Does Aristotle hold the key to improving real estate’s reputation?

COMMENT The property industry has always beaten itself up about its reputation. When I was being interviewed for the role of director general of the British Property Federation back in 2001, I was asked what I was going to do to improve the way the property industry was regarded. Since then, I have campaigned long and hard to improve the reputation and standing of the industry, but what progress have we made, and does it actually matter? Despite being an industry that is awash with property data, we do not have a huge amount of good-quality information about our reputation and what it does for trust in the industry. The BPF conducted an extensive survey back in 2018 which suggested that only the banking and finance, and energy and utility sectors received less favourable ratings. There is, however, a fair amount of less scientifically gathered evidence to suggest that the reputation of our industry is still, more than 20 years after my initial BPF interview, somewhat flaky. Falling short Various MIPIMs and the Presidents Club scandal were low spots. The scrap between landlords and occupiers during the pandemic didn’t help either. The many criticisms levelled at the housebuilding sector over standards, executive pay and leasehold abuses have undoubtedly rubbed off on the property sector more widely, as have the events surrounding the Grenfell Tower fire and the subsequent arguments over blame and rectifying past mistakes. Development is still seen by many as providing excessive gains to just a small number of individuals. The diversity and inclusivity of the industry is seen as still sadly lacking despite the excellent efforts of many companies and umbrella organisations such as Real Estate Balance. And on the environment, the fact that buildings account for some 40% of carbon emissions has led many to see us as the principal barrier to reducing the impact of climate change. I would contend that our industry needs a good reputation and the trust that flows from our activities more than almost any other business sector. This is because our “product” is pervasive in society. That means society sees and experiences what we do at first hand and judges us accordingly. It also means, through the democratic process, that ordinary people are able to have a say in what we do – and in many circumstances, and often with some justification, prevent us from doing it. We are arguably a collection of very different industries, and an individual’s experience of us will vary hugely depending on whether they are judging us by the quality of their semi-detached home, their rented apartment, the shopping centre they visit or the warehouse or small business unit they have leased. A single voice We need a genuine pan-industry alliance to agree a programme of awareness raising, of public presentation and of unrelenting advocacy and education, which might perhaps start with explaining the ecosystem around buildings, who operates them and who to complain to when things don’t work well, and installing more creative displays about what a new building will look like and how it is being constructed. Public awareness could also be helped by a concerted campaign showing just what a range of great careers can be had in the property industry. Surely what we should be doing is showing school-leavers that there are many different routes into the industry. This is something that will bring enormous benefits to the industry through the ability to reach into a larger pool of potential recruits that will help alleviate the shortages of the people we need to plan for, design, build and manage our property assets from cradle to grave and improve the social, gender and ethnic diversity of our industry. And if we can broaden the type of people who come into our industry then there will be more conversation in families, schools, universities and communities generally about our industry and what it does. Concerted campaign Of course, it is no good raising awareness of our industry if the behaviour of the industry lays us open to criticism or the product is deemed to be rubbish and the process for delivering it cavalier. What we need to see is a concerted improvement in the quality of what is delivered and the way in which our industry behaves, both at the development stage and in the way our properties are managed as an integral part of any community or place. Basic behaviours around leadership, honesty and transparency in what we promise, genuine consultation, no dumbing down and perhaps better research into what people really think of us and our product would all help, as would a better-coordinated focus on providing genuinely net-zero-carbon buildings. Some people in the industry do get it right. But once again, the fragmentation of the industry’s well-meaning efforts in this area works against an effective solution. The process for achieving this is very much down to the individual developer/investor, and we do not seem to have been able to develop an industry-wide definition of what is expected of a good property company – developing or investing. A new code of practice? So, is the answer some sort of equivalent of the combined code for the property sector covering how we go about developing and managing buildings? A pan-industry, ongoing campaign to improve awareness and enforce good behaviours will be expensive, but if we looked at the running costs of all the different advocacy and representative organisations in the industry – I totted up 35 with whom I used to have regular discussion in my time at the BPF – surely a bit of rationalisation could yield, say, £1m a year or more to spend on a concerted campaign to raise the industry’s profile and establish some sort of industry-enforced code of practice, with some real teeth. Who is going to put their hand up and lead this, and who else is going to be prepared to sacrifice some of their independence, and their resources, and follow? I have absolutely no doubt that the key to real change in how we are perceived is to get a lot smarter about organising ourselves to bring about real, fundamental improvement, not just in the wider perceptions of our industry but in the quality of what we offer. And we need a better-coordinated industry prepared to put some welly – and cash – behind it. In summary, I am going to turn to an unexpected source to set the overall blueprint for what we need to do – Aristotle. Aristotle came up with a good schema in his little blockbuster of 350 BC – On Rhetoric: A Theory of Civic Discourse. He talked about logos – a reasoned, clear, evidenced explanation of what is to be done; pathos, reflecting a sense of real and perceived care, feelings and respect for others’ needs; and ethos, being trusted to do it well, with impartiality and integrity. Translated into something a bit more modern for our industry, it would be about thinking through and expressing logically our role in society and the economy, showing empathy with the people affected by what we are trying to do, and then behaving ethically at all times in the way we deliver it. That way, we can make sure we establish a reputation that will cause the rest of the world to trust us. Liz Peace is chair of Real Estate Balance and the Old Oak and Park Royal Development Corporation This is an edited version of Liz Peace’s Chapman Barrigan Lecture Photo © David Woolfall