The First Man To Mars? Meet Larry Connor

What this episode is about

Larry Connor, a pioneering candidate for manned Mars exploration, shares his journey from private citizen to NASA-trained pilot, emphasizing the necessity of passion, commitment, and a robust cultural foundation in achieving exceptional goals. He reflects on his experiences with failure and success, advocating for a future-oriented mindset and the importance of operational culture over mere mission statements in fostering a thriving and innovative environment.

Key takeaways

• Exceptional achievements require passionate commitment; nothing great ever came from a casual stroll in comfort.
• Culture trumps mission statements—live your values daily or they’re just wallpaper in the corporate jungle.
• Fear isn’t a motivator for everyone; striving for excellence can be scarier than facing the abyss.
• Learn from your failures but don’t dwell—success is future-focused, and yesterday is just a lesson.
• A relentless pursuit of excellence isn't optional; it’s the bedrock that elevates good teams to greatness.

Who speaks in this episode?

• Ryan Hawk (Host) · 24 min speaking
• Larry Connor (Guest) · 37 min speaking

What is discussed, and when

1. 0:00 – 10:00: Larry Connor, The Pursuit of Excellence, Miami of Ohio
2. 20:00 – 30:00: Larry Connor
3. 40:00 – 50:00: AX1 mission, Ocean Gate, Larry Connor, Mariana Trench

Notable quotes from "The First Man To Mars? Meet Larry Connor"

• I'll give you a big one. So, there's broke and there's worse than broke. What does that feel like to you? The guy who's worse than broke not that long ago to billionaire Larry…

  about Larry Connor · at 1:11

• Circle of success. Think long-term, not short term. And relentless pursuit of excellence. By the way, I wrote a book called The Pursuit of Excellence. I love that one. Okay, I…

  about The Pursuit of Excellence · at 4:39

• Frankly, we don't care where you went to school. If you went to an outstanding school like Miami of Ohio, okay, that's great.

  about Miami of Ohio · at 9:48

• For example, when we did the AX1 mission, 17 days at the International Space Station. Extraordinary. By the way, the backstory that nobody knows is I spent.

  about AX1 mission · at 41:24

• Degrees science medicine engineering things like that. I have none of the above. I went to OU Ohio University.

  about Ohio University · at 42:19

• Wild. Okay. But within 12 months, you also go to the deepest parts on our planet. 36. Well, we did three research dives. 36,000 ft, 35,000 ft, and 25,000 ft. What was the…

  about Mariana Trench · at 43:51

• 36,000 ft down, I knew so much about the vessel, their safety record. Keep in mind in submersibles, it's a shame what happened with the ocean gate tragedy in June of 2023. Mhm.…

  about Ocean Gate · at 46:57

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

• Larry Connor — Person · Main guest · 3 mentions · first at 1:20
  Primary interview subject discussing his leadership philosophy at The Connor Group, his failure-to-success business arc, and high-risk exploration (ISS mission and Mariana Trench dives).

Books & papers

• The Pursuit of Excellence — Book · Referenced work · 1 mention · first at 4:44
  Larry Connor wrote this book, reflecting his core values and business philosophy.

Companies & orgs

• Ocean Gate — Company · Referenced organization · 2 mentions · first at 47:09
  Mentioned in contrast to the safety standards of Larry Connor's submersible dives.

Places & events

• AX1 mission — Event · Key achievement · 2 mentions · first at 41:24
  Larry Connor's space mission to the International Space Station, where he conducted over 200 hours of experiments.
• Mariana Trench — Place · Research location · 1 mention · first at 40:17
  Larry Connor conducted research dives here, exploring the deepest parts of the ocean.
• Ohio University — Place · Educational background · 1 mention · first at 42:25
  Larry Connor's alma mater, where he majored in English with a concentration in Shakespearean literature.
• Miami of Ohio — Place · Educational reference · 1 mention · first at 9:52
  Mentioned as an example of an outstanding school during the discussion on hiring practices.

Full transcript with timestamps

0:00 If you're going to do anything exceptional, it's hard. Have you done things exceptional that were easy? No. Well, okay, defense risk. Think about any endeavor. Have you ever seen anybody who's exceptionally good at something, who one doesn't care about it, two doesn't have passion, three is not willing to work at it. The reality is those things go hand in hand. You told me more about going to space. I was the first private citizen NASA has ever trained and I was the pilot. Within 12 months, you also go to the deepest parts on our planet. Are you always like on the lookout for something that's going to scare you? I I have no interest in being scared. Can you tell me more about the fact that when you have culture, a mission statement is is not necessary.

0:46 If you're going to build something, you got to start with a great foundation. That's what culture is. True culture is almost tribal in nature. How does this thing get started? I had an idea and a belief. Most companies, they spend most of their time talking about the problem. We're completely the opposite. What's one of your biggest failures? I have a lot of them, but uh I'll give you a big one. So, there's broke and there's worse than broke. What does that feel like to you? The guy who's worse than broke not that long ago to billionaire Larry Connor. I don't think it's relevant. Really? No. What do you mean? That's not what's important.

1:26 My recommendation, live in the future, not the past. Larry, first, uh, thanks for having us. I really appreciate you welcoming us to this really cool office, man. Yeah, happy to be with you. So, I was just walking through your um halls, and I I love this quote. I want you to speak to it. The quality of a person's life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence regardless of their chosen field of endeavor. Can you talk more about why that's important enough to you to to hang up on the wall? And so think about any endeavor.

2:02 Have you ever seen anybody who's exceptionally good at something, who one doesn't care about it, two doesn't have passion, three, you know, is not willing to work at it, four isn't constantly trying to get better. I mean, the reality is those things go hand in hand. I sense that is a part of your ethos of the type of a person you are. Is that something that you developed along the way or were you born that way? Yeah. So, it's an interesting question, Ryan. You know, I think part of it may be genetics, but I think a lot of it is environment and so was I born with it or not? Uh, I don't know. Do we have as one of our core values relentless pursuit of excellence? By the way, that's in everything. Everything.

3:02 Whether it's a small detail here in the office, whether it's how does the parking lot look? Uh how do we treat our associates? Uh so that's certainly embedded in our DNA. So I I was reading this book called Culture which which Chris gave me a copy and he told me it's on his agenda to get done for next year. Meaning it's a living breathing document. It's updated. One of the things that you you've written in this says at the Connor group we don't have and never will have a mission statement. True. We have culture. When you have the latter the former is not necessary. I was like huh interesting. Can you can you tell me more about the fact that when you have culture a mission statement is is not necessary. So think about culture, Ryan, as the foundation, the anchor points.

3:52 So if you're going to build something, yeah, you got to start with a great foundation. That's what culture is. Mission statements in our experience most times is somebody's idea that gets hung up on a wall that people can recite. Yeah. But they don't live. True culture is almost tribal in nature and it's how you conduct yourself, your actions and deeds, whether it's in a day, a week, a month, a year, or a decade. So, you mentioned one of your core values. I'm a big fan of core values. You have five of them. Do the right thing. People count. Live the circle of success. Think long-term, not short term. And relentless pursuit of excellence. By the way, I wrote a book called The Pursuit of Excellence. I love that one. Okay, I love that that fifth one. It sounds like you do too. All of these, how did you come up with these core values and how do you ensure that they're actually true? That you and your

4:57 company are actually living them out each day instead of just being things hung on a wall or written in a book. Sure. So, here's the background. We started this organization 33 years ago and we did some things right and some things wrong. We never made excuses. We constantly learned. So reel forward to 201 17. So roughly 25 years after we started and so somebody said, you know, we need to reduce to writing all of our fundamental beliefs. Mhm. And that's all this is. These are how we've lived our life for 25 years when we wrote it. Mhm. So, it's a fair question, but it was validated by 25 years of actions and deeds. Yeah. And in sometimes against great obstacles and great odds. But we never ever waver.

6:13 They are complete non-negotiables. And let's say you're here. Let's say you're in a senior leadership role and you don't do the right thing. I don't care who you are. you're not gonna work here. And if you one and done, would you just fire if I I mean it depends on how you define the right thing? But do you you fire people that quickly or like how does it work? Depends. Yeah. Now there are times when people deserve second chances. But there are such egregious violations that but keep in mind it's no surprise everybody knows what these non-negotiables and standards are. And if you choose to violate one of those really basic, then we have the right to choose for you not to work here. But keep in mind, it was all started by you making a choice. Keep in mind, we all make mistakes. We think there's two kinds of mistakes.

7:13 One or what we call honest mistakes. Let's say you were in charge of our capital projects and you went out and did a project at an apartment community and it didn't turn out exactly right, but you'd never done it before. Well, that's an honest mistake. But let's say for example that was the 10th time you did it and because of your lack of attention to detail because you didn't manage it, you didn't set the expectations, you didn't hold people accountable, project comes out bad, son, that's an avoidable mistake. So, so it depends upon who it is. But keep in mind wrapped around that every person who comes here, we try extremely hard in the interviewing and hiring process. We have a very unique system we do. So, almost any position here, you're going to do at least five different interviews and you're going to spend a whole day, what we call a day in the field. So, we can show you everything. And along the way,

8:33 we will say to people, Ryan, this place is not for everybody. For some places, it's the best place you've ever worked, but for others, it isn't. And let let's and let us kind of outline what that looks like. So we because people count have an obligation to be honest with you, to be direct with you, to be constructive with you, and to be timely with you from more of a coach development standpoint. Mhm. So bottom line is if you ever got to that point where you're choosing to leave because you violated doing the right thing, it's not going to be any surprise. Yeah.

9:26 What's the unique interview process like? Like how does that work? How have you designed it to ensure you're getting the type of people that would fit in a culture? I understand. So we don't hire for experience. We don't necessarily hire for knowledge. Frankly, we don't care where where you went to school. If you went to an outstanding school like Miami of Ohio, okay, that's great. But we hire for personality traits. And so in each position especially in leadership roles we'll have depending upon what position like most leader we have what's called the big six and you have to have all six of those if you don't we're not moving forward and then there'll be three or four others.

10:28 So let me give you one interesting example. We're in the real estate industry, specific apartments. We hire nobody. Nobody from that industry. You mean you don't hire any managers, sales, service people, leadership? None. Zero. Haven't hired one in over 25 years. Because the way we operate is so dramatically different. We know that 95% of the people just can't make the transition. But if you are aligned in terms of your culture and beliefs, we will invest a huge amount in you in terms of training, coaching, development to make you successful. So what's so different between the Connor group and the way you guys do it versus the way everybody else does it in this industry?

11:26 Yeah, everything. Let me just give you okay I'm not from the industry so I don't know. Yeah. So let me give you maybe two examples. Okay. Okay. So customer service by the way that's a foreign concept in most industries and most businesses. We think it's invaluable to measure to be held accountable to and to execute at an elite level. So we have a way to track that at every single property on a real-time basis both for the prior month and the prior three months. So our service technician that's a he or she who goes out let's say you have your stoves out or your air conditioning's out and they go out and do what's called a work order in the industry. If you can do six or eight of those a day you're considered to be doing a good job. Our standard is 23 a day. A day. So you're like, "Wait a minute, that's triple." Yep. And we're one of the few companies in the US that accurately and timely measures whether

12:40 you, the resident, we never call you tenants, by the way. You're either a resident or a customer, whether you're happy with the service that we're delivering. Wow. Okay. So, um, you need some of the big six. Like, what are some of the big six? I'm not familiar with that. So, we can tell you all six. Okay. So, let's say we're going to hire you and you're going to be in a leadership role. Okay. These are all important. So, don't get hung up on the order. Okay. Number one is you have to be able to motivate and in some cases inspire those people work for you. We're going to take on what most people would think are impossible objectives. two, self-accountability and the ability to be able to hold other people accountable but in a honest, direct but constructive manner. Three, organization multitasking.

13:39 The speed of the game here is very fast. Even though we're in a low tech industry, we were on a pretty complex system. If you can't manage all those moving parts, you're not going to be successful. Four, cultural fit in terms of philosophy and belief. Five, grit. I mentioned that at the top. If you tell us that's impossible, we're all in. Okay, that's just your opinion. It's not actually the facts. And we can show you time after time when we've done whether it's from our industry or other endeavors we're in things that are supposedly impossible to do.

14:22 And then last is work orientation. If you go, look, I want to come in at 8:30 and I like to take an hour and a half at lunchtime. Hey, that's great. And then leave at 4:30. That's great. But you're not going to work here. So all six of those you have to have. If you have five out of six, we're not going to we're not going to ask you to join us because we know we're going to make a huge investment in you. Yeah. And by the way, you're going to make a huge investment in us. It doesn't make any sense unless it's really has a good chance to work out long term. And we just know from doing this for 30 years that if you don't have all six, the culture is so defined that it's just not going to work. How how do you find if like know if they have that in the interview process? That seems like it would be really hard. Uh well, if you're going to do anything exceptional, it's hard. Have you done things exceptional that were easy? No.

15:21 Like layups? No. Well, okay. Defense rest. So yeah, definitely. I'm just curious how how you do it. So, we have a system of questions and we score them plus minus. Okay. And then what we do, let's say we're going to interview you, okay? For a leadership role. Five different people are going to interview and each person has generally the same questions with some variance. You're going to score them plus minus, then they're going to go to the next person. But nobody's going to tell anybody else how they score until you get uh finished unless someone says, "Oh, we need to stop now.

16:04 We don't have the right fit." And then what we do afterwards is everybody sits down and we go around the room because each the information's been siloed. Nobody knows what you're thinking. And you're going to say, "Hey, I score this individual on motivated and inspire as a plus. I score this person on organization as a plus. I score this person on work orientation as a minus. That's how we do. By the way, it's not a perfect system, right? And then from there, we bring you in to a day in the field to expose you, but then we're interviewing you all day long. And by the way, we're very transparent about that. Look, this is going to be a two-way street. We're going to interview you. You need to interview us and decide if this is the right place.

16:50 Uh holding people accountable starts with yourself. Um, there's grading systems here. You do that with yourself, with your boss, with with leaders. Sure. How does that work? How do you hold people accountable? What's the grading scale? Can you just walk me through that? Sure. It needs to be based upon communication, clarity, and clear expectations. So, we're going to say, "Hey, after you've gone through training, okay, Ryan, you're in this leadership role." We always start with the yearly objectives. Every department has a business plan. We cascade that to monthly objectives, then down to weekly. So, we're going to have a monthly expectation meeting. We're going to say, "Okay, next month we need to accomplish the following goals." Do you understand those? Can you do that?

17:45 Do you need any tools to help you? Because it's our obligation to arm you with the necessary things you need to execute and be successful. Okay. Then we're going to do each week what we call an AM individual accountability meeting. We're going to sit down with you and go, "Okay, hey, it's Friday. Did you get done this week all the things you needed to accomplish?" And if you didn't, okay, fine. Then we're going to try to figure out what the root problem is. So tell us what the root problem is, why you didn't get this done, and then tell us what the solution is. We most companies, they spend most of their time talking about the problem. We're completely the opposite. We're trying to spend 20% or less of our time on the problem. Now, we got to get to the core and then at least 80% of our time talking about a real workable solution.

18:45 And so whether it's during the week, you're self-evaluating. At the end of the month when we do this, let's say you and I when we sit down, the first thing is going to happen is you're going to lead the conversation. Even though you're reporting to me, you're going to say, "Okay, Larry, here are my objectives for April. Here's what I got done. Here's what I didn't. Here's what we decided to defer. Okay, fine. We're good." Right. Yeah. So, it's a it's a strategy of information and accountability up. Most organizations, right, all this is being driven down. We're the complete opposite. We want to drive all this accountability up. And if you own it and you're accountable and you're responsible and you think and act like an owner, you're going to do much better than you ever thought possible.

19:45 To me, it fuels my backgrounds in sports. Uh I love immediate constant feedback and coaching. We filmed every rep in practice, played quarterback, so there's a lot to criticize or to celebrate. That feels like, did you get this from sports or is this just how you are? I'm curious how you created it this this kind of sports immediate always constant feedback. Can I ask you a question, please? You're a quarterback. Yeah. Did you wear Did you wear like the red jersey where they couldn't hit you? When I got to college, they had us wear those. Yes. Okay. So, you don't like to hit or what? Well, it wasn't my choice.

20:22 Oh, I love to hit. I was an option quarterback in high school, so we were hitting all I had to punish the guys trying to hit me. Okay, well that's good. Yeah, I was a little concerned there for a minute. You don't like quarterbacks? You are. You are a quarterback. There are some quarterbacks, you know, that I think play the game, right? And then there's Who do you like? Well, contemporary. Yeah. Patrick Mahomes. Really? Why? I just like the guy's a complete gamer. He is. He's never out of it. He's tough. He's never given up. Like, right. Yeah.

20:57 He never blames anybody. If there's ever a problem, he's a guy after the game sitting in the press room owning the problem and talking about how he's going to fix it. I also think he's probably I don't know him. My guess is he's probably pretty inspirational leader. His teammates seem to love him. I think that's a very telling sign is you you can't really fake the teammates just kind of putting up with a person versus like actually loving the person and to me it seems like they do. So anyway, back on track this constant coaching feedback like that that's the ethos of the Connor group it feels is that it's always happening. Yeah, I think we we did that in part from sports and then I think from failing. Yeah, we learned a lot of it.

21:45 Failing is the absolute best teacher. The issue is failing's difficult and it can be debilitating. And man, it doesn't feel good. You've done that. You understand that. If you can get yourself to the place, easy to say, hard to do, where you associate nothing from failing except learning Well, then, oh, I failed. And the first thing you say is, what did I learn? You go from a very negative voice to a positive constructive voice. And so, we are experts in failing. And I would argue that's why we've had some success.

22:32 What What's one of your biggest failures? Well, I have a lot of them, but uh I'll give you a big one. So, in the 1980s, I started a computer company in 1981. I'm going to give you the very short version to a nine-year ugly story. Okay? Nine years later, we had built this business, scaled it, and went out of business. I lost all the money I put in. I lost all of our investor money. We closed all. We didn't go bankrupt. So after nine years of working 75 80 hour work weeks, it was all for not. So at that point I'm 40 years old, broke, a wife, two kids, and a farm. Actually, I'm worse than broke because I didn't have any money and I didn't have a job. and I had borrowed $900,000.

23:35 Keep in mind this is this is now 1990. So a few years ago and I was bound to determine every person or bank that I borrowed if I was going to pay them all back which by the way I did like three four years later. So there's broke and there's worse than broke. That's like being a ground zero or being in the in way in the basement. So I was in the basement, but I would argue all of those failures in this computer business for nine years and a lot of the systems and strategies that we learned through failure form the foundation for our future success for example at this company.

24:20 So I'm fascinated by the beginnings of things. Can you go back to that those those that day when the Connor group started? I know you had partners initially. Uh what happened? Like you you're you're you're worse than broke, right? You're 40 years old. You're worse than broke. You owe $900,000 to people. You're determined to pay them back. You didn't file bankruptcy. How does this thing get started? So, I had an idea and a belief and those can be powerful. I had done some real estate investing kind of on the side and I thought these people in the real estate business in particular apartments they act and operate them like a passive business. But wait a minute have most of the components of any kind of normal operating business. You got revenue, you got expenses, you got personnel, right?

25:20 You got a physical facility, you got customers, everything. I said from operating the computer company and I had owned other kinds of small businesses, I think we can bring a completely different approach to owning and operating large, nice, well-located apartments. And the fact that we don't have any experience, the fact that really we're ignorant, I thought was an advantage because we're not trapped by preconceived notions. Oh, this is how the industry always does it. That was the basic premise. We're going to build a totally different operating model. We're not going to look at the book, the playbook. We're not going to pick it up. We're not going to tear it up because we're not even going to pick it up.

26:20 And if we got a bunch of talented, committed people who are like-minded, somehow someway we can pull this thing off and somehow someway we can convince some people to invest with us. And the rest is history. And it's turned out reasonably good. When I got an email from your team, the subject line is one of the best I've ever received. It just says billionaire Larry Connor and I was like, "Wow, that's a good one." What does that feel like to you? The guy who's worse than broke not that far long ago to billionaire Larry Connor. I don't think it's relevant. Really? No. What do you mean? That's not what's important. There are far more important standards, Ryan, than money. What's it What is it? So like How well have you treated your associates? Yeah. Have you made them better people?

27:22 How much have you done to help other people locally, regionally, nationally? Have you actually made a difference? Have you been successful? Have you helped other people reach their dreams? Have you actually taken this money, shared the wealth for the betterment of others? Those to me are all the higher standards than some financial number you have behind your name. How does it feel that you've changed so many people's lives? Well, I don't think an individual changes people's lives. I think everything is a team sport. Agree. But leadership matters. Yeah. You started this place, though. Yeah. You've helped lead in that. I I agree. Yeah. But you don't win as an individual. You know that sports.

28:24 You just It doesn't work that way. But it does help to have Tom Brady or Patrick Mahomes. There's no question. Yeah. It takes everybody. Everybody, but leadership matters. Yeah. Tom Brady, Patrick Mahomes. Yeah. And so to me, the true measurement is how many other people around you, how many other organizations around you that you've helped to be successful. Yeah. One of the interesting things about this place that I think is kind of rare is, and let me make sure this is accurate. Do you guys come to work on Saturdays?

29:08 Absolutely. Every Saturday? Pretty much. Most Saturdays. Most Saturdays. So, I'm curious. One, why is that part of like your ethos to say we we we come in on Saturdays when most places don't do that? Yeah. So, we don't tell people they have to come in on Saturday. Oh, okay. But go back to like kind of the core of who we hire. Yeah. People who are career oriented, people who have work orientation, people who are high achievers, people who are going to act like owners, highly responsible. Well, if you aggregate all those personalities to characteristics together, whether it's 7:30 in the morning, you come here at 7:30 in the morning, you're going to see a lot of cars. By the way, we don't tell anybody a start time. You come here at 6:00 tonight, you're going to still see a lot of cars in the parking lot. We don't tell everybody you got to be here at 6:00.

30:08 And if you're just doing it for FaceTime, you're not going to work here very long. And so that's why you're going to see cars on Saturday, but not everybody on every Saturday. So for example, quality, not quantity, quality time with your family. So hey, you got kids and let's say your son or your daughter's playing soccer at 9:00 on Saturday morning. Well, yeah, you ought to be there to support them at their game, right? So, it's back to culture and it's back to people. If you have those two things at a exceptional level, there's literally nothing you can't do.

30:59 You write in the book culture, we exist quite simply to be the best. How how do you how do you measure being like I understand trying to be at my best. Yep. But how do how do you try to be the best? Like those are two different things. I'm curious how that works. So our belief is you can measure anything like you have a crew here, right? Yeah. Yeah. We can measure every one of these guys. For sure we do. Okay. Yeah. So this misconception that there's a lot of things you can't measure, we don't believe it. There's not a business. Keep in mind, we've owned other kinds of business like we've owned, we've started different technology firms when they said, "Well, you can't really measure this." We've been able to. So, if you're a planner, well, here's the foundation pieces, okay, that allows you to measure anything. If you got the the four Ps, four Ps. If you got the right people, you got the right plan, you got the

32:16 right processes, and you have perseverance, you're going to end up with measurables no matter what the endeavor is. So by the best, you mean you're you you can measure the industry, you can measure what you guys do, what other companies do, how you're doing versus them, against them. Yeah. So we can measure just think about the industry we're in return on investment. We can take our return on investment whether it's for last year, three years, 5, 10 or the last 30 years and measure against everybody and ours is in the top onetenth of 1% over the last 30 years. That is wild. We can look at customer satisfaction, resident satisfaction.

33:02 We can measure it against the best standards of customer satisfaction either against in our industry or other industries. Productivity. I just gave you the one example. Yeah. We can measure our productivity either in leadership roles or specific roles against anybody else. Sales, service, you name it. So there is virtually nothing we've ever found in any business. Keep in mind we've started eight different businesses. One of them really unsuccessful. We talked about that. Fortunately the other seven really successful and I'm hardressed to find anything we haven't been able to measure. But keep in mind a lot of these things are hidden. They're not apparent.

33:59 You have to find the hidden opportunity. No matter how bad things are, there's always opportunity. But many times it's very hard to find. What do you mean? Like what are some examples of that? Well, recently we've done a really poor job in 23 and 2023 and 2024 on a couple of our key metrics. One of them is occupancy. The other is what we call resident retention. We think that's vital. Keep the resident versus get a new one versus what our historical numbers are. And these are real problems. But what we said to people, let's figure out what's really at fault.

34:53 And I bet we can actually not only fix the problem but go to the next level of excellence by finding a better solution. And by the way, we've done that on both those fronts. So there's almost whether it's personally or professionally, there's almost nothing. So anytime something bad happens to you, what's your reaction? I want to know why and try to fix it. That's good. But I'll offer one other thought. Okay? You want to know what's wrong. You want to fix it. But where's the opportunity? Almost everything when it goes bad, if you can find it again, maybe personally, professionally, whatever, help other people is going to be a hidden gift, a hidden opportunity.

35:48 It's a great way of framing it. Um, you seem pretty hardcore. I say that as a compliment. Uh, it's not for everybody. Um, I'm serious. He's laugh Chris is laughing at me. I'll second that. But I'm curious since you've had experienced multiple businesses of failure, a lot of success. Um, maybe for the future, have you noticed the world is not as hardcore as it used to be or is No, it's always been this way. I've always been hardcore. We find people. It's fine. Or do you have any concern I guess is for the future and the people when you interview like are we going soft like that's that's kind of the question like or you feel like no we're good we just got to find the right people. I have great faith in some people. Okay. You know people say oh well the kids today you know they're not like when I grew up. That's every generation right. Yeah I I don't know whether that's true or not but it's not relevant for us. Yeah,

36:49 there will always be people who want to be high achievers and there will always be a lot of people who are lower achievers or ah that's good enough. It is very difficult to do what we do but we wouldn't have it any other way. Yeah. And I don't know if it's being hardcore or whatever. If you go around here, you're going to find that people genuinely like each other here. By the way, not everybody, but the vast majority of them do. Sure. Yeah. Because it's like tribal. Yeah. In the best sense of the word. like we have a tribe, we have a language, we all kind of believe in roughly the same things.

37:43 We all get along because we have purpose around what we're trying to do and we're going to help each other. By the way, this place is not political. It's not who you know or how long you've been here. It's based upon your per performance and the content of your character. Sometimes when a place is like this very high expectations, commitment to excellence, it's not for everyone as you said. Sometimes people come in, they're like, whoa, not for me. Is the turnover like what's your turnover rate? I'm curious when it comes to that because of how how the expectations are. That's a very fair question. So it depends.

38:22 So, for example, if we're talking about somebody uh let's say uh one of our what we call GMs, general managers at the property, we have actually done a good job in reducing turnover, but again, we're going to hire all people who have never done it before. We're going to invest six months of training before you ever run a property. Wow. Okay. And if we hire 10 of those people, probably a third of them are not going to make it. But the other twothirds will, and they're going to be successful, and they're going to see and feel and achieve success that the majority of those people never thought they were capable of doing.

39:17 Gotcha. And so it depends upon the position. If you look here in this office here, this what we call, we never call this headquarters. We are the central support office. Our job is to serve our internal customers. Who are those? Well, we own 15,000 apartments in 17 different markets. It's all those people who run those properties. sales, service, management, everything else worked out. And so there's turnover, but there's not excessive turnover here. Got you. So the second part of this conversation is also fascinating. It could be hours long. You may be one of the most interesting humans on the planet. You spent time off of the planet. You spent time in the deepest parts of our planet. Uh, all within 12 months. So, you're an astronaut. You've gone down to the Mariana Trench. True.

40:19 You've done a I mean, looking around, you skydive from outer space, it seems like. I mean, crazy racing cars, all this stuff. Can you can you let's go to the one 12-month period when you went out to outer space. Sure. You're an astronaut. You also go down to the Mariana Trench. Yep. I remember reading all about it as this happened. Like, who is this Larry Connor guy? He's crazy. Like, in a good way. Again, that's awesome. So, can you tell me more about going to space and and and why you wanted to do these these crazy things?

40:45 Sure. I'll give you one interesting component. Okay. We never do anything that doesn't meet two specific standards. Can we do it safely and can we do it successfully? And that's why we've been able to do all these things. And I'm still here talking to you today. The other thing is if you go is there a common thread because there's a lot of different things. Good question. Challenge and purpose. For example, when we did the AX1 mission, 17 days at the International Space Station. Extraordinary. By the way, the backstory that nobody knows is I spent 10 months full-time training.

41:41 I was the first private citizen NASA has ever trained. And I was the pilot, which by the way is kind of a bit overstated. You're not piloting anything. You're maybe pushing some buttons. And so the challenge was to be the first and NASA astronauts before they ever go into outer space have generally been in the astronaut corps for five years and they all have advanced degrees, STEM degrees science medicine engineering things like that. I have none of the above. I went to OU Ohio University. I was an English major with a concentration in Shakespearean literature, which qualifies me for basically nothing.

42:40 So, so that was the challenge. The purpose is we did over 200 hours, unheard of, of experiments and research at the International Space Station. Two of the key partners I worked with is Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic. My other crew mates all had experiments. So so we brought great purpose to that mission. And by the way, we weren't space tourists or anything else like that. We had to pass most of all the rigors of any NASA astronaut and we were designated by NASA as astronauts. So Wow. Okay. That theme runs through kind of. Yeah. Because now there are some space tourism. You saw Bezos just sent one up and they went out for like seven seconds and came back. Yeah. But the difference is there. So we spent 10 months in training, 17 days in space.

43:37 That's wild. For them, they spent one day at training. One day, right, and 10 minutes in space. Yeah. It's completely different, right? And not even I You're like a full-blown astronaut, correct? We would argue that. Yes. It's wild. Okay. But within 12 months, you also go to the deepest parts on our planet. 36. Well, we did three research dives. 36,000 ft, 35,000 ft, and 25,000 ft. What was the purpose behind that research? So, an organization contacted me. They had heard about the AX1 mission and said, "Look, we have a research vessel.

44:18 We're in the Marion Trench. We have a crew of 40, seven scientists, but it's expensive. And so, we're not trying to make money. We're trying to cover some of our costs. Would you be interested in doing a dot?" I said, "Well, first off, I know nothing. Tell me more about that." Once I learn as a layman, I'm like, these guys, keep in mind, 71% of the earth is covered in water. A lot of people don't realize that. So, what you do in terms of research in the ocean actually matters. So, I went back to them and said, "No, I won't do one dive, but I will do three." And so, we did three very successfully. Lots of research, lots of papers written. So again, it was a challenge and it had purpose. What's it like down there? I mean that dark. Dark. Once you get past 600 feet, it's dark. And you went how far? 36,000 ft. Wow. What do your ears feel like? Uh it's not because you're in a chamber where you don't really have to

45:24 equalize. Okay. So you're not subject to the bends coming up. And so it takes about took us about 4 hours to get to the bottom. We spent 3 hours on the bottom. Three three and a half hours on the bottom. Another three and a half. So it's about 12 hours. And you're in a titanium sphere that's literally no bigger than this table. And there's two of us. And but we have cameras and we have lights. And the guy that I was with is was the founder of Triton Submarines, the best submersible building company in the world that's based here in the United States. And so it's extraordinary if you know what you're looking at. No, I didn't know what I was looking at, but fortunately I had him. And I started doing some of the piloting cuz I've got a lot of background in piloting things. And so it was it was it was it was really worthwhile. Are you always like on the lookout for something that's going to

46:36 scare you, challenge you? You're not I I have no interest in being scared. Are you scared when you do these things? When you go 36,000 ft? When you go to outer space? No. No fear? No. How? Well, training preparation yeah mental attitude when you go like 36,000 ft down, I knew so much about the vessel, their safety record. Keep in mind in submersibles, it's a shame what happened with the ocean gate tragedy in June of 2023. Mhm. Well, that was a submerscible that had bad technology, bad engineering, bad planning, bad leadership. Okay? And it never got what's called DMV certified. That's a Danish company.

47:32 And so with the submersible we went down with a little known fact is in the last 50 years any submersible that's been DMV certified has never had an accident. The Ocean Gate disaster tragedy was completely outside the realm of safety. Gotcha. Okay. So I am curious though like do you have things on the docket looking forward that you want to do? Are there are they secret? Are they you could you I do. What what are they? I can't tell you. So you So we have two different projects coming. Two big projects coming up. Two big Yeah. One of them this year but they generally tend to be complicated and so this one this one is is hopefully we've actually been doing training. We were actually on location.

48:26 I can't tell you where. Uh, is it on this planet? It is. It's actually I was like, maybe Larry's gonna be the first guy to go to Mars. Yeah. No, no, it's actually And you would know the location as soon as I told you the words. Okay. Uh, and so hopefully in the fall we might be able to do it. And then we have another one that's planned for 2026 or 2027. But most of these were operating under embargos with non-disclosure agreements. So, it's just we're just not able to talk about them. Sure. How do you balance out? I know you you obviously know your stuff here inside and out.

49:06 You're a family man and you do all this crazy stuff like go to outer space and go deep in the sea. Sure. That's a lot of different things, competing priorities. How do you manage all that? discipline, focus, organization, and really good people around you. And so, you're right. But it's amazing what you can get done in a day or a week if you have all the things I just mentioned. And you think about family time as quality, not quantity. Mhm. It's not that you're at home. What are you doing? Are you present? Are you engaging?

49:54 We try to do things as a group. And then I try to do things like oneon-one. Yeah. Like my granddaughter who's nine and game for anything. Like I've taken her indoor skydiving. I took her hot air balloon. Okay. I've taken her ziplining at these really like high kind of so so you try I think kids learn with experiential learning and so that's what would like her I'm trying to do to expose her I take her on business things with me in fact my my so that's a grandchild but my kids I have three I've tried to do the same thing with them. Like if you just take them with you and you expose them whether it's sports, whether it's business, whether it's charitable G, whatever it might be.

50:58 I think they really learn a lot by seeing and observing. When you have the means and extreme wealth, now you didn't start getting your wealth till after the age of 40. So, this this may not apply directly to your kids, but how do you raise kids to be tough, resilient, and gritty if they're son of a rich guy or granddaughter of a rich guy? Like, how do you do that? First off, never act like you're rich. What does what does that mean? Like, well, it means you don't like, oh, whatever you want. And, oh, you want a brand new Oh, you're 16.

51:32 You want a brand new Mercedes? No way. Yeah. My son wanted a car. I'm like, "Well, you earn a third of the money and we'll do the other two/3 and oh, by the way, it's not going to be some hot rod." Like, we went over to this Ford Mustang dealer and he's like, "Oh, yeah." And and and oh, it's got this small engine, everything. Keep in mind, I got a racing bracket. I'm like, "Okay, fine." We go to the dealership. I said to the salesman, "You mind if I drive?" Let's say I took him on a ride that on the drive back, the sales guy's like sitting back in his seat like, "Oh my god, what happened to me?" And my son from the back goes, "I guess we're not buying this car."

52:25 So he got a Honda, a little small four cylinder Honda. Okay, fine. So I think it starts with the parents having perspective and teaching about the right things to do and the right way to do it and how you treat people uh and understanding that wealth can be used for good but it also can be really bad. Yeah. Um, looking forward, I'm cur I know there's some things you can't talk about, but I am curious like what do you what are you most excited about? Because I I talked to your guys before doing this and I was like, "Will Larry ever retire?" And they said, "No way." He's like doing what he loves. Why would he retire? And I love that feeling. I feel the same way. It's a it's a it's it's an amazing place to be.

53:13 So knowing that like you're not going to chill or relax. It doesn't seem like the way you are. What are you most excited about moving forward? Yeah. So I'll answer it. Ryan, slightly different. Okay. People have asked me, "Well, of all the things that you've ever done, what was the one that you like the most or is most exciting?" My answer is always the same. The next thing I'm going to do. And so, you get to make a choice. Do you live in the past or do you live in the future? My recommendation, live in the future, not the past. What about the present? I think the present's important because that is the next step to the future. And so you have to be aware of, hey, what am I doing today, tomorrow, this week, this month, but you need a plan and you need some objectives. And by the way, whether it's personally or professionally or whatever it may be, and I think you need a balance.

54:15 If all you think about is work or career and nothing else, M and you need to think about family and you need to think about your friends. I argue you can do all those but you got to have a plan. You you have uh I don't I may be going somewhere where I shouldn't but from what I've read it seems like you have a really good family life, a good marriage, a long marriage. How have you done that in the midst of being hardcore at work doing crazy again spending a lot of time doing other things? I'm personally curious about I like to think I want to go do big things, be a visionary, go to space would be cool, whatever. What's the key to a good marriage?

54:57 Well, I think it's having relationships with someone who they understand who you are and you understand who they are. Yeah. And it's about accommodating each other, compromising in some cases, and also kind of thinking about is this really worth the argument, you know? Yeah. And and nothing is perfect. So, you try your best and you work on it and and uh but it's it's I mean, you gota, you know, you're going to get out of it what you put into it. And then the kids, you know, it's amazing to me if you were to meet my kids, great kids, all three of them, you're like, did they all grow up in the same house? Really?

56:00 And they did, but they're all very different. So, you know, and then understanding each person and how can you help them, how can you coach them, how can you encourage them, right? And then trying to individualize what you're going to do. But believe me, it's not a perfect deal and it's certainly not easy. Yeah. Uh, one more before we get out of here. Um, Larry, I'm curious. You have a lot of young people you hire. Um, so I'm I'm really thinking about those who are like fresh out of college and I remember being in this place where I want to leave a positive dent in the world. I want to do good, but I'm just kind of not sure what to do. What are some general pieces of life/career advice you have for that person? So number one is don't sweat it.

56:51 Yeah. So, what I said to my kids, because I believe this, hey, you get out of school. Let's say you went to college. By the way, not every kid has to or should go to college. Let's say you're pick a number 22. Go out and experience and explore. Mhm. You may even start with trying to figure out what you don't want to do, which is what I did my 20. I didn't know what I wanted to do, but I ended up making this long list of everything I didn't want to do. I think sometimes there's pressure. Maybe it's from family members.

57:37 Maybe it's pressure they put on themselves. Maybe it's other people. Oh, you know, you got to have a career and you got to do this. You got plenty of time. Stop and think about it today. If you're 22 years old and you just graduated from college, you're probably looking at you got 80 years of living. 80. If you're like, "What do you mean you're going to live to be a 100?" If you look, and we're real involved with Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic and Cincinnati Children's and other places. Absolutely. Obviously there can be accidents and tragedies but that is not today the average age is 79 that's going to accelerate and so are you worried about the first 10% of that remaining life that's 8 years 22 to 30 so my belief has always been to say to them go out and explore learn enjoy yourself and then by the time you get to 30 You ought to think about what you really want to do. And here's my approach.

58:54 Base it upon passion and purpose. If you have something that you're really passionate about and you got purpose around, chances are you're going to be happy and successful. By the way, it is not about how much money you make. Yeah, I've tried poor and I've tried rich. Okay. I mean, rich is probably a little better. Yeah, it is a bit better, but it's not the most important thing. Yeah. And I would argue if you have passion and purpose, Yeah. you're going to have a full life. I I lied. Uh you're in impeccable shape. You look really good. What do you do? I do 10 workouts a week. Okay. So, I do four cardio, I do three weights, and then I do three uh yoga. Uh so, generally, and some days are double workouts, others are rest days. You eat really clean. Yeah, I eat very healthy. I'm I'm 90% of the time I eat like super healthy. I have two cheat meals a week where I eat anything I want to eat. I think you got to do that.

1:00:13 Sleep is huge. Uh for me, I'm not one of those people and go on short sleep. I've actually met very few people who can. For me, I need 8 hours and 20 minutes. Really? You know this? You've calibrated it down to that. Yeah, you've tracked it all. Yeah. Love So, so and then you know mindset you know stress you know I mean how do you manage all that? So if you put together diet, exercise, sleep, manage stress, have good friends, have good relationships, do things with purpose, you can probably be pretty healthy and do amazing things for a long time. Love it. Larry, thank you so much for having us. So much fun. I really appreciate it, man. Thank you. Yep. Great.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "The First Man To Mars? Meet Larry Connor"?

Ryan Hawk (Host), Larry Connor (Guest).

What is "The First Man To Mars? Meet Larry Connor" about?

Larry Connor, a pioneering candidate for manned Mars exploration, shares his journey from private citizen to NASA-trained pilot, emphasizing the necessity of passion, commitment, and a robust cultural foundation in achieving exceptional goals. He reflects on his experiences with failure and success, advocating for a future-oriented mindset and the importance of operational culture over mere…

What is mentioned in this Ryan Hawk episode?

7 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Larry Connor, AX1 mission, Mariana Trench, The Pursuit of Excellence, Ohio University, Ocean Gate. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "The First Man To Mars? Meet Larry Connor"?

The episode runs 1 h 1 min; the transcript is about 8,869 words in 67 timestamped sections.

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