Changing the Game: Property Managers as Asset Stewards in Complex Digital Environments

Introduction to Jennifer O'Connell and Her Unique Background

Drew: Welcome back to the Peak Property Performance Podcast. I am your co-host, Drew Hall, and today's special guest, yes, before we introduce that special guest and co-host, Bill, let's talk about the theme for just a moment. Today's theme is going to be when property managers become accidental technologists. So without further ado, welcome. No, actually, you know what, hang on just a second. Before we bring on folks, let me do this at the top. We've been doing this at the top recently. So just remind all the listeners out there to like, subscribe, share the podcast, everything. Let's keep pushing because we're working really hard to spread the word on this Peak Property Performance movement and honestly, to change the industry because otherwise, what's the point? So if you think you'd provide value here as a guest also, or if you know someone who would, pass it along because we welcome any and all commercial real estate thought leaders from all stages of ownership, operation. Just please reach out to us. LinkedIn is great. Peakpropertyperformance.com is great. Everything leads back to the same place and we look forward to seeing you there. So we'll touch on that again at the end, but without further ado, co-host Bill Douglas, welcome.

Bill: Always a pleasure, Drew. Thanks for putting this together, shall I say. I'm excited. Everybody meet Jennifer O'Connell. I'm excited about Jennifer being on here because she's a property manager in my opinion that gets it. She's not just because she likes our podcasts and the book, but she's actually doing things. So I'll read the formal intro now. Jennifer is a property management operator working at the intersection of day-to-day execution in increasingly complex digital environments. Over the past several years, the role of the property manager, as we all know, has quietly expanded from running buildings and teams to navigating systems, troubleshooting data, bridging gaps that were never clearly assigned or educated. This conversation today is about that shift, what it looks like on the ground, where things are breaking and what needs to change if we want property managers focused on performance and happy tenants instead of playing tech support. So Jennifer laughed when I said that, but Jennifer, welcome to the show. I'm looking forward to this conversation.
Jennifer O'Connell: Thank you. It's a pleasure to be with you gentlemen. Oh yeah. Yeah. All right. So man, how's this for a really open-ended question that could be at least an episode on its own. But when you look at the role of property manager today versus say five or 10 years ago, what has been added to your plate that wasn't there before?
Jennifer O'Connell: So I have a unique opportunity because I didn't come from the property management side. I came from the facilities management side for a very large bank. And coming in here, I kind of brought that customer ideas into where I am now. And what I saw is that the property managers were dinosaurs. It was the thing of the past. They were surrounded by manual central hubs where it was like paper forests of troubleshooting infrastructure and trying to be like, I had said to Bill before, you're in a crime scene and you're trying to link all of that map together to make the big picture for you. And I think what I came doing and I was trying back several years ago is to become a digital stewardship for the company, for the ownership, to be able to stop being task monsters and start looking at the uniform platforms, kind of like how I did in banking and look at a single pane of glass, a kind of, and so that we stop being operational gap troubleshooters and we start being more of performance drivers for the asset. And in doing that, you have to look at the building at not being mortar and bricks, but being a literal breathing entity. And when you do that, you're basically able to see the playing field. The property managers before were making game decisions in real time without having that information. And what happens is you can't perform on a winning team that way. And so what we're trying to show is that we have to make these properties and these entities healthy environments. So the property managers can drive performance rather than sit and worry about every little detail and trying to map things together.

The Role of Data in Modern Property Management

Drew: Yeah. That's good. And you say the word information like that's synonymous with data, which my goodness, data is always weaved in and out of these podcasts as much as we can possibly do it. So what do you think came first? Do you think expectations began to shift before the systems were introduced or do you think the systems began to show up and then therefore the expectations began to shift? What's your thought on that?
Jennifer O'Connell: I think it's either way you could look at it. It's like the egg before the chicken or the chicken before the egg. At this point, we can't worry so much about where it came, but we have to start looking at these platforms and seeing why they're not bridging between each other so that you're starting at the TI work for these tenants and then it's dragging right through from the TI work for construction to the leasing and sales to the TI work to the property management side to the billing side so that you get a clear picture. It's like being a doctor. You need to know all the ailments to be able to make the right conclusions and we need to start having these digital platforms be able to read in. It's like a funnel. We should be able to get it all in so that the property management isn't the manual hub of trying to get that system for that silo to work with this system and I think we're getting there. I think technology, I think AI especially, we're moving totally towards that now where you're able to get all these databases, put them in and kind of shake it up and say, okay, give me the information so that I can have that so I can make better decisions for not only the asset but also for the tenant.

Drew: That's great. I had this note here, this idea of being a tech operator as opposed to just a property operator. It's almost like those two are melding. It's kind of de facto. You become a tech operator as the tech comes in and it's woven into your job function.
Jennifer O'Connell: Well, I always laugh because I used to call us the utility players. We were the utility player. If we needed to be at shortstop or outfield, we just came in and we did it, right? We didn't have the background. You're trying to get all this information and like I said before, you become the manual central hub. A perfect example is first I became the property manager, a phone line went down and I was like, well, can anyone tell me what the phone number is? They're like, we don't know. I'm like, okay, do we have a database? Well, we had a spreadsheet we did several years ago. I literally went into the elevator, hit the button and I was like, hi, this isn't an emergency. I need to know what the phone number is. Then from there, I had to look at databases and I had to go and it just became so cumbersome that I literally was like, okay, this is getting out of control. I'm spending more time investigating and becoming the human hub for these things than actually just getting the elevator up and running for the tenants in the building.

Challenges of Digital Sprawl and AI in Property Management

Drew: Absolutely. You mentioned cumbersome and that's a nice transition to something I wanted to ask you about. We talk a lot on the show and in the book, but about digital sprawl or digital overload. When something, a piece of software or something, technology creates more work than it solves. How many systems do you typically work with across a normal week and where does it start to create friction?
Jennifer O'Connell: You could have, I love it because I laugh about it. You have spreadsheets from like 10, 20 years ago that people are manually doing it. What happens? It doesn't save. It's not updated. It's a whole thing. I always say that you sit in these meetings because I've been in very high level and they look at the system and they say, okay, this is the holy grail. I call it the square and the circle peg. They're there in their meetings and they're like, okay, this is the square. This is logical. This is going to work. Then you have the property managers and everybody else who's like, okay, here's the historical data. Here is the legacy information you have that you're now having to fit that right into the square and you're like, okay, downsizing. You have a tenant. The tenant's downsizing. I had a tenant for 20 years, 30 years. Imagine what goes on in those years. Tenant does stuff. You're doing TI work. They're doing upgrading. All of a sudden they want to downsize and you're like, okay, you're getting drawings from the 80s. You're trying to find spreadsheets. You're going to departments that was siloed and they have their own way of doing it. Basically, you're just sitting there going, okay, open up the walls and let me see the dead bodies. Let me just see the dead bodies so I can start working from here and start re-documenting and I could try to fit that. I say all the time because like I said, the sports, you're up to bat and you're constantly in that batter's box and they're pitching and you're hitting it and you're like, yeah, I'm fouling it off. Then all of a sudden you strike out and you're like, okay, we can't do that for the owners. We can't afford that in our productivity. We're not willing to work hard. I use that analogy because you could be up to bat for a long time swinging and fouling it off. The end goal isn't to foul out or to strike out. It's to win, but we need to be able to realize that the information that we have has to have a platform that is basically operational from beginning to end and they should be able to read in. I'm hoping with the AI migration and everything, we're starting to see that.

Drew: Am I hearing you say you don't necessarily trust AI?
Jennifer O'Connell: Well, I always say it's human error, and garbage put in is garbage put out. So, you're constantly validating and auditing. In life, that's what you do, you audit. I worked for compliance, you're constantly auditing, but now what are you auditing? When you open the walls, you're like, okay, now I know what dead bodies are in there, and I can validate and move forward. Some of it's real, some of it's not. Over time, because you purchase buildings, you build them, tenants are in it, it's a living entity. It's not stagnant, it's constantly creating other information. That's why I laugh, it's not brick and mortar, it's what you're putting into it. You have to audit it every now and then. If you don't have the tools, or it's just cumbersome, you get a little overwhelmed, and you want to win, but you sometimes feel like you're starting in the gun went off, and everybody's already running, and you're trying to catch up at times.
Jennifer O'Connell: I had a client, a property owner once say, every building has a skeleton, and every building has a soul. Some of them are vocal, and some of them are really quiet. You just got to go figure out what you have. The vocal ones end up with data silos everywhere, and the quiet ones just run until they break. It was interesting, and this was pre-AI, of course, he was old school, very successful in commercial real estate, but that's the way he looked at it. He wanted to be able to listen to his buildings. It's a living, yeah. He went to a great extent to say, I don't want somebody to just take a bunch of spreadsheets and make me another one. I don't want another dashboard. I want somebody to use the data and make a decision and make the building better. We have started to do that, I believe. I think the industry is finally going that direction. We're not there yet, but I think we're going the right direction.

Bill: Things like this podcast bring more people to the forefront to speak about what their pressure points are and what they need to help them. Because I think before it was, oh, I run it this way. I think we need to totally be able to evaluate, everybody has these problems. How are you best doing it? How am I? And these softwares, there's like you could have a cable management company come in and say, here are all your cables. But now how does that feed into the system you currently have? I think we're the evolution of technology where before it was like, I just want technology is now what is the most appropriate and filtered for what I need?

Drew: Well, we went through the PropTech bubble, so I'm enjoying some consolidation on digital and technology sprawl too many tools. Like we do see properties where two or three tools have been purchased to solve the same problem, but it was purchased by different groups inside of the same ownership group or management group or operating group. It's crazy, but it happens. And also, don't forget software that now is outdated or you purchased it, it was a very big purchase and now you're like, okay, I need to have it work, but as other technology comes on, because we know it's not like, I mean, we can get an iPhone every other year because they're outdated in their technology, same with software, so you're constantly upgrading, you're constantly trying to see what best fits your business.

Property Managers as the Human Bridge in CRE

Bill: So why do you think, this almost feels a little bit rhetorical based on our conversation here, but what do you think? Why do you think property managers end up being the ones expected to troubleshoot in those cases?
Jennifer O'Connell: Well, I think we're the human bridge. I think we're the ones on the battlefield with the tenants, with the maintenance department, with the construction, you're kind of like the sun, every department kind of comes around you to filter, and you're like taking it all in and you're becoming this little mini rotation with them from the sales and the executives and getting the tenant to the leasing, to the maintenance department, to back to renewals and what's going on in the building. So you become who they go to because who else are you going to go to? And so I think with the technology, we're trying to be more of an asset stewardship for the owners and be able to give them the information, but we want to give it accurately, and that's where I say, we're trying to audit what was in the past, what we currently have, how we can make it better. And does this, the systems that we're using the platforms, are they funneling everything so that we can see in real time, the metrics for them, because when they're asking for metrics, we want to be able to perform the metrics, but we're pulling it from several different databases. And then we have to make the correlations between them. And you're not only the tech person, but you're actually like an investigator of like, okay, I got this from here. I got this from here. How am I giving them the best information so that when the decisions are made, they're made accurately.

Drew: Yeah. So, I mean, along that line, then can you think of a, it doesn't necessarily have to be super recent, but a real example where you literally had to step in on a technical or a data issue and it wasn't necessarily your job, but you contributed to the solution. I'm just curious about, can you think of an example?
Jennifer O'Connell: So, utilities, you get utilities problems all the time, especially with the spike in electric and everything. And you go back and you're like, okay, you have to work with the local utility companies. You have to work with the meters for the tenants. And you're getting this information and you're trying to work through like, okay, you tell a tenant that they have to be on a meter or they have to get this, but yet you're providing the information for them on different systems so that they could budget and we can budget. And then your ownership is like, okay, well, it's so high. How do we break those costs down to bring in your tenants? And you're like, okay. And now you're like becoming that person. And we've done a really good job. We started putting solar panels and we just put in an EV charger on Western New York, very large to subsidize for those tenants and to help out. My team was very pushing those kinds of things so that we could help with not only the information that we're getting, but there are some things we just can't fix. And how do we mediate that so we can have a happy customer?

Bill: Yeah, definitely. So in your example, then with power and introduction of photovoltaic solar stuff, I could imagine, I mean, chime in here that, so you're driving out real costs there. It's not like your demand is going down, but you're providing other generation opportunities of power generation.
Jennifer O'Connell: Yeah. Well, we're trying to alleviate the points for the ownership and for the tenants, because there's just some things like, you're this tech person and you're like looking at it and you're like, okay, I can't make those changes in what's going on in the world. But, it's kind of like being a mom, you sit there and you try to protect what you can before they go out. So, we try to do the best we can and we try to talk to the assets and see what the best solutions will be so that you can drive your customers back into being there and wanting to be there and not having those points on themselves also.

Drew: Well, Jennifer, let's talk about fixing the model. Like if you, I'm going to ask you to hypothetical, if you could redesign how properties and property management is supported relative to operations technology. I'm not talking about IT, my laptop didn't work. I'm talking about that system behind that closet door with all the blinking lights that's running this data or lighting controls, access controls, HVAC controls, elevator controls, whatever. If you could change how properties are supported relative to that kind of stuff, what would you change first? Because your team is being asked to do it.
Jennifer O'Connell: Well, first of all, I think it's a human thing. I think you have to have everybody buy into it. You're only as good as the people who want to put forth the effort. So, I think you have to get buy-in from all the different departments and everybody likes their silos. Everybody is their own, the captain of their ship. And I think you got to have a team mindset. You really, really have to understand that everybody needs to play a role and everybody's important. So, I always use the example of like, everybody loves the Chicago Bulls for the 90s, but you wouldn't have the Michael Jordan if you didn't have the Rodman and the Pippen. So, everybody can play their role. So, I would think that's where we should start first with knowing what environment you're in because everybody has a different environment, big, small. I always use the example. It really doesn't matter if you have the skill set. It's like the Gene Hackman at the Hoosiers when he gets on the court and he tells everybody, okay, it's the same court. You're playing the same game with the same skills. So, one, you need to know your environment so that you could basically work with the team you have. And then, once you do that, you need to know what was in the past. You have to know that. History helps you and you need to audit that a little. And then, you need to start making decisions as a whole on a universal platform to bring in these systems so that from the beginning to the end, it's transparent and it's direct so that everybody can, at the end, make a decision.

Drew: And get the metrics that they need. Well, we see, you know, building engineers have a role and then another part of property management would be the leasing staff, right? The ones that handle the tenant facing stuff. And in between that is this digital and data gap. So I think that is where we're seeing compression and a lot of roles expect property management to pick it up. And the whole digital architect, digital management, digital team is a gap. That's why I was asking, how would you like them to be supported?
Jennifer O'Connell: You talked a lot about, which I fully agree with by the way, everything to do to get ready, but how would you like to be supported in that realm? Well, I think listening to the property managers tell you where their points of pain are and not only just the property managers, but like you said, the leasing department, the sales and sitting down and literally saying, okay, how can this system funnel through it? And the problem is sometimes you can find solutions. It's just perfect example. We had a very cumbersome, tenants would come to us and say, okay, I want extra work done. It's outside of my lease. How do I do this? And I would constantly see, and it wasn't even funny. They would hand a paper. One person would sign off. They'd hand it to the next. The tenant would get an email saying, this is what we could do for you. I was like, this is ludicrous. So it took me a while. It really did. But I sat down with every department and I said, okay, I have this problem and this point. I need everybody to buy in. And they did. And basically what we did is we systematically streamlined project costs so that when the tenant wants something, they go into the system, they click it. I mean, it took time. It took everybody to do it, but unfortunately the property management, because you're hearing the customer, should be that person saying, these are the things I need to make my customer happy. And we did it. And from the moment the tenant puts in the request to the transparency of the quote, right down to all the approvals, wherever you are in the United States to our approval, it goes right into the system, into the billing, into their statement. And everybody can see it. And it was a success because we said, look at this. This system, if we all work together and it takes a while, but we streamlined it. And all those facets, now we're starting to say, okay, we could do another project like this. And we could systematically streamline this for our tenants. And it's worked out really well.

Bill: I love the example of removing complexity, because we, at least our culture here, is we try to do that. More complexity is not necessarily better. Reducing the point of failure. Yeah, reducing friction points or points of failure applies to people just like it applies to networks and reducing those. So what do you think needs to happen for property managers to focus on performance instead of troubleshooting systems, other than just KPIs and people screening? But if a system fails and the property manager is expected to manage that, I mean, it doesn't really affect the performance of the property. It's gonna take that property management person offline until it's solved. How can we give them a higher bar to focus on and communicate with the owners in a way that we need to manage this old data and digital side and here's the result? So how can they focus on performance?

Metrics and KPIs for Effective Property Management

Bill: Jennifer O'Connell: Metrics. I always say metrics. You know, if you can perform and say, this is, look at how we're losing here. Like the project costs. Once we did that and revenue went up because it was simple, you win. That's it. You win. They look at the metrics. They say, hmm, I'm gonna be able to make money. Okay, let's do another one like this. So it's time consuming. It's like practice. You gotta practice constantly to win the game. It's a struggle. You know, you lose a lot of people because they say, this is a lot of work. But life is a lot of work. So once you get there and you have that trust, I think they start to buy into it. But you need the metrics. You need to show the facts. You need to, you know, sometimes you have to fall to show that, you know, this is why this is needed.

Drew: We talked yesterday on a show recording about forward-looking KPIs, key performance indicators, and you're saying metrics. I think you're saying the same thing. So what is your favorite forward-looking metric for a property?
Jennifer O'Connell: Well, we always look at retention and customer satisfaction because it lowers your operational costs. Otherwise, it's to the owner. So you wanna bring in people. You need to have everybody, all the fans need to be in their seats to have a franchise, right?

Bill: Yes. Love the sports analogies, by the way. Love it, absolutely.

Enhancing Tenant Experience Through Simplified Processes

Bill: Jennifer O'Connell: So customer experience is what always drives me, you know? Also because it is rewarding, you know, to walk into a space and have the tenant be like, we love being here. Like, we love our property manager. Like, to hear the owners get in the elevator with you and say, oh, I asked the tenant, the good, bad, and the ugly, and they were like, we love her, you know? That's really what drives you, you know? Because it's like performing for, you know, a game. I can't perform anymore like I did when I was on the court. So, you know, you love having those wins. And I think, you know, without having, you know, you can use the analogy again of the fans in the stands. It's just empty bricks then, you know? And you're running empty bricks and that costs the owner. So, you know, trying to move forward and using a platform where tenants are a one-stop shop, they're very happy. You know, listen, look at how it is with iPhone, you know? Nobody wants to go outside of, you know, because they want one area that they could do absolutely everything. Amazon is a great example, right? So, you know, we're trying to give those customers that kind of level. And, you know, like I said, you know, become a steward of assets to grow the investment. And who is the people who are that investment? Are your tenants or your customer.

Drew: Yeah, it reminds me of like, I've used the phrase before, acquired need. Like once you become exposed to something, you're like, wow, that's nice. I can't believe I've done without that. It's now a need, you know? I mean, there's so many like white level or white glove services like what you're talking about.
Jennifer O'Connell: Yeah, and that's what we're moving more towards for the tenants. And, you know, easier access because, you know, even to the form that I've simplified it for my team so that we're not constantly getting the, they're striping today, they're doing, you know, HVAC routine maintenance. So we streamlined it. We have standard announcements that go out. The minute that we have something, the tenant knows what's going on in the building. It becomes more of a community and environment where they can go in and say, oh, look what's happening. I, you know, so we're using those tools to help, you know, bridge those gaps. But it, I hate to say it, it still falls on the property manager.

Bill: Yeah. We just don't want you to have to be the technical person as well.
Jennifer O'Connell: Believe me, I don't think my tech people want me either. Like the engineers on our team couldn't be property managers very well. Nor could you go into a firewall or a network switch or look at internet connectivity or a data flow out of this system. Like, you know, there's-

Drew: Right, I mean, there's BMS systems. They're not even both fruit, right?
Jennifer O'Connell: Yeah, I mean, look at just, your building access system goes down, you know, and everybody calls the property manager and you're like, my codes aren't working, my fob's not working. And you're like, let me call somebody.

Bill: Right, yeah, yeah. You're in the same, you know.
Jennifer O'Connell: Yeah, agreed. But like, you're that face. Unfortunately, you are the median in the mapping between their solution and their problem. And it just comes with the territory, I guess.

Drew: Mm-hmm, yep, yeah, that's true. All right, so you will be aware of the fact, since you've watched us before, that when we get to the end here, we end up with the extra floor, as we call it, Jennifer. So just as a quick reminder, extra floor is just, as opposed to everything else we've done so far is conversational, great examples and things like that about the industry stuff. Now it's time for, you know, the listeners to get to know the human side of you. So here's our stock three questions that we come for. Number one, what's the best piece of career or life advice that you think you might've ever received?

Personal Practices for Professional Success

Drew: Jennifer O'Connell: So I would say one of them was when I played ball. My coach would say, hard work beats talent anytime talent doesn't work hard. And I've learned that. You have to have grit, you have to be able to put in the time for the practice. The practice is hard, the game should be fun. But I've taken it further, and I even tell my daughters, like, that also builds your character and your character's built when nobody's watching and your reputation stays with you. You know, things go by, careers, you know, sporting, you know, but you really need to work hard and show because you never know who's watching. And it's really not for them, it's for you. It's to be able to look in the mirror and say, I did what I needed. So I would say those, that was kind of my mantras, kind of how I live by.

Bill: Absolutely, yeah. Well, kind of along that lines, because it has the word practice in it, what's one habit or practice that consistently makes you more effective?
Jennifer O'Connell: So I, the one, well, I do several things. One thing is I try to work out. I try to keep my mind and my body healthy, you know? So I try to work out several days a week. It comes from, you know, practicing my whole life, college ball, you know? You don't want to lose that. But also your mind, your mindset. You need, at night, so one thing I always did when I played is visualize. You visual, you know, if you can visualize it, it can happen. So we would always visualize winning the game. You know, it's kind of the Coach V thing where he would cut down the net before he even won. So you basically, like, even at night, like I take that decompression time for my professional and my life, and I look at it and I say, what can I do better? What happened there? I go through situations, problem solve in my head, visualize it, so I'm prepared for the next day. And I'm also calming myself to say, okay.

Drew: Self-grace and saying there weren't things that I did right, but there are things that I can make better for tomorrow. Yeah, nice. All right, last question then. Are you an early bird or a night owl?
Jennifer O'Connell: Oh, well, if you ask my husband he'd say, I like the nights. I will say I am a night person. I work out at night. I do, you know, I always feel like, but being, you know, a mom and everything, I could do both. I don't require that much sleep. I think if I get like six hours a night, I'm good. So I would say, but I'd like it on the back end. I would rather have my nights where, you know, I'm not a morning person with the, you know, the birds really. But I, listen, in business, you get up early, you got to do what you got.

Conclusion and Contact Information for Jennifer O'Connell

Bill: So that's exactly right. Yeah. Well, Jennifer, how can our listeners contact you? What's the best way?
Jennifer O'Connell: They can reach out to Jay O'Connell at Uniland.com. You know, we are in Western New York, so you can contact me through there. I am on the board of directors for Habitat for Humanity and for BOMA. So you can contact me through there either.

Drew: You were the property manager of the year recently for BOMA in New York.
Jennifer O'Connell: It was a couple of years ago. It was, it's a, it's a good organization and it, like I said, I came into it in a different environment and career to here. And so it did, it helped validify and direct me. So it was good.

Bill: Well, Jennifer, thank you for being on it. I enjoyed the conversation. It was a pleasure. Thank you for sharing everything.

Drew: And thank you to our listeners. And as Drew said at the beginning of the show, don't forget to like, follow, subscribe, share, you know, find an episode you like and send it to a friend and say, I think this is worth listening to. That's actually how we got Jennifer on the show today. If you think you would add value by being on the show, please reach out. Thanks again, everyone. And we'll see you on the next episode of Peak Property Performance.
Jennifer O'Connell: Great. Thank you so much, gentlemen.

Bill: Oh, thank you.