Episode #5: Qualities of a Leader

Watch the full video here!

About the Episode

In the first episode of season 2 of the Get On Board podcast, Michael Mendillo and guests Jesse DiGiovanni and David Calloway, discuss the foundations of what make people “successful” and how they define what that success is. They also share some personal experiences that tie to how and why effective leadership is the catalyst for positive culture and top-tier businesses.

About the Guests

Jesse DiGiovanni

Vice President, Human Resources | FirstService Residential 

Jesse DiGiovanni, vice president of human resources, is responsible for the oversight and direction of all human resources activities, including planning and development of initiatives to align with company policies, culture and best practices. She will also serve as a strategic business partner, working closely with market and operational leaders to help meet and exceed organizational goals. 

David Calloway

Vice President, Business Development |
FirstService Residential 

David Calloway is the Vice President of Business Development for FirstService Residential. In this role, Calloway provides leadership and operational oversight to the division’s lifestyle communities and associates throughout New Jersey. 

Calloway has over nine years of community association and business management experience and most recently held the regional director position for the company’s NJ/PA Lifestyle Division. Prior to his regional director position, he was the business development director for the company’s NJ/PA High-Rise division. Previously, Calloway worked with DowntoEarth Landscaping where he opened their Virginia/DC Metro branch and worked on both the business development and operations ends of the business. He was also the head coach for the Monmouth University Hawks basketball team for 13 years where he brought them to three of their four NCAA Tournament appearances. He was recently inducted into Monmouth University’s Hall of Fame. 

About the Get On Board Podcast

The Get on Board podcast is a leadership podcast that will help you discover leadership wisdom through thoughtful and real conversations. Join your host and FirstService Residential, president, Michael Mendillo, as he shares perspective on culture, people and what being a great leader truly means. 

Michael Mendillo is an equity partner with FirstService Residential, the largest residential management company in North America. As president and principal, Michael’s responsibilities include client retention, leadership development, culture building, organizational growth and strategic initiatives. Michael possesses first-hand knowledge of industry and corporate trends and challenges, having directly pitched and closed some of the largest communities in the region. Michael is responsible for identifying, due diligence and negotiation of all regional acquisitions – through closing and integration. He has been involved in 24 such strategic acquisitions including The Niles Company, Community Management Group and the Abbott Group, attributing to the key growth of the organization. 

Listen and/or watch the full episode above! For more Get On Board podcast updates, follow FirstService Residential on Facebook and LinkedIn, and don’t forget to subscribe on the podcast platform of your choice! 

You Can Read the Full Episode Transcript Below! 

S2E1 – Qualities of a Leader 

0:01 

[Music] 

0:14 

welcome everybody my name is michael 

0:16 

mendillo 

0:17 

and you are here with get on board 

0:20 

this is our season two 

0:23 

of this podcast and we are absolutely 

0:25 

thrilled and happy that we got the 

0:27 

renewal for season two so thank you for 

0:30 

all of you for joining in 

0:32 

in season one we got a lot of great 

0:35 

comments and uh some great feedback 

0:38 

uh helping us into season two on the 

0:40 

topics a little bit different here 

0:43 

with this type of podcast is making it 

0:46 

more conversational we're gearing this 

0:49 

towards 

0:50 

uh what we like to believe our our 

0:52 

listeners and uh 

0:54 

people who are attending 

0:56 

these podcasts which could range from 

0:59 

people in the management side of the 

1:00 

business 

1:02 

real estate as a whole 

1:04 

the vendors and professionals that work 

1:07 

within the business 

1:09 

of course residents board members 

1:11 

committee members 

1:13 

all the above we're trying to really 

1:15 

hone in on topics that really reflect 

1:18 

all of us and what we need and to do our 

1:20 

jobs not 

1:22 

executive level players 

1:24 

or just property managers it could be 

1:26 

from the accounting side and again like 

1:29 

i said different vendors and stuff of 

1:30 

that nature um but we we're hitting 

1:33 

great great topics and today's um 

1:36 

an excellent topic it really kind of is 

1:39 

what i'll say 

1:40 

uh the foundation of what makes people 

1:44 

successful in organizations and property 

1:47 

successful it's leadership that's a 

1:49 

broad statement leadership what does 

1:51 

that really mean i have two phenomenal 

1:54 

guests that are part of the first 

1:55 

service residential 

1:57 

family 

1:58 

and they're going to be sharing their 

2:00 

point of views 

2:02 

um as well as their experiences we want 

2:04 

this to be very authentic 

2:06 

in a way where um we have and will show 

2:10 

some signs of vulnerability things in 

2:12 

our own careers that we have done where 

2:14 

we made mistakes and learned from them 

2:16 

and we're hitting on a couple of really 

2:18 

good topics under the leadership 

2:20 

specifically so let me uh bring on 

2:23 

our uh our guests and have them 

2:26 

introduce themselves and we'll get right 

2:27 

into it so again thank you so much for 

2:30 

being part and uh we do appreciate your 

2:32 

loyalty uh first is dave callaway so 

2:36 

dave why don't you take a a 

2:38 

little time and introduce yourself a 

2:40 

little bit about your uh your career 

2:43 

path as well 

2:44 

uh and i'll pass it to you dave well 

2:46 

thank you michael and thank you everyone 

2:48 

for 

2:49 

joining us this is a great 

2:51 

uh opportunity for us to all share on 

2:53 

some great um 

2:55 

leadership stories and and how our our 

2:58 

path has helped us to continually learn 

3:01 

even you know just today and yesterday 

3:03 

on on on leadership and self-awareness 

3:06 

uh 

3:07 

i have been with first service for over 

3:10 

fi a little over five years now 

3:12 

and i came to first service through the 

3:15 

landscaping industry where i ran a 

3:19 

division in virginia from a new jersey 

3:22 

based company 

3:23 

and prior to that i actually was in 

3:26 

college athletics i in 1987 

3:29 

attended monmouth university i was a 

3:32 

little skinnier back then had a little 

3:34 

more hair 

3:35 

and played basketball and i was 

3:37 

fortunate enough to have a basketball 

3:38 

scholarship and then stayed on and was 

3:41 

an assistant coach in 1999 91 right 

3:43 

after i graduated uh and six years later 

3:46 

i was fortunate enough to become the 

3:47 

head coach i was 28 years old i was the 

3:50 

the youngest head coach in the country 

3:52 

and three years later shaking mike 

3:54 

schefsky's hand of duke as we played 

3:56 

them in the first round of the ncaa 

3:57 

tournament so i had a whirlwind of 

4:00 

learning on the job at a very young age 

4:03 

of leadership 

4:04 

that started way way well before 

4:07 

becoming a coach but 

4:09 

definitely thrown into the fire of 

4:10 

division one athletics and that's helped 

4:12 

prepared me uh the rest of my business 

4:14 

life 

4:15 

awesome and again i think you know the 

4:18 

background from dave's point uh of you 

4:21 

and his journey 

4:22 

is really uh leadership has played a big 

4:25 

big part so i think we're gonna hear 

4:27 

some really great great stories and 

4:29 

great thoughts 

4:30 

from dave 

4:32 

jesse d giovanni uh 

4:34 

welcome and jesse would you like to 

4:36 

share 

4:37 

with our listeners a little background 

4:40 

on yourself as well yes uh thank you uh 

4:43 

michael i'm 

4:45 

actually so glad to be part of this 

4:48 

podcast it's uh obviously a topic that 

4:50 

i'm really passionate about and talking 

4:53 

about leadership 

4:55 

uh you know i had to i knew you were 

4:56 

going to ask me to introduce myself and 

4:58 

i had to really think about it because 

5:00 

i'm i'm not very good at you know 

5:02 

telling my history 

5:04 

so 

5:04 

i i really just like almost had to write 

5:06 

it down and say what have i done 

5:08 

and um you know i like david i i 

5:13 

i started in my career at a very very 

5:15 

young age 

5:16 

um 

5:17 

before i even got into human resources 

5:21 

um and you know now as the vp of hr for 

5:23 

for service 

5:25 

i um 

5:27 

i started as a manager you know i worked 

5:30 

in a very very large and popular uh 

5:33 

newspaper in the metro area 

5:36 

and i was promoted at barely 20 years of 

5:39 

age um to manage the call center 

5:43 

that um that supported the newspaper and 

5:46 

uh you know initially had a small team 

5:49 

of about 40 or 50 folks 

5:52 

on that in that department and it was 

5:54 

through that job that i discovered my 

5:58 

passion for developing and for coaching 

6:00 

others 

6:01 

and um you know i wasn't one of those 

6:03 

kids that graduated high school and 

6:06 

um 

6:07 

went right to college 

6:09 

i i did initially and i got a 

6:10 

scholarship and i thought i was going to 

6:11 

be a veterinarian i mean i couldn't have 

6:13 

gone in a more polar opposite place 

6:16 

than i did um but i dropped out and i 

6:20 

started working 

6:22 

and i really just sort of stumbled upon 

6:25 

human resources just because of the 

6:27 

things that i enjoyed doing 

6:29 

so when i discovered that i went back to 

6:31 

college 

6:33 

and you know in my undergrad studied 

6:35 

studied hr in my master's concentrated 

6:38 

in hr 

6:39 

and just did the hr path um that many 

6:43 

people take so 

6:44 

you know i did recruiting i was in 

6:46 

training um did employee relations did 

6:49 

some compensation and benefits work and 

6:51 

then um ended up in this sort of 

6:53 

generalist role that i'm in now 

6:55 

but i'm really so grateful for my 

6:57 

experiences because um my experience and 

7:00 

the fact that i'm in 

7:03 

a field 

7:04 

that is 

7:06 

in every single industry gave me a 

7:08 

chance to try a lot of industries 

7:11 

so you know i started way back when as i 

7:13 

mentioned in the newspaper and 

7:15 

publishing industry 

7:17 

and then i moved to hospitality and and 

7:19 

restaurants 

7:21 

i went from there into traditional 

7:23 

retail i did pharmaceutical retail 

7:27 

i went into e-commerce retail i had a 

7:29 

chance to work for really small 

7:31 

companies there were you know under 500 

7:33 

employees to really large companies 

7:35 

there were 50 000 employees 

7:37 

and um i had a chance to go and work for 

7:40 

private companies 

7:43 

our founder-owned companies which is a 

7:44 

very different type of leadership that 

7:46 

you have to have than anywhere else 

7:48 

and for really large public companies 

7:51 

i had a chance to take companies from 

7:52 

private to public um and the opposite 

7:55 

you know from public to private so um 

7:58 

so i'll tell you that the the experience 

8:01 

of seeing leaders in different 

8:03 

environments under different challenges 

8:06 

in different industries has really been 

8:09 

uh probably part of the best part of my 

8:12 

job is just to see 

8:14 

how 

8:15 

it does need to change in different 

8:16 

circumstances so i'm really excited to 

8:18 

be here and talk about this topic today 

8:20 

thank you awesome well thank you and 

8:21 

thank you both uh i think uh 

8:24 

you know just to give our our listeners 

8:26 

uh a background is important because 

8:28 

what's the credibility of someone's 

8:30 

point of view what experiences have they 

8:32 

had through their journey of their 

8:34 

career so i think it's very very helpful 

8:36 

with that and it sounds like uh we have 

8:39 

some we're gonna have some really great 

8:41 

great point of views obviously in the hr 

8:43 

world people are the most important 

8:45 

thing but leadership is people and 

8:48 

people are the most important thing so 

8:49 

let's get right into it uh folks with it 

8:52 

um top qualities of a leader 

8:55 

right so 

8:57 

uh we'll start with you dave if it's 

8:59 

okay 

9:00 

you know if you would think through um 

9:03 

from your point of view 

9:05 

maybe one or two we have to go that 

9:08 

deeper let's just pick one or two kind 

9:10 

of top qualities you see 

9:13 

that um and or that you feel have been 

9:16 

important in your leadership and working 

9:18 

with other leaders who you've looked up 

9:21 

to as mentors as well as ones you were 

9:23 

mentoring as well 

9:25 

uh yeah michael and thank you you know 

9:28 

it was interesting listening to jesse i 

9:29 

think as you grow as a leader and i 

9:32 

think back to you know back my high 

9:34 

school days and as a as a high school 

9:36 

athlete and then a college athlete and 

9:38 

then a young college coach 

9:41 

um your leadership you develop at a 

9:43 

young age from learning from others you 

9:47 

know and 

9:48 

the people the leaders that you've 

9:49 

gravitated to or were fortunate enough 

9:51 

to learn from and you pick up on a lot 

9:54 

of great things that those leaders 

9:56 

uh the qualities that they have uh and 

9:59 

then you might even pick up on one or 

10:01 

two that you realize that maybe they had 

10:03 

a flaw or a mistake that they made and 

10:06 

you learn from that and and you as you 

10:08 

grow in your career uh you know that's 

10:10 

mistakes that you you you try to avoid 

10:13 

or or curve a little bit if i consider 

10:16 

you know the qualities you know 

10:18 

at a younger age it was and as a as an 

10:22 

athlete uh the one that always came to 

10:24 

mind was leading by example uh you know 

10:27 

just you know and it was much easier as 

10:29 

an athlete to be honest with you because 

10:31 

you can go out and just perform an 

10:33 

effort play and just go out and and 

10:35 

exercise uh maybe if you had some 

10:38 

god-given talent and athleticism or 

10:40 

skill set uh and outwork people and and 

10:44 

and you know just perform right 

10:46 

uh as you grow in life um 

10:50 

and the journey continues uh especially 

10:54 

as you get older and then that that 

10:56 

athletic ability starts to go away 

10:58 

um you know uh that's where i think the 

11:02 

challenges come that the real leadership 

11:04 

is is is up in in the mind and the and 

11:06 

the learned uh 

11:09 

skills and lessons that you have there 

11:11 

uh to me turn more into then the ability 

11:14 

and the two that hit me it seems like 

11:16 

the most 

11:17 

are the ability to listen 

11:20 

uh and that's an active listening of 

11:23 

genuinely being in in the moment and 

11:25 

engaged and connected 

11:27 

with whoever you're you're having a 

11:30 

conversation with whether it's someone 

11:32 

you report to or someone reports to you 

11:34 

or just a even just a friendly 

11:36 

conversation you can always provide 

11:37 

leadership with with a friend 

11:39 

uh and then the the empathy of really 

11:42 

putting yourself into their shoes 

11:45 

and really seeing it from their point of 

11:48 

view i think true leaders do a great job 

11:51 

of that 

11:52 

and not necessarily especially in 

11:54 

moments when you don't you do not 

11:55 

necessarily 

11:56 

agree 

11:57 

uh with the point of view uh that that 

12:00 

person's coming from but if you can put 

12:01 

yourself in their shoes and see hey this 

12:04 

is why they see it that way let me just 

12:07 

take a step back and look at it from 

12:08 

their point of view and let's have a 

12:10 

really open and genuine and authentic 

12:12 

conversation around that and then we can 

12:14 

come to some sort of decision 

12:16 

uh i think that's uh where i've grown as 

12:20 

a leader the most uh in particular uh in 

12:24 

my career 

12:25 

great great and definitely 

12:28 

listening is a big big factor in this uh 

12:30 

leadership a lot of people feel they 

12:33 

have to have the answers they cut people 

12:35 

off they try to finish what they think 

12:38 

they're they're going to say and 

12:41 

great leaders really are patient and and 

12:43 

great listeners and allowing those those 

12:47 

opportunities to absorb so great on that 

12:50 

and jesse your thoughts on 

12:52 

one or two qualities that you see 

12:55 

yeah you know um listen there's just so 

12:57 

many right to list and it's it's hard to 

13:00 

choose um something in particular but i 

13:03 

think 

13:04 

for me it's more about 

13:05 

what makes some leaders slightly 

13:08 

different than others in terms of that 

13:10 

quality that they have and 

13:12 

you know what i've learned is that 

13:15 

leaders who have a really high tolerance 

13:17 

for mistakes 

13:19 

and learn how to take 

13:21 

a mistake and change it into an 

13:23 

opportunity 

13:24 

um to develop and teach and train uh 

13:27 

through that are probably 

13:30 

the one of the most successful leaders i 

13:32 

see you know the idea of 

13:35 

maybe even 

13:36 

a little bit 

13:37 

letting your 

13:39 

your person go kind of down the path in 

13:42 

which they might make a mistake if it 

13:44 

isn't a risky mistake 

13:46 

and being able to 

13:48 

you know take that and talk about that 

13:51 

with your with your person and say hey 

13:53 

look you know i i 

13:55 

let's talk about the lessons that were 

13:57 

learned from this mistake that you made 

14:00 

because there's such value in learning 

14:04 

when you've done something the wrong way 

14:06 

or you know maybe in the not the best 

14:09 

way 

14:10 

uh and being able to turn that into an 

14:12 

opportunity to to learn it's it sticks 

14:14 

you know so i think that's something 

14:17 

that i see great leaders do 

14:19 

i think the other thing 

14:21 

that is is really a quality that's 

14:23 

unique is a leader who 

14:25 

really pays attention to what people do 

14:28 

really well and then learns how to 

14:31 

leverage that 

14:33 

into a way in which they can help that 

14:35 

person sort of exploit their backs their 

14:37 

best talent you know because there's a 

14:40 

there's a synergy that happens when 

14:43 

someone does something really well 

14:45 

and they're excelling and feeling a 

14:47 

sense of achievement 

14:49 

but also you know being able to the art 

14:52 

of being able to take what they do 

14:53 

really well and fit that in 

14:56 

to either a need the organization has or 

14:58 

that particular team has you know i call 

15:01 

i call that building capabilities inside 

15:03 

of the team so um to me those are two 

15:06 

things that really stick out that i see 

15:09 

um from really great leaders that sort 

15:11 

of differentiates them from everybody 

15:13 

else all right great and i'll tell you 

15:15 

these are these are you know three 

15:17 

things that stood out there 

15:19 

uh well two uh patience 

15:22 

right the the leader having the patience 

15:25 

and you know that patience is a is a is 

15:28 

a fine line because sometimes you need 

15:30 

to pivot and execute really quickly on 

15:32 

reacting to certain situation the others 

15:35 

as you said you have to let them learn 

15:38 

right it's kind of like 

15:40 

you know 

15:41 

we know at our age different than maybe 

15:44 

we knew at 

15:45 

15 years old but you know what the 

15:48 

mistakes we made at 15 was our journey 

15:50 

to get where we are at this age so 

15:53 

you have to almost allow sometimes 

15:56 

that trip and fall as long as it's not 

15:58 

catastrophic 

16:00 

and the other part of it is really 

16:02 

looking at where the positive is in 

16:04 

trying to correct the 10 percent where 

16:06 

the individual might have uh areas of 

16:09 

opportunity to grow or improve 

16:12 

are we really leveraging the other 70 or 

16:14 

80 or 90 percent where that person 

16:17 

really shines 

16:19 

[Music]