Episode 57: Engagement Is Not Endorsement: Leading Through Disagreement

Charlie Harary (0:00)

This is Crossing the Chasm, your front row seat to how leaders think in real time. My name is Charlie Harary, RXR's Chief People and Organizational Strategy Officer. And I'm joined with RXR's CEO and leader, Scott Rechler. Join us as we break down what's happening in the world and we pull out the leadership lessons behind the headlines. Scott, thanks for taking the time.

Scott Rechler (0:17)

It's great to be here.

Charlie Harary (0:18)

You have been elected, you've been appointed to be on Mayor Mamdani's New York City Business Advisory Council. And I know that you have disagreements with the mayor on certain policies and it would seem more natural for someone to say, listen, I don't agree with your policies, I don't agree with some of the things you're saying, I'm not going to be part of your council. But yet you didn't do that. You decided to join the council. Can you share this a little bit as to what you were thinking in doing so?

Scott Rechler (0:39)

First, I would say that as I have some disagreements and I have some agreements, right, I think one thing just starting with the mayor and his administration is, and we talked about this early on, I believe you got to not be drowned out by the noise, by the headlines of what people say they think is going to happen or are happening. But look at the facts on the ground. And what I've seen in the facts on the ground is New York right now is flourishing, right? We have more people coming to New York not fleeing New York. We have more companies leasing space in New York. We have more people renting apartments in New York. We've had the vitality and energy in the city is extraordinary, right? So the headlines of we have this new mayor and everyone's going to flee is not the facts today, right? The second thing, I think more practically, is that engaging with the administration has been also much more constructive than people anticipated.

From RXR's standpoint, as a business leader, if we have an issue, there was issues with the related homelessness encampments, you call the first deputy mayor, calls you back that night. An issue on something in economic development, call the deputy mayor, she calls you back that same day or the next day or over the weekend. So they're engaged, they're being constructive, they're focusing on trying to get things done, right? So the first thing is, again, don't get drowned out by ideology or news headlines in the concept. The second thing, and most important for me is, listen, I love this city, and if any mayor, whoever that is, asked for my support and my advice, I would give that. Same thing for any governor or any president. Anything I could do to be helpful for the city state of this country, I feel compelled as a citizen to be able to offer whatever I can offer. And I think it's even more important if you do not have a full agreement with someone, right? Because when you disagree, it doesn't mean you should disengage. It means you should engage more. It means that's where you should be having the conversations and make sure that your voices are heard. You're not always going to be accepted, but at least you can make your case to be able to show someone why you believe something is different than they may be believing themselves, right? That level of engagement, understanding it's not endorsement.

Charlie Harary (2:37)

It's an interesting distinction because I think sometimes when people disagree with somebody, they let that disagreement overshadow the rest of their judgment and then hope that the person fails. Losing the larger picture along the way.

And here I think you're doing the opposite and saying, listen, whether or not every policy I agree with, the most important thing is the city. And that's really what I'm after. I'm after the success of the collective. And so willing to engage in tension and willing to engage in different opinions is better than not being invited to the room at all.

Scott Rechler (3:06)

And I tell a story that back in teen, I had the honor to be able to take Martin Luther Martin III at the request of then President-elect Trump to meet with him on MLK Anniversary Day.

And when I was going with Martin to the meeting, he was telling me how a number of his colleagues were giving him a lot of pressure to not go. And I said, so why are you doing this? And he said, because my father would always say, when you disagree is the most important time to come together and discuss, right? Because if you're not in discussions, if you're not engaging with people, you're just going to go, the discourse, the lack of discourse is just going to create more divisiveness. And it's important to have these conversations. And it stuck with me as even more important, again, when you have that level of disagreement, to have discourse versus continued divisiveness. And so if he was able to do that, this is easy to do. The other thing I'll just say with the mayor, I agree with a lot of his diagnoses of the challenges of the city, right? I agree that we have an affordability issue. I agree that we have a housing issue. I agree that there's a sense of disenfranchisement of a lot of particularly young people who feel like they're not having the same opportunities that maybe past generations had in the city. The question is, while that's the diagnosis, what's the prescription to solve it? We may be not agreeing on some of those things, right? Some we don't. But there is issues that got to be dealt with. They're real issues, they're complex issues. And I think it's critical to have businesses' voice at the table to be able to share that perspective. And I think one thing that was important about this Business Advisory Council that was set up was it's only business people. In many cases, what other mayors have done is they set these up and you have business people, you have labor, you have civic, which is okay. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that. But all those voices together end up diluting the message, right? Versus it diffuses it down. Here, you have a central voice of business in New York, not just big business, big, small, medium-sized businesses all coming together sharing their concerns with the mayor.