Insights in Multifamily Maintenance with James Ohrn

[James Ohrn] (0:00 - 0:10) Third day working, I get the on-call pager, and at 11.30 at night, I get a call from a first floor apartment where all three bedrooms are flooded.

[Adrian Danila] (0:10 - 0:48) Hello, everybody, and welcome to another episode of Multifamily X podcast, Masters of Madness. I want to start by thanking our sponsors for making this broadcast possible. They are Kairos and Apple.

With this being said, we're going to our guest today. Our guest today is James Warm. James is area maintenance manager with Avenue 5 residential.

Welcome to the show, James. Thank you for having me, Adrian. James, I want to start by introducing yourself to the audience.

For those that don't know you or don't know you well enough, walk us through your background in multifamily.

[James Ohrn] (0:48 - 2:55) Yeah, my background in multifamily maintenance starts in 2012. I was running a training business out of an apartment complex in Federal Way, Washington. And I interacted with the maintenance crew a lot.

With my training business, it was sport performance and strength and conditioning, mostly off time for most people. And with that, the team at the site had an open tech position and offered me a job that fit my schedule. So I jumped on it.

I figured at worst, I'd learn a lot about maintaining a home, a business that I might not know and get a rent discount and be able to supplement my income. So with that, I spent about 6 to 8 months in the tech role, then was able to advance to assistant maintenance supervisor. And then in about 18 months, I took over supervising the property, which was 340 units, 28 building garden style, outdoor pool, spa, outdoor basketball court, multiple parks, indoor basketball facility, big clubhouse, a pretty big facility.

Really, really fell into it and then just continued along that path. Then about 3 years in, I took a hiatus and then was back in Chicago pulling wire for an electrical company and got a job offer to come take over a lease-up building, an opportunity in Capitol Hill, Seattle with a team member who I knew was ascending with a new property management company called Avenue 5. And I saw an opportunity to get on with a future player in the space and be able to grow with them and be able to use my leadership background to advance and hopefully impact maintenance in a way that I thought would be kind of leading towards the future.

And that's where I came in as a maintenance supervisor, ran a couple buildings along with the lease-up for about two and a half years, and then was able to ascend to regional level where I'm at right now. And I've been in this role for going on 5 years now.

[Adrian Danila] (2:56 - 3:14) James, what inspired you to choose apartment maintenance? Was it a choice that came with a reasoning, like a very strong reasoning, or it's just something that kind of like randomly happened, you fall in it? Because our most common answer when you ask someone, how did you get into the industry is like, I fell into it.

So I'm curious about yours.

[James Ohrn] (3:14 - 4:16) It's kind of a unique situation. In 2011, my sister passed away in an apartment fire. And there were some circumstances surrounding that event.

She was six months into her first year at a university and was at an off-campus party. And she had decided to stay the night with these people. A fire broke out in the middle of the night and the alarm system was off.

People weren't alerted and she was the only casualty. Fast forward a year, I'm looking for supplemental income. I fall into maintenance.

And then I start really getting into the understanding of the backside of the business and seeing how I could use my leadership, take my morals and values and really implement them, trying to grow the attitude around maintenance to hold themselves accountable so that maybe someone else doesn't have to go through this. So my motivation for the long term has been trying to mitigate any other family having to go through what we experienced with my sister losing her life.

[Adrian Danila] (4:16 - 4:31) I'm really sorry about your loss. The worst can really encompass. Empathy is very hard.

Even for me, it's very hard to just listen to the story. I want to go back to where you started. You just started.

What was the position? What was your first job? Was it a maintenance technician?

[James Ohrn] (4:32 - 5:42) Yeah, I was a maintenance technician. Coming in green, just a positive attitude and a work ethic. I love physical activity.

I love a sense of accomplishment. I love working with my hands. My background is I have a degree, a bachelor's degree in management and administration with a minor in physical education.

And then I have a strength coaching cert. So it's always about building a mode, following that mode and giving good effort to that in that space. If you liken that to something like maintenance, you have a mode for doing service requests, a start, a middle, a finish, follow up communication, creating an individual experience for that resident.

The same thing with turns. There's a set sheet and a progression. You touch each piece and you progress through it.

And then at the end, you get that sense of accomplishment. Yeah, it was kind of a natural fit just for who I am and the activities I like to do. And then continually learning.

There's never a time in maintenance or in physicality where you know everything. You're always learning. You're always evolving.

And I like that chase for knowledge as well.

[Adrian Danila] (5:42 - 5:59) You kind of had a leg up having a management experience prior and also having a bachelor's degree in management. What were other things that helped you transition from a technician job to a manager, to a service manager job?

[James Ohrn] (5:59 - 8:02) I think I had a leg up with the admin side. I think admin is a little bit tough for a lot of maintenance people because we are visual learners. We like to learn with our hands.

We like to learn by doing. Having gone through traditional education, writing classes and communication and all that kind of stuff, I was set up for success in a way where the things that are hard for people on our side were kind of easy for me. So I could really do those without really thinking about it and then hunker down on creating experiences, individualizing that, and then learning the labor side of things to be efficient with that.

So that really helped me kind of jump ahead. I can remember specifically when I was trying to promote from tech to assistant. The manager at the time went through our online learning portal.

And this was Graystar at the time. So they have a robust online learning portal. And she assigned me something like 138 classes that I had to take before she would consider me.

And man, I hammered through about 80 of them in about two days while staying on top of my labor side of things. Just to show them like, if I need to, I can step up and do this. And I think that's really what they wanted was for me to show dedication and understanding like there are levels to this and you have to earn it.

And I think that was a beautiful opportunity for me to show that side of the work ethic and improve myself so that they could trust me to step up. And then my maintenance supervisor at the time, a great guy named Ben, he was really into the labor side and he hated the admin side. So that gave me a leg up.

I'm doing all of that for him. So yeah, I got to learn really fast all of the aspects. And then coming up, I was a scholarship football player in college.

I played team sports my entire life, going back to my physical side of the secondary job that I have. And understanding my role and playing it well, and then trying to advance and build up the team as we go really, really kind of gave me the mindset that allowed me to stay focused and continue to move in a progression upward.

[Adrian Danila] (8:02 - 8:11) James, what are some pieces of advice that you would like to share with someone? What would be your message to them? Why should they choose apartment owners?

[James Ohrn] (8:11 - 9:16) I think number one is, it's been said before, but it's a bulletproof industry. We are providing housing, which is a basic need for all humans. So there will always be jobs.

There's always going to be an opportunity beyond the opportunity that you have right now. You can switch up your roles. You can be creative with it.

There's so many lanes of the business that you can learn as you go. Starting off green in maintenance, you're able to earn an honest living. It's going to be there.

You're needed and people appreciate it when you do a good job. And then consistently being able to learn. There's never a time, like I said earlier, where you know everything.

You get to touch relationships with people and they let you in their homes and gain so much perspective from just day-to-day interactions, even outside of like the physical work or even the admin, just in growing yourself as a person, as you navigate relationships. Yeah. Starting off green in the industry, understanding it's going to take effort and dedication.

The industry will give back to you if you invest in it as well.

[Adrian Danila] (9:17 - 9:34) Let's go to the next step. Someone is a maintenance technician like you started in the industry. They want to move up.

They want to become a service manager. What are some pieces of advice for those type of individuals? And what are some lessons that you've learned in your journey towards becoming a service manager?

[James Ohrn] (9:34 - 10:56) Advancing in the industry is all about investing in yourself. You have to show up consistently. You have to be willing to learn.

And with that, aligning yourself with people who believe in you, who can promote you. Finding a company that has those opportunities to advance. Taking the skills from everyone around you.

Humbling yourself to the point where you know that everyone knows something that you don't. And then trying to learn from them. That's crucial to advancement.

And then, yeah, aligning yourself with people who believe in you that can get you to that next step. And then just work in your mode and staying as patient as you can, but jumping on the opportunity when it arises. Some people say that you're not ready for the next position.

You have to be truthful with yourself when you're thinking about things. Can I take on this stress? Do I know 50% of the position above me?

And can I acclimate to that quickly and then learn the other 50% as I go? Do I have the communication skills to ask for help or delegate or whatever it is to be a leader? Being truthful with yourself, sitting back, understanding your strengths versus your opportunities, and then building your plan around that.

I think those are all things that not just in maintenance, but in life will get you to the next step. Especially in maintenance, understanding where you're at, growing, and then aligning yourself with people who can get you to that next step as well.

[Adrian Danila] (10:56 - 11:11) I want to go to your current position, James. Tell us a little bit about the size of your portfolio, how many apartment homes, how many communities you're overseeing, and what are some of the main responsibilities of your current job?

[James Ohrn] (11:11 - 13:16) I am stationed in Western Washington. Western Washington's portfolio for Avenue 5 is roughly around 110 apartment properties from Everett to Olympia and then out onto the peninsula. Specifically for the portfolio I get to work with, I am over the downtown sector of Seattle, which is about 35 to 40 buildings floating in between there, and then about 7,000 apartment units.

Main responsibilities are, I think, first off, be available. The best ability is availability and a willingness to help. Specific to the role, area maintenance managers at Avenue 5 are tasked with leading their team.

Everybody from your lateral, regionals, leading up to your VPs and giving them input where needed. And then everybody on site being, I like to say, I'm a corporate resource to help them make their life better at work and then advancement. I really try and dig into the training aspect of things and personal development of the teammates that I get to work with, which harkens back to my strength coaching cert and everything like that.

And then we oversee building inspections per year. So essentially like an in-house due diligence for each building. We also do due diligences for new business.

We integrate properties. We do supplier relations. I think something that I really like to dig in on is getting involved with the local organization, the Washington Multifamily Housing Association, and in giving of myself there to help build the industry and represent Avenue 5 and my teammates as well as possible there.

Really, we can touch any lane. Marketing needs something. Career development needs someone to pop on our nationwide webinar per month or anything like that.

Just making myself available through all those lanes as well and just trying to learn from everybody. Overall leadership in all of those lanes, if it's possible.

[Voice Over] (13:17 - 13:21) And now a word from Dean Fungawing, founder and CEO, Kairos.

[Dean Fungawing] (13:21 - 14:53) This first customer when we installed this solution form, we installed on January 4th this year. And within like three weeks, the temperatures of the attic had gotten below 40, immediately sent a notification to the chief building engineer. They saw that the temperatures that night, according to the weather forecast, were going to drop into the 20s, low 20s.

Well, sure enough, the ambient sensor could tell that the attic was dropping very fast, like hours, within hours, down to 32 degrees. And that night it had gotten down to 20 degrees. Well, luckily for them, they went on Firewatch.

Once they saw the temperatures were opposing freezing, they could drain the lines of the system. And that way there was no risk to the asset. And they just had to pay for a little bit of overtime for somebody to walk the building every 45 minutes.

In the morning, when the temperatures start to rise, they could turn the system back on and go back off of Firewatch. This happened multiple nights in a row. And one of the nights they actually caught a crack in one of the lines, the leak sensor.

They were able to detect that there was a small crack in one of the lines from it just being an old line. And they only had to pay $3,000 for a specialized plumber to come and fix that line. They didn't have any damage.

Last year, over $300,000 worth of damage because of the apartment's flooding. Same building, same issue. The following year, zero water damage.

And the only difference was they knew what the temperature of the pipes were. And that's it. Once you know, then you can act and be responsible.

[Adrian Danila] (14:54 - 15:50) James, I want to talk about scaling. So from being a service manager overseeing a few hundred apartment homes to being an area manager overseeing now 40 properties in a neighborhood of 7,000 apartment homes, it's a huge jump. And I'm sure that didn't happen overnight.

What are some things for someone that is looking up to someone like you and said, Hey, one day I want to be like James. What are some pieces of advice for them in regards to scaling? Because the mindset that you need to have to be successful in one property is totally different.

And also not just the mindset, but the skillset is totally different from one property to like overseeing 40 properties, 7,000 apartment homes. What are some challenges that you were up against when you scaled up? How did you overcome and what pieces of advice do you have for someone that wants to follow the same path?

They're currently service managers, want to become an area manager like you.

[James Ohrn] (15:50 - 19:27) I think all of this, a base philosophy of mine in life is a growth mindset, spinning everything into an opportunity. We're here to be solution-based. We're here to create the answers to the problems for everybody.

I think that is relatable from a single site to the area maintenance role. For me, I was lucky enough to be able to see multiple properties at once, even though they were smaller properties. Having gone from a single supervisor over a single property with more units to a single supervisor over 3 properties with less units, but more things moving really gave me an understanding of how to plan and create a mode and then follow along.

So that helped me understand what would be necessary when moving into a role where I'll be working with multiple properties. I think if you're looking at a single site, if you have teammates underneath you, understanding your leadership mode and trying to be... I believe in transformative leadership, being a leader that teaches your followers how to lead and then with the hopes that they can take over your position and advance themselves to the point where they want to.

Not everyone has to advance. But if they want to, giving them the tools and then understanding how to learn through teaching, I think is huge. And that's a great practice you can have at a single spot before you move into a higher level leadership role where you have the responsibility of building the experience for all of the teammates that you oversee.

Specifically, with the way that I approach the role that I have the opportunity to work is really trusting the teammates that are there. These are people who have lives and they're investing in this work so that they can go home and invest in their loved ones and their hobbies and all this kind of stuff. So there's a human element to everything we do because we work in people's homes.

So your work is never done. But with that, empowering the teammates in the skill sets they have to accentuate their strengths and then creating opportunities for them to build in the areas where they might not have as much experience. Always being open, always being understanding, leading with compassion, kindness and empathy, and then just staying true to your morals and values as you invest in people and as they invest back in you as you learn from them as well.

So I think it's consistently learning and trying to grow with everyone as they grow as well. James, how many direct reports do you have? I mean, technically, as an area maintenance manager, we don't approve time clocks or anything like that.

But when it comes to the maintenance supervisors who look to me for guidance as their leader with people moving on from positions here and there and changing around of portfolios between 30 and 40 at a given time. And then I do take the responsibility of sharing my contact information with everybody at the site level. So if property managers need leadership on the maintenance side, they can reach out to me and we can build plans for their teammates, them themselves, if they need to be enlightened down to if a porter wants to call me and get some advice, I'm here for everything.

That's the way I look at it. Direct reports, yeah, 30 to 40, depending on the unit count at that time and who we have in open positions and stuff. And I take a lot of pride in the teammates that I have.

There's a lot of talented people out here and I just love getting to learn with them every day.

[Adrian Danila] (19:27 - 19:34) What's the extent of your involvement with recruiting of new maintenance personnel?

[James Ohrn] (19:34 - 22:01) It depends. In our space, specific to Avenue 5 in our area, we have anything from 15 to 17 regionals on one side and they have six to eight buildings per portfolio for them. So it depends on how their ownership team likes to staff and things like that.

Avenue 5 also has a recruiting division that does full service. And a lot of times, if someone's getting pushed into a position, we'll be brought in for either a phone screen to give a blessing or an in-person interview at the site to walk with them to see if they would be a good fit, as needed. The biggest recruiting tool that I'm able to help facilitate is the recruitment of referrals from maintenance team members, knowing people who want to get into the industry because they see the lifestyle that the people have and what they've been able to build with it.

And usually they get sent to me directly. I can talk to them about what their vision is and try to build out a plan for them and then place them with a team that is able to build the experience that's going to hopefully get them to grow and stay in the industry. I think another piece of that, not just recruiting from a standpoint of staffing teammates, open positions and stuff like that.

I think a good thing that I keep in mind is we're not just recruiting new teammates. When you're out on site, when you're working, someone calls you and they have a problem and you're able to work through that solution with them. You're really helping recruit the people that you already have to stay with the company.

I think WUMPA, the Washington Multifamily Housing Association, serves 189 management companies just in Western Washington. There's competition out here. There's other companies that do great things with great people as well.

I'm an advocate for the team that I get to work with, but I can't say that we have everybody's number one position defined, but being able to recruit the teammates that we have and really let them know that I'm here to build them as well. Whether I can find a way to advance their skills to get into a position that they see a future with Avenue 5 or potentially building them up to be able to take on a greater role in a different industry or with a different company, but specific to that, investing in the people to recruit them to stay with us as we grow, I think is just as crucial as recruiting new teammates.

[Adrian Danila] (22:02 - 22:44) I want to stay a little bit on building gyms and talk about effective strategies to find talent. I'm starting with a statement. It's not based on numbers that I've seen, statistics, just personal observation.

I think within our lifetime, businesses in general will grow at a faster pace than the population grows. Therefore, there's always going to be a need for new employees, not just in multifamily maintenance, but everywhere. I think more so in multifamily maintenance.

It's been an area traditionally more challenged than any other industry in general, than the average industries. So what are some tactics that we could or we should deploy as an industry to attract more talent, in your opinion?

[James Ohrn] (22:44 - 25:07) I think this is a question that comes up regularly, especially in the maintenance space. We were at a recent national conference for our company, and we had a team get up and talk about statistics of turnover in apartment units being something between 50 and 60% of your apartment complex is going to turnover units per year. And I believe that that statistic is consistent with the turnover of maintenance teams as well.

You got to think 50 to 60% of your maintenance team, whether that's taxpayers and everybody is going to move on from your company to a different position or maybe move on to a different role within your company as you grow. Incentivizing people with an understanding of investment in training, investment in personal development, and aligning that with the means to be able to live the lifestyle that they're looking for. I think there's a real understanding that some of our entry level positions don't start at a pay that could necessarily allow them to live at the complex that they work at.

Growing that skill set, pinpointing personality traits that are customer service driven, but also intrinsically motivated to buy into the training factors and leadership values that you can instill in them. And then growing your team that way is really crucial for the future of the industry. I think the number one ask of our teammates is more training.

We've talked about it multiple times already on this podcast. How do we level up? Someone sees the next pay as the thing that's going to get them to be able to feed their kids better or something like that.

So whatever that motivation is, and then really investing in those people, creating those training opportunities, leading those teammates who are leading those teammates to invest in them as well. I think that's really what can grow our industry as a whole. I mean, we're skill specific on the maintenance side.

I was with recruiting the other day and our recruiting manager stated something along the lines of maintenance is skill based. So you have to have some general knowledge of buildings and working with your hands and tools and stuff like that where it's a little bit harder to train than leasing. And usually there's a little bit more investment on the sales side of things because that's where we make our money for the people that we're working for.

Really diving into that training and consistent leadership to know that people have someone who has their back.

[Adrian Danila] (25:07 - 25:13) You mentioned leadership earlier. I want to ask you, what's your philosophy on leadership? What's your take on leadership?

[James Ohrn] (25:13 - 26:05) I believe in transformative leadership, as I stated previously. If you're willing to listen to me, read the definition, I have it right here. Transformative leaders know how to encourage, inspire, motivate employees to perform in ways to create meaningful change.

And the result is engagement and empowerment to innovate and help shape organizations. So basically, transformative leadership is investing in people so that they can create the future that they want. And then the company can benefit from that as well.

Within that transformative leadership, I'm going to go back to the growth mindset, continuously being open, understanding each interaction is unique, truly investing in that person so that they can grow to where they want to be. You're there to facilitate the business, but the business doesn't run without the people. So if you invest in the people, everything else will come true after that.

[Adrian Danila] (26:05 - 26:17) I want to stay a little bit more on leadership and ask you, how did you get involved with the Cari Anderson Emerging Leader Mentor Program? And what has that experience been like for you?

[James Ohrn] (26:17 - 27:42) Yeah, it's a wonderful program that the Washington Multifamily Housing Association rolled out this year. I've been working with them on and off for the past seven years, hearkening back to how can you elevate, get out and put yourself out there and invest in the team and in the industry and the partners around. So the Washington Multifamily Housing Association and I have had a relationship for years doing different volunteer opportunities and things like that.

So when this came about, Trisha Johnson and Slode Sabana started pinpointing people that they thought would fit well into this cohort. They reached out to me and asked if I would apply. I applied and I was chosen for the opportunity to work with a wonderful person.

Her name is Christy Rolfe. She's been in maintenance longer than me. She might even know more than me.

I can almost guarantee it. She's got a great work ethic and she's a great person. She allows me the opportunity to learn and grow with her.

It's been wonderful seeing progressions and kind of taking what I would usually do with the teammates that I have and being able to spread that to other industry partners. She works for Thrive Communities, but I have a saying that we're one industry. So if we all grow together, we all get better together.

It's been great seeing her perspective, seeing her tools, being able to learn from her and kind of put her on some of the game that has helped me advance and then kind of plan out a vision for her future as she wants to grow in this space as well.

[Adrian Danila] (27:46 - 28:00) Most prop tech companies are built this way. We're hiring people that could write code. We're hiring people that are selling the product.

But the end user is nowhere in this picture. How is Appwork different than the scenario just described?

[Sean Landsberg] (28:00 - 28:32) Well, we're fundamentally different because we are the end users ourselves. We meaning myself. I am an end user of the product.

I use the product myself on a daily basis. But something that we're a little bit different that I always like to look at us as we're almost like a community of people, us, Appwork and all of our clients, where we leverage everybody's feedback, collective feedback to help make Appwork the incredible product that it already is and to help continue improving it. So we're constantly innovating and all of our innovation, all of our pipeline really comes from the feedback and the ideas that our clients are giving us.

[Adrian Danila] (28:33 - 28:44) James, how do you see technology and innovation changing the landscape of multifamily maintenance? Are there any trends or tools that we should be aware of as maintenance professionals?

[James Ohrn] (28:44 - 29:51) I think the trend right now is streamlining efficiency. Avenue 5 is jumping on the happy property bandwagon. We're centralizing all of our maintenance stuff to one app that helps communicate across the team, which allows for synergy and then efficiency from there.

Coupling that with some other technology space where, you know, maybe some lower end service requests or emergency maintenance requests are taken on by a virtual assistant, whether that be AI. In the future, as of right now, there's some different technologies out there where you have remote technicians who are able to offer residents a solution by walking them through the fix themselves in real time. I think that could be the future to help decrease the on-call load, which is I think everyone's least favorite part of the industry and help build a better work-life balance that way.

But yeah, centralizing through a single app for communication and efficiency and then potentially some virtual teammates helping navigate some of the smaller things.

[Adrian Danila] (29:52 - 30:19) You mentioned streamlining the processes and centralizing them to be, I guess, managed from a single app. I want to stream centralization a little bit more. And I want to hear your take on centralization, maintenance centralization in general, besides just centralizing the technology part, streamlining that.

Is that a possibility? Is this centralization really possible in maintenance at an institutional level? Or is it just a buzzword or is somewhere in between?

I think that's where we're going.

[James Ohrn] (30:19 - 31:48) I think that's what we're pushing for. Labor costs are the highest costs for all investors in this industry. And trying to find a way to decrease labor costs so that we can increase profit margins is really, really the vision.

And with that, centralizing all work through one place and then being able to divide it out between teammates seems to be the future. I believe it could be easier in a space or, I guess, easier to implement in a space where you are in an owner-managed company because you're able to blanket that new process across all of your buildings. In a third-party space, we're trying to do that, working with multiple different clients and getting them to buy into the centralization.

I think the future with things like Happy Property or Leonardo and all those is as we centralize that communication, we streamline the scheduling of things, are we able to reduce the cost at the leadership level and maybe have a strong supervisor over a pod of a portfolio and then have specific techs or supplier partnerships that you're able to lean on that are then directly scheduled out through the app and streamlining that to create that efficiency. I think that could be the vision for keeping costs lower and really leaning into the technology to make sure that efficiencies keep moving forward.

[Adrian Danila] (31:48 - 31:56) Looking ahead, where do you see the biggest challenges and also opportunities for us as an industry in the upcoming years?

[James Ohrn] (31:56 - 33:04) I go back to the interview I had for Emerald Awards finalists last year, and I was able to connect with an interviewer from the East Coast and we talked about the future of technology in the business. I asked him a similar question. He stated something that keeps on coming up, which is a lack of skilled tradespeople within the maintenance world.

We have plenty of people outside suppliers, electricians, plumbers, painters, all that kind of stuff. There's a realization that you could probably make more money by going independent and then becoming a supplier. So I think making sure that we are creating the opportunities and training people up within the maintenance field to grow here and giving them the skills and finding people with the work ethic who want to do the actual labor part and then grow from there.

The technology is great, but if we don't have the people on the ground to do the work, then there's a gap. So I think our biggest opportunity is pinpointing people who really want to invest in this industry and grow their knowledge base and their skills and put effort and then continue that process with the people that they build below them as well.

[Adrian Danila] (33:04 - 33:14) James, the journey to the top could feel lonely at times. Is that a feeling you had while you were advancing in your career? And how do you overcome that feeling of loneliness?

[James Ohrn] (33:15 - 36:39) I think everybody's journey is specific to them. And you have to be okay with understanding that it's you versus you and continually trying to grow that way. It can feel a little lonely when you put in all that work and maybe you don't get the job that you wanted or something like that.

Staying focused on the task at hand, staying in the present and understanding your impact. I think that's crucial to finding any feelings of loneliness. I think back to my first week as a tech.

I came in kind of just looking at it as a job and not understanding the true scope of the work. Third day working, I get the on-call pager. And at 1130 at night, I get a call from a first floor apartment where all three bedrooms are flooded.

I had never talked to a carpet supplier or a remediation company before. I didn't really have time to learn the toolbox that I needed to dive into to take care of that. I called my supervisor who was a great dude, a great mentor.

And I asked him, what do we do? He goes, well, you're going to take care of it and then we'll deal with it in the morning. You have to be okay with investing in yourself and understanding, hey, it's on me to get this done.

Do you feel a little lonely when you're the one who's running it? You can take pride in the fact that you've invested in it and you're able to conquer those challenges within you, navigate this controlled chaos and then come out on the other side. And then as you develop, you create relationships and you can really lean on those relationships to help build yourself up.

That's why I think the team that I get to work with, having monthly calls where we're able to create open lines of communication to support each other with all the supervisors that are talented people that I get to work with, leaning on those relationships help decrease some of that loneliness. Everywhere I go, teammates want to be supported and they want to be celebrated. A lot of times you end up at a single property and you feel siloed.

We'll do these company picnics and stuff like that. And I end up knowing everybody because I'm everywhere and I pop around a bunch. But then I realized if you're not creating these connections between teammates, if they go to a company outing, they might have a property next to each other, but they've never met each other.

So facilitating that and taking that leadership role and then understanding where I've kind of felt on my own at some point and realizing that I have the opportunity to kind of create a space that allows for other people to not feel so lonely is something that I take pride in and I've had to lean into as we grow ourselves. Obviously, individual investment in the self is the way to success. Then creating those relationships that can help build you up as well.

I mean, it's a relationship business, whether that's your teammates, the residents you get to work with, the company as a whole, the industry and the surrounding people. So you're never alone, although the only person who's with you to the end is the person in the mirror. And you have to invest in that, but you can invest in the relationships around you too so that you don't feel...

Because you're never alone in it. We get on these calls with the maintenance supervisors and everybody has a story about something that has happened recently that none of us and other properties really want to deal with, even though we have our own problems and stuff like that. Finding that common thread where we're all fighting this fight together, maybe it might look a little different over here or there, but we got each other's back.

I think that's a meaningful way to fight that loneliness.

[Adrian Danila] (36:40 - 36:52) I want to ask you about the people that had the most impact over you in your life in general and in your career. Could you name your top people or it could be one person that ranks top on both categories?

[James Ohrn] (36:52 - 38:34) Personal life, it's definitely my siblings. So my little sister was my best friend. We grew a lot together throughout the years.

And then my older brother is someone to look up to, who's very successful and navigates life in the right way and is willing to always help people. So I think those 2 people really helped me have a foundation of support so that I could grow myself. In the industry, I couldn't be where I am today without the help of Natasha and Mira.

She was ascending and I jumped on her coattails and was able to ride that wave as Avenue 5 with that relationship. I think Alex Watts and his brother, Ben, have been paramount in advancing, seeing the way to do things, even if we don't interact that much or anything like that, just watching them and learning their mode and understanding what makes them successful. Aydin Edraki is a wonderful person who I look up to.

He's a counterpart of mine as an area maintenance manager. Kevin Hansen, another area maintenance manager who I've seen go from renovation tech to assistant to supervisor. And now he's a teammate of mine at the corporate level and being able to learn from his progressions and see the things that he's great at and try and add those to my game.

I think if you're willing to learn, if you're open to experiences, anybody can be a mentor in some capacity. There's always something to be seen and always more game to be put on if you're open to I think the biggest thing for me were my siblings and then some of the key players in the industry up here who gave me space to grow and then believed in me to build me up on the opportunities presented themselves.

[Adrian Danila] (38:34 - 38:46) James, we're only around for a limited period of time. Some will argue for a short period of time. So I'm thinking a lot lately about legacy.

What would you like your legacy to be? How would you like to be remembered?

[James Ohrn] (38:47 - 39:54) You don't really remember what people say. You remember how they make you feel. And that's something it takes a lot of investment in trying to create a positive impact with every individual interaction that you have.

That's something that is paramount to who I am as a person. That's what drives me to keep going. Investing in every interaction and trying to leave that interaction better myself as a person, but hopefully giving some hope to that person or leaving them with some positivity and hoping that becomes contagious.

That's in my LinkedIn profile. Positivity is contagious and I believe it. And I think it starts with really individualizing your interactions to understand who you're working with and see them as the individual being they are and then giving them your best understanding of how to support them moving forward.

My legacy, if there is one, will come from the pieces of hopefully love and compassion and kindness that I give to people and hopefully they bring that to the world themselves. And then hopefully it multiplies from there. That's the way that I look at it.

[Adrian Danila] (39:54 - 40:03) James, as we are approaching the end of this amazing conversation, what are some final thoughts that you want to share with me and with the audience?

[James Ohrn] (40:03 - 41:06) I think overall, life is what you make it. I go through life trying to be the best I can be so that I can help support the people around me. And I think if more people invested in that and made that something that was a cornerstone to how they approach life, it could make everything better for everybody in some capacity.

I believe your mentality shapes your reality. What you wake up and think and the patterns of thinking that you consistently go through will show in your life. Understanding that effort takes no skill.

And if you want to get somewhere and you believe in yourself and you invest in that, you can build that. It might not be today. It might not be tomorrow.

You got to stay humble or be humbled sometimes. But with that, it's endless opportunity to grow that growth mindset and just in staying consistent, disciplined, knowing yourself and investing in that and then the people around you. I think everything will be better as a whole, as one earth, if everybody did that for themselves.

[Adrian Danila] (41:06 - 41:27) James, thank you so much for being here with us today, for taking the time out of your busy schedule. Thank you very much for watching us today, for listening to us on the podcast platforms. I'm Adrian Daniela, your host.

I want to thank our sponsors from Kairos and Appwork for making this podcast possible. We hope to see you back here soon. Have an amazing day.

Thank you.