As Employment Sags, RE Firms Still Adding Execs

 As the difficult economic times continue, the unemployment rate keeps on the increase. Still, new hire announcements hit my inbox every day and I'm writing news briefs for CPN’s People on the Move section on an almost daily basis. One thing that has caught my attention is that many firms are busy tapping new managing directors, senior vice presidents and other high-level executive postitions. Just yesterday, Canyon Capital Realty Advisors announced the hiring of David Ridini to serve as managing director with responsibility for identifying and overseeing investment in the Northeast. And Trammell Crow Co. recently appointed David Stahl as senior vice president with the firm’s real estate acquisition group. Also, Mike Neal joined Colliers Spectrum Cauble as senior vice president of retail. Last week, Susan Carras joined Cushman & Wakefield Sonnenblick Goldman as senior managing director, based in the firm's Washington, D.C. office. Also last week, Rockwood Capital L.L.C. announced that veteran real estate investment professional Frank Orioli had joined the firm as managing director of transactions. Finally, Jones Lang LaSalle just hired Terry Darrow as a managing director to lead its Dallas/Fort Worth industrial practice. And these are just a few examples of what I receive in my inbox on the daily basis.

    

    As the nationwide unemployment rate continues to march upward, will real estate firms continue to make new executive hires? Or could the employment slowdown reach the upper management levels?

CPN Fast Poll: TALF as a Solution

How beneficial will the newly revised TALF be for commercial real estate? Is it enough? Is it a good start? Do you have a better solution? Give us your thoughts!

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Finding Success--Today & Tomorrow

What determines success now, and how much will it need to change in the future?

These are questions I've had to ponder recently while narrowing down the list of companies to be profiled in CPN's Goldbook, which we changed this year from our traditional compendium to a more pointed selection of companies that can be considered a gold standard for success in the current economy. Working through the nominations of our CPN 100 advisory board of top industry executives and determining the best sources of research to address the characteristics we had determined to best produce success in this market took me down some new paths that produced some interesting results. I worked with a list of characteristics that included innovation, agility, flexibility, intelligence, foresight and confidence, plus an ability to make smart strategic decisions in a rapidly evolving environment, and I dug up research that evaluated these strengths.

But what I can't help wondering is just how extensive the need for new strategies will be. After all, history is famous for repeating itself (to paraphrase) and the real estate and finance industries are hardly an exception. Every time they overstep their bounds and take on too much risk or otherwise throw caution to the proverbial winds, they wind up in dire straits.

Yes, this is the worst economy short of the Great Depression, but does that guarantee when we emerge we won't repeat the same mistakes? Yes, there are some significant changes taking place--I see it in my own so-called publishing industry as well as in the real estate, finance and other industries, most especially in the shift toward greater emphasis on the Internet and electronic communications and the expansion of possibilities relating to this. But still, just how much will business really change and how much will go back to how it was?

Given Americans' tendency toward exuberance--and I think the tech bubble was a good example, with the life-changing New Economy bursting along with the rest of the bubble--I predict some combination. Some things will certainly change--some things pretty significantly--and hopefully they will be beneficial changes. But there will also be a significant amount that goes back to the way it was. Because Americans, at least, may be exuberant, but human beings in general are creatures of habit.

I think we will need to make a conscious effort to determine what to retain and what to change and then keep working to keep ourselves on those tracks. But it won't be easy and we will likely be only partially successful.

Should Goldman Repay Its TARP Funds Now?

Are the banks really coming back already? Or is everybody just so happy for good news every positive sign seems like the return of the market? President Obama keeps cautioning that while there have been some favorable signs, we still have a long way to go and other efforts to try, and he's probably right. And after all, the news isn't all good--at Goldman, for instance, only certain business areas showed positive movement in the first quarter (most notably, fixed income), while other parts of the company continued to decline (such as principal investments).  But when both Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs offer positive news, and Goldman expresses an interest in paying back government money it only just borrowed, it's tough not to feel somewhat optimistic--or at least hopeful. Of course, we still have to hear this week from JP Morgan Chase and Citigroup. But meanwhile, the question remains: Should Goldman strive to repay its TARP funds so soon--and should other banks follow? Or should they hold on to the money and strive to put it toward helping consumers with financing? What will help the economy more?   

Down to Business

My colleagues and I have spent a lot of time talking about corporate real estate lately. Or rather, I suppose that corporate real estate has been forcing its way onto our agenda more and more. Of course, we've always covered corporate concerns, but direct coverage has been relegated to special sections, and we've the rest of the time, we've approached the topic through coverage of corporations' service providers. Only when I take a step back do I realize how much more CPN has to cover the general economy, consumer spending, unemployment and other macroeconomic issues. No longer are these concepts tangentially related to our readers.

That's not to say they never mattered before, of course. But in a time of astronomical deals and deal volume (it wasn't even really that long ago), it was multibillion-dollar deals, not defaults, that drove the news cycle. It all seems so simple now, doesn't it, that this was a backwards way of approaching our business, both your transactions and our headlines? In a matter of stating-the-obvious (at a time when we admittedly need to hear the obvious), Ernst & Young is backing a back-to-basics approach for real estate investors. And Cushman & Wakefield presents 10 strategies for how corporate real estate executives can contribute to the health of their corporations in an upcoming white paper, which will premiere in CPN's April issue, addressing such plain-and-simple responsibilities as shoring up the right paperwork so prospective bids can move quickly.

It just seems time to get back to the basics so we can all get back to business, remembering, of course, not to get ahead of ourselves again.