Teach Your Staff to Leave You
Every time I hear Gary Keller talk he talks about talent. EVERY TIME. And it never fails, someone in the room raises their hand and says something like “I’m 
having trouble with my buyers agent.” or assistant, or whatever. Who the person is doesn’t matter. What matters is that people are always the problem! Yes. People. People are our problem!
Why are people our problem? It’s usually a combination of things in the beginning. Rookie mistakes that we make hiring. First, we may have hired the wrong person. Well if we hired the wrong person we simply need to “de-hire” said person and hire the right one. Initial problem solved.
Now we’ve done it! We’ve got the right person! Happy day! We’ve got our amazing buyers agent, assistant, marketer, etc. We couldn’t be happier. Business is running smooth and we starting thinking that people are the solution and not the problem. Yes, if people are the problem then people are also the solution. Enter problem number two: We notice that performance begins to slip, our people seem unhappy or discontent with their job with which they once thrived? Well, it goes back to people being the problem. EXCEPT this time the person that is the problem is generally US, not THEM.
Yes. We are now the problem. What happens is when we hire capacity talent (people who can grow in their role and ultimately into a new one) instead of cul-de-sac talent (people who lack growth capability) they want to be developed. Capacity talent wants to thrive at their job. They want to be the best they can be. They want to learn more. They want the opportunity for advancement even if they choose not to take it. Capacity talent will rarely rest until they are the absolute best at their job (and possibly even better than you at yours). And this is where we lose them. Because our leadership skills are lacking. We fear that if we develop our staff to be “too talented” that they will leave us! And then our perfect business where we were once so happy will be shattered. I can tell you this is not the case.
In my early leadership days I had the same fear. That if I taught my people enough to leave me that they would. Reality is that if I taught them how to thrive on their own and go it alone, they stayed! They stayed and were happy and more productive than ever! Enter: happy dance! This happens because you are satisfying their need to grow and develop. You are providing the leadership that they desire. And through this process they usually realize that going it alone would be harder and less rewarding for them. By less rewarding I don’t necessarily mean financially. We’ve all stayed at underpaying jobs because we’ve respected and liked the people we worked for. And if you’re anything like me I can say that you’ve probably given a boss or two the “one fingered peace sign” at a good paying job. Yes, I have actually done that. That woman was evil. But I digress…
Teach your people to leave you and they rarely will. Be the solution to their career desires and they are yours forever.
Is your middle name “Real Estate”?
Come on. Lets be honest here. You know that you secretly roll your eyes when you see someone changes their name to “Joe RealEstate Johnson” or “Suzy SellingHomes Smith” or “Liz Jacksonville Landry” on Facebook. We all hate it. If it isn’t on your passport, don’t put it on your Facebook profile. I am very vocal about things like this with my coaching and training around the country. So why do people still do it? Well, what I have found is that there are is a segment of trainers out there that are spreading this non-sense (not to mention violation of FB terms of service) through out the real estate world quicker than rumors in a middle school locker room. I partially blame them, and I partially blame us as an industry.
We as an industry are all about hopping on the latest and (often not) greatest way to get out name out there and tell everyone that we sell real estate. Making sure people we are friends with know that we are in real estate is a good thing. Slapping it in their face as the first thing they see or hear from you is a bad thing. This is why people refer to us as sleazy used car salesman. Now; if you are wondering why this is so wrong and offensive I’ll lay it out for you.
- It is a clear and direct violation of Facebooks Terms of Service.
- Facebook is what is considered the “backyard bbq” of social networks. – you would NEVER walk up to someone in your business suit at a backyard bbq to shake their hand and immediately say “Hi, I’m Liz Selling Jacksonville Homes Landry. Great to meet you.” would you? NO. OF COURSE YOU WOULDN’T! Just think of the reaction on that poor persons face. They would run away from you.
- Facebook is comprised primarily of people who already know you and like you. Hence the fact that they already know you are in real estate. You need not put it in your name.
- There is a convenient little spot RIGHT UNDER YOUR NAME on your profile page that says where you work.
- If you just hover over someones name in the news feed where they work shows up there too! So you don’t need it in your name. See proper example below.
Now here is the deal fellow real estate agents. I am kindly asking; begging in fact, for you to STOP pissing off you your friends and family! By doing this you look unprofessional, sleazy and frankly just desperate.
You are hurting your selves by doing this. More importantly if someone does get annoyed enough and Facebook decides to delete your profile you will lose not only all of the connections you’ve built, and all the pictures; you will also lose any and all fan pages that you are the only admin on. I often say there there are certain places to bend the rules, certain places to break them, and others we follow properly. This is one where you should follow the rules. The consequences are too great. So I ask you; is it really worth it?
*Names of all known violators have been left out in the hopes they will read this and correct the issue quickly*
Folding jeans… maybe some of us need a lesson.
It was 12 years ago for those of you wondering. No. This is not one of those blogs where I am going to talk about how much easier life was at 16. Or how I miss those days. Because it wasn’t and I don’t. I would rather poke my eye out with a fork than go back to high school. I am going to talk about the job I had when I was 16. That’s right. WORK.
I was a sophomore in high school. Played sports so I was busy, and I had a job at the local Levis store. I made crap money, I worked crap hours, and my boss hated me. None of these things were working in my favor. I mean seriously. I would be in school every day by 7am, ball practice in 100* weather until 5, work from 6-10:30. I worked every Friday night. Most Saturdays and Sundays. I would go into work after a day of ball practice and I had no car, so I had to get a ride from someone if my parents were not home that night. Then I would work for about an hour, the store would be slow so I would get sent home.
At first I was overjoyed to get sent home. “Awesome. Now I can go be a teenager. WORK SUCKS” – then I realized that as tough as it was for me to find a ride to work, it was even harder to find a ride home. I was broke because I only worked an hour. And to top it off I soon realized my boss sent me home not as a reward, but because I wasn’t good at my job and wasn’t worth it to keep around. I know. Its hard to believe. But I like most 16 year olds thought I knew everything and that I could get away with avoiding work while at work. As a matter of fact, I know many adults that still do this today. So what was the outcome. I would exhaust more effort, had higher stress, made less money and was inconvenienced more by AVOIDING working while at work than if I actually just did my job well.
LIGHT BULB! 
It was a magical day the day I decided to actually do my job at work. Time flew by! I felt accomplished. My boss was impressed. The following chain of events was great. I got better at my job so it got easier. I got more hours because I was good at it (which meant more $ to me!). I got a raise! I got a promotion several months later. I ended up being promoted to a supervisor by the time I reached 17. At 18 I was making better money than any other high school kid I knew, and many adults. I had an understanding of business, profit and loss statements, working with and leading people, etc. Not to mention, I can fold a mean pair of jeans.
Why did this happen? BECAUSE I ACTUALLY DID MY JOB! I spent so much time and energy avoiding my job the first 2 months I had it that I am almost ashamed to admit it. Obviously I changed that.
My simple point is this. And I am going to capitalize it because I want this message to be clear to everyone. STOP AVOIDING THE PARTS OF YOUR JOB THAT MAKE YOU SUCCESSFUL AND GET YOUR BUTT TO WORK! For some of you that means paperwork, for some it means lead generating, for some it means just working at all at anything.
My promise to you is this. If you actually work. If you actually do what you are supposed to. Your stress levels will go down, your income will go up, and the ease of your job will increase. Give it a try, the avoidance isn’t worth it.
If you think you’re job is tough. If you think its thankless. Do me a favor. It is the holiday season. Go to your local retail shop and get a part time job through the new year. There is no hell quite as special as working retail in the holidays.
LL
1 Hour Business Consultation with Ben Kinney – Yes, you could win it!
Lets get straight to the point! You’ve got a chance to win a FREE 1 hour coaching session with Ben Kinney!
How you ask? Simple! Anyone who signs up for MAPS Mastery Technology Coaching during #KWMC is entered to win. ONE, yes ONE lucky person will get a one hour business session with Ben!
For the rest of you we’ve got something for you too! Any agent that signs up for a MAPS Tech Group Coaching session during #KWMC will be entered to win one of three 1 hour coaching sessions with one of our other tech coaches! They would be me, @ChadHyams and @ChrisMcnamara!
Registrations for group can be online OR at the MAPS Booth! MASTERY Registrations must be done in person at the MAPS booth. All registrations must be in by Friday to be eligible. Don’t wait, space is fillng up quick!
If you reallllllllllly want to do MASTERY Tech Coaching to enter for Bens time please Facebook MSG me and we can make arrangements.
Follow the Tweeters #KWMC
As many of us are just 5 days away from touching down in Austin, TX for KW Mega Camp the twitter streams and status updates will be overflowing with #KWMC information!
To make life a little bit easier on you I’ve compiled a list of some of the most active tweeters that will be updating live from the event. Feel free to follow each of these tweeps or the public twitter list I’ve put them on!
If you are planning on following all the news during Mega Camp you should also be sure not only to follow these folks, but to follow the #KWMC hashtag. It is the official tag of the event. Don’t know how to follow a hashtag? No worries, I’ve got this handy dandy video right here to show you. 
5 Reasons to KEEP Your LinkedIn Profile
It has been brought to my recent attention that there is a (surprisingly) large group of people who are thinking about deleting their
LinkedIn profiles. I had no idea about this epidemic. I was completely caught by surprise and I felt as if I needed to throw my friends a life vest before they drown in the waters of their own decisions. Luckily… this is not life or death. I will advise you though to KEEP your LinkedIn profile. And if you don’t have one, set one up.
1. LinkedIn has GREAT search engine optimization results and will show up if a potential client searches for you.
2. The boardroom of social media. This site is not for socializing. It is for networking and professionalism.
3. They had an $8Billion IPO in May and shares are selling for over $100 each. Clearly, the business community see’s value here.
4. They just introduced the “APPLY” button for job seekers.
5. You may want to expand your business and search others profiles (aka – their online resume) for recruiting. Vise versa – you may need a job if you don’t do your prospecting.
So what I am saying here is that although LinkedIn is not the worlds most bustling social network they do indeed have their place. And they are important to have up, running and UPDATED.
LL
Because size does matter…
Stop your dirty thinking! I am referring to the size of your database! I know I tend to stick to the cool new things in my blogs and speaking like social media and internet; however today we are going to kick it old school. Sort of.
Do me a favor and think about your database. How many contacts do you have in it? Now ask yourself this. How many of them are likely to do business with you? Above I said we are going to kick it old school. Well the reason it is followed by a “sort of” is because in recent years our database’s tend to become more like phone books than ever before. The main problem for this is the internet. Yes, I just said the internet is causing problems. However it is not the Internets fault. It is ours. Because we are improperly managing it.
Lets look at what is happening. Our databases are supposed to be people who are likely to do business with us based on past and current relationships. With internet lead generation we tend to get a lot of looky loo’s and tire kickers who register either with limited information, or fake all together. Yes, fake. Mickey Mouse is not really interested in buying that lake front home. I promise. So what do we do? We filter, label and top grade our leads. Having a database of 8,000 people does you no good if you’ve never connected with them. Ever. We have the false belief that our large database of 8,000 people will produce us business simply because of its size. This is not accurate. My recommendation is to use labels to differentiate who really is in your “database” and simply who’s data you are storing and mass emailing. Don’t get me wrong. I am NOT saying to delete all of those 5,000 emails you have. Yes, some of them may need to go. However its probably not costing you anything to do business with them and there are ways to pull them back in to convert them (but that is a different topic). I want you to clean up your database for tracking and conversion purposes. The size of your database (your TRUE database) will directly influence the size of your business. Manage your database well and you’ll thrive in business. Oh yeah, be sure to add your true SOI on your social platforms. It makes relationship building as easy as pie… or cake depending on your sweet tooth
LL
