Graeme M. Keith
Graeme M. Keith III: Carrying a Legacy Forward with Innovation
The Keith Corporation (TKC) is a full-service commercial real estate firm, serving clients in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Australia, and the United Kingdom. It was founded by Graeme Keith Sr. and Graeme “Greg” Keith Jr. in 1989. Today, Graeme M. Keith III leads several divisions of the company and is also a part of the Executive Leadership team. TKC’s mission is to deliver the highest level of quality, service, commitment, and excellence to its clients. The firm’s vast client portfolio includes multinational Fortune 500 corporations, top-rated hospitals, Department of Defense contractors, industrial giants, and high-growth startups. The firm is a progressive commercial real estate firm and credits employees for its success as it remains focused on the future.
Staying Relevant through 3 decades
Graeme M. Keith III believes that the longevity of TKC is attributable to adaptation, but also to the firm’s family-oriented culture. They have many employees who have been with them for over 25 years and the median length of employment is 10+ years. Graeme feels extremely fortunate to have, and is very intentional about maintaining, such an incredibly tight-knit and family-oriented culture. That culture leads to fierce loyalty and long-term personal and professional relationships and fulfillment. This also results in a natural progression to mentorship opportunities where the newer employees build relationships with some of the more seasoned employees which ends up creating a powerful cycle and stronger bond. “We believe our people are our single greatest asset and there would be no success without them, so we try to invest heavily in them and create an environment where they are fulfilled personally and professionally,” says Graeme.
Further, he says, regardless of the industry and the company culture, to stay relevant and thrive, you must adapt. There are plenty of companies that had great cultures that ultimately ended up becoming extinct because they didn’t adapt. We are constantly trying to “skate where the puck is going, not where it is” which leads to a lot of lively and creative discussions internally. The simplest example of this is that TKC originally started as a single-tenant, net lease build-to-suit developer focused on the Industrial sector. Soon thereafter, they had opportunities for expansion into retail followed by office, healthcare and, most recently, airplane hangars.
“While we are always trying to grow and evolve, one of the non-negotiables is always providing excellent customer service to our clients. In order to provide that level of service, we are always trying to stay on the cutting edge of optimization technology, as well as industry best practices. Our key stakeholders not only assess the competitive landscape and see where we are deficient compared to our competitors, but those stakeholders also double down on where we set the standard,” says Graeme.
A Leader par Excellence
Graeme M. Keith, III graduated from The McCallie School, Wake Forest University and Charleston School of Law and is a licensed attorney in South Carolina. In his 11 years at The Keith Corporation, he has completed well over $500 million in deals. He has started and runs several other companies, including MedChat, LLC, and Flux Capital, LLC and he has a stealth start-up that is democratizing access to the financial sector, helping consumers to be more well-informed. Health and Wellness have always been very important to Graeme and he has competed in several half and full IRONMAN triathlons, XTERRA World Championships and won countless mud runs and adventure races across the United States.
All of the companies Graeme is involved in have a very similar philosophy: he tries to be the weakest link on the team. He explains, “If I am the weakest link, I feel like we’re going to have a very competitive team. I learned this when I was competing in mud runs and adventure races across the country and the same philosophy goes for business as well… This is a Biblical philosophy. In Proverbs 27:17 it says: ‘As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.’ If you want to be faster, train with faster athletes. If you want to be smarter, spend time with smarter people. If you want to be more successful, surround yourself with people who are more successful than yourself.”
Graeme always tries to surround himself with the best: At The Keith Corp., he works alongside an incredible team of dealmakers, project managers, accountants, administrative professionals, etc. At MedChat, he works with an amazing team of developers and engineers, as well as very talented sales, implementation, and customer success teams. This is the same at the other companies he’s involved in. The common theme at all of these organizations is that he tries to ensure he is one of the weakest members of the team.
“One of the greatest misconceptions about leadership is that it’s the Leader who drives the results, but in my opinion, it’s the exact opposite. The Leader may chart the course, but it’s the team who is most responsible for the outcomes. As a Leader, I simply try to find the most talented people and put them in positions where they can succeed,” says Graeme.
Exceeding Client Expectations
What TKC does is not super-unique, but how they do it is a hyper-focused commitment to customer service. Everything they do is client-driven; they always aim to provide the highest level of service and quality to their clients in a straightforward manner. Tthere have been a lot of changes over the last 33 years, but TKC’s commitment to its clients has not changed and will not change as long as there is a Keith at the helm.
Client service looks different for every client: some want weekly updates and status reports, and others just want the keys when the building is finished. The team at TKC first tries to understand the most important items for its customers and then tailors its program around those hot button items. Those can range from cost-conscious value engineering exercises to aesthetics-driven design to ensuring flat floors for automation technology or building controls and security.
In addition to tailoring its program to clients, Graeme and his team always try to under-promise and over-deliver by completing the projects on time and at, or under, budget. “If we do not feel like we can do a project in a first-class manner, we will let our clients know. It does not happen often, but we have passed on a handful of projects because we did not feel like we were positioned to perform at the level our clients expect from us,” shares Graeme.
Aside from the customer service piece, TKC also leverages a plethora of different software programs to add value to its clients’ processes. These range from mapping programs to demographics subscriptions to utilizing geofencing technologies to help understand and predict consumer behaviors that are relevant to our clients.
As a result of its culture, Graeme feels that TKC is fortunate to have many employees who have been with the firm for decades. This makes continuity of service much easier and builds a predictable and scalable business for their clients. “A huge part of our success and relevance is the team that we have. We believe in hiring the best, most qualified people, giving them the tools they need to be successful, providing a great working environment, and giving them the autonomy to perform their job without micromanagement,” asserts Graeme.
Advice for young and aspiring entrepreneurs:
Graeme advises them saying:
1) Keep your head down and focus on your end goal. Despite what you may see on social media, there are no shortcuts to success, and
2) Thomas Paine said: “Character, unlike money, is much easier kept than recovered.” Your reputation and character should never be put on the line. An easy way to determine this in a bright-line test is to think about someone you admire and look up to. Then think of the behavior in question to accomplish the goal you’re seeking to accomplish – would you be proud or ashamed if the person you admire found out about how you acted to accomplish that goal? Your character and reputation are precious and no amount of success is worth risking them.
Assessing the Future
From a personal standpoint, Graeme has a long list of goals he would like to achieve. They run the gamut from hiking the entire Appalachian Trail to seeing Mavericks or Jaws (big wave surfing spots) from the water to driving 200mph in a car and making someone’s lifelong dream come true. He would like to start ticking off some more of those goals over the next few years.
From a professional standpoint, he loves innovating and creating and believes there will be a handful of new and exciting companies over the coming years. He thinks the web3 movement has the potential of being the most disruptive movement since the creation of the internet and hopes to be involved in that space in a meaningful way. He also believes the blockchain and web3 movements have the potential to play a huge role in the future of commercial real estate. At TKC, he has created a digital leadership task force to evaluate what we think that might look like in the future and consider how it could bring value to their clients as well as their internal shareholders.
While he does not have any immediate plans to enter into any new sectors, the entrepreneurial nature of his company means he is always evaluating new opportunities and business lines. “I believe the largest gaps in our service offerings are currently in the multi-family residential and storage sectors. I do not expect us to make a move into either of those sectors this cycle, but believe there are opportunities there that could make sense for us down the road,” concludes Graeme.
Walter Sciacca
A Serial Entrepreneur and Unrivaled Leader
Evolution is critical to growth and survival. Adapting itself to changing times and tides is crucial, whether for a creature, species, society, or business. Those who refuse to change, become obsolete and eventually extinct.
Without letting go of their original, unique idea, services, or products, businesses must find ways to incorporate the demands of the current trends, technology, and customer requirement. Today, we present the story of a leader, who has always tried to have an inspired vision when it comes to creating business trends instead of following them. This has eventually led him to create innovative development and business models. He is, Walter Sciacca. A brand, a reference point, and an unrivaled leader.
From the Beginning
At the age of 25, Walter founded his first company for the organization of circuit events, computerizing all the organizational steps and therefore being the first company in the world to use such a system. He changed the way in which events are organized and managed. Everything was born from a passion for motorsport and IT, to which organization and management were added. The aim was to innovate and create new trends without following existing ones.
As with other well-known companies in the world, everything started in a garage, inside a small racetrack in the south of Italy, where Walter transformed the garage into an office. His business grew exponentially and achieved a six-figure turnover in its second year. Over the years, he has organized over 1500 events in several racetracks in Italy, in other European countries, and even in other continents, winning over the most important brands of Automotive and Motorsport for the organization of their events.
A well-calculated shift
Walter didn’t want to keep himself limited to the events. So he decided to shift his field of action to management consulting. This was the time when some international racetracks called him directly for a consultant role, initially for the organization of their events and then as a consultant. He was entrusted with implementing ideas to improve racetrack management, setting up a new business model to increase their turnover, profits, the quality of their events and competitions, and thus their national and international prestige.
One of these many consultancies turned into an important role, as he was nominated CEO and Managing Director of the Imola Circuit – Enzo and Dino Ferrari, one of the world’s most important and historical racetracks. His mission here was “time-based”. He was entrusted with the difficult task of boosting the fortunes of a historical racetrack that was heading towards financial decline. He became the creator of the facility’s sporting and economic revival, managing to triple, in his first year of management, the turnover and laying the foundations for the return of the Formula 1 World Championship, an event which then materialized in 2020, after a 14-year absence.
In just two years, Walter achieved all the objectives he was given, and then left the role a year ahead of his mandate, to work on the countless consultancy requests that he had received in the meantime. He subsequently worked in managerial consultancy and the creation of new racetracks or the improvement in how existing ones are managed. In 2020 he founded his eighth and current company, Sciacca International Projects, based in Milan.
The clients of Sciacca International Projects are governments, worldwide investment funds, multinational construction companies, project developers with high economic and technological impact, as well as individual industries and entrepreneurs who, alone or as a group, want to finance and carry out private or commercial projects.
What makes Sciacca Different?
In one word: energy. The energy to transform. The energy to create something new and exciting. Sciacca believes that “traditional” racetracks must change their business models, and they must carry out a real change in direction for the future, over the next 10/20 years. Walter himself developed a paradigm change that allows the concept of a racetrack to change, a structure that increasingly meets the needs of an elite audience, with the solution to obtain benefits in terms of profitability where there are loss-making balance sheets. The sports facility, in this newly developed model, takes on the importance of a business opportunity, with a particular emphasis on efficiency.
Hence the transformation of a sports facility – racetrack – to a real estate operation. A radical change in planning is needed to be able to sustain operations with positive outcomes.
There are two types of projects that Sciacca Projects will present directly to clients: the first is aimed at an elite client: luxury villas that will have a private racetrack, as well as other activities and services.
The second is aimed at a wider audience: a traditional racetrack, and therefore able to host national and international events, but only in appearance, as they are designed to host a whole range of activities that have never been held in a “racetrack” before.
Then they are working on a project that concerns a completely innovative Automotive Mall; a project to build the world’s first completely covered racetrack. They are also working on a project to build the world’s biggest virtual reality and simulators park.
Dealing with Predicament
As a leader, Walter comes across situations every other day when he needs to take tough calls. There also are moments when decisions aren’t as simple as they seem with emotions overriding rational choices. On dealing with such situations, Walter feels whatever condition leads to an altered emotional state, it’s important to know that those who manage to defuse their emotions ‘win’. Experience alone isn’t enough to defuse your emotions, but specific training courses that help you to learn how to manage your own emotions in the most extreme situations also help. “I’ve had the privilege of participating in training courses with the most well-known professionals in applied psychology regarding problem-solving, negotiation, persuasion, knowing how to manage mental traps, active listening, strategic communication, and so on. You need a lot of commitment and continuous learning because in life you either learn or you stop,” shares Walter.
He also feels that most leaders tend to take too much pressure on themselves and find it hard to delegate important or even everyday decisions. On a personal note, he finds micromanagement too restrictive and detrimental to the business and prefers efficient management. His style is horizontal, not vertical or pyramid management, and likes to inform everybody of the business plans. He likes to encourage and reward when the circumstances require so.
“I’ve always said: “if things go well it’s everyone’s merit, but if things go badly, it’s all my fault! It doesn’t matter who’s made the mistake, it’ll be my fault.”
In general, forms of communication are fundamental on all levels, you have to be able to create authentic relationships with true interests, you need to be empathetic, you have to be able to understand others as psychological aspects are important,” says Walter.
He feels leaders should be more empathetic. They have to look at things from different angles and ask themselves what they would do if they were in the other person’s shoes. They need to give people who haven’t got experience a chance and help them to grow professionally with the awareness that they’re working and can make errors, and therefore leaders have to be ready to resolve possible errors, making those who make them see them as a lesson in what not to do, and explaining how to do it better. It isn’t a punishment, but instructions for the future.
Leaders have to indicate the objectives and ask the employees how they intend to reach them, without imposing their way of working straight away. “Sometimes you’ll be surprised and you’ll discover that this objective can be reached in different ways, some of them quicker and cheaper than others, so always listen without interrupting,” shares Walter.
He continues, “Then ask for advice and decide whether to give guidelines or let them do it by themselves. The new recruits that I put in the teams are those who must freely express their ideas, so I like to delegate and I do it continuously. You have to trust young people and at the same time, those who already have years of experience, without creating competition but rather constructive challenges.”
So what other qualities make a Leader?
Being able to listen to understand and not just to hear;
Being able to communicate efficiently and empathetically; and
Being able to defuse emotions in tense situations in order to manage relationships empathetically and with emotional intelligence.
The above are the first three that come to Walter’s mind, but obviously, there are many others: empathy, being able to resolve conflicts, knowing how to inspire, knowing how to motivate, being able to put yourself in other people’s shoes, knowing how to look at things from different angles, driving your own team without giving off the impression that you’re commanding them, just driving them, flexibly managing time, modesty, curiosity, the drive to learn and improve, passion, resilience, perseverance, recognizing merits, delegating, encouraging, motivating and being a “psychologist”. This is because one mustn’t think that others will do what they, the entrepreneurs or managers, are willing to do. Emotional intelligence and empathy are fundamental for one’s own team and with clients. “You need to do a bit of soul searching, and when needed, make difficult decisions and have the strength and determination to continue defusing emotions and activating rationality, but always with tact and respect. Raising your voice doesn’t work, punishing errors is another error. Naturally, a good leader must have a vision, he must see where others can’t see yet, and take the whole team with them without leaving anyone behind,” explains Walter.
Rewarding Moments
Hundreds of press articles around the world have been dedicated to Walter, as well as acknowledgments and prizes. The one he cherishes the most was in 2012, the same year his daughter Vittoria was born. “In October that year, I was awarded an honorary degree in Economics and Commerce with a Ph.D. It was a great surprise for me, but throughout my life, I’ve never paid attention to prizes or acknowledgments because, for me, the best one of all is the satisfaction of our clients, as the success of our business is down to them,” reminisces Walter.
As for the young entrepreneurs who look up to leaders like him, Walter feels that while it’s good to have passion when they start, it mustn’t blind them. Passion must be balanced with rationality and analysis because so many professionals have gone bankrupt following their passion.
He shares that it’s important to continue learning and one has to travel a lot to see for themselves how others are developing. While one shouldn’t blatantly copy others, one must take hints on how to do things differently and better. “It’s important to never stop updating your knowledge, participating in training courses, conferences, and how useful it can be for continued growth because you never stop learning. You must be resourceful but humble at the same time. Above all, never give up, you need to try and try again until you achieve your desired goal. Don’t be scared to make mistakes and learn from them. In conclusion, I’d recommend being patient and proactive at the same time” advises Walter.
Living with the New Normal
The pandemic has impacted every sector bringing about either sudden change or a fast-pacing ongoing change process. When asked how has it impacted his company and its growth plans, Walter says, “The dreams I had in my drawer I’ve realised them all, now I’m working on the ones I have in the wardrobe and then there are the dreams I have inside the warehouse and it’s a very, very big warehouse.”
He believes that the future lies in the fragmentation and sectorisation of the target audience, in a market where the ability to evolve is the key to success. The recipe for success calls for a fundamental and not at all expected ingredient. It’s the vision, the ability to “see” in advance the evolution of the market in which you work, and to achieve it, you have to be real “visionaries”, able to keep project ideas in your ‘warehouse of dreams’, thought up even 5 or 10 years earlier and destined to become reality in the coming years, where the only limit is to have no limits.
The Covid-19 pandemic hasn’t created problems for Sciacca, regarding its future objectives and projects. It’s certainly accelerated some processes, especially in the IT sector which has already reached incredible levels of development. The IT sector has always been a strong point of the businesses Walter has established and Sciacca was already way ahead of the competition. This advantage has proven to be successful because, with minimal effort, they obtained the maximum result. They are able to bring the clients’ projects to life through virtual reality and augmented reality. This is a huge advantage as they can see the project as if it already existed and appreciate its qualities in a “real but virtual” way. “My company has developed projects that won’t be revealed for another 3 or 5 years, and others will be carried out within the next 10 years. These projects satisfy investors and their clients for a long time and in the meantime, I’m already thinking about the next decade, because as I’ve said before, being able to evolve is the key to success but only if you can look towards the future,” concludes Walter Sciacca.
