“For me I think that slightly odd career route has actually proved to be really, really valuable. Looking at things from an equity analyst perspective but also from a really quite detailed operation perspective has given me a level of confidence around the industry that, that’s really key. The other thing I’d say is that, this is a great time to be, um, wanting to lead within the industry whether you’re, you know, male or female because, um, since I joined the industry there is now a much great acceptance of the valuable different types of leadership.”
Susan Freeman
Hi, I’m Susan Freeman. Welcome back to our PropertyShe podcast series brought to you by Mishcon de Reya in association with the London Real Estate Forum, where I get to interview some of the key influencers in the world of real estate and the built environment. Today, I am delighted to welcome Louise Bonham. Louise is the chief executive of MAPP, one of the UK’s leading real estate management and advisory firms. Louise joined as chief executive in September 2023, bringing with her a wealth of experience in UK and EMEA property. She is responsible for charting the company’s strategic direction within the ever evolving world of property operations. Louise leads an executive team across MAPP’s property management business and subsidiaries, redefined building consultancy by MAPP and energy by MAPP. Ensuring outstanding service delivery, award winning workplace culture and sustainable practices. Louise is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales and until April 2025, was a non-exec director and audit chair of Miton UK MicroCap Trust Plc. Previously Louise was also a non-exec director for a number of early stage property companies and held a range of senior executive appointments including at CBRE and Kushman & Wakefield where she was a member of the UK and Ireland’s Executive Committee and co-headed the EMEA Asset Services Business.
So now we’re going to hear from Louise Bonham about her diverse career to date, her role at MAPP and where she’s taking the company. Louise, good morning, it’s lovely to see you. We saw each other a week or so ago, uh, you were speaking at the Real Estate Balance 10th Anniversary party which was quite a milestone and, uh, we’ll talk a little bit about gender and diversity later on in the conversation. So if you could just kick off and share a little bit about your early life and upbringing and how you first became interested in real estate?
Louise Bonham
Yes, actually I was thinking about this last night and actually my early life is relevant in that I’m from an agricultural background, my father was a rose grower rather than an arable farmer but very agricultural and actually when I left university I thought well I think I’ll train to be an accountant because it’s a very good general business qualification, um, and I duly got a training contract with Deloitte and then they said, well which department do you want to be in? And gave me a big long list and so many of them were just befuddling, you know, I was just 21 at the time and, you know, particularly the, the financial services in the insurance areas that just felt, you know, too great a leap from a history degree. But I thought, well, you know, property is very tangible, I like the look of that and then I think almost a couple of days later having started to think about that, I was being driven to a 21st birthday party by the parents of a friend of mine and the father was also a farmer and he said, oh how’s the job etcetera, and I said, well, you know, I’m, I’ve got to choose which department to go into and he said, oh, um, Deloitte, I think they look after British land don’t they? And because he was a farm I assumed it must be something to do with agriculture and I thought, well that’s my background too so that sounds a good option. So I, I called Deloitte and said, well I quite like the property but also, um, apparently you look after British land and I think, you know, I might be, might be interested in that because of my background and they said, well, you know, that’s one and the same department. So, um, so I really didn’t quite know what I was doing but anyway went and joined Deloitte and indeed did work on British land. I mean obviously doing pretty low level work but that was a nice way into the industry.
Susan Freeman
It’s a great story actually, I hadn’t thought about British land as potentially being agricultural but why, why not. So had you intended to become an accountant or did you see it as a stepping stone to other things?
Louise Bonham
I think I always saw it as a stepping stone to other things. I mean I, I was open minded and thought well maybe I’ll be an auditor or a tax consultant long-term but I think I am a generalist at heart so I knew that I wanted to, um, hopefully run businesses if I was lucky enough and I suppose I thought, well, you know, the financial bit is often the bit that people struggle with later on in, in life and careers so let’s get that bit ticked off and that’s actually, it set me in good stead so it was a good call.
Susan Freeman
So I think your next role was at Deutsche Bank?
Louise Bonham
So I moved to Deutsche Bank to, um, be an equity analyst so I was covering REITs in ‘07/’08 so that was quite a baptism of fire, for again probably, I must have been about 26 at the time but actually a really, really interesting time and I think I suspect quite fundamental for the rest of my career because when you’ve seen such a, such a big change going on, you learn a lot quickly. And then off the back of being in that team at Deutsche Bank, I then went to Brunswick which is a, financial PR but really corporate comms company and I went to work in their real estate team and again that was a slightly odd move to make at the time I think but I was, um, really intrigued by the investor relations world and what that meant and obviously I’d had a lot of contact with investor relations leaders when I was an equity analyst. And I, I really enjoyed the time at Brunswick and I think that understanding of the importance of communicating well, um, to different stakeholders has probably been quite useful for the rest of my career.
Susan Freeman
I think that’s probably and understatement isn’t it. And you didn’t want to stay there though?
Louise Bonham
Well that was, that was a short but lovely period because we moved to Hong Kong and my husband got a job in Hong Kong. So we went to Hong Kong and I had the first of our four children there, um, so actually, I’m actually a very proud returner to the UK property industry in that I had, um, I had actually four and a half years off when I had our first three children, um, the other one came a little bit later. And so that was four and a half years of really not working at all and then when the youngest of those three was 1, I, uh, was looking to return back into the industry. And actually you know, that is, it was a long time ago now, um, but it was, it was a hard thing to do and it took an awful lot of time and energy and, and focus but I was fortunate and I got a role at, um, CBRE on their occupier side with a very, at the time, a very, very, um, I guess probably kind of forward thinking manager who let me do some more flexible hours than, than perhaps would be normal and that was great and so I was at CBRE until I left there, I was, by the time I left I was the COO of the advisory and transaction services business and then I moved to Kushman & Wakefield where I, um, had my first taste of, um, property management. I was leading the UK business there and then subsequently the European business until Covid and then actually just before Covid, I’d left Kushman and I had an aspiration to see if I could break into non-exec life and actually, so then for about three or four years I did purely non-exec work for early stage property companies, the window for IPO’s was, uh, uh, the door was not open but, um, great experience. And then got approached about the MAPP job in, end of 2022.
Susan Freeman
Well that, that was a good, um, encapsulation I think of, uh, of a very sort of interesting career and I just want to wind back to the career break and coming back into work after four, four years before I imagine it was not easy and you had, what three children under the age of 3.
Louise Bonham
Yes.
Susan Freeman
How did you go about, and I don’t think, I don’t think you had help at the time at home. I mean was it difficult to get back into work?
Louise Bonham
Well actually once I went back to CBRE I was fortunate and was able to have help at home, um, with the children but, so the hardest bit was that nine month period of job applications because I did have three pretty much under 3. I think the third one was born when the first one was, you know, three years one month or something and so when they were all sleeping, they’re good sleepers so I used to put them to bed in the afternoon, I’d just let them sleep for as long as possible and do as many job applications as possible and I had to really just throw, throw my head into the ring for anything, um, I mean literally anything that had property vaguely attached to it. And I worked out one time I think I was doing about, you know, almost 25 hours a week of kind of job applications and so many, it’s hard to hear back anyway but of course with a big gap on your CV it is difficult but eventually the snowball started moving and I had, I had a couple of job offers. But that, that was actually the most difficult bit. I think once I was back in to the job market and once I was back in an office, you know, it was enjoyable, it was fun. I think the work I’d done, um, before the children meant that I was in good stead but, um, but getting back in was really, really hard and I think, I think that is probably still the case. But on the flip side Susan, I think there’s something also quite interesting around, I talked to a lot of women who were just having families and I think perhaps the hardest bit and perhaps the thing that can hit your career the most is that when you’re coming back after small children and you might have two in nursery and you’re racing back and forward and all the rest of it, and you’re, you know, you’re feeling a bit uncertain. I think actually those really early years can be (a) the most stressful and (b) where perhaps you start to get moved off lists for promotions because you’re seen as perhaps as a little bit unreliable because whatever, whatever. Well I missed all of that out, I just didn’t work and so I think it in some ways I missed the hardest bit out. I mean I am not saying, by the way, that I think it’s right that people should be moved off promotion lists, absolutely not. I mean I am a big fan of talking about how, you know, everyone should be able to take their career at the pace they want at any given time. So I think in some ways that, that gap and I was privileged to be able to do it, made things easier.
Susan Freeman
That’s interesting actually, I hadn’t thought about it that way before. So it must take quite a lot of, I suppose confidence and resilience because you’re getting, you know, you’re putting in a lot of applications, you’re getting a lot of, um, refusals. You have to be, you have to be pretty resilient don’t you?
Louise Bonham
Well I suppose so and I mean I think, you know, and bluntly the hardest thing is you, you go back in at a, a lower salary than you, you left it and that can feel very hard. I think you have to keep going and you have to accept as well that you, um, that you have some slightly embarrassing interviews where you realise that you are slightly out of date or you realise that, I had a dreadful one where they seemed to think I could do the latest version of Excel and I hadn’t got a clue and so, yes you do have to be able to then go home and say, oh no, no I’m just going to keep going, I’m going to keep going, I’m going to keep going. There are lots of good books out there now which you can read and actually I was an avid reader of all of them. I suppose the other thing is once, once I had got a job offer I actually, um, uh, started working with a coach and she’s been really amazing. Since, I still work with her now, so she was great for that bit, once the job was kind of, once I had the job, um, she was great at making sure that I had the level of confidence required once I went back.
Susan Freeman
It’s interesting because not many of my guests actually talk about coaching and I think a lot of top executives do have coaching and has it continued and how does it affect the way you do things?
Louise Bonham
Oh hugely, yes it absolutely has continued. As I say, I have the same coach now that I had, um, you know, like, well over, gosh over ten or eleven years now and I also, I work with two coaches at the moment, so one will help more on leadership type stuff, um, and another more on operational things and it’s, it’s really valuable. I think it’s even more valuable now because you don’t have quite the same people around you to show you how to do things or to talk things through with when you’re the CEO and there’s so many things that you do need to think through and you do need to think out loud and, but you don’t want to be talking about everything to the people who work for you because so many of the things that I will think through we’ll never actually do, I’m just thinking of options and I’m thinking of different strategies and I don’t want people going off in the wrong direction so there’s that element. And also, you know, if you’re having a, a difficult period personally, you know, you want to make sure that you’re, you’re thinking that through elsewhere.
Susan Freeman
Yeah exactly because I imagine it can be quite a, a lonely place as, as, um, CEO and there are certain things you can’t or don’t, don’t want to discuss with the people that you’re working with?
Louise Bonham
Yes, yeah I mean, I’m fortunate I have a great team that work with me here and I’ve got, um, two fellow board directors who, who are very supportive but again there’s still things that, it’s useful to have someone who knows you and can kind of say, well, you know, maybe you could approach it this way, what do you think? So yeah, that’s been invaluable. I would recommend it to anyone, I really would.
Susan Freeman
So let’s go back. Your first role post your four year absence was at CBRE and did you work full-time when you were there or, or was it, was it more flexible?
Louise Bonham
I did 80% over five days. So I, I think I, I was in the office Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and I worked Monday and Friday from home which was Monday and Friday mornings from home. And again that, that kind of allowed me to feel I was still, still around for the children. There probably weren’t many people doing that at the time but it worked.
Susan Freeman
I was going to say, it’s become obviously quite normal, you know, in our post-Covid world but at that time it was quite sort of forward looking wasn’t it?
Louise Bonham
It was and I think the reason I suggested that is I thought that actually it would be easier for people to feel, well Louise is available every day, even if not for the whole day and that seemed a good way in and, and yeah it worked really well.
Susan Freeman
And you were at CBRE I think for four years, what then prompted your move to Kushman’s in 2018?
Louise Bonham
Well I was coming back after I’d had five or six months off with the fourth baby so I guess I was kind of finding my way back in, um, which again was very smooth, um, by then I knew what I was doing so it was okay. Um, and, um, yeah so I got a call about, about the job at Kushman and it looked really interesting so I made that move and again it was particularly attractive because I’d been on the occupiers side and going back onto the investor side which I’d historically was, um, you know, it felt like a good way of kind of continuing to build up those generalist skills that I was after.
Susan Freeman
And what was the role at Cushman’s?
Louise Bonham
It was, um, head of asset services in the UK and then I became head of asset services in, across EMEA as well.
Susan Freeman
And then I was going to say, you know, 2020, you know, what prompted the move into, into non-exec roles but as you’ve said, uh, it was quite a strange time, it was Covid and lockdown.
Louise Bonham
Well then there was a personal element there as well in that we had planned, my husband had been in his job for a very, very long time, about 17 years at that point, we’d planned to take the children out of school and go travelling for a year. So the plan was that we would go in August 2020. So we were both kind of gearing up and I had, I’d left Kushman and, uh, Mike was about to resign but, um, anyway that didn’t quite happen, um, we, we did manage to take them out a bit but so, so, so it all kind of came together.
Susan Freeman
So what you planned a, a sort of world trip?
Louise Bonham
Yes exactly because it would have been the last year that they were all younger than secondary school age. So we did actually manage to go, um, we went in, um, 2021 for, for nine months so that was fantastic.
Susan Freeman
That is fantastic. And you’ve mentioned the non-exec roles and were you, I mean one, one of the comments that’s been made is that women tend to move into sort of pleural non-exec roles sort of quite early on in their career and is that do you think because of the flexibility that it offers, that they can’t necessarily get if they have a sort of full-time managerial role?
Louise Bonham
Yeah I think that could be one of the, one of the attractions I think and I think you’re right, I have since I’ve been doing the MAPP job and I am just have one non-exec now but I have had people say to me, oh no, we’re really glad when we see women doing exec work for longer because, uh, we think that’s, that’s the best thing for the industry and indeed other industries so it might be the flexibility I think. I guess it depends on the type of person you are. As I say, I’m, I’m quite a generalist so a variety suits me.
Susan Freeman
Okay. Then, as you mentioned, September 2023 you were approached to take up the CEO role at MAPP and MAPP is one of the UK’s leading independent real estate management and advisory firms. Now what prompted you to actually take on the role when that came up?
Louise Bonham
Well it is as simple as, actually the culture here is, is really, really, really special and I think, I think I actually mentioned this at the Real Estate Balance event last week, you know, I think perhaps I’d always been a bit cynical in the past that, you know, a really great culture made a really, really big difference. Actually it does though, um, and so the people I met were fantastic. So I met Nigel Mapp first, Mr Mapp and David Klein and, um, got on well with them and the rest of the team and I was actually appointed in March 2023 and the part of the appointment was the fact that there was a clear aspiration and timeline to move to employee ownership, um, hence the, the idea to bring in a kind of new external CEO as it were. So the first big thing that I did when I was here was, again working with lots of other people, but, um, take us through the, the transaction to become employee owned.
Susan Freeman
I mean that is, um, an interesting exercise and perhaps you could tell us a little bit about what that actually means, you know, what the benefits and, you know, whether there are any, any disadvantages?
Louise Bonham
I think, you know, it. It probably depends on the type of company you are. I think it’s quite important to make the point that essentially all the shares or the one share are held by the trustee, so there’s a trustee board. It’s not a case of giving each employee a certain number of shares, that’s not how it works at all. Um, but the trustee is holding, um, the interest in MAPP for the benefit of employees and I think so legally employees are expected to take even more responsibility for the, you know, the success and the productivity of the business and on the other side of things, um, we are duty bound to show how we are taking on employee feedback, not just in terms of benefits and things like that but also in terms of the strategy of the business. And also there are also mechanisms to allow us to share the success, the financial success of the business, um, more with employees and that’s something that, um, with employee owned businesses tend to develop over quite a long period of time. The, the employee owned businesses that you see in the US are, are farther advanced than perhaps in the UK. I think it works extremely well for MAPP because in property operations, you know, operating these assets in the States, there, there really is nothing that we do that one person can do individually. It, it really is the chain, you know, the number of people involved in, in, um, creating great spaces and, and, uh, managing them really well and safely is, is absolutely huge so it is a real team sport, one individual cannot really make the big differences so actually employee ownership is spot on for that. And I think for me what was really attractive about it is I am completely almost obsessed with the fact that I, I really believe that the people who are doing the work know best and they know about the future of the business. You know, I, I obviously can make sure that the corporate side of things is running well and I can, you know, think about the things that I want us to be doing for clients and occupiers but in terms of the day-to-day, um, those people on the front line know best so actually being encouraged to listen to them even more is, in my book, a very, very good thing.
Susan Freeman
And how common is this ownership structure in this country?
Louise Bonham
Increasingly, increasingly. There’s a huge number. I haven’t got the number to hand actually but no, there’s, um, a really significant number and, um, we work with an independent trustee called Graeme Nuttall who is, um, a real leader in the field and he’s always, um, coming up with new ones and actually the press cover them quite a lot so, um, yes I’d recommend it.
Susan Freeman
And how has it changed the culture and the structure of the business so far?
Louise Bonham
Well I think when we were literally signing the transaction there was a pause, I can’t quite remember what happened but, you know, there’s these pauses where something has to happen legally back in the office and, and I said to the, the team of lawyers we were with, well what works best, you know, which companies take to this best? And they said, well, you know, it does tend to be the people who are already quite employee led and so we were quite employee led, we’re very employee led already so it’s increased that but also, you know, we, we have restructured a little bit just to, to make sure that the siloes are broken down and everybody can kind of contribute ideas across all services rather than just in their own. We have brought in future shapers groups and again I think the important thing about them is it’s not just those groups are looking at all different areas of our business, both what we do for clients what we do for occupiers but also what we do corporately and they’re not just coming up with, you know, small ideas. They are genuinely feeding into the strategy of the business and questioning it. We have a very engaged population of just over 670 people and they, they are always challenging what we’re doing next so, um, so there has been an increase in that and it, it’s a step-by-step thing, you know, the more we can do for our people on the financial side of things, you know, the better and the more involved they can be the better.
Susan Freeman
And I think, I mean you’ve mentioned numbers but I think that number has, has grown substantially since you joined. Is that right? You are actually increasing the size of the business?
Louise Bonham
Yes, yes so I think it was probably, it was probably, we are probably 100 people stronger now than we were, um, when I joined so that’s, uh, just over a couple of years ago. But no, you know, it’s, uh, a lot of people in our business, you know, we need them, you know, because of the fact that, as I said, operating business assets take so many people.
Susan Freeman
And do you think that it’s, it’s going to be challenge to keep the special culture going? As you grow the business?
Louise Bonham
Well that is always the big concern and we’ve spent a lot of time, well I’ve spent a lot of time since I joined trying to put my finger on what it is that makes the culture so special. So we have five values and they’re really interesting actually. So, uh, I think my favourites are obviously, be appreciative, is one of ours and that’s very important to me because it makes such a different to peoples’ day-to-day, um, lives. But also, um, we say, um, avoid ambiguity, you know, we say, you know, shoot the elephant in the room, that kind of thing. So there’s some kind of slightly unusual values there but, I spent a lot of time at the beginning of this year going round all our five offices and asking people, well what is it about the culture that you really like, you know, what is it? You know, more than, we have a great Christmas party or we have a great summer party. What is it that makes every day something that you enjoy because our people are very, very protective as a culture, you know, that’s their, again like you, that’s their biggest concern that we might lose it. And I think where we landed was, everybody is very approachable, so approachability is the key, so we only hire people who are approachable, we only hire people who have, you know, quite low egos and again the key thing there is that everybody can feel that they can, you know, go and say to anyone, actually I think we could do this better or, actually I’m stuck on this, can you help me, you know, and I think that really does happen here and it’s actually a really, really important thing I think from a health and safety perspective. So it is absolutely critical that anybody in the business can send me an email and say, actually I am a bit concerned about this or, would you mind helping with this. So I think it’s approachability and we are really, really focussed on, on keeping it as we grow. So far so good, Susan.
Susan Freeman
Yes, well it sounds good. So I think it might be useful for our listeners if you actually talk a little bit about what MAPP do?
Louise Bonham
Well I think it’s a, a nice place to be so essentially historically MAPP was a property manager and we, we are still very, very specialist in that area. We talk more now about operating property because the breadth of what we do is just absolutely huge, so we have what might be seen as traditional property management and we have a lot of that of course. But within that there are so many things, you know, there’s all the building technology elements, we do, uh, renewable power purchasing agreements, we do, um social value analysis, uh, we have design for management, we have building consultancy. So it’s almost everything that you could possibly need to operate an asset and from when you start to think about buying it, to after you sell it. So the breadth is, is absolutely huge and so getting that right and really pulling all of that together I think is the key so we talk a lot about making sure that when you put all of those operational specialists together, we must be more than the sum of our parts, you know, so that service and we believe that the service mix that we have when you put it together, allows us to be more than the sum of our parts for our clients. And we talk about, I don’t know if you’ve, um, seen it Susan, but we’re, we’ve got a, a kind of image that we use which is a marching band. We talk about operational harmony because essentially we, we see that as, um, showing all the different operational specialists that we’ve got, all playing their instruments in a different way, but when it, when it comes together well, um, it sounds great so that’s the approach.
Susan Freeman
And do you, so you have a MAPP band or choir?
Louise Bonham
We don’t, we don’t actually. I have done a lot of singing historically, maybe I should start a choir.
Susan Freeman
Yes that’s my, uh, input. Um, and what sort of, um, property owner clients do you generally work for? What, what sort of properties do you manage?
Louise Bonham
Well, all types. So we have, um, obviously office retail, um, mixed use, uh, growing mixed use, um, team, um, industrial. So all, all the commercial asset classes and we manage for the big institutional investors, um, so the smaller REITs and, um, we have a quite a lot of, um, overseas clients as well. We’ve got some, um, really exciting estates, um, in London at the moment. We’ve got Spittlefields, um, where we were last week of course, uh, London Bridge City, the Portman Estate, uh, so quite a variety and all across the UK. So, um, five offices including one in Glasgow, so.
Susan Freeman
And what would you say differentiates MAPP from other operators in the, in the space?
Louise Bonham
Well we are fervently specialist and so we, we will never, ever expand into anything that isn’t strictly linked to the operations of a building, um, because that’s what we’re good at, that’s what we know and we believe that if you start to bring in more, some of the more consultancy, um, service lines, more agency, it can be a distraction from the nuts and bolts. So, um, we will always remain specialist and I do believe that the culture is particularly special. It’s been something that’s been really, you know, eye opening for me, um, and I think that because we have people who want to stay, our retention rates are very high and our average, you know, average tenure is very, very high, that allows us to create quality service.
Susan Freeman
Yes I think that must be a positive that there is, there is continuity for your, you know, for your clients. And technology must be sort of pretty key to the services that you, you provide. I mean, how are you seeing technology re-shaping the property management and I suppose the occupier experience? I mean it must be very important to what you do?
Louise Bonham
Yes indeed. I think I mentioned building tech earlier and, um, making sure that all our buildings are running as effectively as possible and there’s a huge amount of, um, work that goes into that, um, in terms of making sure BMS’s are running and running well. In terms of technology I think the, the next big things that are coming, you know, work flow, again making sure that things don’t take too long in our part of the industry, that’s the next big phase, you know, we have a lot of great tools already, um, but I’m sure there’s more. And also the, that interface with, um, clients and occupiers, um. at the moment I think that can feel a bit standardised so really making sure that that’s more tailored, um, is the next, next big move forward I think. We are at the moment very focussed on making sure that we are able to adopt AI tools well and effectively and we’re very focussed on making sure that we have all our data in really, really good order so that when these tools do start to appear, that are, you know, ready for us to use at scale we’ll be ready to go. But obviously we are, we’ll need to choose our timing carefully.
Susan Freeman
And it’s difficult to balance, you know, some of the pressures on costs with, you know, providing the service quality that you want to provide. I mean are you able to offer options to clients so, you know, they can manage the costs against service trade-offs, I mean it’s, um, there must be quite a lot of pressure on that at the moment?
Louise Bonham
There is, it’s a huge amount of pressure and obviously inflation is, is a big conversation topic for us. I think, yes we absolutely can, we can talk to clients about trade-offs and we do and also we think as creatively as we can to make sure that service levels, um, from all our supply partners, um, remain as strong. But yes, you know, in, in this part of the industry that is the, the, uh, the eternal challenge, um, is delivering high quality at a, at a reasonably low margin. Again, for me that’s part of the, part of the fun of the job, you know, we, we enjoy doing that well and we, we enjoy the fact that it’s something that we have great experience in and again, I think that’s one of the real strengths of being a specialist in property operations which is that we get all of that, we’re comfortable with it, it’s what we do.
Susan Freeman
And you’re a BCorp and, you know, I know that’s important. I just wondered with all the messaging that’s coming from Trump and, um, you know, America at the moment on sustainability and, um, and Net Zero. Are those, you know, goals continuing to be important for you and, and what, what are you hearing from clients on that?
Louise Bonham
Well corporately yes, our, our goals haven’t changed at all and we’re, we’re as focussed as we ever have been. I think in terms of clients, we haven’t seen a big drop off in interest at all. If anything, we’ve actually seen more clients, um, expanding what their interest in sustainability, perhaps in a more tactical way perhaps, you know, where, as again, I suppose as an industry we are all better informed now so clients are more clear as to exactly what they want for which asset and, you know, where they want the social, um, value impact analysis done and where, where they don’t. So I think, um, we haven’t seen, it would be wrong to say we’ve seen a drop off because we haven’t but we, we only manage UK property so, um, that probably explains it.
Susan Freeman
Yeah so it will be interesting, interesting to see how things go. And we were talking about real estate balance when we started the conversation, so let’s talk a little bit about gender balance. The real estate balance report in 2022 talked about gender balance at board level having improved from 2016 to 2020 but had been back to declining since 2020 and I think their most recent report, you know, it hasn’t improved. Do you have any thoughts on, on why that is because we seem to be sort of making progress, things seem to be going quite well and there seem to be less, less women at board level and also worryingly, falling numbers of women in middle management. I just wondered if you were seeing that if at all, in your business?
Louise Bonham
Well not in our business actually, we’re, we’re doing alright, you know, we’re 55% female. It is the case that in our kind of upper earning bands, so I guess people who report to me I think that’s 60, just over 60% men but actually the, the band just below that is 68% women. So, so that band is okay at MAPP, perhaps because we have such a variety of skill sets. I think, um, and hopefully because they, they feel very welcome here but I don’t, I don’t know what the answer is Susan. I was really disappointed with those, um, results when I saw them last year and I do think there might still be something around, you know, we used to talk about it a lot didn’t we, we’d say, well you can’t be what you can’t see, that was the thing wasn’t it. We used to say that a lot and maybe that’s still the case. I, I do think that perhaps for, and again it’s not just women with children, it’s all women, but I think perhaps there’s a fear that actually going right to the top of a company is actually going to be just so much harder to manage with, with your life. I think I would argue it’s actually easier because you have a level of autonomy that you don’t perhaps in the middle of organisations. I mentioned it earlier about the different pace of careers, I do think there’s something there because for lots and lots of different reasons people want to kind of perhaps go a bit slower in their career for a few years and then I wonder if perhaps our industry kind of says, oh yes, no well they’ve, they’re not as good as they used to be. So actually they kind of take them off the lists, take them off the lists whereas actually, it’s absolutely fine to maybe have a, a few years where you’re not going for all the promotions but then once your, your children or your elderly parents have, um, require less of your time, you maybe want to go for the promotions then. So I think there is something around that. I think also just looking at the, for the children side of things, I think it’s easier to return after children and feel more senior and I think women feel under great pressure to get more senior quicker than perhaps men do, um, and I think that can, um, put people off staying in the sector. So all kinds of things but, um, I don’t know what the answer is.
Susan Freeman
No and also I mean just thinking about some of the people that I’ve interviewed, um, Rita-Rose Gagné at Hammerson, uh, is standing down, Stephanie Hyde at, uh, JLL and I don’t think they are being replaced by women so, you know, some of the, I suppose, role models are going. I mean do you feel that it’s been an advantage or disadvantage being a woman in a predominantly male sector?
Louise Bonham
I think it was hard earlier on in my career, yes I think it was and I think, I think it was the small things that were difficult. Again, I mentioned this last week didn’t I at Real Estate Balance, I think things like if you’re 26 and you’re walking into a meeting and everyone’s talking about, uh, you know, a certain sport or whatever and you can’t, you can’t enter into the conversation, it can be very difficult then to kind of then draw up a chair next to that person because those people are talking and they’ve sat down together and then how do you break into this conversation and actually that did feel, that did feel hard at the time. I do remember actually, I think it must have been at Kushman, anyway I had a meeting with a client who had four children the same age as mine and it was a great meeting and we just talked and, you know, the, the work bit was when I went, and I remember going back upstairs and saying to some of the men in my team, I get it, I get it now, that’s why it’s so easy for you because you just have all of this ease and the stuff outside of the job is so easy to chat through. So, um, I did find that quite hard but less, you know, not in the last, last few years at all and again it’s easier the more senior you are I think.
Susan Freeman
And, I mean apart from the, um, you know, the gender issue, you know, as a sector we have a real problem bringing in young people from different backgrounds and I don’t know, you know, whether you have any thoughts on how we do that and in fact what, what you do to bring people from different backgrounds into MAPP?
Louise Bonham
Well we have apprenticeship schemes, um, as, as I know a lot of our industry does and we don’t just recruit from the real estate courses, again having not done that myself, I’m, you know, very comfortable recruiting people from all kinds of degree backgrounds or indeed those without a degree. I think there’s two sides to what I would say about this. I think in some ways the industry can beat itself up unnecessarily because actually if you look across everybody who works in the built environment, I mean there’s a huge amount of diversity but it just tends to be that the people in the room talking about it are not looking at the whole of the built environment, they’re maybe just looking at, you know, the lawyers and the accountants and the, um, you know, the big agencies. There is a huge amount of diversity and so I’m a big fan of moving people around roles and the industry as much as possible so we work with, um, our supply partners to try and do that because there’s a huge, a huge amount of talent perhaps sitting in a part of the industry in, within our supply partners who might like a go at something else as well. So I think we can beat ourselves up too much about it but having said that, we also need to face up to the fact that in terms of social mobility there’s a huge amount still to do.
Susan Freeman
Yes we are, we are trying aren’t we. And is there anything in particular that you, you learnt about empowering your teams and, you know, how to give them sort of real, real ownership of what they’re doing?
Louise Bonham
I think perhaps that thing about avoiding ambiguity and shooting the elephant in the room and being really candid, I think perhaps there’s been a little bit of a, you know, secret weapon sounds, sounds aggressive but it’s not aggressive but, um, for me in that actually sometimes just saying to someone, look I can see why you’re cross about this, if I were you I’d be cross about this as well, but perhaps we can do it like this. And just being really open with people and not hiding things from them I think works really, really well so even if it’s something that you think it might be easier for me if only a small group of people knew about it because it would make it quicker and more effective, it’s really important to makes sure that you’re telling absolutely everyone who needs to know any information and I think actually, uh, Nigel Mapp who founded MAPP, always says, you know, information’s just information, it’s not power, you know, and he’s entirely right. There’s not a lot out there that shouldn’t be shared. So I think that is definitely something that works well for me and delegating well. I think the art of delegation is something that again actually the accountancy firms train it in really, really well and that’s something that’s benefitted me throughout my whole career.
Susan Freeman
And what about, you know, the occasions when you have to deliver a sort of difficult message, you have to tell somebody something that they don’t necessarily want to hear and, and you don’t want to be ambiguous about it, as you say. I mean those conversations must be really difficult to handle?
Louise Bonham
Yes I suppose although actually I, I have a talk that I do at our leadership training courses and I actually always say, you know, the thing about difficult conversations is it is a muscle, um, and the more you do it, the more it becomes second nature and I think that has been the case for me. So I don’t, I don’t kind of dread those conversations. The other thing I would say in those courses and I think I do this a lot is, don’t always assume you can take a person from point A to point B in one conversation, you know, it may take two, it may take three and don’t just have the same conversation three times, work out well I want to take them from there to there in the first conversation, there to there in the second and there to there in the third. And that might take a little bit longer, take a bit more of your time but often you get to a better outcome.
Susan Freeman
And I think you, you’ve also mentioned to me that you have, um, quite a large HR department?
Louise Bonham
Yes we have twelve, um, people in our people team for 650 overall. Yeah that’s, that’s crucial and it’s a real, I think it’s a USP for MAPP. So that team, as well as doing all of the usual stuff that you expect and they really, really sit alongside line managers and help them so they give them the tools to make sure that our line managers can be really ready for difficult conversations they have to have but also that our line managers are trained to treat everyone as an individual and that our line managers understand what that means. And again, so if our line managers have anything at all in those kinds of areas that they need support with, we’ve got people on hand to do it with them, um, I think that makes a big difference.
Susan Freeman
So it sounds as if there’s quite a lot of training that, um, that goes on at MAPP?
Louise Bonham
Yep huge amount, um, with a massive focus on line management because firstly we can see that, um, strong line management delivers high quality for our occupiers and for our clients but also we can see the direct line between affective line management and our inclusivity stats so, um, people feel comfortable here, uh, when they’ve got a good line manager and of course that leads to greater attention and that leads to more quality and so it’s, it’s a virtuous circle.
Susan Freeman
And has, has MAPP always operated like that?
Louise Bonham
Yes, yes it has and I think it was, it’s been built like this over, so we are about 28 years old now so, it’s been built up slowly over that time so I was very fortunate to come in to a culture that treated line management with a huge amount of respect.
Susan Freeman
And may there hasn’t been but has, has there been anything that’s been a sort of real leadership challenge in your career to date?
Louise Bonham
I think now is a difficult time to be running companies in that the geopolitical situation is, is just ever changing and it, it has a direct impact on, on everything that we do. I was, I was doing a, a presentation internally yesterday and we were looking at the, um, CBI optimism index, uh, for the last five years which, you know, okay it’s a bit of a blunt instrument but it’s not a pretty sight and I think making sure that you are showing people the great things that are going on internally and the great things that they’re doing whilst also on the other side of things making sure that as a CEO you’re retaining as much flexibility and optionality as you can, is a challenge but, uh, again, easier when you actually put it like that for people rather than ignoring it.
Susan Freeman
And it must be, I mean actually must be even more of a challenge I suppose for some of the big global companies…
Louise Bonham
Oh gosh yeah.
Susan Freeman
…because you know, changing things takes a lot longer?
Louise Bonham
And again that’s, I suppose that’s a point about being employee ownership as well is that I do have the ability to change things, you know, I don’t have to go through layers of shareholders. So there’s a big advantage for me there.
Susan Freeman
And is there any advice that you’d give to someone aspiring to a leadership role in a real estate company?
Louise Bonham
Gosh I am not sure, I’m not sure I presume to Susan but, um, well for me I think that slightly odd career route has actually proved to be really, really valuable, you know, the kind of looking at things from an equity analyst perspective but also from a really quite detailed operation perspective has given me a level of confidence around the industry that, that’s really key. The other thing I’d say is that, this is a great time to be, um, wanting to lead within the industry because whether you’re, you know, male or female because, um, since I joined the industry there is now a much greater acceptance of the value of all different types of leadership so you know, we, I remember being kind of trained to almost be like an alpha male, you know, sit in front of the window apparently Susan because it’s, the light makes you feel more powerful, look more powerful but, you know, that, that’s long gone now and so now you can lead how you feel is best. That does make it harder in some ways because there isn’t a manual to follow but I actually think there’s probably never been a, a better time to be wanting to be a leader in the industry because I think the doors are much more open.
Susan Freeman
Yes it’s interesting, I do remember times in my career when I smoked cigars and wore sort of trouser suits because…
Louise Bonham
Yes, yes.
Susan Freeman
…I felt that was the thing, the thing to do.
Louise Bonham
And shirts with cufflinks, that was a, that was a period of time wasn’t it.
Susan Freeman
And aftershave actually at one point. But yes, as you say, things have changed. And if you weren’t in real estate, is there any other, sort of in a parallel universe, is there any other career you think you would have been happy pursuing?
Louise Bonham
Oh gosh, I don’t know, I, I, considered the civil service very strongly for quite a long time. Again, I think the attraction of that was the, the generalist element, um, and I think, I knew that you could move around quite a lot within the civil service but there was a, I don’t know if it’s still the case, but there was a very scary exam you had to take and I think after having done my degree I’d had enough of that so I didn’t, I rejected it as an opportunity.
Susan Freeman
Very sensible. And looking back at your career to date, is there any decision that you made or you didn’t make that you would like to re-visit?
Louise Bonham
No, no I don’t think so. I suppose the, the thing I probably learnt is that gut feel is, is worth a lot and I actually read something interesting where recently, very recently, just in the last couple of weeks where it said actually, you know, CEO’s often say, oh my gut feel is X but it isn’t, that’s built on years of experience and you’re actually pulling all of that together to get that gut feel and actually I think you know that with jobs, I really, really do. My dad used say that, uh, to me, he said, I was trying, uh, which job shall I take next? He’d say, well, well go with your gut and my mother used to say, you know, what do you know, you’re a farmer, um, but he’s right, um, and actually so I think going with your gut is key. I think the best decision I made Susan, it was probably the, and a lot of people told me not to do it, but the best decision was to fight my way back in and to keep going even though so many people said, why are you bothering, you’re not going to have any money left at the end of the month, and all, you know, once you’ve paid for the child care. But it was so worth it to have kind of had the, the career that I’ve had since.
Susan Freeman
That’s fantastic. So Louise, thank you very much, thank you for your time today.
Louise Bonham
Thanks very much Susan.
Susan Freeman
Thank you so much Louise for sharing so many useful insights on your varied career to date, the real estate sector and your vision for MAPP and I am full of admiration for the way you manage such a challenging role alongside bringing up four children.
So that’s it for now. I hope you enjoyed today’s conversation. Please join us for the next PropertyShe podcast interview coming very soon.
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