Matt Kelly – Finding A Smooth “Landing” Path for JBG Smith (#27)

Bio Matt Kelly is the CEO of JBG SMITH and a member of the Board of Trustees. Prior to the formation of JBG SMITH, Matt served as a Managing Partner of the JBG Companies and a member of the firm’s Executive Committee and Investment Committee and was co-head of JBG’s Investments Group. Prior to joining the JBG Companies in 2004, he was a co-founder of ODAC Inc., a media software company, and worked in private equity and investment banking with Thomas H. Lee Partners in Boston and Goldman Sachs, & Co in New York.   Matt Kelly currently serves on the boards of various industry, civic and philanthropic organizations including the Urban Institute and the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History.  He is Chairman of the Board of the Medstar Washington Hospital Center and serves as an Executive in Residence of the Steers Center at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. He holds a Bachelor of Arts with honors from Dartmouth College and an Masters of Business Administration from Harvard Business School. Show Notes Current Role Matt Kelly transition to being a public company CEO from a private company partner/leader (2:30)Oversight and accountability of firm (3:30)Day to day role making investment decisions has stayed pretty much the same (3:50)Chief “Cheerleader” is shared among senior team and is now more focused with him during the pandemic (4:20)Changes were significant (5:30)Private to publicIncreased size to 4X larger with assets Partnership structure to a REIT Combining two big teamsApprovals?Physical location of peopleIntegrate accounting & health care systemsHe had never worked for a public company so felt his biggest challenge was to give confidence to the team (6:30)Determining “who needed to be in the room” (7:00)Brought on a series of new people to help solve issues (7:15)Fortunate that almost all new people fit in well and worked out (7:45)Had to rely on people to accommodate all the changes (8:10)Balance of leading with confidence without doing it before (8:50) Personal Background & Education Raised in the St. Louis area (9:55)Father was an Irish immigrant and went to medical school in Ireland, now a psychoanalystMother from IndianaRaised by parents that motivated him to move away (11:00)Attended Dartmouth College (11:20)Quite an adjustment to live in the East and an outdoors environment (12:00)Spanish, Biology major initially (14:00)Dad told him that he should be “called” to medicine, which he realized he was not “called” (15:00)Dad’s advice- “Study what you want to do and interest you” (15:50)Decided to become History major which was his passion (16:15)Friends turned him on to business (17:10)Interviewed with Goldman Sachs and other banks due to “fascination” with business and learn (18:00) Matt Kelly’s Career Trajectory Went to work for Goldman Sachs in NYC (18:30)Learned after two weeks he did not want to be...