Embrace the Pain.
Now don’t get me wrong: I don’t want you to suffer. But sometimes suffering teaches lessons that sunshine and rainbows can’t.
People who know me know that I balk at a lot of technology. Not because I don’t think it’s valuable or amazing, but because I think it can be so amazing that it’s easy to let the shininess blind you from the things you actually need. We don’t go anywhere without tiny computers in our pockets and pocketbooks; we’re so connected that we know of happenings in countries thousands of miles away within seconds of them occurring (and ironically, often while not knowing what’s going on down the street with our neighbors). We are wired for tech. We feel inadequate when we disconnect. And while all of that is amazing, it’s equally dangerous insofar as it often prevents us from getting to the heart of solving for the lowest common denominator.
Zen often emphasizes simplicity and minimalism, focusing on essential aspects rather than excessive complexity. In fact, this is the principle that initially piqued my curiosity surrounding Zen philosophies. While I don’t believe in experiencing pain for pain’s sake, I do believe experiencing pain is often a necessary and useful vehicle for uncovering real needs.
When I first came to the STR/VR industry from hotels in 2015, I was flummoxed that we didn’t have a pace report. But it wasn’t just Natural Retreats; it was the entire industry. It took nearly two years to get one I was happy with, but when I finally did, it was a victory I still can’t adequately verbalize to this day… More akin to experiencing some form of “ultimate reality” in which I could only experience vs. explain. But the pain I experienced as a result of not having that pace report directly contributed to the level of elation experienced when I was finally victorious (that sounds dramatic, but it was) nearly two years later… And the pain of need both reinforced its necessity and contributed to designing and producing the tool that did what I needed it to do.
Similarly, there was no “STR Report” (Smith Travel Research, not to be confused with the Short-Term Rental moniker), either. Hotels largely live and die by that STR Report, so not having anything similar in the STR/VR space felt lacking to say the least. When I came face-to-face with Pierre and Transparent Intelligence at the VRMA International Conference in Orlando in 2017, I thought I’d won the lottery! Again, another instance where I had been feeling the pain of a gaping hole (lack of aggregated market data).
Fast forward to today when there are more tools and resources than I ever thought possible a mere five or six years ago, let alone eight. And those tools and resources are light years ahead of where they were even two or three years ago (many of them didn’t even exist two or three years ago)! But here’s the rub: While fancy tools can absolutely revolutionize how you work, adopting a tool that doesn’t solve a defined problem can quickly become a problem in and of itself.
I am a skeptic. I am just wired that way. I question everything. And I mean EVERYTHING. Every. Damn. Thing.
As a revenue manager, that’s probably a good trait. As a leader, it can be crippling. As a revenue leader, it’s probably more of a pro than a con.
I resisted a pricing tool for years… Probably longer than my team would have liked. But I am thankful that I didn’t give in too fast, and at this point (because as I’ve mentioned, I’m open to re-evaluating everything at any given time), I’d likely do it again the very same way if I had a do-over. Because when I did finally engage with a solution, it wasn’t a surrender but discovery of a true solution to a need. I did feel pain (with my team) leading up to the decision to engage Wheelhouse, and I did know we needed a tool to assist in our day-to-day, but the pain and patience paid off in spades when we (it was very deliberately a team effort) found the right solution for us that solved the right problems. I should also add that even after the decision was made (and it was not an easy decision b/c the competition is excellent), we moved very slowly during the onboarding process as I felt it was imperative to experience all of the changes/pain points – in outcome, sure, but also foundationally in how we operated on a day-to-day basis and how those shifts would affect our analysis, actions, and interaction with other departments downstream.
Now, I know I can be curmudgeonly as well, so I have to be self-aware enough to know the difference between being willing to experience pain points as part of a growth journey and being critical for the sake of being critical, but this has been perhaps one of the greatest life lessons I’ve ever been fortunate enough to learn.
-Sarah
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