5 minute read
MANAGERS AND
Managers and Team Builders: Four Principles to Develop a Great Team By Carla Cross
“I work alone.” “I don’t need to be a member of a ‘team’”. We’re heard that for years in the real estate industry. Yet, the strongest, fastestgrowing real estate companies have team building as part of their cultures. Agents who want to expand their businesses create teams. So, TEAM is no longer a four-letter word. The importance and implementation of leadership through teamwork and synergy is back in style in the real estate industry.
Why Building a Strong Team is Important to Agents AND Management
As with all industries, the real estate industry is evolving. We’ve gone through the ‘go it alone’ phase. Because we’ve gotten more sophisticated in business. We realize that no one succeeds alone. We understand now that people working together create something more substantial than the sum of the parts. In addition,
with the challenges in the business, we finally get that many minds focused on the same task can accomplish much more than each person working as his own little island. Supporting this trend, strong company cultures have emerged which encourage and reward teamwork instead of solely independent achievement.
Franklin D. Roosevelt said, “People acting together as a group can accomplish things which no individual acting alone could ever hope to bring about.”
If you’ve ever played on a sports team, you know the chaos that ensues when every player tries to be the star—to go her own way. That’s not a team. That’s a group. You may also know the joy of playing on a team that shares a common focus and commitment to excellence. What a difference! What if you could bring that into your real estate office or your agent team?
It’s much easier to talk about teamwork than to create a team. One of the reasons is that most of us have never worked as a team before. As an agent, I didn’t create a team. But, in my management career, I worked to create teams with common focus. How did I learn how to create great teams?
An Unlikely Place to Learn Teamwork
My first experiences in great teams, and then leading teams--comes from the world of music. I’ve created and led teams as a jazz musician. I’ve played in exceptional orchestras (I’m a flutist). I’ve seen conductors pull together one hundred disparate, temperamental, independent musicians as an inspiring team. (It’s a lot like managing a real estate office!). So, the four truisms here come from my experience in both worlds—the musical performance world and the world of real estate team-building.
It’s Not Just About Developing YOU as a Leader
You may think that, as a leader, your job is to find team members that
will work well together. That’s true, as far as it goes. But, your ultimate job is to train and coach those team members to start doing some of the leadership jobs you’ve done. That way, you can keep moving to higher levels of leadership. You can expand and sell your business.
One of the differences between leading a group and leading a team is that, in a successful team, team members also become leaders, and think like leaders, looking out for the good of the team, not just for themselves, In other words,
Leaders develop leadership on their team.
Otherwise, leaders are not really leading. They’re managing—or micromanaging. From developing leadership over a couple of decades, I’ve found four major truisms for developing your team with strong internal leadership. These principles apply whether you’re in management or in sales interested in building a team.
The Principles to Developing Team Leadership
Just because people accept a position doesn’t mean they know how to proceed with the job. They need to have clear direction, a job description and a firm understanding of the responsibilities--prioritized. Do you have a job description for each of your team positions? Do you provide it prior to hiring? Do you coach to it? Do you help your team members get so good at it that they can start training new team members (move into leadership)?
Principle #2: People don’t know WHAT to do to get the job done.
Even if you hire someone who has real estate experience, it doesn’t work to leave it to them to figure what exactly needs to be done—from your point of view. They don’t know your priorities. They don’t know how you work. Do you have processes and systems in place to teach them exactly what needs to be done?
Principle #3: It’s your job to teach them HOW.
Principle #1: People don’t know what’s expected of them.
Some people think “leaders” are the “idea people” and aren’t supposed to
get into implementation. But if you want your team to excel, you must show them how. Having worked with assistants for over 15 years, I have found that assistants and team members need help in systemizing any process that you want done. They need help in developing dialogues to deal with affiliates and consumers in the way you expect. They are good at systemizing their own processes- -but not good at all at systemizing ours! Help them.
All systems in place? Do you have foundational systems in place from which to improvise? Do you have a solid training program to bring a new team member on board? Do you a method to ‘clone’ yourself to develop someone who can take over your job?
Principle #4: When accountability factors aren’t built in, things don’t get done.
There’s a great difference between “do it the way you want” and expecting results and “do it the way you want and let’s check how it’s going regularly”. Hold your team members accountable for each step along the way to completion of a task as well as the end result. Do you have solid, measurable benchmarks from which to measure? How do you know you and they are succeeding?
The pay-off for developing competency and leadership skills in all of your team members is a business that is ‘owned’ by all those involved, with empowerment assured.
Vince Lombardi, one of the greatest football coaches of all time, said of teamwork, “Teamwork is the primary ingredient of success.”
Your goal is to develop processes, systems, and training for your team members—all which reflect your philosophy of how you do business. They reflect your values and your culture. Bring them into a leadership mentality with you, so you can delegate more responsibilities and finally replace yourself!
Copyright©, Carla Cross. All rights reserved.
Carla Cross, CRB, MA, is an international speaker, writer, and coach, specializing in real estate management. Her Leadership Mastery Coaching program is unique in the industry. A National Realtor Educator of the Year, Carla was recently named one of the 50 most influential women in real estate. Join Carla’s Community and receive special offers and free resources. Contact Carla at 425-392-6914 or www.carlacross.com.
