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Our “Male Ally of the Month” column focuses on the men going out of their way to support women in the hospitality industry. While we all know they don’t have to help, these guys want to help, and this column takes the time to find out how and why they are determined to help us reach gender equality.
Not even five years out of the Cornell University Nolan School of Hotel Administration, Jesse Pohl is already making his mark in the industry and as a champion for equality. Earlier this year, when we were looking to host an event in Miami to gather herteliers, Jesse jumped in to support and raise awareness with his contacts in the South Florida hospitality community. His beliefs for equity run deep and are authentic, which is why we’ve chosen him as our Male Ally of the Month. Is Jesse a representation of the next generation of men? Is equality only a matter of time? We chat with our Mr. September, Jesse Pohl, Analyst, Hotel Investment Sales, JLL.
What drew you to hospitality and what was your first job in the industry?
My first exposure to hospitality was at the dinner table - I grew up in a true foodie household. Dinnertime was a time for all of us - my mother, father, older brother and I (and occasionally our cat Dmitri, with his paw out) - to connect, debrief the day, discuss plans and ideas. Absolutely NO phones at the table! So meals were always about the people you shared them with. But, to be sure, delicious food made that all the more compelling! My dad is an avid wine collector (some early, responsible, tastes of alcohol contributed to bringing me to the table each night) and my mom is a professionally trained chef. So we ate and drank well, and most of the time we spent together as a family was around food.
My mom’s profession in my childhood was as a food writer for Westchester Magazine. She got connected with Chef Andy Nusser while writing an article for the magazine, around the time I was looking for my first internship in high school. Chef Nusser connected me with his colleagues at Batali & Bastianich Hospitality Group, and I went to work in Manhattan for Mr. Rajan Lai, VP of HR for B&BHG at the time, the summer before my senior year. I got to see F&B at the corporate level, and spent time working the front line in such famed restaurants as Lupa, OTTO, Casa Mono, and Felidia. I enjoyed the corporate side, but I found in the restaurants that the delivery of precise - and genuine - service was even more gratifying.
A final note on my foundation that I would be remiss to leave out: my time in Scouting (I am an Eagle Scout), where service to one’s community, both local and global, is a key pillar. This solidified my commitment to always give more than I take. Indeed, Life is Service, as says our core tenet proudly inscribed in Statler Hall at Cornell…
You went on to Cornell and graduated Magna Cum Laude, well done! Have you always been driven to push for excellence?
Well, I appreciate the pat on the back, but for me, there is really no other way. Well, to be completely transparent, I did have to be pulled back to that realization at times growing up when the allure of newfound teenage distractions pulled me out of focus (thanks, Mom and Dad for steering me true!) But at this point it really is a core principle of mine to do everything to the absolute best of my ability. If my name is on it - or even a colleague’s or friend’s name - I require it to be of the quality and integrity that it can be shouted from the rooftops, or as the old saying goes, “on the cover of the New York Times.” I want my work to stand on its own and make me proud, wherever it winds up or in whoever’s hands.
As to my core values, which directly feed into my commitment to the pursuit of excellence; I wrote in my journal, one brisk January day during my senior year at Cornell, a promise to myself: “I will conduct all business, public and private, ethically and equitably.” If, at the end of my day I can’t look back and say I kept that promise, nothing else will have mattered.
What has been your journey to get to your current role at JLL?
Well it all begins in May of 2020 - I am, for better or worse, a COVID graduate. Leaving the house in Ithaca where I’d lived the past two years with my best friends, to then be quasi-quarantined back at home with my parents and no career yet to speak of, was jarring to say the least. That first month back home wreaked havoc on my self-identity and self-confidence. Fortunately, I didn’t have long to sit in self-pity before my next chapter began to take shape.
In late 2019 before COVID set in, I had engaged with one “alternative” (non-hospitality) career path - a real estate role at Ranger Power, a utility-scale solar development firm based at the time in DUMBO, NYC. In June of 2020, with our industry reeling, that was the only company to re-engage with me when I reached back out. I gladly joined them, initially in a remote position, with the ultimate plan to do what I always thought I’d do after college - move into NYC and advance my career.
What ultimately transpired, though, was a far cry from it! Ranger Power offered a position as Real Estate Portfolio Manager, but in Chicago! I had never been to Chicago, had no family there, hardly any connections at all. But there I was, in October of 2020, pulling into the city for the very first time with everything I owned in the back of a rented minivan. Exploring my new home in downtown Chicago, in the height of the pandemic was about as bizarre an experience as you might imagine. In reflection, I had the most amazing time in Chicago and with Ranger Power. It definitely brought me pride when I told people that I had a role in driving the greatest energy industry transformation in generations, for a healthier planet.
By mid-2022, though, as the world had returned to normalcy, I too was ready to return to hospitality. JLL, headquartered in Chicago, had the pedigree and reputation I could proudly pin my name to, and I was ecstatic at the opportunity to join the Hotels group in a third-party asset management role. Asset management was the perfect way to get back into the industry, speaking the language again and working with both owners and operators day in and day out. I loved my team and learned a lot, but before too long, I realized I was even more drawn to the high-energy and fast-paced dynamics of JLL’s investment sales and brokerage business.
On one of my many trips to visit friends in Miami for some sun, I engaged with JLL’s Miami hotels team, and pursued an analyst role with them relentlessly. Within a couple of months, in the Spring of 2023, I had sublet my apartment in Chicago and headed down to Miami, again with all my belongings in the back of a (this time slightly larger) rented U-Haul. It’s been another amazing chapter for me here in Miami ever since.
Have there been women who influenced your life and career?
Indeed, too many to give due credit to in this short response! But I will try.
Of course, my mom is number 1. She taught me to be curious, ambitious, and unapologetically authentic. She nurtured in me a love for food and cultural travel, and of course, opened the door to my first opportunity in our incredible industry. She also raised me, by her own example, with the understanding - not some principled and brave stance, but the simple understanding - that every woman has the right to be as ambitious, as confident, as loud, as anybody else. When I see a woman in a position of power, authority, or expertise, it does not intimidate me or threaten me, it reassures me. Because I know, in almost every case, she is overqualified.
And such has indeed been my experience reporting directly to women in business throughout my career. With Ranger Power, I reported first to the Director of Operations, Carter Scott, a deeply knowledgeable energy interconnections expert from Maine. Later, as the organization restructured, I reported to the general-counsel-turned-COO, Danielle Changala, truly one of the sharpest individuals I have ever known. One of the qualities they both possessed, which I admired and benefitted from tremendously, was their openness to deliver candid, clear, and constructive feedback to get the results they needed from me to run the business. Carter and Dani are indeed two women not intimidated by anything.
With JLL Hotels & Hospitality, our global head of asset management during my time in that practice was Andrea Grigg, perhaps the most stalwart and effective asset manager in the business. She taught me by example to know my stuff cold, stand up for what I know is true, and hold colleagues and counterparts accountable for stated goals. Also at JLL, Gilda Perez-Alvarado, global CEO of the Hotels group during my early days with the company, had a presence and an ability to curate relationships across boundaries that anybody in business should seek to emulate. Watching her operate at the highest level of business, particularly in certain parts of the world not known for elevating women, inspired me every day.
…just to name a few!
Let’s get to your views on equality, going from Cornell, which has slightly more female students than male, into the real estate sector of the hotel business which is heavily male dominated. Do you feel a more diverse industry would be better for business?
Without a doubt in my mind. As a general principle, I believe that every industry should reflect a cross-section of the people it serves. Who, in hospitality, do we serve? The answer is simple: it’s EVERYBODY. Our industry is perhaps the most important (maybe outside of government, healthcare, and a few others) to reflect the people it serves. How can our industry possibly hope to meet the needs - and equally valid, the wants - of all guests if our teams, from the C-Suite to the front line, do not reflect those very guests? It simply cannot.
So, we’ve established that the teams directly responsible for serving the myriad guests of the hotel industry ought to reflect a cross section of those guests. But who serves them? Of course, it’s the owners and investors, who hire them, who empower them with the resources and the authority to serve those guests. So it really stems from ownership decisions made in the real estate space. And I will add, from conversations with senior members of our industry, that the ownership side has become less attuned to the human dynamics of the operations side over time. So let this be a call to women, and members of all groups really, who feel they know what our industry needs but haven’t been able to get it yet through ownership: take the leap! Come over to the real estate investment and ownership side. Winning ideas win in this industry, you just sometimes need to do it from the top-down.
How do you think we increase diversity in leadership?
While we clearly are not yet at a point where we’ve reached the perfect mix of diversity in industry leadership, it’s important to collectively appreciate that we have come a very long way. Progress doesn’t happen overnight, and if we expect it to, we will be perpetually disappointed. My grandmother, in the ‘40s and ‘50s, was lucky to find work as a typist for minimal pay. My mother, in her college years, was made to wear a tight dress and spin around for a restaurant manager before she was hired as a waitress. Now take me, a young man in the year 2024, who has had more women managers than men, at top firms in both the energy and real estate industries. That’s some pretty meaningful progress.
But indeed, we’ve got farther to go. So how do we get there? As I see it: I think that by and large, folks (men) in positions of authority in the industry do genuinely want for more diversity in leadership. I don’t think anybody worth working with believes today that their firm is better off with a homogeneity of white men at the leadership level. And that doesn’t mean just a “token” woman here or there.I do truly believe that most people understand the value in having diverse voices genuinely participating in leadership decision-making. And while we need to hold current leaders accountable to proactively foment this inclusion, I would also reach back to one of my earlier responses as a call to action: Women - be ambitious, be confident, and be LOUD. Do not hesitate. It may be uncomfortable, it may turn heads, and it may ruffle feathers. But you will get where you are meant to be.
Your passion for Equity is admirable, do you feel your views are representative of Gen Z? As we look toward the future, do you think the hotel industry will get to equality in leadership naturally as the current generation rises up the ranks?
Absolutely, yes! Mine is the most forward-thinking generation yet, second only to one - the children we will bring into this world, and so on. As we face crises that are existential in nature like never before, such as the global climate crisis, global conflict risk, and massive income and wealth inequality across the planet, we were born to be problem-solvers. And as we tackle these truly existential threats, I believe that improving equity across genders, races, and other divides will be an integral part of the solutions we bring forth and implement. As my generation continues to replace those prior, we will experience a monumental shift: away from the choice of equality, to the acceptance of equality as a plain reality. Ultimately, equality will be a collective understanding, and not an optional belief. But for now, we have to keep our voices LOUD.
As my generation continues to replace those prior, we will experience a monumental shift: away from the choice of equality, to the acceptance of equality as a plain reality.
Quickfire with Jesse
What is your morning routine?
It starts in the best way possible - I wake up next to my two favorite women! That is, my superstar girlfriend Emalie, and my darling rescue cat Rapunzel. I suit up, hop on the MetroMover (rare public transit that actually functions in Miami), and have breakfast at the office while I clear the inbox and prioritize for the day.
What do you do to relax?
Music is number one! Any time I can catch a live show or hit a dancefloor, I’m there, shaking tail. Then, for more quiet nights, it’s relaxing at home with Emalie and Rapunzel, watching the Yankees or catching up on our latest TV show. On a nice day, I would love to tell you it’s hiking in the woods, but sadly, Miami is not known for its wooded trails! So I make do with a bike ride across the Venetian Causeway to Miami Beach…
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
“Your reputation takes a lifetime to build, but only an instant to destroy.” Build it, and protect it, with care.
What books, podcasts, TV are you into right now?
I’m like a million years late, but finally watching The Sopranos! Just finished season 2 - don’t spoil it!