 Well, it's 4 p.m. on Tuesday afternoon, and that means it's time for working together. I'm your host, Cheryl Kerzer-Garcia, and on this show we talk about the changing face of business and work in Hawaii. And we welcome you to call in and join us with your questions or comments. You can telephone at area code 415-871-2474, or you can tweet us at thinktechhi. Today we are so, so fortunate to have a special guest who means a great deal to me personally because he was my first boss. So joining us today from production Hawaii is its president, Mike Roussel. Hi Mike. I can't believe how long it was ago that I was your boss. It was 34 years. Amazing. That's true, but you're still 15 years older than I am. And that will stay that way. Yeah, it will. Now, Mike, you actually saw your first business success or your first entrepreneurial success as a producer of trade shows and other special events. Can you tell us a little bit about the shows that you were responsible for bringing to life? Well, first let me back up and say that my first dipping of my toe into the entrepreneurial pool was before that when I started a company called Honolulu Emergency Labor Pool, H-E-L-P. Health Incorporated is what it became known as, and it was an industrial temporary help company. Wow. But I operated for eight years before discovering that I would much rather be in the trade show slash exhibition show business after having done an industrial trade show in 1977 and discovered how much fun it was, how gratifying it was to be the producer of an event that all kinds of top level executives were praising and thanking me for. And I got hooked. And the industrial show went on for five or six years after that. Shows have a tendency to sort of wane after a while. They can anyway. So I decided that it was a good idea to create other types of expos. The one that exists to today was created shortly after the industrial show timeframe and it's known as the Hawaii Seniors Fair, which has had a very long, no pun intended, life expectancy, which I'm happy about. It goes on as we speak. It's a full house show every September at Blaisdell Center. And I'm in my glory when I'm there. That's nice. And you continue to fill the show with exhibitors and present new and different products for your market? Well, if you don't, you're not doing your job very well. The thing that keeps the show successful is keeping up with the times, adapting to various changes that the market tells you are important and advisable, and listening to your clientele, your exhibitors, say, Mike, why don't you try this? Or why don't we do this? Or isn't it time that we, you know, so on and so forth? And if you pay attention to those hints and shouts and murmurs along the way, the show stays vibrant. And I'm happy to say the Seniors Fair has accomplished that. That's good. What sorts of clues do you look for that a particular project is either losing relevancy or gaining relevancy within the market? Well, clues. The best source of clues for me for what I do and what I try to continue to improve upon would be in the form of feedback from our exhibitor clientele, who, given the type of show that we're doing, have an insight into their Kuliana, their field, if you will. In the Seniors Fair, there are seven or eight different major subfields that address the different needs of Seniors. And, for instance, one really strong one is Travel on Leisure, because that's what Seniors do a lot of anymore. So the Travel on Leisure exhibitors in the show are constantly telling me what's going on in their realm and what I should be, you know, focusing on to make sure that it is well publicized and attended. That's good. Now you're also the president of Production Hawaii. Tell us about that organization. Well, Production Hawaii is essentially in the rental business and the business of producing events for other people that would just as soon not learn how to do it. A good example of that is Sunset on the Beach. We've been the producer of Sunset on the Beach since day one. And Sunset on the Beach is owned, essentially, to use the term loosely by the Waikiki Improvement Association. And Rick Eggins, God bless him, has much better things to do than walk around on the sand down at Queens Beach producing a very lively, enjoyable entertainment event. He does have some very capable help in a young lady by the name of Janet Maduli, who has very deep resources in entertainment and she's no stranger to a live audience and a stage presence and whatnot. But my company comes in and physically makes that event happen for the benefit of the owners. Wow. I didn't know you did that. And I have to thank you because I have spent many, many evenings at Sunset on the Beach. Thank you. We're happy to hear that. It's a wonderful way to spend an evening. Well, it is. There's only one downfall from that. I enjoy a martini at the evening and you can't do that at the beach. Talk to me during the break. You're going to tell me how to do that? Uh-huh. Okay. Now, every business has challenges. What are some of the challenges that you've experienced? And how do you overcome them? Well, a business that must have employees to function inherits challenges just, you know, no way around it. I've been very fortunate to be able to attract and retain people that don't really provide that many challenges, although there are some. But I realize that when those challenges are brought forward and find themselves squarely in front of me, I need to know how to respond to them so that the people that are helping me be successful are successful as well. And are, if you will, motivated to continue doing the right things. And so that's my best answer to what you said. Okay. Say a little bit more about, it sounds as though you don't have very much turnover. Do you? Very little, unfortunately. The kind of turnover that I have is when an employee reaches a level of competence, expertise, knowledge ability and whatnot that he or she has offered other opportunities at compensation levels beyond what I can offer. I can offer in my business. So the folks that leave us usually are going on to something better, which I think is a great kind of turnover. I love to see that happen. It's very, very rare far and few between that a turnover happens for disciplinary purposes because the crew that I have is very self-disciplined. They take care of themselves. They take care of each other. They try not to bring, you know, Manini problems to me. They realize that that's not my job. Right. And I would imagine too that there's a need, they would need to develop a tight core relationship amongst each other because of the nature of the work. I mean, you have to do it safely and you have to maintain, follow all of the necessary regulations. Well, we don't have that many regulations. We have to be safe. I mean, that's for sure. And we would want that in any case. But there is obviously in Hawaii a very strong emphasis on safety in the workplace. And there is a lot of, shall we say, policing that goes on in that regard. I'm very happy to say we have never been, quote, busted for not being safe. We have always told the mark and had, I could count the lost time accidents over how many 30-some years on one hand. Wow. One hand. That's great. Yeah. I, in some of my previous corporate HR work, I've handled safety. And that's a record that we should figure out how other companies can replicate it. Right. I wish I could tell you there was a magic formula. I think it just takes a concerted effort among a group of people that will want to be safe and have some insight into how to achieve that. And if they don't understand a safety issue and they either get corrected by a supervisory person or they discover something's not working because I bang my finger and it doesn't feel good, they can fix that because they're not dumb. No, no. But you also have a safety factor for the customers that come to see your shows, the folks at Sunset on the Beach. How do you ensure that you're minimizing opportunities for foolish people to hurt themselves? Well, at the seniors fair, we have a unique challenge in that regard because our audience is elderly people. A lot of elderly people. I've been there, I know. You know. And in order to have the show look right and feel right, we carpet all of the aisles. And unless you're constantly after that carpet to make sure that it's smooth and not crumpling up and creating trip hazards, you're taking care of your audience pretty well. There's nothing really much else to be concerned about because people don't move that fast. They aren't trying to win a road race. They're trying to see the show at their own pace. And for the most part, our seniors at the seniors fair audience level have a fairly slow pace, which is okay with me because they don't get hurt. Yeah, that's true. What made you decide to become an entrepreneur? Why that as opposed to... You're a very talented man. You could turn your hand to anything and be successful. So why entrepreneurship? Well, that harkens back to age 12, if I may. When I first discovered that a paper route was a good thing for a 12-year-old guy that liked to have a little money in his pocket. So I took on a paper route and had a pretty easy time of it. So my mentor from the newspaper came to me and said, how would you like to have two paper routes? Instead of one, he said, I think you can run two of them and make more money and earn more of these premiums that we offer for enlarging the size of the event. So there's where the entrepreneurship comes in. So taking a paper route with 50 customers and turning it into a paper route with 70 customers takes some... Skill. Yeah, well, it takes perseverance and it takes a certain salesmanship kind of element of your personality that I think I was born with. I'm not going to take credit for creating that. I think it just comes with who you are and what your mommy and daddy were able to pass along to you in those categories. But that's when it started and it just kind of got more and more intense for me as we went along. And after my obligatory time doing other things, like school, like military service and whatnot, I went right back into, where do I get a business license here? I need to open my doors for creating entrepreneurial opportunity. That's neat. So are you seeing the traits that you have that made you successful? Are you seeing that in the younger generation today? Boy, that's a tough question because I don't spend a whole lot of time with the younger generation today. They are not especially attuned to the kind of work that we do. A typical college kid doesn't have a lot of interest in swinging a sledgehammer. That's true. We're going to do a little bit of housekeeping here. Tell everybody about the great programming we've got on Think Tech Hawaii, and so we will be right back in two minutes. Don't go away. Here on Think Tech Hawaii, where we co-host Hibachi Talk, where we talk about technology and all kinds of cool guests. Also, my co-host with me today is... Andrew, the security guy. Thanks for watching. Thanks for watching Think Tech Hawaii, and thanks for watching Hibachi Talk. We also have Angus. Angus, I bring you all kinds of weird things. Oh, look, you can see my lips move. Hi, Aloha. My name is Chris Letham, and I host a show called The Economy and You. The show plays every Wednesday at noon. And on my show, I bring on guests who are interested or are working in the technology space. And so I'd like you to come and watch the show and learn with me about all the sort of exciting things that we're doing in Hawaii to build and grow our economy ecosystem. So I'd like to say Aloha, and I look forward to seeing you on the show. Thank you. Hi. Welcome back to Working Together. I'm Cheryl Crozier-Garcia, your host. And we are having a great conversation with Mike Rossell, the President of Production, Hawaii Incorporated. And he was just telling us about the skills that he is noticing with our upcoming generation of workers. And you mentioned that a lot of people are not interested in swinging a sledgehammer. And I want to talk about that a little bit more because there's always going to be a need for somebody to swing a sledgehammer. And other manual output. That's true. The trick would be to show an entry-level person of the millennial persuasion that swinging a sledgehammer or sweeping a floor or what have you leads somewhere. They would probably find it impossible to believe that this is something they're going to want to do for very long. And it would clear that if you do it well and you do it with a certain sincerity and personal commitment to the quality of the work, you're going to go up the scale. You're not going to stay down there where you don't want to be. You're going to go like this. And that's, I think, the key to bringing out the best in entry-level folks. I remember getting my first job. It wasn't quite as bad as swinging a sledgehammer, and my grandfather told me that I should be looking for things to do. Tasks that needed doing and I should do them without being told. And if I did that, all would be well. I'd be successful. The boss would like me. It would be good. And that was probably the best advice someone could give me. But I don't see that same kind of willingness to go oven beyond the call in our young generation. Have you found ways to, apart from telling them that if you do a good job at this, you'll be able to do a good job at something else. Have you been able to motivate your crews to see what needs doing without being told and getting that handled? Well, I'm blessed in that regard. I have a crew that's very tight-knit and they look at each other as brothers. And they kind of take the onus to break in, if you will, a new person to understand that, hey, we all take care of each other. We are going to be safe together. We're going to be successful together. We're going to make money together. Mike's going to treat us well as a group and as individuals. So be part of that. And so I don't really have to do much to inform relatively new people of those opportunities. Their co-workers really do it for me. The long-term result is those people that take that seriously and do see an opportunity stay and they go upward. That's good. That is I don't even know what to say, Mike. It's what you should be shooting for. Let's put it that way. Yeah, I agree with you. And I'd like to figure out a way to bottle it, whatever it is. And then you and I could go into business together. Be entrepreneurial together. I don't mind. Okay. What advice do you have for young entrepreneurs? Let's say I'll give you an example. The last show I did, we had two young folks on and they were starting businesses of their own. One of them was an eco-tourist kind of thing where they take tours, teach people how to paddle board and things like that. The other was a young man who is interested in starting an organic B farm for the purposes of producing organic honey. So what kind of advice, if they came to you and said, you know, Mike, you've been successful in Hawaii for a really long time, I want to be successful like you. Tell me what to do. Well, my first question would be how much money do you have? It's always an issue. You mean undercapitalization? Most entrepreneurs sell themselves short with that particular, you know, challenge in mind. They say, oh, well, you know, I'm good at what I do, so the money will be, you know, automatic. It's just going to happen. Well, it's not that way. You have to plan to have enough money to meet obligations as they come due. And most entrepreneurs that I am acquainted with, including yours truly, have learned that the hard way by not having enough money to make do with oncoming surprises. Unfortunately, those experiences are a long time behind me, but I did learn on a steep curve what it was all about to not be ready for financial demands that you didn't have the pocket to deal with. So I guess my first piece of advice would be if you don't have enough money, you know, to meet your expenses without any income at all for two months, you better go out and find some. Because without it, you're going to be treading water big time. Okay. What else would you recommend? What else? Well, I believe in long work days, long work weeks, sure, there's got to be some time for some recreation and some, you know, keeping your physical body going the right direction and enjoying some of the finer things that you're working supposedly to be able to possess. Those considerations are kind of individual in nature. Some people are better than others at staying physically fit. Some people are better than others at putting in long hours. But I would encourage any budding entrepreneur to try to work an 80 hour week and see how that feels. Make sure you have enough work to do so you don't get bored but put in 80 hours see if you can do it. If you can do it, you're loaded for bear. With adequate capitalization. With adequate money, yes. What about the gig economy? You know, where people are constructing livelihoods from numbers of part-time jobs or numbers of little ventures. So you might have someone who drives for Uber when they're not at work. They rent out their spare bedroom as an Airbnb. They get involved in various kinds of small business, multi-level type operations. How would you advise somebody in that type of situation to maybe look for something where they're working for someone else for a while or would you encourage them to continue to hustle? Well, the activities that you just described are peculiar for the most part to individuals who are not in business quote unquote. They're manipulating their personal fortunes like the Uber driver and the B&B option and whatnot. They're not really in business as such. They're dabbling in making money under their own auspices and steam and not actually sort of hanging out their shingle and saying I'm a business. That's a major step and it's not a bad idea to dabble as an individual experimenting with entrepreneurship before you go into it full blast and with both fists swinging and ready to take on the world. That comes at a certain point but I'm saying be ready for it. So your suggestion that those activities are valid and helpful is correct. If you had your whole life to do over again, would you do anything differently? You mean I don't? Well, for purposes of discussion. Well, I might have finished college. I never did that. Dr. Crozier finished college about six times didn't you? Well, yeah, but who's counting? Well, yes. I stopped counting at 25% of college. I was too interested in going out into the big bad world and exercising my entrepreneurial muscles rather than sitting in a classroom which I think would have been a good idea to try to do that. That's one change. As far as my selections and opportunities and activities I didn't exactly take it as it came. I invented some of it and accepted some that was suggested to me by others. I've looked at successful people that do things in a similar way to I would do them and try to emulate. So those are things that if I'm flashing back on years of walking the earth, those are the things I might change. Well, that's great. You know, it's not too late to go back to school. And so in the last 60 seconds that we have before we have to go away, I would encourage you to think about going back to school. Now you can study something you love just because you love it and there's lots of money available for scholarships. Well, I'm very happy to hear you say this. I do have the time on my hands because I have such energetic people working at my business that I could basically walk out and stay away for a while, maybe weeks or months. I've done so recently in the last couple of years. And I'm going to have to chew on what you suggested because it is interesting. You'd be welcome in my class anytime. Well, okay. I'm going to use a hint that it goes in the right direction. You'd have to earn your A, though. Well, I would certainly do my best. Yeah, I bet. Well, Mike, thank you so much for joining us. It's been a great half-hour. And we need to do this more frequently than once every 34 years. Oh, I agree. So thank you again for joining us. And thank you all in the audience. I'm Cheryl Crozier-Garcia, working together, and we will see you in two weeks. Merry Christmas.