Are you willing to push back against industry consensus and the doubts of others? If so, you could become a leader like the late Ted Turner, writes coach Darryl Davis.
On Wednesday, we lost a great visionary. Ted Turner dies at the age of 87. The man who founded CNN, won the America’s Cup, owned both the Atlanta Braves and Atlanta Hawks, and pledged $1 billion to the United Nations left a legacy that most leaders would envy.
But the part of his story worth learning, especially for those in real estate leadership, is not what he built. That’s what he believed when no one else believed.
Mr. Turner didn’t come to the company as a polished executive with a smooth runway. His childhood was difficult, his father was strict and demanding. Turner was sent to boarding school at an early age. His sister passed away after a long battle with illness.
When Turner was 24 years old, his father took his own life. Turner took over a billboard business that his father had planned to sell, refused to honor the sale agreement, and turned it into the basis of a media empire.
chicken noodle news
The reaction to CNN’s launch on June 1, 1980 was not respectful skepticism but outright ridicule. Industry insiders derided the acronym as “Chicken Noodle News.” The three major broadcast networks dismissed it with more confidence than judgment as an unserious project by Southern outsiders. Conventional wisdom held that no one wanted 24-hour news.
Turner was undaunted. He mortgaged other holdings to finance it, hired hundreds of journalists, and built satellite infrastructure at a time when it was still cutting-edge technology. It was all about the belief that the world was changing faster than the old gatekeepers were willing to admit, and someone needed to report on it in real time.
The 1991 Gulf War settled this debate. CNN has become the first network watched by presidents, prime ministers, and Pentagon officials. News organizations that ridiculed it scrambled to imitate it.
Properties worth studying
How was Turner able to absorb that ridicule without giving in? He had plenty, but he wasn’t arrogant. He wasn’t lucky, but he had some good fortune. Properties worth studying are easier to develop and more difficult to develop. He trusted his own reading of what the world was going to be more than he trusted the consensus of his colleagues.
This is rare in any industry. This is especially rare in the real estate industry. In the real estate industry, the gravitational pull of “this is how we’ve always done it” is huge. Brokers and team leaders are surrounded by voices telling them what won’t work, what won’t hold up in the market, and what won’t be paid by consumers. Most are well-intentioned. Many are wrong.
turner test
Real estate is in the midst of a structural reset. Commission practices have been rewritten following the National Association of Realtors settlement. A pre-screening buyer representation agreement is the norm.
Private listing networks are pulling inventory out of the co-op MLS system at a pace that has caused the industry to openly question whether the co-op model itself will survive. Consumer expectations for technology, transparency, and service are far more advanced than the landscape in which most brokerage firms operate.
Leaders who hesitate will fail. Winning leaders see clearly where things are going and act before everyone else has caught up.
That’s the Turner test. Are you trading securities based on industry consensus, or are you reading with your own clear eyes where the market and consumers are actually moving?
The news came first
In “Call Me Ted,” Mr. Turner pointed out one factor above all else. That means news always trumps personal opinion, advertiser preferences, and management’s feelings about a story.
This discipline is what our industry needs right now. The forces driving private listing networks and national MLSs are fundamentally not driven by what will serve consumers. These are driven by what serves the corporate balance sheet of the company that manages the inventory.
To ensure the real estate industry rebounds, we need the same unwavering principle that the customer comes first. Keep that as our North Star. That way, we can have reliable answers to the corporate players who are reshaping this industry for their own benefit.
build a belief muscle
Belief is a muscle, not a personality trait. Turner built it on decades of being undervalued, starting with a father who doubted him and ending with network executives who told him cable news would never work.
For leaders in the real estate industry, the same muscles are being exercised. Every strategic decision your colleagues disagree with will prove to be the right one, every tough decision will survive agent pushback, and every investment competitor will be racing to copy you in two years’ time. That muscle grows.
You grow even through failure. Turner was wrong about plenty. With the Time Warner merger in 1996, he lost operational control of what he had built, and he openly regretted it. But he kept moving. The willingness to keep moving forward even when you make mistakes is part of what faith requires.
last question
Turner’s life will be remembered for CNN, the Braves, philanthropy, and a list of accomplishments long enough to fill a chapter in American business history. But the lesson for those of us who lead the real estate industry is more fundamental than any of those.
What do you do when the audience laughs at your idea?
If your answer is “I’m going to break down,” you’re going to spend your career managing decline. If your answer is “I keep building,” you have a chance to make an impact like Turner’s.
The industry needs a motivated leader who has been the real estate version of “Chicken Noodle News” for several years now. Agents and consumers are ready to accept them. The question is whether enough brokers and owners have the conviction to step into that role.
Turner did. That’s why we’re talking about him today.
