Leslie Hale has been inspired by many mentors and role models throughout her life and now as the newly named CEO of RLJ Lodging Trust, which gives her the distinction of becoming the first black woman to run a REIT, she plans to pay it forward.
Last week Leslie Hale was named to succeed retiring CEO Ross Bierkan in August and take charge of the further integration of FelCor Lodging Trust, which RLJ acquired last September.
Hale is currently executive vice president, chief operating officer and chief financial officer of FelCor. She joined predecessor company RLJ Development in 2005 as director of real estate and finance. Previously, she worked at General Electric Capital Corp. and Goldman Sachs & Co.; she earned an MBA from Harvard Business School.
HOTELS talked to Hale about how she feels about this milestone and how she plans to further executive opportunities for women and women of color in the hotel industry.
H: How do you feel about this important appointment and where does the industry need to go from here when it comes to promoting women and women of color?
Leslie Hale: For me personally, you asked me how do I feel. I am the granddaughter of a sharecropper from west Tennessee. My granddaddy hoboed from Tennessee to California. And so when I juxtapose the CEO against that, I’m humbled.
In terms of what this really means not only for me, but for my family, I’m overwhelmed by the number of people who reached out and who’ve talked about how my story has helped and inspired them. The optimal thing for me about this is that it’s able to help other people like Ann Fudge (Ann Marie Fudge, a African-American woman who rose to the presidency of a US$5 billion division of Kraft General Foods, before she turned 50) helped me, right?
I take my role in terms of leading the mighty men and women of RLJ very serious. I also feel the obligation and responsibility that goes with the role as well.
I am humbled by the inference of being the first, but I have no interest in being the only. When I reflect on my career, I think about the fact that there are a lot of talented and high-potential women in the real estate industry, and lodging in particular, that given the opportunity I think could ascend.
When I think about my career, I’ve always tried to put myself in a position where I could not just be successful but be extraordinarily successful. By joining RLJ, I benefited from joining an organization that was a true meritocracy. This is an organization that truly values diverse perspectives and backgrounds. As a result of that, it really freed me up to contribute at extraordinary levels within this organization because RLJ looked past gender and race and focused on my talent and contribution. I never had to worry about my thoughts or ideas being discounted because I was a woman or a minority. I brought my A game seven days a week.
I really think that other organizations could benefit from understanding that. Understanding that when you create an environment where people can bring their whole self, you can truly maximize the value of that talent.
I hope that my story really outlines for other people and other organizations the necessity to really value diverse perspectives and backgrounds in a way that allows them to bring their best talent.
H: How would you grade the hotel industry on how well it’s done in promoting women and women of color?
Hale: I think better than most. There are different levels of leadership within the lodging space. There are a number of women GMs within the lodging space, which is a leadership role within a business in itself. But obviously, you look whether it’s the brands or you look at the management companies or you look at ownership, there’s still a lot of work to be done at that level where capital is controlled and disbursed.
In my career, I’ve always tried to make sure I was on the money-making side of the business because I felt that was important and that’s where all the key decisions were made. I believe that there’s still a dearth of women in leadership positions in that particular area.
H: Do you feel an obligation to pay it forward?
Hale: Oh, absolutely. I am the product of a strong mentorship throughout my career. One of the things that’s most exciting about this opportunity for me is not what it does for me, but for all the people who invested in me to see their advice and counsel pay out dividends. So I absolutely feel the necessity to pay it forward. I am an alumni of the Tweedle Foundation, which is an organization that actually focuses on women and minorities in the financial service space and was really the organization that gave me access to RLJ through mentorship. So I’m a huge believer that I have a responsibility to pull as many people up the ladder as I can.
H: What kind of message do you think this sends to the next generation of leadership?
Hale: That you, too, can ascend. I don’t view myself as special. I view myself as hard-working and with determination. I grew up in a family where my parents were entrepreneurs and they instilled in me an incredible work ethic. I like to tell people I’ve been working since I was 7, but I didn’t start getting paid until after college.
If you work hard, if you prepare yourself and you navigate the corporate waters to put yourself in a position to be successful, you can ascend. That requires help as nobody gets to where they are by themselves. There are so many people along the journey for me who pointed me in the right direction when I came to a fork in the road, or shined light on an opportunity that I might not have otherwise had, who opened doors for me that seemed or appeared to be locked, or even got me out of a ditch when I turned the wrong way.
So I am hopeful that people will see that when you open doors, good things can happen. That when you invest in people that it can pay dividends. And that if you work hard, you can be successful. So I think that there’s a lot of perspectives from my journey that I hope really helps people, and I’m going to do my best to make sure that we maintain the culture here at RLJ and also help others understand the benefits of this culture.
H: Can you elaborate on the pivotal moment and how it helped get you to this moment?
Hale: My Tweedle mentor, Alan Braxton, who’s unfortunately no longer with us, asked me a question. He said, ‘Who are your peers?’ I flippantly answered the question and I started saying, this person over here and that person over there. He stopped me and said that your peers are not the people who come from the same background as you, that went through your same college or that are doing the things that you’re doing today. Your peers are the people who are doing what you want to do.
And what he was trying to get me to do was to look up, and not look left or right. When you look up, you strive more, you reach further and you sort of visualize that you, too, can be them. And that was one of the most powerful pieces of advice that I ever got and it changed the way that I viewed myself. Not only changed the way that I viewed myself, but also the way I viewed myself in the world.