There is a client that I coach, lets call her Jane. (or Cookie)
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Jane has a great business and is always working hard. She has built a nice size team and she grosses over $2,000,000 in revenue every year. The question I asked her the other day was, “Is your team working?” Jane asked what I meant and I said,
“Is your team making you money? ”
“Are you able to take more time off? ”
“Is the team communicating well?”
She thought they were, except she could not get more production from everyone and there were some client issues due to a lack of communication.
I asked her a very important question. I asked her how much income was she putting in her pocket when she was a single agent with an assistant.
Jane said she was taking home over $500,000.
I said, “Ok, so now you have a team of seven. How much are you taking home of the $2,000,000 plus you make?”
She said $380,000. Then she said, “but now I have freedom that I did not have.” I asked what does that mean and she said,
“Well, I can come and go as I like.”
I asked, “how much are you working when you were a single agent?” she said, “seven days a week.” I then asked, “How much are you working now?” she said seven days a week.
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She then said, “I feel like I am fooling myself.” Jane needs to think about her position and her leadership skills.
Solution
As you can see Jane has a major issues. One is she is not making enough net profit and second; she is working as hard as ever. The question she needs to ask herself,
“Why am I making less money?”
She knows that the team is growth mode. Jane was a new client when I started to dig into this. Here is what I found:
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There was no business plan, so she was just operating day-to-day.
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The agents were being paid on a 50/50 split and two of the four agents where on a 65/35 split (65% to the agent).
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Her marketing costs where 29% when they should have been 10% and so on.
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I told her minimum profit should have been 40%
She was also having all emails sent to her for her review. She would spend hours reviewing. This tells me she had a trust issue with the team or she was a control freak!
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In order for the team to grow and for Jane to grow, she needs to allow her staff carry out the responsibilities they have been assigned. Yes, they may fail once in a while but that is ok! They will learn.
She never took holidays because she felt the clients deserved to deal with her. You have to present the team to your clients as a valuable part of the business and allow the agents to take over.
The truth is that in some cases the staff will do a better job than you.
If you work all the time you can never be 100% focused.
I asked her what her expectations were for the buyer agents. She said she wanted them to be productive and has told them they should call people and knock on doors, but they never do.
You have to set CLEAR expectations of what you want and expect your agents to do. You must hold them accountable. When they do not do what is expected — talk to them.
If they keep failing to do what they are supposed to — Say GOODBYE!
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Conclusion
There is only one thing you should do daily in your business and that is MAKE A PROFIT. When you are not making a profit it means your business model not is working. It takes time and effort to adjust your model so it works for your business.
One of the biggest things I see is;
‘Many people that start a team still want to micromanage everything!’
When you do that you are killing the ability of the team to perform, because when you are continually telling them to perform there is no need for them to extend their thinking.
Allow your people to grow.
Finally, give your phone to an agent and go on a holiday.
Coach Ken
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