University Place

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Jeanan Yasiri

This is Entrepreneurialism in Society. It's a course that's offered through the University of Wisconsin School of Human Ecology. I'm Jeanan Yasiri. As we begin today I'd like to extend thanks to our partners in

supporting this course

the UW Office of Corporate Relations, the UW College of Engineering for their technical support, and financial support which is provided through the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation which is committed to advancing academic education in entrepreneurship. Additionally, we'd like to thank our media partners, Wisconsin Public Television and their University Place crew for taping today's lecture. I'm so very pleased to introduce our special guest today, George Gialamas, owner and president of the Madison-based Gialamas Company. The Gialamas Company is a commercial real estate development company that George established along with his wife, Candy, in 1975. The company's vision and philosophy have sparked development here in Madison that's attracted new people, new jobs and promoted economic development in our area including ownership and development of Old Sauk Trails Business Park starting in 1986. That development has grown to over 58 buildings containing over 300 companies, occupying three million square feet. That park's business alone employs 12,500 employees, creating an annual tax base for the city of Madison of $350 million. George was born and raised in Chicago, came to Madison to work for IBM where he stayed for 14 years. He earned his degree in philosophy from Marquette University which we'll ask him about later. In 2008, Marquette honored him with the Helen Way Klingler College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Alumni of the Year award. Nationally, George received the Ellis Island Medal of Honor award. And today George and Candy have long been active in their philanthropic community and very proud supporters of many nonprofit interests including the arts and other nonprofit interests in Dane County. Today we're going to deviate from a formal presentation and instead enjoy a casual conversation with George Gialamas. So please join me in welcoming George today.

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supporting this course

George, I am so pleased that you were willing to come and chat with us, and I want to kind of go back. I know we're going to talk about entrepreneurship, and we're going to talk about how it relates to students that are in the audience. But first, you were born in Chicago, tell me a little bit about your childhood. >>

George Gialamas

Oh, gosh. I can't remember that far back. I was born on the south side of Chicago for what that's worth. And I think it's important, because you learned to grow up in the streets in those days, and I guess you do today, to some extent. But grew up, we didn't have much money, as we are as fortunate today, but we learned to do with what we had. And family was the key thing, just like it is, I'm sure, with you. Family is the most important thing. It still is today, by the way. And it helped me when I was growing up in Chicago because your family were your friends and your compatriots and the support that you needed to grow. But Chicago was a good training ground. I think anybody here from Chicago or any big city, you learn how to stay in your little cocoon, is it, I don't think that's a proper word, but you stay in your little area and you grow in that area and you grow out of it. But I had my first job out of there, too. You said I came to Madison with IBM, I did, but I started in Chicago with IBM. So they're the ones that moved me around the country a lot. But I'm talking too much. >> No, you're not talking too much at all. When you were younger and even before you went to IBM, had you considered what you wanted to do when you grew up, as it were? Do you even conceive what an entrepreneur was? >> I don't even know what an entrepreneur is today.

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George Gialamas

I think we're all entrepreneurs, folks, we all are. It's just the degree of how much you want to put into it. The fact that you're even here makes you an entrepreneur. I don't call myself an entrepreneur because it happened. I was lucky in a lot of things. They call me an entrepreneur. Okay, I'll take whatever titles they throw at me, and also the bad titles they throw at me. And they throw an awful lot at me over the years, I'll tell you. But don't be afraid to call yourself entrepreneurs, don't be afraid to call yourself anything. You're going to step and you're going to fail and you're going to step again. That's the important thing, is taking that other step. I'm sorry, I'm rambling. >> No, you're not at all. George, tell us what brought you to Wisconsin. >> Well I was working with-- IBM hired me in Chicago, as I said. Then they moved me to New York. I worked in Manhattan and I was a bachelor then. Actually I was a bachelor a long time.

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George Gialamas

But I was really gung-ho on IBM. And this is the '60s now so this is when some of you may remember the old 360, that piece of hardware they came out with that was really a hot item we were selling, and it was a year-and-a-half or two-year waiting period just to get it. Today, if you had to wait a year-and-a-half, or two years, none of you would have what you have on your desks right now. But that's how long it took. And these were big boxes. The small computers, we weren't pushing those things. In fact, I think it was one of IBM's down falls. They just wanted to sell the big box with the stations all around. What did they call them at that time? I forgot. Well you know better than I. I used to be able to operate those big computers in those days, but I can't even do a very good job on these little things today. Thank God I've got an IT guy that helps me. And I'm a little ahead of the game only because of my background, but you folks know so much more about computing than I ever learned. I want you to know that. Our day, we had to punch cards. You know what punch cards are? >> I do. >> Yes, that's what we had, and that's what we started with. But IBM moved me here, and I fell in love with the place. They were going to move me to Detroit, and I said no. And in those days you couldn't say no to IBM. IBM used to mean "I've been moved."

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George Gialamas

And if you were promoted, and I was promoted four or five times up to the time I got to Madison, you had to move, that's all. They didn't want you in the same office working or managing people that you worked with. That was their philosophy at the time, which had some pluses but it also some negatives. It was hard to set up a household and family and get started. But that's why I was a bachelor until I was 31 years old. >> So you were there for 14 years and obviously eventually developed your own business, but what did you learn in that very large corporate structure that eventually helped you? >> Well, any big company like IBM it was a great company at one time, it truly was, and I use the word was. I think I'd love to write a story about what happened to the company in time, and I might do that some time. But that's talk for another day. It used to be a salesman's company. If you were out there and you were pushing their product, you were their hero and they would do, you could make as much money as you want. And to make six figures in the '60s was an awful lot of money, I mean an awful lot of money. It was like making over a million dollars today, probably. But it was very possible. And all the sudden they started putting restraints on what the salesmen could make. And whenever you see that kind of thing happening in a large company, putting limitations of any kind on you, be aware. Take from the company what you can, learn what you can, but don't sell them your soul right away. Just take what you can from the company. The only problem I had with IBM is I spent too much time with them, bluntly. 14 years was a full career in those days. But I don't blame them for anything. We all make our own decisions. We're afraid to make moves, a lot of us are. And I was too. That was my career. I was going to stay with IBM and be with them as long, finish my career there. But then I didn't like what I saw happening, and be aware of this. Be aware of all your surroundings whenever you work for a company. If you don't like what you see, take a step and move on. Don't be afraid, please. We all have choices. You can make choices and stay where you are and, you know, maybe be bored. It was becoming boring because I don't like people controlling what I was doing. I want to be "a free spirit." I think it's important as an entrepreneur, and again we all are entrepreneurs, to be a free spirit. There's something my dad told me, I want to pass this on to you. He told me in Greek. But I will tell you in English.

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George Gialamas

He said, you take a step, in this case you make a choice, and it's either the right step or it's the wrong step. It's very simple. And if it's the right step, super. You stay there, you continue on. If it's the wrong step, again very simple, you move on, take another step. The problem is too many of us that are "not entrepreneurs" don't take that other step. So the worst thing you could do is not take the step. All right? Does that make sense? Well, I don't want to lecture, I'm sorry. >> Very, very wise advice. And I know that students have heard you loud and clear. I'm thinking about kind of the trajectory of your career. IBM for 14 years, a philosophy major at Marquette prior to that, and eventually it all translates into real estate. How did that happen? Is there a connection there? >> I think so. First of all, I believe in a liberal arts background. I really do. I think it widens your views, perspectives. Whether you're engineers, I think you should get more, a wide spectrum. And get as many different types of experiences as you can and take some arts, take some classes, music, whatever. It's all good for you. I think the broader we make our minds, help our minds broaden, the better off we're going to be in the long run. If I just focused on a particular thing, like philosophy for instance, that would have probably hurt me, and I would have walked around with my head up in the sky and not known where I'm going. So I had a bit of the philosophy giving me a broader reach of things, but I also had some business, and I had some, took a lot of biology. And I could have applied for medical school, for instance. Thankfully I didn't. I enjoy the business world tremendously. If I hire somebody today I want to see that he or she has a broad background. I don't want them to know just real estate. And I've argued with a lot of real estate people about that. You can hire real estate people and put them in the back room and let them do all the numbers you want. That's not what you want. You want somebody with a broad, broad view of things. >> Let's talk a little bit about Madison when you first started entering real estate as your next career path. Tell us what it was like. When was it? It was mid-'70s. >> It was '74, I think. >> Because a lot of these students... >> They weren't born, were they? >> Well, not only not born but would probably be challenged to consider Madison without all the development beyond the Beltline. Some of us remember it, but they wouldn't. >> Well, Madison ended at Gammon Road basically back then in the '70S. There was no development past Gammon Road. So the fact that we went past the Beltline was even stranger. But we had to get a big enough piece of land. Let me go back. >> Sure. >> I was with IBM, we were looking for a new home for IBM at the time. And I looked all around, I, with a group of people from New York and every where else, were looking for where we could place IBM. We ended up not finding any land around. There wasn't anything that was commercially zoned, wasn't open to any further development. The city was pretty much confined. So we ended up literally moving out to, it's on the Beltline. I don't think it's in the city today. >> Probably in the town of Middleton, is it? >> It was a concrete building we built. No, it's in the town of Madison. And they were very upset the fact that we moved out of the downtown Madison. Oh, we moved out partly because of the Vietnam War too. They were breaking our windows almost every week, and it was pretty dangerous for our secretaries and our employees to even work downtown. They didn't want us around. IBM was part of the war effort, they thought. So we moved out to the Beltline. In fact, the IBM building is presently the new Mortenson --, an insurance company there. It's a big concrete block building. I think concrete block, not block, a poured concrete building. Part of the reason was to show that they were afraid. They were afraid with the war effort and everybody attacking the big corporations. I lost my thought. >> We were talking about what Madison was like during that time that you were getting into development. >> So when I was with IBM we had the old computers, if you remember that if you had a printout from the computer in those days it was like God speaking. This is what you put in and this is what's going to happen. You had a projection. Nobody would dispute a computer printout, nobody, because the computer said so. So I was doing a lot of this computer work for a lot of my friends in real estate just as a favor. But it was simple. You do a 10-year projection on an investment in an apartment building or on office building, or this or that, and I said, geez that looks pretty good. I started believing it. Well, I came in the game, I left IBM in '74, and I said I was looking for a job. I didn't know what I wanted to do. I had absolutely no clue what direction I was going to go. I knew I did not want to spend the rest of my life with a large company. I guess it finally got to me. And I said to my wife, I called her up for lunch, which I never had lunch with my wife, and said let's talk. So we talked a bit and I said I'm leaving, and I need your help and support. Of course, she said. I don't know what I'm doing, but we'll find something and we'll survive. I had one or two kids at the time, I'm not sure, maybe a couple kids. So we took off and I said I'm going to-- Oh, I made a deal with one of the companies with one of the people I use to call, in the city of Madison, and said let me help you if you want to order some computers, I'll sell myself as a consultant. So they called me. I had a lot of friends and a lot of acquaintances. They called me and one company, I won't mention the name, said we're looking for a new home for our business. So I found a place for them because I was driving around a lot when I was looking for a home for IBM. And I found out that I could be paid a commission if I had a license. It was on the market. So we told the man this is the property to buy. I said if I go to school real quick, and I went to MATC, got a quick license, and so help me made my first commission that way not having planned to be in real estate at all. So that's how it happened. And there's no glorious answers other than the fact I was trying to survive and pay for my family and take care of my kids. >> George, given that point in your life, was that the first time you'd considered working for yourself? >> No, I wanted to work for myself always. I just didn't know what to do, I really didn't. Again, philosophy background, I'm not specifically trained. I was trained with people. And I'm trained in marketing. And in those days I knew computers. Compared to today it's nothing. So we had a little background. I had a lot of job offers, but I didn't want to go back to work for another company. I had a lot of offers. When you were an IBM person in those days, you were top of the heap as far as training. They do an awful great job in training you. That's what you have to look for if you're going to work for a big company, make sure they've got a good training program. The big companies have those good training programs, and the small ones, unfortunately, don't. Unless you work for us, of course, you'll learn from me.

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George Gialamas

Big companies do have good training programs. That's very important. >> Let's talk a little bit about, again, the climate of the city at the time you were getting into the business and especially where you were developing. A little political at times, the concept of developing on that west side of Madison. >> It was very political. The city of Madison did not want to grow. They had 24 alderoids, I call them.

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George Gialamas

I'm sorry. Someone's son that was an alderman is here, but he was a good one. And I used to call them that, and I had no fear of them however. I had no fear of anybody because I was talking to CEOs around the country, selling to them. I just had to convince these people that this was good for their city. And it was hard. Nobody wanted the city to grow. They really didn't. They literally wanted to hold the boundary lines where they were. We did a lot of talking. Madison had a lot of neighborhood groups, they still do, and it's probably one of the problems that it hasn't grown better than it has because of the neighborhood groups. But that's, again, another issue to talk about. The city council was, I would say, not anti-growth but very, very, they wanted to be very controlling. And so when I came up to them I said we got this piece of land, 486 acres, they thought I was crazy. It was the largest piece of annexation to take place up to that time. And I said no, this is what we'll do, we'll make it an office park. I know the city of Madison needs an office park because I was looking around for land for IBM. I said that's why you've lost IBM. That's why you're could lose a lot of these other companies. Well, long story short, we convinced them to do it. And I said we have to go out far enough because you can't accumulate enough land within your borders now. So they went along with it. But the best part about it is that we made our own zoning text. And we hit the minimum requirements, maximum requirements that the city wanted plus we surpassed that. And I said fine, if everybody falls within this I don't want to have to come to Madison and get approvals for every little project we do. We got that passed. And that's the main reason that that park is successful today, it really is because it doesn't take you six months to get through the city process. We literally can make a deal today and be in the ground within 30 days. >> You know, that last example may answer, in fact, what I was going to ask you next which is, what assets, what entrepreneurial assets did you use to overcome those that were really against the development? >> I don't know how to answer that. Entrepreneurial assets. Big talker maybe.

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George Gialamas

>> Tenacity. >> Tenacity, yes. You never say never. You never say you can't. You always can do. You have to have a can do attitude. If they say no, forget it, back down, never. Never stop. Don't stop. You have to keep going, keep going. No matter how many people kick you and say no to you, you're just not going to get anything done. And that's not only in Madison, that's anywhere in anything you do. In anything that might make you more of an entrepreneur. Like I said, you're all entrepreneurs, just different degrees. Take those steps. That's the key thing. You have to have a can do attitude, you have to. And a very positive one. If you go around saying they kicked me, or they hurt me, or they did this, too bad. Too bad. Just go on. Keep going. Don't stop. >> One of the things that we explore in this class, because we're talking about entrepreneurship, is identifying innovative solutions. We also talk a lot about taking risk. Can you tell us how you handle the stress of making decisions that may or may not be really carefully calculated, but you got to go for it? >> That's a tough one to answer. I could look back now and tell you honestly I had more stress working for a big company than I do working for myself. All right? I knew that the decisions I made, I was either right or wrong, and again I go back to the basic thoughts. If I was wrong, I take another step. If I was wrong in a big company, you might lose your job. Right? Or they overlook you for a promotion. And that's all we were worried about when I was a young man. That's not the only thing, I was worried about who I'm going out with that night, too.

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George Gialamas

That was important. But I have less stress on me today and building my career than I did working for a large company because you control yourself. Okay? You make yourself what you are. Nobody else is going to make it for you. You're going to tell yourself what you're going to do, what you can do. And there's nothing you can't do. Whatever steps you take, your choices. I'm not telling you to go crazy and be stupid. Be as calculating as you can. Figure things out as best as you can. People say, well, geez I just can't go in this direction. You know you're going to fall off the ledge if you keep going in that direction. That's just dumb. Don't be dumb.

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George Gialamas

You're all intelligent. You're in this fantastic environment. And great building, by the way, I'm very impressed with this building. I'm sure you all have the smarts to make the wise choices. And the mere fact that you're here tells me a lot. I'm excited for all of you. >> Can you think of or share, George, maybe a hiccup or a failure that really helped teach you lessons as an entrepreneur? >> Every day. I have fallen quite a few times. I was this close to bankruptcy three or four times. You don't remember the '86 tax law, that hurt a lot of us in real estate, anybody in real estate. But that wasn't something we created, it was something, in this case, the government came up with new laws, and they changed the rules in the middle the stream, which makes it difficult. I'm not saying I never made any mistakes. I made a lot of mistakes. I don't want to go through each one of them. I can pick out specific ones. I built a building once because I was bored. Okay?

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George Gialamas

>> Of course, I want to ask which one. >> It was the least successful building I built. Least successful. And you know what? I felt good when I sold it. And I don't sell my projects. I hold on to all the buildings we built, and we've built over a couple million square feet. So this building I sold because it was a bad omen to me. I shouldn't have built it. It was because I was bored and there's nothing better to do. I didn't have any tenants, blah, blah, blah. It just wasn't a good decision-making process. But, thankfully, at that time I could afford making a mistake like that and still survive. I've been doing this now, what, I don't know how many years, 35-40 years now. >> About 35 I think. >> 35 years. The last two years, these are tough times, folks. Good time to be in school. The last two years, the first time we haven't built a building or have a project going. And I learned my lesson then about don't do it now because I'm bored. So I'm not going to do anything. I'm not going to do it until everything is just right. So I learned that lesson. And I'm telling you don't do things when the chips aren't falling properly for you. Make sure they do. I am bored today because I don't have any projects in the ground, and all I'm doing is putting out fires. I mean, I love what I do. I absolutely love what I do. I think we're building up this community, we're making it a first class community, and if any of you would like to come see our projects, call my son and we'll be glad to show you, walk you through some of our projects. >> All at once hopefully. >> Yeah, all at once, it's true. Aris Gialamas has joined us today, and we really appreciate you being here. I'm going to grab the mic and I'm going to come out to the students so that they have an opportunity to ask questions. >> Am I talking too much? >> No, you're doing great, are you kidding? But I do need to figure out how to put this on. >> Turn the bottom. >> You know what? You're so right. You're teaching me. Is this working? >> Yep. >> Okay, great. And the students just kind of wave at me, George, and then I hand it off to them. The first person who has a question for you, George, is actually a gentleman who took this class the very first semester it was offered. Jeremy Crane joins us and he's got a question for you. Good to see you, Jeremy. >> Can I ask two? >> Can you ask two questions? I think that George is up for it. Stand up though so he can see you. >> The first question is a quick one, and I think Jeanan was trying to pick your brain a little more about this and you didn't really answer it that much, but you talked about coming to Chicago and living in New York at one point, can you tell me a specific think about Madison that you really love about this town? Is it the people or the food or the bars? I don't know, what is it?

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George Gialamas

>> Well, when I was younger, is my mic on? >> Yep, it sure is. >> When I was younger I didn't expect I was going to stay in Madison, honestly. I thought I was going to move. They moved me to San Francisco. They moved me to Kansas. They moved me to New York. So I lived in big cities. And going to Madison, I actually had my choice, at the time I could have gone to Madison or Rockford. I said I'll pick Madison because it's a college town. The main reason I came here. And I figured I'm going to be here a year or two and I'm going. After I got here, I really fell in love with it. I fell in love with the attitudes. I'm more right than most of the people in the city, though. But I like the lakes, and I never learned to swim in Chicago. I learned to swim here in the lakes, swimming pools. The people were pleasant. It was small enough but sophisticated enough. They had the arts. They had all the things I was used to. I love Broadway, for instance. I love music, musical shows. Opera, those are things I enjoy. They had them all here. In fact, right here at the university. So that was one of the things that kept me here. Then I found my wife, I met my wife. And she had a little bit to do with my staying.

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George Gialamas

>> Do you have another question? >> Yeah, the other question is you sort of touched upon being in business for so long and kind of going up and down, coming close to bankruptcy and then being in places where you can afford to make big mistakes and just do projects because you're bored, for example. Can you talk about going through those swings in business and how you feel as a person during the different points in time when it's really high and also at the points when it's really low. >> Good question, great question. First of all, in every business you've got highs and lows. The real estate industry for the last 10 years has been going like this. And all the sudden boom, it fell off the edge. We're all neurotic. All of us. Any entrepreneur is somewhat neurotic. You have to be. You got to excite yourself all the time to keep going with that can do attitude. So if things slow down around you, you say that's BS, that's not true, it's not slowing down, everybody else, not me. So you go and you go and you go and you just keep going and all the sudden you say hey maybe they're right maybe things have slowed down and maybe we better rein in ourselves a little bit and find out what's going on. I was concerned because I had so much energy, and I'm a workaholic, by the way, I didn't want to stop. I can't stop. I just want to keep going. And I don't like the word workaholic. You love the stuff you're doing so much you just want to do it all the time. That's how I define workaholic. And I do. I want to develop, I want to build, I want to create and a make a new part of the city and we have. We achieved that. It's not done yet. So I'm a little bored right now, but I've learned to hold my reins a little bit better. Does that answer your question? >> Yeah, that was great. >> Hi, George. I'm Nick. I have a question about your buildings in the last couple of years or maybe in the past before. Have you ever had a point where you had a lot of buildings sit empty where you couldn't find tenants? >> No. >> No. Just that one that you sold off, basically, that didn't really work out? >> We rented it up finally, Nicholas. But our occupancy rate in today's market is 93% so we're in darn good shape. But I'm not happy unless it's 100%. Because that's all profit out there. >> Why is that? >> Why is what? >> Why are you at 93%? >> Oh, thank you. I've got the greatest team in the world working with us. I really do. My people are, they service, service, service. They take care of all of our tenants. They stay with us. We don't lose tenants, by the way. With over two million square feet, we haven't lost 50,000 square feet of tenants. That tells you something. >> Go ahead. >> Hi, I'm Bethany. I was wondering since you seem to have your family so integrated into your business, what recommendations you might have for entrepreneurs who are considering going into business with their families. If there are any boundaries or if you just, everything just kind of runs together. What advice you might have. >> Thank you for asking the question.

I toughest job I have

being a father and a boss. Go and get a job somewhere else before you work for your family. That's my best advice. My sons have, and maybe they should have worked more somewhere else. But no, don't go right into family business. Get some experience from someone else. By the way, I'm happy to say, if I may brag about one thing, we've got a family business of the year award, small family business of the year award. Last year. Was it last year? >> Last year. >> So that tells you about my people and family are real close. I treat all of my employees, all of them, as family. >> Hi, I'm DJ. Just to kind of jump on that question. She kind of stole where I was going. You said just advice in terms of family business, is there any downside to a family business? Like my dad created his own business, and he told me a long time ago never hire someone you can't fire. >> They can be fired.

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I toughest job I have

Again, a good question. He's got to be able to fire you, yes. But if I had to fire my son I'd still--, I'd fire him if it's for the betterment of the company. Yes, I would. You warn them, that's all. You warn them severely. Again, the toughest thing to do is be a father and a boss. It really is. I'd rather not have them report to me. If you're big enough you can have them reporting to somebody else, but a smaller company doesn't happen all the time. Yes? >> Hi, George. I'm just wondering with the success of your company what marketing tools you've found have been really successful for you. >> Well, what marketing tools have been the most successful? I don't want it to sound like BS but service, service, service. Really. Don't sell them and forget them. This is a lesson I learned from IBM. In IBM when we sold equipment, a computer, and I made, let's say, I'm just throwing a number out, let's say I made $50,000 selling this big computer system to someone else. I live with that computer and that system setup in the company. If they ever threw it out, I would lose my commission that I made. So what did that teach you? Follow up, stay on top of it. That was a big, big lesson. So I tried the same in my own company. I said you put them in and you make sure those people are happy. I require that all of my tenants are talked to at least quarterly and semiannually. Walk in the door, say hello. Nothing else? What else? Whatever they need we'll try and take care of. So follow up. Service, service is so important. And, of course, quality. Again, IBM taught me that, quality. They were the best product in the marketplace by far. And I'll say this and I'll

defend it to anybody

we build the best product in the marketplace in Madison, Wisconsin. Probably in the state of Wisconsin actually. >> Back here. >> Hello, George. My name is Carlos. Over here. How you doing? You keep saying that you're bored. What exactly do you mean that you're bored right now? Is there something that you wish you could accomplish? Is there something that's getting old for you? What do you wish you were doing right now? >> I'm not bored with the business. I'm bored with the fact that I can't be building a new building right now. I have plans in my office. You should see them. They're beautiful buildings sitting there. I'm antsy, maybe a better word. I'm antsy. I want to get in the ground with them. The banks are tough to deal with today. They're not lending any money. There's no new tenants so it's silly for me to make a dumb move and put a new building up that I can't fill. I'll just lose money. I'm not going to do that. Like I said, I learned that lesson before. So that's what I mean by I'm bored. Because my real love is just developing new products. The next project, that's my goal. Yes? >> Hi, George. I'm Stephanie. On your website you have a tenant assistance form for maintenance problems, and I was just wondering if keeping up with maintenance is the most costly part of real estate in regards to other areas in your business. >> Most costly? No. It's expensive, yes. But we have to do it because this is what the tenants want. We service things within 24 hours. Everything. There's nothing we don't do within 24 hours. And usually within two because we've got enough people, and our projects are confined so we can reach them real fast. We have a few projects on the east side and around the city and around the state, but most everything we have is in Old Sauk Trails Park. We have great service people. They know the buildings backwards and forwards. If somebody calls-- Oh, let me tell you about this, this is more important, most important. The biggest complaint in any office building or anywhere is HVAC. They're either too hot or too cold. Right? >> Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning. >> Okay. So that's the biggest concern with any building in any office building. So we are able, from our office, to control three million square feet of space from one computer in our office. If somebody calls and says, it's hot or it's cold, we can adjust the temperature from our computers now. You know how this kind of stuff is done better than I do. I don't know how to run it. But we have all of those controls. Nobody else in the state can do it. Not even the state of Wisconsin can do it. The University of Wisconsin can't do it. They can do it per building, but they can't do it from like my office, control these buildings. And that's very expensive to set up. But I know that's the number one priority and concern of all the tenants, and we don't really get any complaints at all. We know the computers are set up so that if anything goes wrong and one office gets too hot it notifies us before the tenant calls. And we can see all the things that are working right and anything that's not working. So that's an expensive thing, and it helps us service our tenants better. >> Hi, George. I'm Amanda. >> Hi. >> So I know that lately the whole green movement has really been picking up, the social responsibility idea, and I was wondering if you thought this was a fad and your opinions on it, and if you felt that your company would change from this. >> Three years ago, I think, we built the Marshall Erdman building in our park. >> 'O7. >> '07-'08. They moved in in '08. It's 150,000 square feet or something like that. It's the first Gold LEED Certified building in the state of Wisconsin that's multi-tenant. The first. Gold LEED. Is it worth it?

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People can't afford the-- they talk about it, they think it's nice, and it is nice, and it's a fantastic building. It's too expensive right now. Honestly. And I have more, I don't have more vacancy, I've got space vacant in that building because I haven't lowered the rent to attract the tenants. People like it, they love it, they think it's great but I can't pay, George, I'm sorry. So I don't think, I'm not going to do next one, the I'll do green features all the time. And we have. But you're adding an awful lot of extra cost today. It will be standard someday, but the costs are quite high. It costs me 20% more to build that building to make it green, the green features. I'll give you one example if I may. This is the latrines-- ah, latrines-- the bathrooms. The urinals, I'm sorry. The urinals in the men's room were no-water. But I was a little leery about that, but we wanted to make it Gold so we had to put waterless urinals. Well, to be safe I put the water behind in the wall anyway, just in case. Because I don't think a lot of the guys like that. Or ladies. So it turns out that a couple of those we keep some waterless urinals but we converted some of those back to water urinals. So those are the kinds of things. People haven't really adapted to it, all of these things that are green. Will I do it again? Yep. But somebody's going to have to ask for it and be willing to pay. It costs a lot. >> If I can add to that. Another one of the reasons we had converted... >> Actually, Aris, hold on just one second. I want to make sure they hear you. >> My son is expecting another daughter within next few days. >> Hour or two.

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If I may add, one of the reasons we actually converted is on the greenness fact, we're also looking on a point system too and we have to get so many points for our certification. And through the practice of maintaining the building, we realized that as waste goes down, and usually we have water which will sweep it all away, with that the cleaning product it took actually overweighed the cost of not using water, which actually saved 40,000 gallons of water a year, and the green aspect of it too. So while upfront it looked really nice that oh, they're waterless urinals, at the end of the day you're actually using more water and using more cost and actually having more chemicals put into the environment by having to maintain it properly. >> Our building is a test building, and they're using it, the Green Society is checking us out. And we're keeping good notes. Remember, Marshall Erdman and Associates, they do buildings all over the country, and we're their landlord here in town. But they're keeping really meticulous notes because some things work and some things don't. And we're finding out ourselves. >> We have one final question from Monique. >> Hi, George. I'm Monique. I just wanted to know, just bring it back to when you were at IBM, you said you were promoted like three or four or five different times. What do you think was the quality they saw in you to be promoted and also the quality that you see in employees that you hire to promote them as well? >> I don't know what the heck they saw in me. I really don't.

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I talked a lot. I was a good salesman. The fact is, honestly, I was rookie of the year for IBM my first year in the business. So I was a good salesman. That's what helped me get promoted. And the offices that I was promoted to wanted good salespeople and sales training. So I was training a lot of people to be sales. I was blessed that way. I'm lucky. But I also, there's something else. I was a bartender once. It's good experience, folks. It allows you to learn to talk to anybody and all kinds of folks, not all just drunks.

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But there's a lot of folks you can talk to about anything. You can call it BS if you want, that's fine, that's part of the game. Just don't lie. Being a bartender, being in some kind of an area where you're out with people is more important right now at your age than being in the back room making an extra $100,000 a year. Don't take those jobs. Take the job where you're out front. Take the job where you're going to meet people. Take the job where you're talking and learning. Don't go in a back room somewhere. Forget about that. You hire people, someone else to do that. If you have a job, one is paying $100,000, the other one is paying $50,000, and you get more exposure at $50,000, take $50,000 right now. You don't need the money now. It will come later. And the better you communicate, communicate is the key, the better you're going to do. That answer you? >> George, thank you so very much. I know that the students join me in thanking you for your time today. >> You throwing me out? >> I will never throw you out. In fact, the fact that you kept saying that you were suffering from boredom suggests to me that maybe you just come back more often. Even though you're a Marquette University grad, you'll always be a Badger at heart for having given us this great lecture today. Please join me in thanking George.

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