Leadership Best Practices: Mind the Gap

Not so long ago, most commercial real estate firms were behind their counterparts in other industries when it came to fostering diversity. But a sea change has come over the industry, and most firms have decided that to fully succeed, women and minorities have to play a bigger role in their operations. At the same time, a new generation has flooded the workplace, and companies need to change their use of office spaces and methods of working to attract and retain the new recruits. As a result, modern real estate firms don’t resemble the companies of the past, but these changes have made it easier to succeed with clients, many of which have also put more emphasis on diversity.

“This industry for a long time has been a little insular,” says Thomas J. Bisacquino, who has served as NAIOP’s chief executive officer since 1991. It was rare for someone to choose real estate as a career “unless your father or brother owned a real estate company. It was a ‘who do you know’ kind of business.” The rise of REITs in the past few decades began to change things, as these public firms needed to better reflect society. Other forces have also started accelerating this transformation.