Architecture is a key ingredient to success in the real-estate business. However, we're not simply referring to the architecture of properties. But more precisely, the architecture involved in the strategy of a real-estate firm's operations. No one can tell you that better than Daniel De La Vega, the President of the international One Sothebys conglomerate.

De la Vega deployed an open architecture strategy of hiring top specialists across the world in luxury markets- from the US to Latin America to Europe- in the process of making the One Sothebys brand name synonymous with the best in luxury properties worldwide. As opposed to the traditional real-estate firm, which relies on local experts, De La Vega saw a bigger vision for his firm and instituted a coherent system of top-down, centralized customer service to spread clientele across his expanding empire to the specialists in the markets that demand came in for.

As De La Vega elaborates: “We wanted to build an international system that wouldn't compromise local specialization, and that would be greater than the sum of its parts."  Through the process, De La Vega not only separated One Sothebys to the top of its class, but he also built a shining precedent for the rest of the real-estate industry to aspire towards.