very vigilant and are in close contact with the police department, which is good for the tourism industry when you look at it on a macro level. We save lives, mitigate situations, we take people off the plane. Last year we responded to over 10,000 incidents at the airports alone.

We’re here to protect the state of Hawai‘i and that’s what motivates me each day. We’re the first and last encounter for visitors coming to Hawai‘i, so we put our guards through a tremendous amount of aloha-spirit training. We really try to exemplify the aloha spirit while also keeping people safe. That’s an incredibly difficult thing, but we try to be ambassadors of aloha and instill that throughout our whole management team.

How has the state’s low unemployment rate affected business?

That’s a big challenge we’re facing right now. Everyone is looking for workers. We hired a recruitment specialist earlier this year to attract and retain new hires because, as of this interview, we’re 160 guards short.

We also launched a program where our HR department calls on individual guards to check in about the onboarding process, how their manager is treating them, whether or not they have the uniforms they need. We never did that when the unemployment rate was high. We should have, and we’re going to continue to do so. We currently offer new employees a $1,000 sign-up bonus or $1,500 if they carry a state-issued guard card.

This industry is all metrics driven, so we’re always comparing ourselves to other regions when it comes to overtime, workers’ comp, gross margins, net profit and more. One of the most interesting comparisons we’ve found is that we have one of the highest officer-retention levels among Securitas locations throughout the United States. Last week we were number one in the nation. We’re also in the top 10 for lowest officer turnover. I think that can be attributed to the fact that we try to stay very close to our staff, take care of their needs and treat them like ‘ohana.

Why is community outreach such a significant part of your business?

What we do here is pretty unique, but that’s just the nature of Hawai‘i. There’s only 660,000 employable workers in the entire state. Compare that to San Diego County’s 1.5 million or the 22 million in downtown Los Angeles. If you don’t stand out the right way, you’re going to stand out like a sore thumb the wrong way.

I think it’s very important to connect with our clients. That’s something I’ve driven here. You’re building lifelines—that’s an analogy I use to ensure we have good retention of contracts as well as employees. We have to take care of everybody and give back to the community here. The islands are too small not to.

Keith Mallini

Nov 6, 2017

Keith Mallini’s fascination with the alluring persona of a restaurateur began as a teenager working at his aunt’s restaurant on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Behind the scenes, he says, the reality was much less glamorous, but when it came time to open, his Aunt Annie would be dressed to the nines and commanding the room as an icon in the community.

Drawn to the culture and energy of the restaurant industry, Mallini sidelined his original career plans in biomedical engineering and international business to help take over L’Economie, a little bistro tucked into the Arts District in his native New Orleans. “That was pretty much the end of all my other aspirations,” he laughs.

When one of his business partners—a CIA-trained chef—decided to abandon the endeavor six months in, Mallini picked up the slack in the kitchen and found he had a knack for running back-of-house operations, too. Learning on the job came easily to Mallini—his aunt had him bussing tables at 12 and mixing drinks at 14—and he’s won numerous awards and culinary competitions utilizing the skills he’s picked up over the years. (His favorite? The American Culinary Federation competition he won for a dish featuring Louisiana’s invasive swamp rat.)

After closing down L’Economie due to structural issues in the building, Mallini went on to take over a restaurant in Baton Rouge, one with a much higher volume, that he renamed Mallini’s, The Place. “I was running the kitchen and also the front of the house, so I developed a sixth sense about what was happening out on the floor just by looking at the servers’ faces,” Mallini says. “And having past experience in the kitchen, I could understand what the back of the house was going through at all times and could help ease the tension.”

After about five years in Baton Rouge and a stint as general manager at Victor’s in the Ritz-Carlton, New Orleans, Mallini was offered a job in Hawai‘i, where his mother was from and where he’d spent some of his childhood. Mallini spent the next several years overhauling the food and beverage programs at the Hanohano Room and a few other properties in Hawai‘i before finding himself in Chicago, where he eventually opened the restaurant Prasino and was given free rein to build the beverage program and refine the place’s sustainable, organic concept.

It was there he made the contact that would eventually lead him to his most recent venture at the newly revamped International Market Place. Mallini was living on the Big Island and managing Rays on the Bay at the Sheraton Kona when his old contact from Prasino asked him to head up the Waikiki eatery he was opening with mainland investors. “I figured they needed somebody to help them navigate the waters of doing business in Hawai‘i,” Mallini says. “I really stressed the fact that we needed to embrace the culture. Those were my conditions to come on board.”

At Baku, nearly everything plays off the restaurant’s robatayaki (“fireside cooking”) concept. “There were some specific menu items that the owners wanted to bring over from the other location, but I was given free rein as far as service style, training and beverage program,” Mallini says. “We took a core concept and built everything else around it. One of my passions is tying everything together.”

Given his experience managing restaurants in soulful New Orleans, sleepy Hana and cutthroat Chicago, Mallini found himself in a unique position to forge a good balance of embracing progress and honoring tradition. “I remember I was interviewing for a job here, and the director, who was from New York, was telling me about how many managers he had been through,” Mallini says. “I asked him if any of them knew the difference between ‘Ewa and Diamond Head. He was like, ‘What do you mean?’ It’s things like that—you have to be able to relate to your staff.”

Since opening the restaurant in September, Mallini’s days have been a whirlwind of admin, phone calls, meetings with wine purveyors, POS programming and menu edits. But there’s nothing more rewarding, he says, than sitting down with a glass of wine after a full day of putting out fires around the restaurant.

What does it take to make it in this industry? According to Mallini, a generous helping of expertise, patience and humor. “I’ve found that a sense of humor goes a long way in any situation,” he laughs.

Baku
k.mallini@baku-waikiki.com

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