“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: It is the courage to continue that counts.”
– Winston Churchill
From the Desk of Henry Russell, CEO of SANTOS Holdings:
Standing on the bustling streets of Chinatown, I stood alone gazing at the towering structure at 100 Division Street—a real estate technological advancement that Richard Du, founder, and chairman, and I shared a vision for that we call “Blue Ocean.”
A one-of-a-million project, Blue Ocean spans 100,000 square feet and costs over $100 million. The escape from city life features bowling lanes and archery ranges, but no video games. Behind the scenes, a project of this magnitude requires a high formality and aesthetics.
As the CEO of Blue Ocean and a leader of teams over the years, I have embraced certain principles, believing in the equation: dreams and reality plus determination equals success. Leadership requires openness and accountability toward our teams. Teamwork was crucial to our project’s success. To succeed within our company and any corporation, our teams and leaders remain flexible, open-minded, and willing to innovate for the best outcome.
With SANTOS Holdings, Blue Ocean was designed to foster genuine connections and healthy competition while creating an atmosphere of opportunity and aspiration through openness, flexibility, and innovation. While it is no secret that our resolve has been tested along the way, at SANTOS Holdings and Blue Ocean, our teams worked together diligently to support one another during challenging times.
As a leader, I draw strength from one guiding principle: Pain plus reflection equals progress. According to Ray Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater Associates, we can learn and grow from difficult experiences and setbacks (“pain”) by actively reflecting on them. When setbacks arise, the best strategy for you as a leader is to pause, reflect, and reset. Prepare your mindset to adapt to varying strategies and turn failures and mishaps into stepping stones.
According to Viktor Frankl, a Holocaust survivor and social psychologist, stimulus and response have a “gap” separating the event from the response. By pausing to reflect, you gain the power to choose how to respond and move forward. With Blue Ocean, I reinforced this principle by pausing and stepping back to learn from our failures, have trust in faith, and embrace the drive to see it through.
Setbacks are learning opportunities to improve future efforts. Rather than seeing failure as the end, I encourage our team to view it as an opportunity to learn and adjust. As a leader at Santos Holdings, I believe in resetting your perspective. In my teams, I fostered creativity by encouraging open discussions and valuing each voice.
As the grand opening approached, I was proud of transforming a dream into reality—a vibrant hub for fun, business, and lasting achievement. I saw Blue Ocean’s opening as a testament to strong vision, hard work, determination, and teamwork. Ray Dalio’s words resonated at that moment: “Pain plus reflection equals progress.” Our success resulted from hard lessons learned from each challenge and how we overcame those challenges, as evidenced by Blue Ocean’s now existence. I look forward to new projects and am ready to inspire others with the same determination and open-mindedness that brought Blue Ocean to life.
Our journey with Blue Ocean was only the beginning.
If you are interested in learning more about SANTOS Holdings’ commercial real estate offerings, contact us today to explore the immense possibilities.