Study Break

On NAIOP member Jack Schultz’s list of Top 10 Development Trends for 2008, one really stands out.  Following Kalamazoo, MI; Newton, IA; and El Dorado, AZ, have promised to pay for the college education of anyone who completes grade and high schools.In light of of the economic flux that we are currently in, this seems like a bold incentive package that inverts the traditional concentric circles of economic development.Instead of corporate tax incentives to bring jobs and improvements to the community, these communities are funding higher education to attract (and educate) people, then entice employers needing educated labor, with the net effect of driving retail, and higher-end residential development as a way to lift the general economy.

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective CREs

The Spring 2008 issue of Development Magazine quotes Mark Gibson, Leader, Strategy and Operating Real Estate Advisory Services for Ernst & Young, on the seven skills that corporate real estate executives should bring to the table, listing them in order of importance:

• Project Management
• Strategic Planning
• Process Implementation
• Understand the Business
• Fortitude
• Real Estate

Real estate makes the bottom of the list.  This is interesting and a concession to the idea that the new commercial real estate executive is largely a strategist with a global perspective who reports directly to the CFO and works to harmonize real estate with IT and HR to achieve enterprise-level objectives.The one thing I think Gibson missed is CRM (Client Relationship Management) which remains, along with strategy, where the focus of the internal corporate real estate department is since the movement toward outsourcing began in the 1990s.