Breaking Barriers and Building Connections: Annie Holcombe on the Value of Mentorship in Vacation Rentals

Hello and welcome to another episode of Direct Booking Direct Booking Success Direct Booking Success podcast. I'm Jennn Boyles, your host, and today I have Annie Holcombe with me. Annie is the other half of the Alex and Annie the Real Women of Vacation Rentals podcast and she has been working in the hospitality industry for 30 years. So welcome, Annie.

Thank you so much for having me, Jenn. It's actually an honor. I've been following you for several years now. I think our LinkedIn world connected everybody. No matter where we live, we all seem like we are in the same neighborhood. So it's great to finally meet you and get a chance to oh, well.

Thank you very much. I've been following you guys and listening to your podcast. So it's wonderful to have you here today. Now let's start with getting into your background. 30 years. I don't want to date you. I'm not going to ask you how.

Old you are or anything like that.

Because I've been around too. But where did you start off? 30 years ago?

Yeah.

And it's a great reminder that this industry has been around, hospitality has been around forever. You can go back to the dawn of time for hospitality and vacation rentals being part of that. So it's really great that you are here to talk today now, mentorship. The landscape of vacation rentals I think is very dynamic and I think that the idea and people talking about mentorship is sort of gaining traction now. Do you have a specific moment that maybe you realize the crucial role that mentorship can play in the growth of property managers and owners?

Yeah, I love the idea of the matchmaker mentee mentor situation that you'll be doing at the Vacation Rental Women's Summit. I think that is a really great idea and that it's going to go on for a few months. It's not just for a couple of days because it's hard like you touched on. We are working very independently. We're siloed basically in our own offices, our own homes, some of us in our own teams. And it's looking beyond that. And I think that our sector is predominantly male driven however it's women mainly in this sector and we face specific challenges, don't we, as women as the whole?

Yeah, I think it was a stat that was I think at the last women's summit, there were some people on stage, and I don't remember exactly the number, but it was somewhere in the neighborhood of around 65% of the people in vacation reynold industry were women, yet they held less than 3% of sort of that c suite. VP levels, the senior level roles within the industry. And that's not to say that's a bad thing because we're a lot of family run businesses, there's not a lot of big corporations sitting in it. So it is a little different. But I think how do we create the opportunities? I look at the STR side of the business, we talked about this off camera, the short term rental side of the business. That seems to be different from vacation rentals. It's really not. But there's been a big movement within that to just elevate people to get into the business, get one unit, get started and they don't care whether you're male or female. I think that vacation rentals are just something that's like they're generally homegrown businesses, they're small markets. Again, it's family run, it's not a big corporation. So it's just more based on, I think, tradition than it is any purposeful intent of not having women. It's just that I think that women didn't know until recently that that was an opportunity for them to have that business and to be a leader within an industry. If you didn't have it, you don't have to have a degree to work in vacation rentals. You don't have to be a specialist. I mean certainly it helps with business or whatever, but it's a business that anybody can do if they have the drive and the willpower.

Yeah, you learn on the job, don't you?

Yeah, absolutely.

And mentorship is a real big part of that if you want to maybe go a bit quicker. And I think as women, rightly or.

Wrongly, we're not going to get in.

A whole gender debate. But a lot of life falls on a woman's shoulders with the family and the home life and stuff and then a business on top of that, it's a lot. And going out and finding a mentor that can help you over those bumps, I think is a really great way to sort of navigate hurdles, break through barriers, and I think do you have any tips? Like, we're not all going to be at the vacation rentals, the Women's Vacation Rental Summit, which happened just last week by the time this airs. But are there other ways you think that maybe women who want to be mentored, how do you think they could really get into it or get started?

Well, I think the first thing is just identify what your need is. What is it that you want to learn, if you want to learn more about your business. There's people within your market generally that you could partner with. And I think there has been a notion for a long time that you had to be enemies with the person that was running a competitive business, but they're really not. I mean, they're your partner in the industry, in the market. You're both trying to get the same thing to happen for people to come to your destination. Ultimately, you want them to choose you over your competitor, but you're driving for the same goal. So I would say get to know the people in your market, participate in your destination marketing organization, your chamber of commerce, join those organizations. But on a broader scope, obviously now, being a member of VRMA, there's a lot of educational offerings there. LinkedIn has just become amber Hurdle calls it the water cooler of vacation rentals, and it truly is. I mean, the networking that gets done for vacation rentals on LinkedIn, I've never seen anything like it. It's like Facebook, but it's not. With the exception of maybe a few circumstances, everybody's real positive, everybody wants to share. And so just ask, I think just putting that question out there. I know I've done things where I'm just like, I don't know what this particular project I'm doing looks like, or I need feedback, or I need guidance, or just input, and I'll throw it out there and people strangers are willing to offer their feedback. And I think that that's the great thing about it is it's just like people want to be engaged with each other regardless of where we're at. And it's really fun to go to the shows when you haven't met somebody. Like all through COVID, we'd been talking to people, had zoom calls, and you go and you finally meet somebody one time a year and you feel like you've known them for 20 years. But the biggest thing is just put yourself out there. I mean, that's one thing. You can't sit there and assume that life is going to come to you. You have to go to it, make it happen.

Yes, definitely. And I think that's how we get through our businesses here. But we're a hospitable bunch. We're in hospitality. Our backbone is hospitality, and I think we want more positivity. I think it's really impressive that you see all this positivity on LinkedIn. I think this is really great because sometimes social media can go into the not so great territory, but it's really combating what you found earlier in your career when you had a senior manager who was really a put down on you. And we need more of that positivity. And I think that's where the role of a mentorship can really transform someone's life. If you're somebody who is a manager and you're continuously putting down people's ideas, they're going to stop bringing you those ideas. But if someone is there to sort of lift people up and I'll tell you a story. I was in London, and this was in the spring, and I was sitting at dinner with my daughter, so of course there's no major conversation going on. And I'm listening to other people around me, and these two girls were sitting. I'm going to say girls, they were in their 20s. They're sitting beside me. And one of the girls was going on about work and how horrible all the women are that she works with, and it just sounded like a horrible situation, caddy and everything. And I think this is what happens sometimes when we are young and we come into this sort of female vibe, this female energy that it takes us a while, I think, as women, to grow into ourselves, to realize that we need to be lifting each other up. And it's collaboration over competition. And I love what you're doing with the mentorship. What do you think this comes out of? Do you think it's maybe just age and wisdom that we sort of start to get into more lifting each other up rather than tear each other down?

And I love that idea we're talking about with the buckets is that you fill them up and then they overflow to the next person that you're with. And when you're talking about a terrible time, the pandemic and the hurricane job, it sounded like your bucket got a hole, basically, and then you found that cause to fill the hole and then that bucket started going back up again. So I love that sort of analogy. And it's thinking about the relationship with mentees and mentors. We can think about all the things that a mentee gets out of it. But what does a mentor get out of the relationship?

Yes, definitely. And I think that both for the mentor and the mentee, that it doesn't have to be one person. If you're someone who's looking for a mentor, there might be different aspects of someone else's business and the life qualities that you want to bring into your business and your life. And the same for the mentor, it can be the opposite thing. The mentee could be mentoring the mentor about something as well. And I think that's what you're getting to when you're talking about it going both ways. I have a program where I mentor people in the program, and there's lots of different programs out there in this business that are mentorship programs. That's why we don't use that word for them, because you're giving your experience and you're helping them through this situation. Now what do you think about this sector evolving so quickly, adapting technology? I can't imagine what's going to happen in the next year that we're going to see with AI coming in, it's going to be crazy. But what do you envision for the role of mentorship? How do you see it sort of evolving or what would you like to see evolving it into in the vacation rental sector?

Ego rather than mentorship. Yes, I totally agree. And I think that you might be interested in that. You might be attracted by it at the beginning, but. I think a lot of people start to see through that flashiness as they're not being substance and it is a hard know we've all been there scrubbing toilets making know I do have to tell you about Lord because when I heard about her saying passive my assive, I was right on to LinkedIn to get in touch with her and said, you have to come on the podcast. So she's going to be on I think because I'm like that is the best phrase ever.

She should need to get a shirt made for it. I should buy her a hat or something.

Yeah, well that's it because it's not a passive thing. The only thing that would be passive is if you invested and then you did absolutely nothing. Somebody else did everything with your money the only way it could be and even in that you would think that.

You'D want to be checking out to.

Make sure your money is okay, there is nothing and then there's some people are starting to say semi passive. Well come off it.

Is hard work.

And I think that's the role of having some mentor or mentors in your life that you can go to when you have a question. I know I have those people in my life and actually just thinking of someone right now, I've never thought of them as a mentor. But of course when I have a question about that sort of topic or that sort of subject, I have different people that I go to and under.

You need to know your life. Absolutely. And I think that that's the other thing too is that you don't have to identify it as a mentor mentee relationship. If you go to anybody for a regular touch base or they're a subject matter expert, they're mentoring you, they're giving you feedback, they're providing you their time and their knowledge to access. So they're mentoring you whether it's been an established relationship or not. So I think again trying to say that it has to be this defined agreed upon structure that might scare people away because as a mentor you're like I don't have the time to do it. And then the mentee is like, well I don't have the time to do the homework that they're going to give me. It just depends how you want the relationship to be. But I think that's just it. It's likely you're going to have five or ten people at any given time. If you go again, I have about 15 to 20 people that I know. That very specific topic that if I go to I probably have three people that are generalists that I can go to and they can go here's where you need to go. But generally they're speaking. There's somebody within a discipline that I know like oh, they are the person that I trust to help me navigate through this.

Yeah. And I think yeah, you've hit the nail on the head there. It doesn't have to be this formal relationship. I am a mentor, you are mentee, or whatever, but I think, yeah, pulling out those characteristics and people that you want to have in your life, I think that's what it comes down to. And I think that if you have questions, look for somebody in your network. Start by using LinkedIn. Look for somebody in your company. You work with others so you can ask those questions. And once you're on the other side of things, if somebody comes to you with those questions, take the time to answer them. And answer them with grace and kindness, even if you're really busy. It's like when our children come to us and we're like up here.

In our eyeballs, right?

And they're wanting to know something, and.

You'Re just like, oh, please, just leave me alone.

I've got to get this done. It's nice. You have to take a deep breath, take a step back and say, right, I have a couple of minutes for you. Let's talk that through. And I think it's the same with when someone's coming to you with questions, is to remember, just take that breath and see what you can do to help. And I think that's how we will build up each other in this industry.

Absolutely. And it's just the little things that matter. I mean, I've encountered more situations where people will come back and say, I just appreciated it so much that you were able to answer this. Just something very simple and you don't know it. And I think once you hear it enough, you realize it makes you feel good to be able to help somebody. But I tell my son, you just don't know what's going on behind people. So there's a phrase in the south and it's blessed your heart. And so it's one of those ones that could be used as a term of endearment. It can be used as, I don't know how this person gets out of their house without tripping over their own feet. It can be used in multiple ways, just depending on the tone or the subject matter. But it always reminds me that you just don't know what the person on the other side is going through. So try, like you said, handle it with grace. If you don't have the time, say, look, I can't get to it right now, but let's put ten minutes on the calendar over here. Just make time for people, because again, you're paying it forward. You're filling up your bucket, you're filling up their bucket. And if everybody's got full buckets of gracious grace and gratitude, then eventually the world's a better place.

That's it. I think we've just fixed it.

I think we have words to write.

Well, there you peace.

I'm going to go talk to the UN and we'll take care of it all.

All to do with buckets.

Okay. Yeah. If you just give everybody a bucket yeah.

And if it springs a leak, well, then this is what you do.

I think that's brilliant.

All right. Now, I really appreciate you coming on Annie and talking about this because it's something that is dear to my heart and it's about collaboration now, competition. I think that that just makes such sense. And us coming together as a community, it's already a great hospitable community and we can even do more with it. Now, before you go, I have to ask you. Now, this is going to seem slightly off topic from what we've been talking about, but when we're talking about mentorship and whatnot, I can see that in the Direct Booking Direct Booking Success space, there's a lot of room for this and help people learn what to do and where to do it. I've got people that come to me all the time and say, I don't know where to start with step one and working your way through. So can I ask you, what does Direct Booking Direct Booking Success Direct Booking Success mean to you?

Oh, my gosh, that's such a big question. And having been in property management before, I know that there's just a drive. It's Direct Booking Direct Booking Success. Direct Booking Direct Booking Success. DirectBook. But you have to understand your market and you have to understand so I think the Direct Booking Success looks like someone or something that you understand that it doesn't happen overnight. It's not one channel airbnb, whatever it is, that's not Direct Booking Success. Direct Booking Success is that you understand the dynamics of your market and that you understand what your guests want and you're not trying to give them something that they're not interested in. So I had a gentleman that I worked for that used to say all the time, you have to be what the market wants you to be, not what you are not. Tell the market what you want it to be. And so I think that Direct Booking Success looks like someone who understands that they can't control it. It's going to change. And you have to constantly be learning. You have to have a mentor. You have to get out there and pay attention and look at the data and not let someone somewhere else tell you how to run your business. You just have to be engaged in the business.

Yeah.

Not sure if that answered it.

Oh, it definitely, definitely did.

Okay.

Definitely did.

So I'm going to put your LinkedIn.

Link in the show notes so people can find you. I'm going to put the Alex and Annie podcast website link in the show notes as well, so I'm sure that everyone listening is listening to your podcast as well as The Real Women of Vacation Rentals. I love that title. So thank you, Annie, so much for coming on today.

Jenn, thank you very much. I appreciate it. And if you have the time, I hope you'll join our mentor group and make yourself available. I think it would be wonderful to have you and your knowledge. And now that you're kind of in our time zone and not in the European time zone, it will be much easier to work with.

Oh, that'd be wonderful. I appreciate that. I'd love to do that. Thanks, Annie.

Thanks.