When leadership gets lonely

Karl Sanft remembers one of the most uncomfortable meetings he’s ever had.

It was 2020. COVID was shutting down in-person businesses across the country.

And Sanft had just stepped into his new role as CEO of 24 Hour Fitness — a business built on busy rooms, shared equipment and close contact.

He had to convince owners to take a risk and pivot to a new business model: jettison the tried-and-true “access” model, where users pay for a gym membership, and embrace a “usage” model, where people could show up, work out and pay for a day or a week — all outside under giant tents.

“I was going to (private equity) owners who are losing money hand over fist during a pandemic. I propose taking the equipment outside and charging people to work out outside. I was probably completely competent until the moment the presentation started,” he said. “And then I felt quite alone.”

Fortunately, the owners bought into the vision.

“The owners were tremendous, and we did it. We led the industry, and many copied us,” Sanft said.

Sanft, who graduated from the W. P. Carey School of Business in 1992 with a degree in business administration and management, said that moment reinforced the importance of personal values and principles — “ground wires” that get him through difficult times.

He said many in the industry were struggling during the pandemic, faced with questions like: Do we shut down operations or close locations altogether? What will save the most money?

But Sanft pushed in a different direction.

“I kept coming back to our mission, vision and values,” he said. “You have to ask: What’s really driving your decisions? Because when things get hard, that purpose has to matter.”

“I can do the math, so I was looking to minimize the loss, but it wasn’t all about the loss. It was about our ability to show that (employees) mattered, our members mattered and the brand mattered. That was what was important to me.”

Those values were especially important as he guided 24 Hour Fitness through bankruptcy, eventually assuming the position of CEO in 2022.

Today, 24 Hour Fitness is thriving, with 240 clubs across nine states.

It helped that Sanft had enough insight to predict how members would respond. Although he spent 30 years in the retail industry, rising to senior vice president of U.S. retail operations at Best Buy, he is a Kenpo Karate enthusiast who has been a member of 24 Hour Fitness since 1993.

“People, for both mental and physical well-being, love their workouts. I knew that there was a demand for people to work out,” he said.

Early in his career, he developed the practice of hosting monthly town halls with frontline employees, called “Coffee with Karl,” which he continues to this day.

“I can't tell you how many people told me I didn't have to do it: ‘We'll get you the information. You can do it in an automated way.’ But there's nothing better than asking line-level people what they love about their job, and what they hate about their job, because unfiltered, they'll tell you.”

Sanft prides himself on having visited every 24 Hour Fitness in California, where he lives, spending time with employees and members and listening to their concerns.

He encourages ASU students preparing to graduate to spend time understanding their own values — not just what they want to do, but why.

“A lot of people are clear on what they want to be, but not as clear on the why,” he said. “Why do you want to lead? What do you want the people you lead to take away from working with you? What do you stand for?”

Sanft says it's okay if you’re still figuring it out.

“But you have to start asking those questions. Because leadership is tough — and it can be lonely,” he said. “If you don’t have a set of principles guiding why you want to lead, it’s impossible.”

Experience and advice can help, he added, but they only go so far.

“At the end of the day, you’re still making hard calls,” he said. “And people are less interested in the decision itself than they are in why you made it and how you got there.”

He also encourages graduates to begin building networks in their new jobs, not only among peers but also horizontally among the boss’s peers.

“There's a lot to be said about building a very purposeful network, a very purposeful personal brand, and then owning that network and owning that brand,” he said. “You've got to branch out. You can't leave your career up to your relationship with one person and leave it at that.”

His parting advice to ASU students: Learn as much as you can in a new job, even if it’s not the perfect fit.

Sanft was new to his first job out of college when he opened his paycheck and learned a hard lesson about taxes: “I thought I was going to cry when I saw my first paycheck,” he remembers. “I called my dad, and I’m like, ‘This is horrible, and I don’t think I want to do it.’”

His father, who hailed from Boston, said in his thick accent, “Karl, you’ll never make less. It’s only up from here, so get started and learn.”

So learn he did.

A store manager's job at Kmart allowed him to absorb as much as he could.

“Most of the kids today are like, ‘What’s Kmart?’ but it was a wonderful experience,” he said. “It was a big store. It was multifaceted. We did every part of business there through retail.”

It was the kind of hands-on experience that taught him how businesses really work and set the stage for everything that followed.

Looking back, Sanft sees a throughline from those early days in retail to leading a company through one of the most challenging periods in its history. The jobs changed, the stakes grew and the decisions became more difficult, but the lesson remained the same: Know your values, keep learning and stay connected to the people you serve.