In Attracting Talent, C&W Adds New Big Apple Chief

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As part of the efforts to remake Cushman & Wakefield, the firm, which recruited about 1,700 people in 2012, is trying to attract the next generation of leaders. “We're fired up about the energy that the next generation brings to the company,” notes Glenn Rufrano, president and CEO. “Their facility with technology is changing us.”

To this end, the firm fosters groups such as C&W future leaders for people who have been in the business seven years or less and provides opportunities for them to interact and engage in community activities. According to Jim Underhill, C&W's CEO of the Americas, the firm is providing more opportunities for these people to have a voice about the direction C&W is taking.

In one recent move, C&W in February appointed Ronald T. Lo Russo president of the firm's New York Tri-state region. Lo Russo, who comes to C&W from Vornado Realty Trust, where he was president of leasing for the New York office, will report to Underhill.

“We talk a lot about transforming from the old C&W to the new,” Underhill says. “And this is a perfect example of the transformation that is occurring here. What's notable is that he's a young guy coming in to run a significant part of our business. His position at Vornado has afforded him a broad view of the entire market.”

At C&W, Lo Russo, who is also chairman of the Young Men's/Women's Real Estate Association of New York, will oversee the firm's brokerage operations in the region, and will also coordinate C&W's brokerage activities with its other global services. As part of this “evergreening of C&W,” Underhill notes that the firm also has younger people running its Chicago, Atlanta and Dallas offices.

As for its retention efforts, certain senior managers are eligible to get an equity stake in the company. Currently employees hold about a 25% overall interest in the firm. Rufrano notes that as part of the original seller agreement (when EXOR took over the company), starting in April 2013 “there is potential liquidity for some of those shares.”