David Litwak:
Go Hello everyone. Welcome to mosey on focus wires how I got here podcast, our weekly focus on innovators in travel and transportation. Today we’re here with Tobias ragga, who is a managing director of hrs. hrs stands for hotel reservation service and was founded in 1972 by Robert ragga, his father in Cologne as a travel agency for the placement of rooms during trade fairs. In 2008, his son, Tobias took over the family business after serving several years as an executive assistant, a head of marketing, and became CEO in 2008. Since he took over, he’s transformed hrs into a global company and expanded its business services. So thanks for joining us take device.
Tobias Ragge:
Thank you very much, David, for having me.
David Litwak:
So we’d like to start every one of these off the same way, which is to ask you how you got here.
Tobias Ragge:
So how I got here is, as you’re rightfully pointed out, the company was founded nearly 50 years ago by my father. So him being also diehard enterpreneurs, you can imagine as a little boy, you know, we had the company sitting at the breakfast table. So I early on got a glimpse of what you know entrepreneurialism is about and what his business is about. And I think my first student jobs, were actually working in the call center of his company doing hotel reservations, when I was like 15. So I got involved in the business, went to get my MBA, work outside of the industry and even work then within the industry for Lufthansa at some point before at some point. You know, it was actually my mom asked me if I wouldn’t be interested in joining the company. And so I think I had a five minute conversation with my dad about joining. So it went like this. So I heard you’re interested in joining. I’m like, Yes, maybe he’s like, okay, when can you start? I’m like, okay, maybe tomorrow, it’s like, Okay, what do you want to earn, gave him a number instead, okay, deal down and get started. So, you know, looking back now it looks like our takeover process was working. Super designed. And it worked out perfectly well, which usually isn’t the case, I think when you hand over the business from first to second generation, founder. But I think the fact that we haven’t prepared for it, and we had to travel to Rome, our way was actually the the secret to success. So I basically was in the company, I would say four years running different areas of responsibility, picking up basically every project, which I thought was important or nobody would seem to drive. And at some point, yeah, I took over the business and created out of what hrs was back then, which was, you know, starting as a brick and mortar business then became a basically the first otaa in 1995 was then later on from myself pivoted into certain different levels of activity. There’s one side of our business which is otaa related, where we also did some m&a, and still today are in Europe, the third biggest otaa we basically branched out from there into the enterprise space, where we build a complete end to end corporate lodging platform, which covers all the aspects from procurement to booking to payment and expense management. And we work today probably with 35% of the Fortune 500 and are the biggest player in this space. And the third line of business was about building tech solutions for the rental vacation markets. And this was created into the market leader for the German speaking markets, a business which you can imagine right now is doing tremendously well. Whereas, you know, the business travel is struggling, but that is it is a good diverse balance of what the group hrs today is all about. And we have presence in now I think 35 different markets globally. And colleagues basically working on all five continents around the world.
Kevin May:
Thanks, Tobias, sir, for joining us. It’s Kev here, sir. Good to see you again. Now we’ve we’ve met and chatted a couple of times over the years, and it’s this backstory that I’ve always found pretty interesting. I mean, can you tell us Do you have any brothers and sisters?
Tobias Ragge:
Yes, I do. I do have one brother, one sister and two brothers.
Kevin May:
So was there any I guess sibling rivalry for joining the company or was it always did you sent your path?
Tobias Ragge:
Ah, no, I was the oldest so I think I was more challenged than then my brother’s distance in this regard. And you have to see also me my sister. We are One and a half years apart, and then my two little brothers, they’re seven, eight years apart. And since my dad was quite quite old, so when when he got us so he was 37 when I was born, you know, also at some point, I think his age that made it difficult for the younger ones to basically take proper the seat that I was taking. And the second component is also, you know, desire to be all in I would say, because, as you can imagine, when you take over founders legacy, a person who is also a strong personality, then you can only do it if you also committing yourself 110% of that venture. And I think that’s something that not everybody was sharing as a as an interest.
Kevin May:
It’s interesting, the words, you said there were a founders legacy. Now, not only is it a founders legacy, it’s also your dad. Yeah. So that’s kind of, it’s almost like double pressure, or did or did you not see it as something that was a challenge more of an opportunity?
Tobias Ragge:
Now, I think it’s good to ask this, because usually you you tend to think that somebody is doing it, because he feels he has the responsibility to do it. And it’s been talked into it. So my father’s family was also intrapreneurs, before and he didn’t want to take over his father’s company. And that’s when his father, I think, kicked him out when he was 18. So he was myself growing up, and I think this experience, turned him into saying, I will never ever force anything on my kids, they are completely free to do whatever they want to do. So it was he never tried to force a conversation. It was really my desire, because I saw huge potential in the business, I found it an interesting business. And I saw just much more opportunity coming, then I said, Hey, you know, if there’s an opportunity in something that’s already good, but you could maybe make it better and greater, that Why not? Why not exploit that opportunity?
Kevin May:
And just just the last one for me for a second? I know you said it was often the you know, the subject around the breakfast table did? Did you through those overhearing of conversations, did you have a pretty good understanding of what the travel business is? Before you joined all? Or was it and I suppose the follow up then is what what is your kind of earliest age that you kind of knew? How it all kind of works? Was it just from overhearing or did you ask were you genuinely interested as a teenager?
Tobias Ragge:
Yeah, I think it was interested because you know, when your dad works a lot, and he’s not, you know, part of the usual socializing that maybe other parents are asking yourself, why is that the case? Right? And you’re trying to figure out, Okay, what is the guy actually doing? And so, I was always interested to, to understand it. And then I think it started really with me when I was, I think, 14 or 15, I think 15 I started working jobbing in the in the call center that to just make some pocket money. And that is when I understood what what is it that we really do. How does the customer journey look like? What are they looking for the customers, why they are basically collaborating or working with the service. My father built it. And that’s when I really got engaged into it to to get my head around it. But I would say Kevin’s probably wasn’t before I really finished my studies that I really got commercially interested in in, you know, how that business be optimized and be turned into something in the future. Yeah.
David Litwak:
Yeah. So Tobias, thanks for joining us today. I like to delve a little bit back more into your family dynamics here. And I apologize. Before we got back onto the business here. You know, there’s a there’s a saying, you know, about how the first generation builds and the second generation expands. And the third generation is, you know, spends or something like that. And I don’t, I’m paraphrasing here, and that, you know, family dynamics among, you know, I kind of family businesses can be delicate. And I’m curious if like, how did you set your dad didn’t pressure you, which I think sounds wonderful. How did he, you know, like, I think, how did he instill culture in you in, like, some of the clues I saw was you started as an executive assistant. All right, and he didn’t just name You see? How did he instill a culture in you to make sure that kind of what made hrs special from the beginning wasn’t lost.
Tobias Ragge:
So I think, you know, the expression we have in Germany is second generation maintains and the third blows it.
David Litwak:
So my attitude, okay.
Tobias Ragge:
Thank you for having the opportunity for me to expand it. But no, but, David, to come back to your to your real question. I think by working with my father, you know, I realized Okay has two personalities. He has a family father personality, which I knew before. And being a son and he has a business personality, which I didn’t know before, before I joined him so and, you know, when you work together, you obviously discuss a lot about the business about also people, leadership, I mean, all of these things, right. And, and nonetheless, at the end of the day, my dad was a was a classical self made man more 1937. Yeah. Tough guy, I would call it Yeah. So, you know, he wouldn’t think about mission statements. So what’s the personality corporate values, you would never create any scorecards for this? I mean, you know, if it was him, he was authentic and his personality, and you could basically see it, observe things and say, okay, that’s what I think is good. And that’s what I maybe would do differently. Because, you know, in terms of our leadership, style, I think we’re very different personalities. Because when I started, I was a young kid, basically, having had no experience in the business world, right. The only thing I had was a, you know, my capability to work with numbers and and be analytical. And everything I learned before, and he was this gut enterpreneur. So right, so you have a completely different way of dealing with things. But when you are 28, or 25, you’d have no guts, right? There’s nothing you can call your gut because you don’t have experience. So and I think this is how I I always keep saying I was tremendously blessed to work as along with him. Because I learned in a few years, probably 35 years of his experience of the industry, how are players behaving? How’s the industry working? Because things come back in a cyclical way, I think over the years, even if tack and things change. And that was tremendously valuable for me. You know, leadership, I personally think, David, this is something which needs to be authentic, and also in the context of you and your social upbringing, and also the time, right, and everybody knows this. I mean, our parents are 20 3040 years older, different social contexts, right? And where we sometimes think, Oh, my God, this is so outdated in their generation that was was the way things were working. So I think you need to somehow figure out the things you think they are very valuable, make a lot of sense. And then just it for with your own way of being an authentic leader.
David Litwak:
So a quick follow up question on that, then before we move on to kind of more business model stuff is, do you have a mission statement and values these days? And kind of, you know, specifically, what were those things that you you kept from the old guard? And what did you install? That was new?
Tobias Ragge:
Yeah, I mean, sure, we have all of these things today. And why I mean, also, just to put it in context, I mean, back then, hrs was a German, purely German company working in Cologne, one office location, I joined hundred 20 people back then, all in one building, you know, constantly exchanging with each other, much easier for people to realize every day, what was the culture, right, and my mentor, the management stuff, but that was management by walking around. Okay. Now 35 countries A few years later, with probably 4050 nations very hard to, you know, to get things together, if you’re not trying to build some kind of a formal, more structural, I would say more modern engineer process for this. But the value is to come back entrepreneurialism from day one still is today, okay, I’m always encouraging everybody take decisions, but also be accountable for what you what you what you do. Second, for us, I think being a pioneer has been from day one part of the DNA of this company, always going and taking risks, going against the the current if you want swim against the current and trying to do things others are not doing because then there is an opportunity. And it doesn’t matter if it’s in terms of business models, if it’s in terms of markets, if it’s in terms of adopting technology, that’s very strong. And I think what has changed over the years, as an additional element of company value, if you want is what we call today global united. So the capability or the I would say the attractiveness of the company today is it has so many different cultural backgrounds in different markets, which I think make it just a better organization to work in and and also enriches all of us I personally think because I’m a big believer of, you know, diversity if you want in order if you’re really in a business, which is global.
David Litwak:
Very cool. Um, so you mentioned something about taking risk with, you know, technology and business models. I think it’s a good segue into kind of more talking about the business model. So you mentioned in your Kind of brief summary at the beginning that you, I have vacation rental management in addition to corporate, which are, I don’t think I’ve actually ever seen them kind of combined in one company. And but that’s been good diversification for you guys. So could you maybe walk us through kind of, you know, all in a little bit more in depth, you know, the various business interests of hrs and you know, specifically kind of like how you thought about expanding into the new ones that you’ve you’ve taken hrs into over the last 12 years of your leadership?
Tobias Ragge:
Right. So, as I mentioned, we have three main lines of business if you want. The founding idea over the years was an OTA a business model, hotel board, a portal, a trance, d hotel.he. You know, he has holidays. So we build basically, a transaction based business model for the leisure but also for the business traveler over the years, we’ve pivoted more and more to what’s the unmanaged business traveler. Because we saw a higher loyalty ization capabilities, we saw conveniences not is a core drive, and not just price competitiveness. And that was basically the founding business model when I entered the company. And it was, yeah, it was a it was it was a big player as a market leader in the German speaking market in the otas side. Now, after I joined, and I would say probably in the year 206, to a seven, it came very apparent to me, we tried to internationalize the business, how challenging it is to really globalize ot a business model, because you have to do tremendous amount of spending on the performance marketing and branding side. And I also have to say, we failed in it, quite frankly, I mean, we probably didn’t have enough risk appetite, to basically spend the money you needed to spend. And it was also a business model, as you might imagine, it was built as a family business. So it was about profitability. It was not just build about scale, right? So just grow, grow, grow, despite the fact of blowing millions of dollars out of the window, it was about really, how can we get this somehow a profitable, sustainable business model, because that was really, I think, for us the breaking point, which we couldn’t solve, because we didn’t, my dad back then didn’t want to change his financing structure. And it was all self funded. And, you know, at some point, it is really challenging in this regard. And you also could see it very early on that the dominance of Google, and then the inference of new players like meta searches, which just creates a tremendous issue on the customer acquisition cost side. So the cost kept raising, rising, and that was something which I saw as a big challenge, which is why at some point, I decided, Okay, we’re going to basically exit the globalization of the otaa model focus on our core strong markets, the German speaking markets, and and, you know, work with the nice margins because of the big brand awareness we had in these markets. That huge direct traffic through the brand awareness we’ve gained over the years, and quasi loyal ization, if you want. We said, Okay, let’s keep that it’s a cash cow. Let’s run with this and build something out of it. And this is when, you know, we, on the one hand side, did some pivots into the leisure side of things where we said, okay, now we have all of these customers already in Germany, but we only have hotel business. So why don’t we go into the rental vacation space. And we did some m&a there in this regard. Some good some bad, I have to say, at the end of the day, nonetheless, the stuff we did was as a lump sum of one thing, which was good. And we created out of a few acquisitions, we created this one integrated players, which we call today destination solutions. So they provide technology like an operating system for either rental vacation home owners, but more for the intermediary market, which usually have in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, where people are intermediate sitting in these vacation destinations, administrating the content and the properties for the home owners. And we built quite a very sticky model there. And that is that is the second thing which which we build out so it’s it’s it’s not so much linked to our enterprise corporate business traveler thing, but more towards our initial founding idea. And the third thing, which today are which I you know, have to say pre COVID was by far because this business was something I started building out I would say in the year 2010 2011, to pivot into the enterprise space. So because as I said, I knew that, you know, margins would decrease in the otaa business, I knew I had to build something different, if I don’t want to retire was 38. And so basically said, Okay, what do we have, we have a transaction business, we know the traveler. Let’s go and pivot into maybe the enterprise space, because I saw that back then travel management companies, and the GDS weren’t really taking care of this business. You know, flights was still the big thing. There was such a fragmentation that the whole market was just evolving around dealing with big chains as part of the supply side. And I saw a nice because I saw that it’s a big market. I mean, on the enterprise side lodgings, 40% of the teenies spent, I saw really weak attachment rates between flight and hotel, I saw players, travel management companies who were focusing on services, and servicing rather than technology and solutions. I saw the GDS being traditionally hooked on the air side. And I said, that’s something we we should go in. As always, when you start something, you are naive, and you have no clue of what you’re getting yourself into, which is good, because otherwise you wouldn’t do it. So I’m sure Kevin and yourself will acknowledge this with your own stories. But so I said, Okay, it’s not a big challenge, right? We only have to do is globalize. Now, we have only to understand now completely target group enter enterprises, and we need to build new solutions, like procurement, payment expense solutions. So what’s the big deal? Let’s go after it. And do it. I mean, I’m joking, it’s erroneous, as you can see, this is what we built over all these years. But we started with simply saying, okay, there’s a target group we can go after. And, and this is where, you know, we we deployed and a lot of our our past knowledge and had to build nonetheless, a lot of new knowledge, because when you think about it, functionally, b2b is sales, right? is B, direct sales is something completely different channel management, then running in otaa, where you have a lot of performance marketing knowledge. So it meant also building a complete new functional expertise as an organization.
Kevin May:
Now, what I’m interested in here is that, you know, you’ve just reeled off, what may be between half a dozen, or between half a dozen and 10, new things, which is probably eight more things than what hrs had done in the 30 years or so leading up to it. So I’m interested in the management style and how you had to do that, because maybe some people in the company would have been thinking, Well, you know, everything was going along. Okay. Oh, and here’s the, here’s the young lads come in, and he’s got all these big ideas. And he wants to put us into 35 other countries, or 34 other countries and do all these kinds of things. I mean, how did you manage that process without perhaps sunlight? Considering Oh, here’s the hot shot with all the big ideas, who’s been to business school? And I say that very respectfully. But you know what I mean, it’s, it’s something that does come up.
Tobias Ragge:
And Kevin, I think a lot of people thought it. Yeah. I mean, at the end of the day, the truth is, I’m now describing, you know, you’re describing objects things in the past with an ex post rationalization of why you did things and nowadays, looking back, it sounds so logical, right? It’s like you had this perfect master plan, you followed it through. And the truth is, obviously, you iterate right you you you stumble across hurdles, you you move from there, you realize, oh, okay, this is what we have to build out. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s, I would say it’s an agile process if you want, nonetheless, sure, I have to break a lot of things, because to your point, and people were saying the business is working, what are we talking about? Also, you know, I always say probably, I wouldn’t hire the people. Usually I hired five years ago, I wouldn’t hire them today, right? Because and why I’m saying this is because the company had to transform so much that because there was without any choice, right? to really go where we wanted to go, that not everybody is then always willing to learn that much. wants to grow that much. It’s a huge challenge for a lot of people. And some people just say, No, it’s too much change. For me, and this was also happening when I entered the company. I mean, obviously, I started with very small baby steps, but Sure, I mean, it was a was a big transformation. And now How did I do it? I think I try to lead the way in a way that I try to, you know, use strategy and division in order to say why and where, where we should be going. But then also, I think a lot of the times my leadership style is a lot about leading by example, okay. But just seeing what people should be doing, but basically doing it myself. And when I think about building up this enterprise business, I probably have had 1000, or more customer meetings in probably 50 countries where I was polishing the door rails myself, and, and learning learned the hard way in order to lead this lead the transformation.
Kevin May:
Would you say, last one for me for a moment. But, you know, during that process, when you were introducing all those different changes, what do you think the staff were saying about? You know, you kind of slightly hinted at it, do you think, and this and the style in which you did it? Were you quieter? Were you trying to be a big leader? Or were you just just bulldozing your way through it? So what would you say they, what would you think their response would be about your style?
Tobias Ragge:
I mean, it’s very hard right? To judge about what others were thinking, I just, what I probably could say is here, a colleague of mine, he said, you know, at one point, he said, you know, hrs, you gotta love it, or you hate it, there’s nothing in between. So, and I’m pretty sure that’s also also then portraying myself a little bit like it that we are going after it relentlessly and trying to do something, you know, to stand out. Or you might find it, it’s too ambitious. And it’s too, you know, tiring and yeah, and it’s just sometimes something which is too much for you, but
Kevin May:
Okay, okay.
David Litwak:
So Tobias, yeah, you you mentioned something interesting about how basic us kind of pivoted away from like leisure otas. And you need to spend an exorbitant of money. And I think this is actually a lesson that if there’s only one thing that new potential startup entrepreneurs and travel to take away from this podcast, it’s don’t think you can just start a consumer brand, and then kind of come in, like everyone else does. But, you know, because there’s way too much spent by booking.com, and Expedia, of course, and we all know this if you’ve been in industry for a while. But what’s interesting is that I think that you’re starting to see a whole new crop of players come in and start to compete in travel. So this weekend, I was reading about pin Duo Duo in China, which does group buying and that they’ve launched a travel site and reminded me how ropey in Latin America, the the food delivery guys have launched rappy travel as well. And it almost seems kind of like you mentioned something about how having a strong brand in a market in Germany and you guys started just adding other travel features on there almost kind of felt like you were building a German super, you know, super app for travel within vacation rentals, with business travel with everything. And that was almost your strategy where you kind of leaned into the brand recognition in Germany because I trying to compete to acquire new customers was too costly. I mean, would you think that’s a fair characterization? And you know, overall, I’d love to hear your thoughts and kind of like the future of otas and then travel.
Tobias Ragge:
Wow, that’s a lot of many big questions. So first one yes, I mean, to your point I knew we have invested so much money all to building this brand loyal icing people. It’s a natural I think thought for everybody who is was an entrepreneur to say okay, how can I exploit that asset further? You know, because it’s such a big cost an investment you have done and this was, what’s the natural thing to do, I would say now branching out in something completely different is is somehow risky, especially when you try to do it with your own money. You know, we didn’t we didn’t basically take anybody on board to basically hatch also the risk and when you go global, you know, you can create maybe something which is really truly outstanding, but you can also fail outstandingly and so that is that is for me. Always the thing, which is important though is you never start with directly say okay, we go global right you operate. That’s maybe when you are 500 million funded, VC backed, top shot story from China from the US you say can we do it directly now globally? You You basically start in a home market, you test it in a few other markets and then you you go from there and we have always the principle follow your customers be smart about it. The low hanging fruits go with your customers into these markets because Because it gives you a first starting point, it’s an easy entree into different hotel markets. So you can you can smartly build upon this. So we needed always to be a little bit smarter, or let’s say more efficient in the way how to use our funds. I would say. Now, to your comment you made David about the analogies with with some other players, I think, you know, what is? What I find interesting is the examples, you’re describing examples where people build something, which was a different edge to maybe the same problem. And I think that’s also what what we did. I mean, it’s not like we invented a new category, right? I mean, we basically built a, I would say, a better solution. And then we started to build our own category of solution, but they first of all penetrated a problem. And I think that’s what everybody should try, right? You go in trying to address a market? Because it’s very, very hard to find and establish a complete new market, right, you usually take an existing market penetrated with a better answer for the for the for the markets problem. And then once you have entered it, and you have become relevant in a certain area, then you’re trying to branch out. Yeah, and you’re trying to then try to build your own unique thing. But this usually can only be done if you have a real understanding of the market itself. And that takes time, I would say, at least was my case.
David Litwak:
So yeah, well, so you’ve, as Kevin pointed out, you’ve added like eight products, right? And what’s what’s next? I’m curious, is there you know, without obviously revealing your internal secret, super secret strategy, is there any, you know, window into kind of, you know, where you guys are planning on taking the company in the next five years?
Tobias Ragge:
Should there’s always plans of what you would you should be doing? Right? And, you know, we always have a saying, don’t talk about it, do it? And, and I stick with that with that philosophy. But right now, I think Still, we have to see, and I think every entrepreneur has to ask themselves today, and especially if we are operating and travel is is your business model? And the solution you have is that may be in a world which might change going forward? Is it still relevant? Do you need? Is your product so relevant? First question, is your business model still relevant? Third questions? How can you basically in a different New World, differentiate yourself from the competition from the market? I think these are all questions we all ask ourselves, right. And, and that’s, that’s where I have to say, you know, last five, six months have also asked these questions myself. But nonetheless, I came to the conclusion of what we build basically lodging as a service, what we call it. So SAS base model for corporate lodging is actually what’s needed after the crisis more than ever, it’s all about how to enable a platform, how to use the data of the platform and leverage this further. And so I think a big stronger play, which we will develop is how to enable data and the use of data in order to generate additional values for the partners of the platform, be the corporation’s the travelers, other hotel partners, to make it at the end, much more balanced marketplace. Because today, when you think when I think about all marketplace, then it’s still a marketplace, which is very imbalanced. Yeah, when you think about it, the lodging market has 500,000 Hotel properties that would call it of which only 25% of chains, but the 25% of the chains make 75% of the distribution in the corporate space. So there’s a clear imbalance between the suppliers and the demand. And the reason for this is that the transaction costs usually quite high to do from a corporate buyer perspective with smaller suppliers. And there’s the trust element, which through COVID will probably grow going forward, where a brand seems to have a premium versus an unbranded property. And this is where we are thinking how can we use data in order to create for the traveler and the corporations, the perfect balance based upon their own strategic but also traveler preferences, and taking away the transaction costs of the market. Now that’s, that’s really something which, which we’re getting our head around.
Kevin May:
So we’re coming up towards the end of this episode. It’s just a couple more questions from me. Before we wrap up. You said about 1015 minutes ago, there’s been some good m&a and there’s been some bad m&a. What would you say? We don’t want to dwell on all the positive stuff that you know, what did you learn from the bad m&a in particular, because it’s such a tricky one?
Tobias Ragge:
Yeah, I think number one, lesson is Kevin cultural fit. So if the culture doesn’t connect, and we’re not talking about ximines, buying General Electric, right? We’re talking about us buying other midsize companies who might have a good business idea might have smart technologies and so on. We’re talking about entrepreneurial lead companies usually. So the DNA and the direction the business has to move going forward needs to be completely insert, because otherwise you’re creating too much friction. And I think that is, which usually makes an m&a process successful
Kevin May:
or not. And, and the penultimate one for me, I mean, you
David Litwak:
actually, Can I Can I, can I quickly follow up on that device. So when it comes to cultural fit, I mean, you said all these are mid tier companies, and they’re entrepreneurial already. Right. So this is something I’ve thought a lot about, like, you know, because, you know, I’ve ran mozia for nine years, and we’ve got our fair amount of acquisition inquiries, and sometimes look at the team that I know. And I’m like, Oh, yeah, these guys would be cool to to work with another as I’m just like, oh, man, this is gonna be like pulling teeth. But usually, like the ones who are it’s like pulling teeth are the ones who are clearly not entrepreneurial. So, you know, can you be a little more granular that way? If you look at four companies, they all started and they’re all entrepreneurial, what were the ones that worked and what ones what were the ones that didn’t? If they’re all on trainer, there must been some other qualities, personality quirks that just didn’t sync with you guys.
Tobias Ragge:
Yeah, I would say also, consistency in the way of working so I think discipline, being structured in the way of working being also strategic about how to work using data. Sticking to once defined routes, unless we have a different set of informations and now want to basically come up with something new. Yeah. So a very rational approach of operating in the business. I think that is something which, which which I found sometimes hard, and sometimes a to opportunistic view on things, and not too much of the mid to long term strategic view on things. That’s something where I’m always looking more into the mid long term perspective. And if people are just opportunistically thinking about just the next quick fix, I don’t think you will ever make the progress you need.
David Litwak:
yet. It’s funny just adding on to that I remember, as I started formulating my own idea what made a good entrepreneur, I kind of drill it down to two qualities, self awareness and hustle. And I saw all these people in Silicon Valley who had lots of hustle, but no self awareness. And so they’d go off careening in some direction, working their ass off and not really get anywhere. And though that people will have lots of self awareness, but no hustle, they quickly realize that they’re like their initial problem, their initial solution wasn’t the right solution to the problem, but they were too lazy to like figure out a second, third or fourth iteration. And I almost feel kind of like, what you’re saying is that, like, I know the types of entrepreneurs, you’re talking about the ones who kind of like, you know, they might have that hustle, but they don’t have a lot of self awareness. And it’s really hard to work with them as you’re kind of like, we want to sit here and think about this. And they’re just that’s not part of their DNA. So
Tobias Ragge:
yeah, I think, you know, to your point, I would totally agree with your points, David. No pain, no gain, right. So if you don’t work hard enough, there’s no way you would get anywhere on this planet. That is my pure belief. Okay. And I think too many people think it’s, it’s easy to do things. Talent doesn’t bring you anywhere, I think it’s the card to the party. But that’s it. That’s,
Kevin May:
it sounds it sounds like you’ve been all of these three, in your time as the CEO, which is a leader, a manager and an innovator. If you had to only have one of those as your epitaph which one would you like to have? What do you think would be the most appropriate?
Tobias Ragge:
one or three, I’m just thinking, most likely, probably I get the most interest out of being an innovator of driving new things into markets. But that is the leader then he needs to really the excitement when you get really these things done. Right. So my personal little puzzle brain gets excited about being the innovator. But the enterpreneur in me says if you’re not the leader, you’re not going to materialize it then you’re just you’re just you know, then it’s just not going to do the job.
Kevin May:
Okay, and finally, I don’t know your personal situation. Let’s just presume for a second that you do have children and you do have children Okay, so that’s that’s the first part of the question. And so you’re getting towards retirement age. And there is like father like son, this opportunity for you to pass on the business again. Would you want Wish the business on one of your own children? And if so, what would be the one thing that you tell them to make? Sure they don’t do?
Tobias Ragge:
Yeah, that is a very good question. So I have three little kids, four weeks, three years, six years. So, so let’s assume my oldest one would be interested, that’s at least another 25 years from now, I would guess that you can consider that option. I would be 69 by then, which would be okay, still, yeah. But quite frankly, Kevin, thinking about our age today and thinking what’s in 25 years from now sounds so ridiculous. To even entertain the second of my time of this thought, I also don’t have a dynastic mindset, in this regard, write that essay, yeah, this is my biggest dream. If in 25 years from now, the company would still be around, it will be a pretty big company, because that’s the only way how you can stay around and relevant. And do my kids who probably grow up in quite a good set of wealth and all these nice things around them, do they have the ultimate hunger and punch to be this hustler David was talking
Tobias Ragge:
I doubt it to be honest. Because I think this is the ultimate thing you need to have. You need to be able to, you know, endure also, you know, the hard times and I’m not sure if that is really what’s what’s possible, but we’ll see if it would be the case, I would be proud as hell, but and happy as hell. But hey, it’s nothing that ever really comes to my mind thinking about
Kevin May:
this will be online on focus wire.com and other channels for many years to come. And you can play this to them
Tobias Ragge:
as a birthday then on 69. Okay, good.
Kevin May:
That was great. So thank you very much, Tobias ragga, for joining us this week. Really appreciate it.
Tobias Ragge:
Thank you very much, Kevin and David for having me. It was a pleasure.
Kevin May:
Okay, so you’ve all been listening to another episode of how I got here. These are mosey on focus wise, weekly chats with innovators and entrepreneurs in travel, and transportation. Thank you all as always for listening. If you’re not a subscriber, you can do so in all the usual channels. It’s Apple, iTunes, Spotify, Alexa, all those usual places. Give us a review. We’d like to hear your feedback. We’ll be back next week with another episode. Once again. Thank you, Tobias. And thanks from David and I will see you next time.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
