For those TL;DR folks, or BLUF as I learned working with Jones Group International:
It’s always a good time to follow your passion and embrace change.
For those of you who are willing to wade through a bit (okay, a lot) more, here’s the full story:
In 2018, I faced a traumatic event of divorce in my life. Like so many others have experienced, it is something you may contemplate in the back of your mind, but you never really see it happening to yourself.
I had been a senior executive in two different government contracting companies and was negotiating to become the President of a third. It was a large business, and my compensation would be a material increase.
But I had left government contracting for a reason…I was burned out by it. Without going into detail, the government can be a challenging customer.
However, I was good at it. My teams liked me as an executive who could really understand the IT challenges. I was good at writing proposals, thanks to working with Adam Rossi and the amazing team he assembled at Platinum Solutions. I knew how to lead diverse teams based on the experience I learned with Sonny Kakar as we rapidly grew Sevatec. So, I was 100% confident I could be successful in this role.
But, probably because of the divorce, I was thinking about happiness and what I wanted to be as a person when I grew up. (Ha, the same question we ask ourselves in kindergarten).
I felt I needed a change.
It wasn’t a good time for change. I really needed the money this position was offering. Kids in college and the costs of ending a marriage takes its toll on finances. Not exactly the best time to be looking for a startup opportunity.
But my best friend since childhood, Chris Reebals, had a vision to start up a Real Estate Investment Trust (a “REIT”) in Birmingham, AL focused on developing single-owner, mixed-use, walkable communities across the country. Not an easy task; it’s never been done before in a REIT.
But something appealed to me about real estate development. One of the downsides of software is that it is ephemeral. I doubt much, if any, of the code I wrote over a 25-year career is still in use today. It’s all been ported to new operating systems and new devices with different user interfaces and user expectations. There’s not much remaining to point to as “my life’s work.”
With real estate, you’re building something tangible. And, if you’re in our particular niche, you’re building something beautiful. That appealed to me on a visceral level.
But I knew something about startups. I’ve succeeded and failed with them. Two companies I started are still alive and kicking after 20 years (JNetDirect and Stelligent), but everything isn’t a success.
Even more than the success/failure rate, though, they are a hell of a lot of work. Uncertain work.
In government contracting, I could predict the future: we’d use our past performance, identify some win themes, engage with our government customers, and win new contracts. If you have a good team with a good reputation, the work was there for the taking.
In this new real estate venture, there was only one thing I was 100% certain of: it would either succeed or fail, but in either case, it would be an all-in situation.
Fast forward to late 2018 and I’m living in Birmingham, Alabama as the CEO of the nascent Premium Property Trust with a mandate to raise private capital, acquire real estate assets, and build a vision for developing a REIT with a market desire to go public.
But man, was I underprepared for the real change I was facing.
I had left a town I lived in for 20 years, with a group of friends that I truly loved. My network of contacts was in the government contracting world, not particularly helpful in this new venture.
And, something I didn’t know about myself: I was wounded. Failing at a marriage takes its toll in a way that is difficult to communicate. It affects your kids, for sure. But it affects you personally in ways that are difficult to see (or admit to yourself).
In my case, I didn’t move to Birmingham on accident. I grew up here. My parents and my brother and his family are here. But I drove from Northern Virginia in a small U-Haul with the few possessions I had and moved into Chris’ basement.
I was more of a mess than I really admitted. Re-entering the dating world, going out to find some kind of happiness, and trying to launch a new business all at the same time.
I had friends and family here, but it wasn’t like my group of friends in Northern Virginia: men I’d grown to love over 15 years, golfing together regularly and enjoying hanging out with our families.
I remember Chris checking up on me one time and I said, “I’m fine. You know, I really don’t get depressed.” He replied cynically, “I don’t see why not.”
Ha. But I am lucky (or delusional) in that sense. I never really did feel depressed. Or in despair. But I was a bit scared. I didn’t know whether this new business venture would work – if I could figure it all out.
Plus, on the personal side, I had resolved one thing for sure: I didn’t ever want to get married again. Not a great starting position for successful dating relationships after 40.
So, what to do? For me, the answer has always come easy, just get to work.
Figure it out. How do you make good real estate deals? How much money do we need? What do we need to put in place legally? What are the key hires? How do we distinguish ourselves in the market? What books can I read to learn this stuff? Where can I seek advice?
To me, this is the essence of change. Don’t fear it, figure out how to accomplish it. Too often, you can get paralyzed by the unknown, trying to understand it all at once. Just resolve to start; somewhere, anywhere. Knock out one thing and move on to the next.
Before I knew it, I began to see success. Two of my business partners in Northern Virginia invested before we had anything much more than an idea. Both said, “I’m investing in you. I know you’ll figure it out.” No pressure, ha.
Chris had a great network in Birmingham. An accomplished architect and entrepreneur, people knew his reputation as an honest, hard-working, and successful businessman. We were able to attract more capital locally.
We grew and now hold about $35M in real estate assets with another $250M in off-market projects in our pipeline. Nothing about it was easy, but I am walking through building sites, wearing a hard-hat, envisioning the developments at completion.
It’s a 100% change from my work as an executive in government contracting. But it’s also completely aligned with what I want to be doing.
And I grew as a person. I became a better man. I started opening my mind (and heart) to faith again. I took myself out of the role of being the God in my life.
And the real God intervened. In November 2021, He put Michelle Warren into my life. By May 2022, we were married. My childhood friend and business partner, Chris, performed the wedding ceremony. My friends from Northern Virginia came down for the wedding.
That wasn’t easy, either. Michelle’s daughter, Ella, was 14. They were living in South Carolina. She didn’t want to change. She didn’t particularly like me (and I’m being generous here). She was a bit resolved to prove it and didn’t make it easy on us.
But, as I posted recently, late last year she asked me to adopt her. And now I have a new daughter, too. Who saw that coming in 2018? Change all around.
If you’re considering a change, I certainly don’t have all the answers. But I do have some encouragement: it could very well be the best thing you ever did. It certainly was for me.
My advice, take whatever time you need to envision what you want in your life, even if it’s not fully formed. Then start. Figure out one task that gets you closer and get it done. If you feel like it’s starting to work, do the next task. At some point, you will probably need to take a leap of faith. No one can predict the outcome.
You may end up at the happiest time of your life, if you’re lucky like me. That’s the nature of change, it may be uncertain, but it can lead to something you may not yet be able to imagine.
If you made it reading this far you might be thinking about making a change yourself. If you want either encouragement or advice, please feel free to reach out.
P.S. Michelle wasn’t the only miracle God performed in my life during this time. He also protected my son’s life in a terrible car wreck, but that is a story for another time.
