Cheryl Yetka

Oh gosh, I’ve been fortunate to have so many mentors throughout my career. Brenda Helps, who was my boss at Miraval Resort, has been tremendous. I’ve also had an incredible mentor in hospitality, Rich Conti, who taught me so much about asset management.

One of the greatest gifts in my career has been working side-by-side with colleagues who were smarter than I was and generous enough to take the time to explain what they were doing and why. That kind of learning is invaluable.

Building a strong network of people I can call on — and who know they can call on me — has been critical. I’ve always tried to surround myself with really smart people, frankly, people much smarter than I am. That has made all the difference.

If it’s a bad deal, you can try as hard as you want, but you’re never going to make it a good deal. That’s probably one of the biggest lessons.

From a leadership perspective, I’ve always believed you treat your team the way you would want to be treated. You also have to hire people around you that you can trust. Obviously, trust builds over time, but I’ve always been very upfront with the people I lead: I trust you.

If I give someone an assignment and a timeline, I expect them to figure out the path to get there. As much as I possibly can as a leader, I try to give the people who report to me — or who have reported to me in the past — the space and authority to make their own decisions.

Never pass up a learning opportunity, even if it’s not something that is going to pay you more or immediately move you up in the company you’re in today. If it gives you a new skill, it adds value. It gives you something you may not have had otherwise, and it strengthens your resume and your overall toolkit.

So take every opportunity you can to learn something new.

I would also say that from the time I started in business to now, the landscape for women has certainly changed for the better in many ways. And in some ways, it has stayed frustratingly stagnant.

So be bold. Be fearless. Don’t get yourself fired — but be bold in your opinions, right? Be fearless in your strengths. And don’t be afraid to have hard conversations with people in leadership. Those conversations matter.

The biggest opportunity in my field right now is affordable housing. The latest statistic I saw was that, nationwide, we are short over 7 million affordable units for people to live in — whether that’s a home, an apartment, a trailer, a manufactured home, whatever it may be. We are short. And when I see that number, I don’t just see a statistic. I see people behind it. Take 7 million and multiply that by four people in a family, right? Those are real people who need safe, stable, affordable places to live.

That creates a huge opportunity for multifamily investors to get involved — not only from a business perspective, but from a more philanthropic perspective as well. Affordable housing also adds stability to an investor’s portfolio. It does not typically have the big peaks and valleys that Class A properties can have, so it can provide a more consistent stream of passive income for investors.

My biggest bottleneck, honestly, is always going to be time. There are so many projects out there. A big part of the work is continuing to build and work my network so people know me, trust me, have seen what I’ve accomplished, and understand that I can steward their investment wisely.

At the end of the day, investors need to feel confident that I am going to do what I said I was going to do and work toward the returns we articulated to them. That takes time. It takes a lot of time. But the goal is to build relationships with investors who trust you enough to keep investing with you.

Above everything else, my faith and my love for Jesus Christ will always come first. That is the foundation of who I am, and a part of everything I do now is focused on growing His kingdom.

For me, that means meeting people exactly where they are, being open to them, and being non-judgmental.

I am a fierce worker. I really am. When I see a need, I tend to run toward it as fast as I can — which is exactly why I try to surround myself with people who are smarter than I am and who will tell me when I need to slow down.

Trust, honesty, integrity, and a strong moral compass are extremely important to me. Those values guide me both personally and professionally.