September 12, 2025 • 35 mins
One of hospitality’s most prolific, well-respected presenters, Jan shares his public speaking journey, including specific things to do before, during, and after your presentation to elevate your public speaking. He also shares how raising your hand can help you to be “seen” by senior leaders, how he navigates tremendous ambiguity, and why acknowledging people’s humanity is critical.
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Episode Transcript
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Lan Elliott (00:00):
Welcome to its Personal Stories, a hospitality
podcast.
My name is Lan Elliot on behalfof its personal stories, and
today I am delighted to have JanFreitag here with us.
He is the National Director,hospitality Analytics at CoStar,
formerly STR I've always thoughtof him as the data person who
(00:23):
provides some of the mostimportant data in our industry.
And if you're not familiar withJan, I hope you'll go on our
website and check out his manyaccomplishments.
So Jan, welcome.
Jan Freitag (00:37):
And thank you so much for having me.
I appreciate the opportunity tobe with you today and chat a
little bit about whatever youwanna talk about.
Let's
Lan Elliott (00:45):
talk about you
Jan Freitag (00:47):
data, all things.
Lan Elliott (00:50):
I wanted to talk about your career journey
because as much as I've knownyou for many years, I don't
think I've ever had aconversation with you about.
How you got to where you aretoday.
Could you share some of theinflection points in your
incredible career and what youthink were the secrets to your
success?
Jan Freitag (01:11):
Yeah.
When I read that question whenyou sent me the prep material, I
was like this is a shortconversation because I've been
with the same company for 23years, which is very unusual.
So I started with STR in 2002.
That was it.
I've been in that role eversince.
At the very beginning as you cantell by the accent, I'm not from
(01:32):
the us, I'm from Germany.
And I did after high school, anapprenticeship in a hotel.
And apprenticeships areliterally for three months, few.
Do the dishes or you clean theroom, so you check people in and
out.
And you do that for two and ahalf, three years or so.
Normally a lot of my classmateswent to study at university, but
I just wasn't ready for that,and I always had.
(01:54):
The hotel industry just reallyappealed to me and I wanted to
work in that.
And at the end, the sort of, thequestion was, what's next?
And there was a GM who said weshould normally progress to a
hotel school.
And there are a bunch ofprograms.
You can go to Lausanne, you cango to Tout in Germany, and
there's this other program up inCornell, but nevermind that,
that's in America.
What you have stuff to do herein, in Germany.
(02:16):
And I was like okay.
So I ended up applying toCornell and I thought, that's
how you apply to college.
You send a letter and then theyaccept you.
So later on I realized that.
That's not really how thisworks.
So I'm standing on the shouldersof giants because they had a
bunch of Germans go through theprogram before me, who had done
very well.
With work ethic and having comefrom the industry, having done
(02:38):
an apprenticeship, they knewwhat they were getting.
And I think that was that, thathelped with my application.
And then from there I was withErnest and Young for a year very
briefly.
It just wasn't for me out inPhoenix.
And then helped a friend start acompany to compete.
With STR, it was 1998 and hesaid, Hey, it's dot com.
We're all gonna make a billiondollars.
(02:59):
Come join me in Ithaca and we'regonna take on this small, sleepy
company in Hendersonville,Tennessee.
That didn't really quite workout.
So nine 11 happened and Randy.
Called Brian Ferguson, the CEOof this company which was called
Real Time Hotel Reports, whichto me still is the best name of
(03:19):
any company ever.
It's it says exactly what it is.
It's real time hotel reports.
But Randy called.
Brian said, look, you have noclients.
Really good ideas and I have allthe clients and I need some new
ideas.
Let me buy you.
And so STR purchased real-timehotel reports and then that
facilitated a move for me toNashville not to Hendersonville,
which is where the office hasbeen for a long time.
(03:41):
But I stayed in Nashville thewhole time and commuted out
there.
And yeah, that was 2002.
And then through STR.
I was able to just do a lot ofdifferent things very quickly.
I think I was employee number 40or so, and very quickly fell
into this public speaking,writing, talking to reporters
(04:03):
role that just a lot of peopleeither didn't want to do or it
was just exhausting.
As you can know, travel andspeaking can be exhausting.
So the inflection points wereprobably just saying, Hey, I
wanna do an apprenticeship andlearn the nuts and bolts.
Of the industry being acceptedto Cornell, certainly an
inflection point.
(04:23):
And then by luck or accidentbeing acquired by the industry
leader, which was at the time,still very small in, in, in
2002.
And then work my way up throughthe ranks there.
And then obviously in 2019 wewere acquired by CoStar.
And CoStar pretty quicklyrealized that they have now
access to all the data, but theydidn't have a CoStar Hotel
(04:46):
person.
And so they tapped me and said,Hey, it looks like you're doing
a lot of writing and speaking.
Can you do that a little bitmore focused on the CoStar
clients?
And the sort of the demarcationline between SGR and CoStar is.
STR deals with data providers,so the Hilton Heights, merit of
the World, and CoStar deals withall the people who don't have
data.
So the banks, the lenders someof the the large PE funds or
(05:09):
consulting shops and so forth.
Lan Elliott (05:12):
There were a few different points during your
career with STR and then ko.
You could have decided to take aleft or a right turn and say,
I'm gonna go do something else.
I'm curious, was there ever apoint in time where you thought
about that or were you alwaysvery determined in doing what
(05:33):
you love, which is what you'redoing now?
Jan Freitag (05:37):
It started in 2002 and thought.
No way.
Like why?
What Nashville Hendersonvillethis isn't it.
Let me get an MBA and get out ofhere.
Luckily Mark Laman, thepresident at the time, allowed
me to get an executive MBA, so Iwas able to work and then go to
school every other weekend,full-time Friday, Saturday.
(05:59):
Not full-time, sorry for, butfor both days.
So I got an executive MBA atVanderbilt University absolutely
with the idea that I would jumpfrom there to.
Wall Street or some othercompany that did something more
interesting.
But while that was happening, Igot a lot more opportunity to
speak and that really resonatedwith me and I really enjoyed
(06:23):
that a lot.
And I think I was able to conveyour data in a way that people
said, oh, let's invite that guyback with the accent, who can
talk to us for 20 minutes?
And we find it interesting whenhe leaves.
So I was able to make this nicheout of speaking and writing and
talking to reporters andcommenting on the major trends
(06:44):
in the industry because weobviously had the data and as
you can imagine, there's alwaysa hotel angle.
It's like in almost any story,if you open up the Wall Street
Journal of the New York Times,you can.
Take almost any story and say,oh, I wonder what that does to
tourism, what that does totravel, what that does to
hotels.
And then eventually thatreporter ends up calling SDR or
(07:06):
CoStar and I'm often on theother side of that conversation.
So the inflection point was,yeah, I don't want to do this.
But then the opportunitypresented itself that I was
like, oh, this is actually, Ireally enjoy this and this is a
need in the company and let'sjust do that.
Lan Elliott (07:26):
I love the idea of finding something new and a job
that you've been doing thatcould actually be fulfilling.
I wanted to ask about careerdevelopment specifically.
Were there certain skills thatyou decided to hone to increase
your opportunities foradvancement?
Jan Freitag (07:47):
I think the most important thing.
Is to raise your hand.
And I don't know that sort ofspeaking him naturally, but it
was something that when I, thefew times I had done it, I was
like, oh, this is interesting.
And so when more opportunitiesarose, I just said, yeah, I want
(08:08):
to do it.
And I think that is if anything,if there's any takeaway, you
know that in any moment in yourspecific.
Career where you sit, there arealways other opportunities
within the company.
You just have to raise your handand say, Hey, if this ever comes
up, I'm very interested.
(08:29):
So the latest example right now,today, and I think this is true
for all your listeners, isaround ai, right?
Every company is saying, oh, weneed to do something.
We're not quite sure what to do.
And I've said, for a year and ahalf.
To my boss and my boss's bossand whoever wants to listen.
I wanna be involved.
I don't know what it looks like,but if this ever is something
(08:51):
that CoStar wants to do, I'mhere.
And now we are knee deep.
We are all using copilot.
So every one of our 6,800associates has a co-pilot
license.
So we're using copilot right andcenter.
So it was like, okay, good.
Let's do it.
So there are task forces andsmall groups and people trying
to see how can we use ai.
So I think we're in this superinteresting moment in time where
(09:17):
some of your listeners who maybe younger in their career, just
raise your hand, and say, Hey, Iwant to do this.
Because there, there are alwaysinflection points and you could
say, I want to do more.
I wanna do something different.
I want to be, I wanna becounted.
I wanna be seen.
And I think I did that withspeaking, and I'm, again, I'm
doing it now with ai.
Lan Elliott (09:36):
I love that.
I wanted to unpack that becausea lot of times.
We talk on this show aboutsaying yes when people present
you with opportunities, butyou're really talking about
proactively looking forward andseeing what could be next, and
then going to your bosses orwhoever might be the person to
let them know if this becomes athing, I would love to be
(09:59):
involved.
And it's proactively bringingopportunities and suggesting
things to.
People who might be able to giveyou that opportunity in the
future rather than waiting forsomeone to come to you and offer
you something.
Jan Freitag (10:14):
Yeah, and it means scanning the environment, seeing
what the company needs.
I know that later on we'll talka little bit more about public
speaking.
But it's something that you arealways in a forum.
There's a high likelihood thatthe company that you're in will
have a department head meetingor will have a, some sort of
meeting with more than 10people.
(10:34):
You can go to your manager andsay, Hey, next time there's a
chance, I would love to present.
I would love to be that personwho speaks about whatever the
topic is, and I would love tohone my skill with that.
And it's super uncomfortable,and yes, your boss may say no,
but at least they may say, oh,okay, you're interested in that.
(10:55):
Let's see, maybe not this time,but maybe there's an
opportunity.
Down the road.
I the example for my own careeris when, so I was early with STR
and Mark and Randy were asked tospeak a lot.
It was, 2002, data was becomingmore important.
Computing power was getting lessexpensive and people wanted data
(11:16):
more quickly.
Mark and Randy were travelingall the time to present Mark
Liano and the president, RandySmith, the founder of SDR R.
And they had young kids and theywere exhausted.
So then they said, Hey, wouldyou like to go to, I'm like,
yes.
And they're like, don't youwanna know where?
I'm like, no, I just wanna gobecause this speaking thing is
(11:38):
like really cool.
And so I was fortunate that theywere like, okay.
Knock yourself out, buddy.
And I was like, young and singleand it was all good.
Lan Elliott (11:46):
That is a perfect segue.
I'm gonna jump over to publicspeaking because as you
mentioned, you started byraising your hand and
volunteering to get on a planewherever it was going.
You regularly speak at some ofthe biggest conferences in our
industry, often thousands ofpeople.
(12:09):
Could you talk a bit to theimportance of the skill of
public speaking and elevatingone's career, and what was your
journey to get to those largestages?
Because when I was younger, Ithought as long as you knew your
material, that was enough.
But there are things that youcan do beyond that, and you do
(12:30):
it beautifully.
So I'm curious what skills youuse to prepare, just so you feel
more confident, and I know youensure you get feedback
afterwards, so I'd love to hearabout some of your tips for
public speaking.
Jan Freitag (12:46):
Yeah, so knowing your material is table stakes.
You can't just not be on stageand say.
I don't really know how, whatthis slide says, like that's not
how it works.
So a couple of things come tomind when I think about
preparing, and a couple ofthings come to mind when I think
about tips or tricks I do whileI speak.
(13:09):
So I have, let me be very clear.
If you saw me 15 years ago, Iwas not that great.
I was okay.
But this is a journey and youjust, I'm very fortunate that I
was able to do a lot ofspeaking, so you then just try
out things and see what sticksand see what works, and see what
(13:33):
resonates with the audience.
The one thing I'm a firmbeliever in is rehearsing out
loud, and I say this too when Ido speaker training here at
Coast Guard, STR, be in theroom.
With the light, with the mic on,with the clicker and hand on the
(13:54):
stage and run through yourpresentation the way you would
tomorrow or in a couple ofhours, depending on if that
means that you talk to thepeople who invite you to speak
and they're like, yeah, man.
But that's gonna be like seven30 the night before.
That's right.
That's the only time when peopleare having dinner.
It's the only time we have theballroom like.
(14:16):
I'll be there.
Or if they say, sorry, this ishas to be between five 30 and
6:00 AM because we need theballroom for breakfast set up.
That's fine too.
Whatever it is, but you need tobe in the environment.
Rehearsing in your room is fine.
It's critical, but you need tosee it because sometimes the
slides don't quite work or thelight is just weird or the mic
(14:38):
doesn't work or whatever.
You need to prepare in theactual.
Theater in the actual way thatyou will do it tomorrow or so.
That to me is absolutelycritical.
Rehearsing out loud, absolutelymandatory.
Don't just think about it, sayit out loud, because sometimes
(14:58):
you stumble over your words andyou realize, oh, this sentence
actually doesn't make any sense.
I need shorter sentences.
You write out your script.
I don't, but some people writeout their script, but you don't
speak the way you write.
Your sentences when you speakhave six words to it.
Your sentences have 14 words toit.
You, nobody speaks like the wayyou write.
(15:19):
So Carl Wilson, who's now givingwho used to be with SDR r who's
now giving speaker training withAli Hoyt.
And they had this great thingon, on, on LinkedIn where they
were talking about, rehearsingout loud, or maybe Ali maybe
posted it.
But that to me is so critical,so rehearsing it out loud, I
make my own slides.
I don't let anybody else touchmy slides because I'm in charge
(15:41):
of what's on it.
And then that helps me obviouslyunderstand what and what is very
easy with data slides is to puttoo much on it.
And then you only really wannamake one point.
You wanna say RevPAR forecast isdown minus 0.1%, but you show
the whole progression of thehistory back in time from 1989
and you show a DR and occupancyand it's totally overwhelming
(16:02):
and your comment is.
RevPAR projected to be down.
Good.
And put that on the slide,right?
Don't overwhelm your audiencebecause when you put your slide
up, they're saying, okay, I'mlooking.
This is time.
This is a DR and the whole timeI'm speaking.
And they can't follow that.
So just be kind to the audience.
(16:23):
The other thing that I firmlybelieve in is rehearsing your
opening lines, your openingthree lines.
Not 10, not 50, not a hundred,but 500 times.
Hello, my name is Jan.
Thank you so much for having me.
I appreciate the opportunity tobe with you today.
(16:44):
Hello, my name is Jan.
Thank you so much for your timeover and over when you're at the
red light in a car, when you'retaking a shower, whatever it is,
so that when the time comes andyou are on stage and you're
nervous and I get nervous,absolutely 100%.
If you don't get nervous.
You're not doing it right.
You can hit play and your mouthstarts moving and you're like,
(17:06):
I'm speaking.
I'm speaking.
Okay, I got this.
And then you kick into yourpresentation.
But the first three or foursentences, they have to be
complete muscle memory.
The worst thing I thinkpresenters can do is they get on
stage, the lights are up andthey're like, here's Jan.
And the first thing out of mymouth is, no, that's terrible.
Say get your opening tight andthen roll from there.
(17:32):
And then we can talk abouttransitions.
I use a lot of rhetoricalquestions, so when I go from one
slide to the next, I say, sosome of you're probably
wondering what that means for aDR now that I showed you.
Demand is down.
You're wondering what does it doto a DR?
And then the next slide shows aDR, right?
So I'm connecting one slide tothe next, with the vehicle of a
rhetorical question where.
I assume the audience wants toknow something and I'm just
(17:55):
putting that out there.
I have no idea if they want toknow that, but they might say,
oh yeah, I was wondering aboutthat.
And then, you move.
And then, lastly just wearwhat's comfortable.
I used to spend a ton of moneyon very expensive ties.
We don't wear ties anymore, butthat was like my uniform and I
put that tie on.
I'm like, ready?
(18:15):
That's my armor.
That's I'm ready for business.
You may have somethingdifferent, but there's something
that makes you feel good abouthow you look, and that also
builds confidence.
Lan Elliott (18:25):
I love that there's so much great information in
there.
I love the practicing again andagain.
I do find once you have yourfirst few sentences down,
because you practiced it outloud so much that the rest of it
then flows a little bit easier,but you do need to nail the
first few pieces and thetransitions.
Because you're transitioning toa slide you may not be looking
(18:47):
at, so you do need to knowwhat's coming next.
And that's always a bitinteresting to remember
everything I wanted to talkabout getting feedback because a
lot of people, who speak oftendon't usually get a chance to
get feedback.
There are people who speak allthe time that may not actually
be that good at speaking, butthey get the opportunity a lot
(19:10):
because they have a importanttitle or an important company.
I'm curious about feedbackbecause you do something very
specific that I think isinteresting.
Jan Freitag (19:20):
Yeah.
So Professor Craig Snow at thehotel school taught this.
When after you're done with yourpresentation, you ask three
questions.
Or you, ideally you ask part ofyour audience members three
questions, but you have to askyourself as well, what went
right, what went wrong, and whatwould you change?
And it's super critical to startwith what went right, because we
(19:41):
are all so self-critical.
And I see this all the time whenI do speakers training, that I
say, what went right?
And people are like I stammeredand my arms were crossed.
And I'm like no.
Time out.
What went right?
Let's celebrate what you did.
Correctly so that you canremember it.
So you can do it again nexttime.
And the time after that.
(20:01):
The time after that.
Let's focus on what went right,because a lot of things went
right.
Okay, good.
Now what will you think wentwrong?
Let me stand.
Whatever.
Okay.
What will you change?
My arms were all over the place,so maybe next time I just put a
hand in my pocket.
It's okay, good.
That's totally fair.
So that this critical therequest for critical feedback.
(20:23):
Starts with what went right,because otherwise you get lost
in, oh my God, there's 17 thingsI did incorrectly and that's
fine.
Maybe you did 17 thingsincorrectly, but you probably
did 20 things that were good.
So let's just focus on thatfirst, and give yourself a
little bit yang and yang, alittle bit of balance, so I
think that's that has helped metremendously.
Lan Elliott (20:46):
One other thing you said before when we were talking
is you go up to someone beforeyou speak and you tell them, I'm
going to ask you afterwardsthese three specific questions,
and then you go and talk to themafterwards.
And I've asked people forfeedback after I've done public
speaking and they go, oh, youwere great.
But I love the specificity oftelling someone you're gonna ask
(21:06):
them afterwards and asking.
For them to think about thesethree things so they can
actually give you specificfeedback, which is so important
to get better.
Yeah,
Jan Freitag (21:16):
I was very fortunate.
My last big presentation washere at the hotel data
conference in, in, in Nashville.
And Ali Hoyt, my formercoworker, who's now a ING coach,
was in the audience.
And I said, by the way,afterwards, I'm gonna ask you
what went wrong, and what wouldyou change?
And so it was super helpful forher to say, yeah, clearly you
got the transitions down.
Well done.
(21:36):
But man, you gotta pause.
Gimme a minute, like gimme asecond so I can digest what you
just said.
I'm like, oh, fair enough.
Thank you.
That's helpful.
Like I need to pace myself alittle bit more,
Lan Elliott (21:48):
there was a point in your career where you decided
that you preferred to be anindividual contributor, even
though you were getting muchmore senior and you preferred
that to taking on responsibilityfor managing direct reports.
And I'm curious how you came tothat conclusion and.
(22:09):
If there were risks that youthought about when you were very
upfront about it with the peopleyou work with?
Jan Freitag (22:16):
Yeah, I was with STR and was traveling,
presenting, speaking, writing.
But there, it wasn't like asuper defined role, but it was
clear that whenever there was apresentation that, that I was
the people who would do it.
Then CoStar bought.
STR in late 19, and then thepandemic hit, hit immediately.
(22:38):
And CoStar pretty quicklysuggested, Hey, we know a lot
about other co, other assettypes, office, multifamily,
retail, industrial, and now wehave all this hotel data and we
don't have a hotel person.
It sounds like you are talkingall the time to reporters about
the hotel industry or rightabout the industry.
Become our hotel guy, and by theway, we need you to hire.
(23:00):
A bunch of regional marketexperts, local hotel people in
four or five markets.
And so I said, okay, sure.
Happy to help.
I'm, I hired them.
I onboarded them.
But because of the way that thecost of reporting function was,
they all reported two managingdirectors and.
I, at that point was a freeagent.
(23:21):
I was doing my own thing,talking very closely.
I mean in COVID, literally everyday with that team that was just
starting.
And I said to my manager at thetime, look, one day you will
realize that all these hotelpeople who right now report to
managing directors who are nothotel experts.
(23:44):
They all should report to me,and I just wanna let you know
I'm not interested.
And she said, what?
Unless this is a career endingmove, I just wanna let you know,
I think my highest and best usefor CoStar is you should let me
be an individual contributor.
You should let me write.
(24:04):
And talk to reporters and givepresentations and think deep
thoughts about the state of theindustry.
But managing is just notsomething that comes natural to
me.
I think I can do it, but it'sjust not something that I
gravitate towards.
And there are certainly peoplein this organization who
absolutely say, oh my God,managing people, this is the
best thing.
Giving other people the tools tosucceed.
That's awesome.
(24:25):
Not that I don't appreciatethat, but it just doesn't come
natural to me.
I'm happy to be a mentor or tobe a subject matter expert.
I just didn't feel like I wantedto manage people.
And she said, okay, let me thinkabout that.
As then they came back and said,Hey, we thought about this and
we like this idea.
Of having a national subjectmatter expert.
So now by the power vested inme, you are the National
(24:47):
Director of hospitalityAnalytics, and please write down
what you're doing.
And now we will hire nationaldirectors, office retail,
multifamily, industrial.
So I was the blueprint for a jobthat didn't exist, that now is,
a, a pretty cool group of veryhardcore subject matter data
experts in their specific assetclass.
So I asked for something that Iwanted.
(25:11):
Was there risk?
Sure.
They could have said, no, atyour level, you have to manage
people, otherwise you don't havea job.
And then I would've said thenI'm gonna manage people, but
then I will have less timespeaking, presenting and writing
just FYI.
But that, that, so that, thatworked out.
I think that wasn't really a bigrisk because obviously if
somebody says, Hey, you have tomanage people now, I'm like,
(25:32):
okay, then I will do it.
It's just given the choice.
Given how I had positionedmyself, I just felt my highest
still today, I think is to beout in the industry and in the
ULI world and in the HLA world,and at those conferences and
talk to people such as yourselfand get a pulse of the industry
(25:53):
and then put that out incomments through the press or in
presentation.
Lan Elliott (25:59):
I think there's great things in what you just
said.
I wanted to unpack whethermanaging people comes naturally,
and I think one of the things wedo, at least in hospitality, is
people get really good at beingthe technical person to do
things and then we give themmanagement of people.
And most people don't ever getany guidance on how to manage
(26:20):
people.
And I have to admit, I had somerough starts.
And then when I finally got anexecutive coach, I grew to
really love it and I found itvery rewarding.
But more challenging thanlearning something on your own.
Learning how to be there and tohelp other people succeed.
But I love the idea that CoStarmade space for you to have this
(26:44):
very unique, prominent role andbe able to have the deep
thoughts that you wanted to takethe time, and that you were very
open with that.
I don't know if that works inevery company.
There are some companies thatsay.
If you want a certain title, youhave to have people reporting to
you.
But I love that CoStar did thatand that you became the model
for the other industries withinCoStar.
(27:05):
That's incredible.
And I love the idea of askingfor what you want.
Jan Freitag (27:08):
And we are certainly, I think amongst the
national directors, we arecertainly still mentors, right?
We're subject matter experts.
Somebody has a specific deepquestion.
We talked about, my, my love forpresenting, I still continue to
do presentation trainings andtell people, Hey, if you have a
big presentation come up, pleasecome to me and I'll give you
feedback, and we'll togetherwork on it.
So it doesn't mean that I'm notinvolved with other people.
(27:31):
It's just that I don't, approve,PTO.
Lan Elliott (27:36):
I love that I'm coming to you for feedback for
my next time I'm on stage.
For sure.
Thank you.
You had touched on COVID andtalking to the team on a daily
basis for COVID, I will alwaysremember now when I look back at
the pandemic just waiting foryour weekly updates, because
(27:57):
early on we were just sitting inour, in my apartment at the
time, and your weekly updateswhen they started felt like a
lifeline.
But you were doing that in amoment of extreme uncertainty.
We didn't even know what thesupply was because so many hotel
rooms had been shut down.
So what is the occupancy?
(28:17):
A percentage of?
Yeah.
But again, we are in uncertaintimes.
I think that's the current themeof the economic environment.
And I'm curious about some ofthe learnings that you took from
that period of time that canhelp us.
Going forward, how do youprocess when things are very
uncertain?
What's the first thing you dowhen there's tremendous
(28:40):
ambiguity out there?
Jan Freitag (28:43):
Maybe this comes with a territory for me, but the
first thing is you gotta trustthe data.
You gotta just see how does itlay out for you?
Huge shout out to Jamie Lang,who at the time was with CBRE,
and he, I think in one of hispodcasts, or in one of his
writings, made a throwawaycomment about China.
Being a little bit earlier inthe recovery and I was like, oh.
(29:05):
And so from then on I focused onChina every week, right?
And if you remember thosecharts, I said, look, China is,
has 12% occupancy and we're 10,and next week they were at 20
and we were at 10, at 12.
And so slowly but surely we docould pattern recognize what was
going on.
So number one is look for thedata and don't let that.
(29:29):
Don't let your preconceivednotion give you the answer and
pick cherry pick the data sets,right?
You just have to say, look,here's what the data is.
In this instance, every week orevery month.
And say, okay, what does thisreally mean?
If I know nothing, if I justhave this data set, how do I
interpret this currently?
I have always said the beginningof this year that I thought
group demand would continue tobe strong.
(29:51):
We are now four months,consecutive months of group in
group demand to clients.
I'm like, okay, wow.
That narrative that I had istotally out the window.
So what's the new narrative?
And so what does the data teachus?
Teach me.
About how to communicate thatnew perspective.
So continually looking at thedata, number one, I think number
(30:13):
two is just read a lot, right?
Have your radar way open andcontinue to look for other
industries data points for otherpeople who you respect their
perspective, be it blogs orpodcasts.
Then synthesize that all intothe message that you have for
your hotel or for your companyor for your industry.
(30:34):
So I think between those twothings, that has worked really
well for me on the data side andthen having a really wide net
and get more insights.
Lan Elliott (30:44):
Yeah, and I think you bring up a good point.
It is about the data, but it'salso about casting a wide enough
net to figure out which is theright data.
To follow what are the ones thatare leading indicators that I
should be thinking about thatwill be helpful versus there can
be a lot of noise and a lot ofdata, so thank you.
That's wonderful.
One of our favorite questions atits personal stories is what
(31:09):
advice would you give to youryounger self, let's say
22-year-old Jan, what would youwant to give him as advice or
things that you wish he hadknown?
About how things were gonna turnout.
Jan Freitag (31:24):
So two things come to mind.
One is when I lecture, when Iget to let guest lecture at
universities, I get thisquestion what would you have
done when you were a student?
And I always say, oh, I shouldhave partied more.
And the crowd erupt and thestudents are like, ah, that's
funny.
We should party most.
It's no.
You all need to study more.
I should have part more becauseI was just heads down three and
(31:49):
a half years.
I was never out.
I overdid it, I did not get afull university experience
because I was so paranoid that Iwould make it a different
country, different culture,different language.
I was so nose to the grindstonethat I just.
Didn't stop to quote unquotesmell the roses.
I didn't really go out a lot andI should have to just get a
(32:10):
maybe more broad social network,so that's what I would tell my
students of, but my younger selfat STR very clearly, and thanks
to an executive coach who calledme on it, maybe too late, but
called me on it nonetheless, tosay, Jan, you just need to chill
and you just need to say, hey.
(32:31):
How are you?
How was your weekend?
You can't just come into everyconversation guns blazing and
saying, hi, I need you to do X.
That's just not how people work.
They're humans and you need tofirst acknowledge the humanity
and then you can say, can you doX for me?
So that is something that didn'tcome supernatural to me, and I
(32:51):
hope I, I'm better at it now.
But that's definitely that Iwould tell my younger self is to
just look at the human first.
Then try to get something done.
Lan Elliott (33:01):
Absolutely.
Great advice.
And Jan, as we come to the endof our discussion, you have
offered a lot of reallyincredible advice, some of which
I'm really looking forward toimplementing.
Do you have one final nugget ofadvice to offer to our audience?
(33:22):
Keeping in mind that the missionof its personal stories is
around empowering personalsuccess.
Jan Freitag (33:31):
The most important decision you can make I think,
in your life is to find yourright life partner.
From that, everything follows.
I'm very fortunate.
I'm married way up as I like tosay.
But with Emily by my side,nothing's I possible, like we
can do hard things.
She's an entrepreneur.
(33:52):
I don't have an entrepreneurbone in my body, but she's a
hardcore entrepreneur.
It's super fun and interestingto see that side of an industry
that I'm not normally used to,but together, we can do hard
things and I think that's beenthe most important decision that
I made, and I think that'swhat's continued to make things
all right.
Lan Elliott (34:11):
I love that because I think with the right support
at home, it gives you that greatfoundation to be able to go out
and try things and know thatthere's still the support at
home if everything doesn't goperfect.
It's a wonderful way to thinkabout it and I couldn't agree
more that having the right lifepartner is such an important.
Part of being successful.
(34:32):
So thank you so much, Jan.
I appreciate you coming on andyou've given us so much great
advice and I am so appreciativeof all you do for our industry
and people in our industry andfor our audience today.
Jan Freitag (34:46):
I appreciate you having me.
And if you're out there, ifyou're interested in talking
more about presenting hoteldata, just pick me up on
LinkedIn.
Thank you.
Lan Elliott (34:54):
If you've enjoyed this interview with Jan, I hope
you'll go on our website, it'spersonal stories.com to find
more great interviews withhospitality industry leaders.
Thank you.
Welcome to its Personal Stories, a hospitality
podcast.
My name is Lan Elliot on behalfof its personal stories, and
today I am delighted to have JanFreitag here with us.
He is the National Director,hospitality Analytics at CoStar,
formerly STR I've always thoughtof him as the data person who
(00:23):
provides some of the mostimportant data in our industry.
And if you're not familiar withJan, I hope you'll go on our
website and check out his manyaccomplishments.
So Jan, welcome.
Jan Freitag (00:37):
And thank you so much for having me.
I appreciate the opportunity tobe with you today and chat a
little bit about whatever youwanna talk about.
Let's
Lan Elliott (00:45):
talk about you
Jan Freitag (00:47):
data, all things.
Lan Elliott (00:50):
I wanted to talk about your career journey
because as much as I've knownyou for many years, I don't
think I've ever had aconversation with you about.
How you got to where you aretoday.
Could you share some of theinflection points in your
incredible career and what youthink were the secrets to your
success?
Jan Freitag (01:11):
Yeah.
When I read that question whenyou sent me the prep material, I
was like this is a shortconversation because I've been
with the same company for 23years, which is very unusual.
So I started with STR in 2002.
That was it.
I've been in that role eversince.
At the very beginning as you cantell by the accent, I'm not from
(01:32):
the us, I'm from Germany.
And I did after high school, anapprenticeship in a hotel.
And apprenticeships areliterally for three months, few.
Do the dishes or you clean theroom, so you check people in and
out.
And you do that for two and ahalf, three years or so.
Normally a lot of my classmateswent to study at university, but
I just wasn't ready for that,and I always had.
(01:54):
The hotel industry just reallyappealed to me and I wanted to
work in that.
And at the end, the sort of, thequestion was, what's next?
And there was a GM who said weshould normally progress to a
hotel school.
And there are a bunch ofprograms.
You can go to Lausanne, you cango to Tout in Germany, and
there's this other program up inCornell, but nevermind that,
that's in America.
What you have stuff to do herein, in Germany.
(02:16):
And I was like okay.
So I ended up applying toCornell and I thought, that's
how you apply to college.
You send a letter and then theyaccept you.
So later on I realized that.
That's not really how thisworks.
So I'm standing on the shouldersof giants because they had a
bunch of Germans go through theprogram before me, who had done
very well.
With work ethic and having comefrom the industry, having done
(02:38):
an apprenticeship, they knewwhat they were getting.
And I think that was that, thathelped with my application.
And then from there I was withErnest and Young for a year very
briefly.
It just wasn't for me out inPhoenix.
And then helped a friend start acompany to compete.
With STR, it was 1998 and hesaid, Hey, it's dot com.
We're all gonna make a billiondollars.
(02:59):
Come join me in Ithaca and we'regonna take on this small, sleepy
company in Hendersonville,Tennessee.
That didn't really quite workout.
So nine 11 happened and Randy.
Called Brian Ferguson, the CEOof this company which was called
Real Time Hotel Reports, whichto me still is the best name of
(03:19):
any company ever.
It's it says exactly what it is.
It's real time hotel reports.
But Randy called.
Brian said, look, you have noclients.
Really good ideas and I have allthe clients and I need some new
ideas.
Let me buy you.
And so STR purchased real-timehotel reports and then that
facilitated a move for me toNashville not to Hendersonville,
which is where the office hasbeen for a long time.
(03:41):
But I stayed in Nashville thewhole time and commuted out
there.
And yeah, that was 2002.
And then through STR.
I was able to just do a lot ofdifferent things very quickly.
I think I was employee number 40or so, and very quickly fell
into this public speaking,writing, talking to reporters
(04:03):
role that just a lot of peopleeither didn't want to do or it
was just exhausting.
As you can know, travel andspeaking can be exhausting.
So the inflection points wereprobably just saying, Hey, I
wanna do an apprenticeship andlearn the nuts and bolts.
Of the industry being acceptedto Cornell, certainly an
inflection point.
(04:23):
And then by luck or accidentbeing acquired by the industry
leader, which was at the time,still very small in, in, in
2002.
And then work my way up throughthe ranks there.
And then obviously in 2019 wewere acquired by CoStar.
And CoStar pretty quicklyrealized that they have now
access to all the data, but theydidn't have a CoStar Hotel
(04:46):
person.
And so they tapped me and said,Hey, it looks like you're doing
a lot of writing and speaking.
Can you do that a little bitmore focused on the CoStar
clients?
And the sort of the demarcationline between SGR and CoStar is.
STR deals with data providers,so the Hilton Heights, merit of
the World, and CoStar deals withall the people who don't have
data.
So the banks, the lenders someof the the large PE funds or
(05:09):
consulting shops and so forth.
Lan Elliott (05:12):
There were a few different points during your
career with STR and then ko.
You could have decided to take aleft or a right turn and say,
I'm gonna go do something else.
I'm curious, was there ever apoint in time where you thought
about that or were you alwaysvery determined in doing what
(05:33):
you love, which is what you'redoing now?
Jan Freitag (05:37):
It started in 2002 and thought.
No way.
Like why?
What Nashville Hendersonvillethis isn't it.
Let me get an MBA and get out ofhere.
Luckily Mark Laman, thepresident at the time, allowed
me to get an executive MBA, so Iwas able to work and then go to
school every other weekend,full-time Friday, Saturday.
(05:59):
Not full-time, sorry for, butfor both days.
So I got an executive MBA atVanderbilt University absolutely
with the idea that I would jumpfrom there to.
Wall Street or some othercompany that did something more
interesting.
But while that was happening, Igot a lot more opportunity to
speak and that really resonatedwith me and I really enjoyed
(06:23):
that a lot.
And I think I was able to conveyour data in a way that people
said, oh, let's invite that guyback with the accent, who can
talk to us for 20 minutes?
And we find it interesting whenhe leaves.
So I was able to make this nicheout of speaking and writing and
talking to reporters andcommenting on the major trends
(06:44):
in the industry because weobviously had the data and as
you can imagine, there's alwaysa hotel angle.
It's like in almost any story,if you open up the Wall Street
Journal of the New York Times,you can.
Take almost any story and say,oh, I wonder what that does to
tourism, what that does totravel, what that does to
hotels.
And then eventually thatreporter ends up calling SDR or
(07:06):
CoStar and I'm often on theother side of that conversation.
So the inflection point was,yeah, I don't want to do this.
But then the opportunitypresented itself that I was
like, oh, this is actually, Ireally enjoy this and this is a
need in the company and let'sjust do that.
Lan Elliott (07:26):
I love the idea of finding something new and a job
that you've been doing thatcould actually be fulfilling.
I wanted to ask about careerdevelopment specifically.
Were there certain skills thatyou decided to hone to increase
your opportunities foradvancement?
Jan Freitag (07:47):
I think the most important thing.
Is to raise your hand.
And I don't know that sort ofspeaking him naturally, but it
was something that when I, thefew times I had done it, I was
like, oh, this is interesting.
And so when more opportunitiesarose, I just said, yeah, I want
(08:08):
to do it.
And I think that is if anything,if there's any takeaway, you
know that in any moment in yourspecific.
Career where you sit, there arealways other opportunities
within the company.
You just have to raise your handand say, Hey, if this ever comes
up, I'm very interested.
(08:29):
So the latest example right now,today, and I think this is true
for all your listeners, isaround ai, right?
Every company is saying, oh, weneed to do something.
We're not quite sure what to do.
And I've said, for a year and ahalf.
To my boss and my boss's bossand whoever wants to listen.
I wanna be involved.
I don't know what it looks like,but if this ever is something
(08:51):
that CoStar wants to do, I'mhere.
And now we are knee deep.
We are all using copilot.
So every one of our 6,800associates has a co-pilot
license.
So we're using copilot right andcenter.
So it was like, okay, good.
Let's do it.
So there are task forces andsmall groups and people trying
to see how can we use ai.
So I think we're in this superinteresting moment in time where
(09:17):
some of your listeners who maybe younger in their career, just
raise your hand, and say, Hey, Iwant to do this.
Because there, there are alwaysinflection points and you could
say, I want to do more.
I wanna do something different.
I want to be, I wanna becounted.
I wanna be seen.
And I think I did that withspeaking, and I'm, again, I'm
doing it now with ai.
Lan Elliott (09:36):
I love that.
I wanted to unpack that becausea lot of times.
We talk on this show aboutsaying yes when people present
you with opportunities, butyou're really talking about
proactively looking forward andseeing what could be next, and
then going to your bosses orwhoever might be the person to
let them know if this becomes athing, I would love to be
(09:59):
involved.
And it's proactively bringingopportunities and suggesting
things to.
People who might be able to giveyou that opportunity in the
future rather than waiting forsomeone to come to you and offer
you something.
Jan Freitag (10:14):
Yeah, and it means scanning the environment, seeing
what the company needs.
I know that later on we'll talka little bit more about public
speaking.
But it's something that you arealways in a forum.
There's a high likelihood thatthe company that you're in will
have a department head meetingor will have a, some sort of
meeting with more than 10people.
(10:34):
You can go to your manager andsay, Hey, next time there's a
chance, I would love to present.
I would love to be that personwho speaks about whatever the
topic is, and I would love tohone my skill with that.
And it's super uncomfortable,and yes, your boss may say no,
but at least they may say, oh,okay, you're interested in that.
(10:55):
Let's see, maybe not this time,but maybe there's an
opportunity.
Down the road.
I the example for my own careeris when, so I was early with STR
and Mark and Randy were asked tospeak a lot.
It was, 2002, data was becomingmore important.
Computing power was getting lessexpensive and people wanted data
(11:16):
more quickly.
Mark and Randy were travelingall the time to present Mark
Liano and the president, RandySmith, the founder of SDR R.
And they had young kids and theywere exhausted.
So then they said, Hey, wouldyou like to go to, I'm like,
yes.
And they're like, don't youwanna know where?
I'm like, no, I just wanna gobecause this speaking thing is
(11:38):
like really cool.
And so I was fortunate that theywere like, okay.
Knock yourself out, buddy.
And I was like, young and singleand it was all good.
Lan Elliott (11:46):
That is a perfect segue.
I'm gonna jump over to publicspeaking because as you
mentioned, you started byraising your hand and
volunteering to get on a planewherever it was going.
You regularly speak at some ofthe biggest conferences in our
industry, often thousands ofpeople.
(12:09):
Could you talk a bit to theimportance of the skill of
public speaking and elevatingone's career, and what was your
journey to get to those largestages?
Because when I was younger, Ithought as long as you knew your
material, that was enough.
But there are things that youcan do beyond that, and you do
(12:30):
it beautifully.
So I'm curious what skills youuse to prepare, just so you feel
more confident, and I know youensure you get feedback
afterwards, so I'd love to hearabout some of your tips for
public speaking.
Jan Freitag (12:46):
Yeah, so knowing your material is table stakes.
You can't just not be on stageand say.
I don't really know how, whatthis slide says, like that's not
how it works.
So a couple of things come tomind when I think about
preparing, and a couple ofthings come to mind when I think
about tips or tricks I do whileI speak.
(13:09):
So I have, let me be very clear.
If you saw me 15 years ago, Iwas not that great.
I was okay.
But this is a journey and youjust, I'm very fortunate that I
was able to do a lot ofspeaking, so you then just try
out things and see what sticksand see what works, and see what
(13:33):
resonates with the audience.
The one thing I'm a firmbeliever in is rehearsing out
loud, and I say this too when Ido speaker training here at
Coast Guard, STR, be in theroom.
With the light, with the mic on,with the clicker and hand on the
(13:54):
stage and run through yourpresentation the way you would
tomorrow or in a couple ofhours, depending on if that
means that you talk to thepeople who invite you to speak
and they're like, yeah, man.
But that's gonna be like seven30 the night before.
That's right.
That's the only time when peopleare having dinner.
It's the only time we have theballroom like.
(14:16):
I'll be there.
Or if they say, sorry, this ishas to be between five 30 and
6:00 AM because we need theballroom for breakfast set up.
That's fine too.
Whatever it is, but you need tobe in the environment.
Rehearsing in your room is fine.
It's critical, but you need tosee it because sometimes the
slides don't quite work or thelight is just weird or the mic
(14:38):
doesn't work or whatever.
You need to prepare in theactual.
Theater in the actual way thatyou will do it tomorrow or so.
That to me is absolutelycritical.
Rehearsing out loud, absolutelymandatory.
Don't just think about it, sayit out loud, because sometimes
(14:58):
you stumble over your words andyou realize, oh, this sentence
actually doesn't make any sense.
I need shorter sentences.
You write out your script.
I don't, but some people writeout their script, but you don't
speak the way you write.
Your sentences when you speakhave six words to it.
Your sentences have 14 words toit.
You, nobody speaks like the wayyou write.
(15:19):
So Carl Wilson, who's now givingwho used to be with SDR r who's
now giving speaker training withAli Hoyt.
And they had this great thingon, on, on LinkedIn where they
were talking about, rehearsingout loud, or maybe Ali maybe
posted it.
But that to me is so critical,so rehearsing it out loud, I
make my own slides.
I don't let anybody else touchmy slides because I'm in charge
(15:41):
of what's on it.
And then that helps me obviouslyunderstand what and what is very
easy with data slides is to puttoo much on it.
And then you only really wannamake one point.
You wanna say RevPAR forecast isdown minus 0.1%, but you show
the whole progression of thehistory back in time from 1989
and you show a DR and occupancyand it's totally overwhelming
(16:02):
and your comment is.
RevPAR projected to be down.
Good.
And put that on the slide,right?
Don't overwhelm your audiencebecause when you put your slide
up, they're saying, okay, I'mlooking.
This is time.
This is a DR and the whole timeI'm speaking.
And they can't follow that.
So just be kind to the audience.
(16:23):
The other thing that I firmlybelieve in is rehearsing your
opening lines, your openingthree lines.
Not 10, not 50, not a hundred,but 500 times.
Hello, my name is Jan.
Thank you so much for having me.
I appreciate the opportunity tobe with you today.
(16:44):
Hello, my name is Jan.
Thank you so much for your timeover and over when you're at the
red light in a car, when you'retaking a shower, whatever it is,
so that when the time comes andyou are on stage and you're
nervous and I get nervous,absolutely 100%.
If you don't get nervous.
You're not doing it right.
You can hit play and your mouthstarts moving and you're like,
(17:06):
I'm speaking.
I'm speaking.
Okay, I got this.
And then you kick into yourpresentation.
But the first three or foursentences, they have to be
complete muscle memory.
The worst thing I thinkpresenters can do is they get on
stage, the lights are up andthey're like, here's Jan.
And the first thing out of mymouth is, no, that's terrible.
Say get your opening tight andthen roll from there.
(17:32):
And then we can talk abouttransitions.
I use a lot of rhetoricalquestions, so when I go from one
slide to the next, I say, sosome of you're probably
wondering what that means for aDR now that I showed you.
Demand is down.
You're wondering what does it doto a DR?
And then the next slide shows aDR, right?
So I'm connecting one slide tothe next, with the vehicle of a
rhetorical question where.
I assume the audience wants toknow something and I'm just
(17:55):
putting that out there.
I have no idea if they want toknow that, but they might say,
oh yeah, I was wondering aboutthat.
And then, you move.
And then, lastly just wearwhat's comfortable.
I used to spend a ton of moneyon very expensive ties.
We don't wear ties anymore, butthat was like my uniform and I
put that tie on.
I'm like, ready?
(18:15):
That's my armor.
That's I'm ready for business.
You may have somethingdifferent, but there's something
that makes you feel good abouthow you look, and that also
builds confidence.
Lan Elliott (18:25):
I love that there's so much great information in
there.
I love the practicing again andagain.
I do find once you have yourfirst few sentences down,
because you practiced it outloud so much that the rest of it
then flows a little bit easier,but you do need to nail the
first few pieces and thetransitions.
Because you're transitioning toa slide you may not be looking
(18:47):
at, so you do need to knowwhat's coming next.
And that's always a bitinteresting to remember
everything I wanted to talkabout getting feedback because a
lot of people, who speak oftendon't usually get a chance to
get feedback.
There are people who speak allthe time that may not actually
be that good at speaking, butthey get the opportunity a lot
(19:10):
because they have a importanttitle or an important company.
I'm curious about feedbackbecause you do something very
specific that I think isinteresting.
Jan Freitag (19:20):
Yeah.
So Professor Craig Snow at thehotel school taught this.
When after you're done with yourpresentation, you ask three
questions.
Or you, ideally you ask part ofyour audience members three
questions, but you have to askyourself as well, what went
right, what went wrong, and whatwould you change?
And it's super critical to startwith what went right, because we
(19:41):
are all so self-critical.
And I see this all the time whenI do speakers training, that I
say, what went right?
And people are like I stammeredand my arms were crossed.
And I'm like no.
Time out.
What went right?
Let's celebrate what you did.
Correctly so that you canremember it.
So you can do it again nexttime.
And the time after that.
(20:01):
The time after that.
Let's focus on what went right,because a lot of things went
right.
Okay, good.
Now what will you think wentwrong?
Let me stand.
Whatever.
Okay.
What will you change?
My arms were all over the place,so maybe next time I just put a
hand in my pocket.
It's okay, good.
That's totally fair.
So that this critical therequest for critical feedback.
(20:23):
Starts with what went right,because otherwise you get lost
in, oh my God, there's 17 thingsI did incorrectly and that's
fine.
Maybe you did 17 thingsincorrectly, but you probably
did 20 things that were good.
So let's just focus on thatfirst, and give yourself a
little bit yang and yang, alittle bit of balance, so I
think that's that has helped metremendously.
Lan Elliott (20:46):
One other thing you said before when we were talking
is you go up to someone beforeyou speak and you tell them, I'm
going to ask you afterwardsthese three specific questions,
and then you go and talk to themafterwards.
And I've asked people forfeedback after I've done public
speaking and they go, oh, youwere great.
But I love the specificity oftelling someone you're gonna ask
(21:06):
them afterwards and asking.
For them to think about thesethree things so they can
actually give you specificfeedback, which is so important
to get better.
Yeah,
Jan Freitag (21:16):
I was very fortunate.
My last big presentation washere at the hotel data
conference in, in, in Nashville.
And Ali Hoyt, my formercoworker, who's now a ING coach,
was in the audience.
And I said, by the way,afterwards, I'm gonna ask you
what went wrong, and what wouldyou change?
And so it was super helpful forher to say, yeah, clearly you
got the transitions down.
Well done.
(21:36):
But man, you gotta pause.
Gimme a minute, like gimme asecond so I can digest what you
just said.
I'm like, oh, fair enough.
Thank you.
That's helpful.
Like I need to pace myself alittle bit more,
Lan Elliott (21:48):
there was a point in your career where you decided
that you preferred to be anindividual contributor, even
though you were getting muchmore senior and you preferred
that to taking on responsibilityfor managing direct reports.
And I'm curious how you came tothat conclusion and.
(22:09):
If there were risks that youthought about when you were very
upfront about it with the peopleyou work with?
Jan Freitag (22:16):
Yeah, I was with STR and was traveling,
presenting, speaking, writing.
But there, it wasn't like asuper defined role, but it was
clear that whenever there was apresentation that, that I was
the people who would do it.
Then CoStar bought.
STR in late 19, and then thepandemic hit, hit immediately.
(22:38):
And CoStar pretty quicklysuggested, Hey, we know a lot
about other co, other assettypes, office, multifamily,
retail, industrial, and now wehave all this hotel data and we
don't have a hotel person.
It sounds like you are talkingall the time to reporters about
the hotel industry or rightabout the industry.
Become our hotel guy, and by theway, we need you to hire.
(23:00):
A bunch of regional marketexperts, local hotel people in
four or five markets.
And so I said, okay, sure.
Happy to help.
I'm, I hired them.
I onboarded them.
But because of the way that thecost of reporting function was,
they all reported two managingdirectors and.
I, at that point was a freeagent.
(23:21):
I was doing my own thing,talking very closely.
I mean in COVID, literally everyday with that team that was just
starting.
And I said to my manager at thetime, look, one day you will
realize that all these hotelpeople who right now report to
managing directors who are nothotel experts.
(23:44):
They all should report to me,and I just wanna let you know
I'm not interested.
And she said, what?
Unless this is a career endingmove, I just wanna let you know,
I think my highest and best usefor CoStar is you should let me
be an individual contributor.
You should let me write.
(24:04):
And talk to reporters and givepresentations and think deep
thoughts about the state of theindustry.
But managing is just notsomething that comes natural to
me.
I think I can do it, but it'sjust not something that I
gravitate towards.
And there are certainly peoplein this organization who
absolutely say, oh my God,managing people, this is the
best thing.
Giving other people the tools tosucceed.
That's awesome.
(24:25):
Not that I don't appreciatethat, but it just doesn't come
natural to me.
I'm happy to be a mentor or tobe a subject matter expert.
I just didn't feel like I wantedto manage people.
And she said, okay, let me thinkabout that.
As then they came back and said,Hey, we thought about this and
we like this idea.
Of having a national subjectmatter expert.
So now by the power vested inme, you are the National
(24:47):
Director of hospitalityAnalytics, and please write down
what you're doing.
And now we will hire nationaldirectors, office retail,
multifamily, industrial.
So I was the blueprint for a jobthat didn't exist, that now is,
a, a pretty cool group of veryhardcore subject matter data
experts in their specific assetclass.
So I asked for something that Iwanted.
(25:11):
Was there risk?
Sure.
They could have said, no, atyour level, you have to manage
people, otherwise you don't havea job.
And then I would've said thenI'm gonna manage people, but
then I will have less timespeaking, presenting and writing
just FYI.
But that, that, so that, thatworked out.
I think that wasn't really a bigrisk because obviously if
somebody says, Hey, you have tomanage people now, I'm like,
(25:32):
okay, then I will do it.
It's just given the choice.
Given how I had positionedmyself, I just felt my highest
still today, I think is to beout in the industry and in the
ULI world and in the HLA world,and at those conferences and
talk to people such as yourselfand get a pulse of the industry
(25:53):
and then put that out incomments through the press or in
presentation.
Lan Elliott (25:59):
I think there's great things in what you just
said.
I wanted to unpack whethermanaging people comes naturally,
and I think one of the things wedo, at least in hospitality, is
people get really good at beingthe technical person to do
things and then we give themmanagement of people.
And most people don't ever getany guidance on how to manage
(26:20):
people.
And I have to admit, I had somerough starts.
And then when I finally got anexecutive coach, I grew to
really love it and I found itvery rewarding.
But more challenging thanlearning something on your own.
Learning how to be there and tohelp other people succeed.
But I love the idea that CoStarmade space for you to have this
(26:44):
very unique, prominent role andbe able to have the deep
thoughts that you wanted to takethe time, and that you were very
open with that.
I don't know if that works inevery company.
There are some companies thatsay.
If you want a certain title, youhave to have people reporting to
you.
But I love that CoStar did thatand that you became the model
for the other industries withinCoStar.
(27:05):
That's incredible.
And I love the idea of askingfor what you want.
Jan Freitag (27:08):
And we are certainly, I think amongst the
national directors, we arecertainly still mentors, right?
We're subject matter experts.
Somebody has a specific deepquestion.
We talked about, my, my love forpresenting, I still continue to
do presentation trainings andtell people, Hey, if you have a
big presentation come up, pleasecome to me and I'll give you
feedback, and we'll togetherwork on it.
So it doesn't mean that I'm notinvolved with other people.
(27:31):
It's just that I don't, approve,PTO.
Lan Elliott (27:36):
I love that I'm coming to you for feedback for
my next time I'm on stage.
For sure.
Thank you.
You had touched on COVID andtalking to the team on a daily
basis for COVID, I will alwaysremember now when I look back at
the pandemic just waiting foryour weekly updates, because
(27:57):
early on we were just sitting inour, in my apartment at the
time, and your weekly updateswhen they started felt like a
lifeline.
But you were doing that in amoment of extreme uncertainty.
We didn't even know what thesupply was because so many hotel
rooms had been shut down.
So what is the occupancy?
(28:17):
A percentage of?
Yeah.
But again, we are in uncertaintimes.
I think that's the current themeof the economic environment.
And I'm curious about some ofthe learnings that you took from
that period of time that canhelp us.
Going forward, how do youprocess when things are very
uncertain?
What's the first thing you dowhen there's tremendous
(28:40):
ambiguity out there?
Jan Freitag (28:43):
Maybe this comes with a territory for me, but the
first thing is you gotta trustthe data.
You gotta just see how does itlay out for you?
Huge shout out to Jamie Lang,who at the time was with CBRE,
and he, I think in one of hispodcasts, or in one of his
writings, made a throwawaycomment about China.
Being a little bit earlier inthe recovery and I was like, oh.
(29:05):
And so from then on I focused onChina every week, right?
And if you remember thosecharts, I said, look, China is,
has 12% occupancy and we're 10,and next week they were at 20
and we were at 10, at 12.
And so slowly but surely we docould pattern recognize what was
going on.
So number one is look for thedata and don't let that.
(29:29):
Don't let your preconceivednotion give you the answer and
pick cherry pick the data sets,right?
You just have to say, look,here's what the data is.
In this instance, every week orevery month.
And say, okay, what does thisreally mean?
If I know nothing, if I justhave this data set, how do I
interpret this currently?
I have always said the beginningof this year that I thought
group demand would continue tobe strong.
(29:51):
We are now four months,consecutive months of group in
group demand to clients.
I'm like, okay, wow.
That narrative that I had istotally out the window.
So what's the new narrative?
And so what does the data teachus?
Teach me.
About how to communicate thatnew perspective.
So continually looking at thedata, number one, I think number
(30:13):
two is just read a lot, right?
Have your radar way open andcontinue to look for other
industries data points for otherpeople who you respect their
perspective, be it blogs orpodcasts.
Then synthesize that all intothe message that you have for
your hotel or for your companyor for your industry.
(30:34):
So I think between those twothings, that has worked really
well for me on the data side andthen having a really wide net
and get more insights.
Lan Elliott (30:44):
Yeah, and I think you bring up a good point.
It is about the data, but it'salso about casting a wide enough
net to figure out which is theright data.
To follow what are the ones thatare leading indicators that I
should be thinking about thatwill be helpful versus there can
be a lot of noise and a lot ofdata, so thank you.
That's wonderful.
One of our favorite questions atits personal stories is what
(31:09):
advice would you give to youryounger self, let's say
22-year-old Jan, what would youwant to give him as advice or
things that you wish he hadknown?
About how things were gonna turnout.
Jan Freitag (31:24):
So two things come to mind.
One is when I lecture, when Iget to let guest lecture at
universities, I get thisquestion what would you have
done when you were a student?
And I always say, oh, I shouldhave partied more.
And the crowd erupt and thestudents are like, ah, that's
funny.
We should party most.
It's no.
You all need to study more.
I should have part more becauseI was just heads down three and
(31:49):
a half years.
I was never out.
I overdid it, I did not get afull university experience
because I was so paranoid that Iwould make it a different
country, different culture,different language.
I was so nose to the grindstonethat I just.
Didn't stop to quote unquotesmell the roses.
I didn't really go out a lot andI should have to just get a
(32:10):
maybe more broad social network,so that's what I would tell my
students of, but my younger selfat STR very clearly, and thanks
to an executive coach who calledme on it, maybe too late, but
called me on it nonetheless, tosay, Jan, you just need to chill
and you just need to say, hey.
(32:31):
How are you?
How was your weekend?
You can't just come into everyconversation guns blazing and
saying, hi, I need you to do X.
That's just not how people work.
They're humans and you need tofirst acknowledge the humanity
and then you can say, can you doX for me?
So that is something that didn'tcome supernatural to me, and I
(32:51):
hope I, I'm better at it now.
But that's definitely that Iwould tell my younger self is to
just look at the human first.
Then try to get something done.
Lan Elliott (33:01):
Absolutely.
Great advice.
And Jan, as we come to the endof our discussion, you have
offered a lot of reallyincredible advice, some of which
I'm really looking forward toimplementing.
Do you have one final nugget ofadvice to offer to our audience?
(33:22):
Keeping in mind that the missionof its personal stories is
around empowering personalsuccess.
Jan Freitag (33:31):
The most important decision you can make I think,
in your life is to find yourright life partner.
From that, everything follows.
I'm very fortunate.
I'm married way up as I like tosay.
But with Emily by my side,nothing's I possible, like we
can do hard things.
She's an entrepreneur.
(33:52):
I don't have an entrepreneurbone in my body, but she's a
hardcore entrepreneur.
It's super fun and interestingto see that side of an industry
that I'm not normally used to,but together, we can do hard
things and I think that's beenthe most important decision that
I made, and I think that'swhat's continued to make things
all right.
Lan Elliott (34:11):
I love that because I think with the right support
at home, it gives you that greatfoundation to be able to go out
and try things and know thatthere's still the support at
home if everything doesn't goperfect.
It's a wonderful way to thinkabout it and I couldn't agree
more that having the right lifepartner is such an important.
Part of being successful.
(34:32):
So thank you so much, Jan.
I appreciate you coming on andyou've given us so much great
advice and I am so appreciativeof all you do for our industry
and people in our industry andfor our audience today.
Jan Freitag (34:46):
I appreciate you having me.
And if you're out there, ifyou're interested in talking
more about presenting hoteldata, just pick me up on
LinkedIn.
Thank you.
Lan Elliott (34:54):
If you've enjoyed this interview with Jan, I hope
you'll go on our website, it'spersonal stories.com to find
more great interviews withhospitality industry leaders.
Thank you.
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