10 Questions Chip Conley

Chip Conley is the founder of Joie de Vivre Hospitality and Modern Elder Academy, as well as the author of five best-selling books.

You never know when you’re going to die and so, there’s a sense of urgency. Two years ago, I found out I had intermediate stage cancer, which I beat. And about 12 years ago, I had a flat-line experience. I actually died and came back. I can’t say I knew my whole life that these things were going to happen but having brushes with death – as Steve Jobs once said – is a wonderful organising principle for life. I have a tendency to throw myself joyfully into the things I feel passionately about. Hence the name of my company, Joie de Vivre.

As a company, we rode the wave of boutique hotels in the US. You don’t talk to a European about boutique hotels, because they’re like ‘what are you talking about? All hotels are boutique.’ Europe has a history of boutique hotels that the US doesn’t. So when I started in the mid-1980s it was pretty much unheard of with a few exceptions. I think JdV brought three things to the table that helped us stand out. Firstly, it was all about culture. Our mission was about creating joy for our employees and customers. And I think people could feel that. Secondly, we believed that boutique hotels weren’t just about being hip and expensive. We really helped to show that they could be affordable. And lastly, we expanded the possibilities for boutique hotels by showing that they can be in places like the suburbs or a campground.

For me it was like a window into the future. What I grew up with was this three-stage life: you learn until you’re 20 or 25, you earn until you’re 65, and you retire until you die. Working at Airbnb really drove home to me that that model doesn’t serve us anymore. At Airbnb I was actually called the Modern Elder. I was 52 when I joined the company and the average age there was 26, so, of course, I was the elder. They would qualify with, ‘you’re not elderly. You’re just older. You’re the modern elder who’s as curious as they are wise.’ And I really appreciated that. As my role shifted into strategic advice, I became more aware and curious about the fact that there are a lot of people I know in mid-life who are feeling irrelevant and bewildered. We don’t have any schools or tools to help people in mid-life figure out what’s next for them. And that’s where the idea for the Modern Elder Academy came from. It’s not just people in classic mid-life who join my programme. I have people from 30 to 88 join. It’s for anyone navigating their changes in adulthood, no matter their age.

I think the key lesson is this idea of mutual mentorship. The idea that we all have something to learn from each other. Wisdom is shared, not taught. In some ways the physics of wisdom is changing. It used to be a waterfall. The young people would sit at the feet of the old people and knowledge was passed down that way. But that just doesn’t exist anymore. Now, the waterfall moves in both directions, from old to young and from young to old. And as such, we need to create environments and habitats where people can appreciate learning from others who are different from them in age – much like THE EMBASSIES seeks to do. In the last 30 to 40 years we’ve gotten a lot smarter in terms of diversity. Diversity has had predominately four pillars to it – gender, race, sexual orientation, and disability – but age was not one of them. Now it’s time for age to be considered as just as important a demographic.

My book called Peak: How Great Companies Get Their Mojo from Maslow really speaks to this. Maslow was able to show and demonstrate that people have a hierarchy of needs. Some basic survival needs, success needs and then transformation needs, what he called self-actualisation. I had the idea at the bottom of a recession to compile a hierarchy of needs for employees, customers and investors, and then run a business based on these hierarchies. It’s a simple but detailed model. I look at any relationship I have that way, whether with an employee, customer or investor. You have to get the base of the pyramid right to reach the peak. But if you solely focus on the base of the pyramid – commodity – you’re not creating loyalty. You’re good enough to be competitive but you’re not good enough to be a pioneer in terms of what you’re really offering.

Covid suggests that the travel industry is in terrible shape – and it is. But there is some evidence to the contrary. People are travelling. They’re just not flying. Instead, they’re taking some form of autonomous transport, like cars. Remote work is also becoming more socially acceptable and companies are learning to accommodate for it. In some cases that might look like living in Minorca, having access to good Wi-Fi and calling into an office in Madrid. In other cases, it means choosing not to have a sedentary singular place remote from the headquarters but spending winter in Morocco, spring in Rome, summer in Stockholm and fall in Ireland. And what I just described there is a traveller. We’ve had digital nomads since we’ve had really good Wi-Fi and iPhones, but Covid has made the digital nomad go mainstream. And what that means for the hospitality and travel industry is really interesting, because hotels are not prepared for this. Remote work is here to stay so I think co-living is going to be quite big. THE EMBASSIES are in the right place.

On the whole, I’m optimistic. Where I’m pessimistic is the political situation. For so many years we were comfortably crossing borders and exchanging culture. Now it’s a turf war. There’s a lot of nationalism. And nationalism doesn’t bode well for international travel.

I’m learning how to surf. At age 59 – close to 60 – that is not an easy thing to do.

Skydiving.

I would like to still be writing. Writing is something you can do at any age. I find writing quite liberating. William Blake said, ‘sometimes I’m just taking dictation’. And that’s how it feels when I’m writing. I’m just taking dictation, because I’m connecting to something much bigger than myself.

10 Questions —Chip Conley

10 Questions —
Chip Conley