What a wonderful exciting world we live in and what a great profession we have chosen. Think about if you only could take a break at a prescribed time. Or only had 45 minutes for lunch, or if you always had to drive in rush hour traffic every morning to make it to the office by 8:00. Yipes! Instead we chose real estate. That doesnt mean that this profession doesnt have pressures or mundane activities, it just means that we are free to make choices of what, when, where, and how we do our job.
In a recent copy of REALTOR Magazine, you know that publication we get monthly and stack in the corner hoping to get around to it, one article caught my eye, Balance, by J. Lennox Scott, author of Next Generation Real Estate, President of John L. Scott Real Estate in Seattle, Washington, with 2,800 sales associates and ranked #15 out of the top 500 real estate companies in the US. In his article, he states that to be successful, the practitioner must have a business plan, but more importantly, the practitioner needs to develop a life plan. He further states that a life plan is developed around different elements than a business plan. The life plan elements he lists are:
The work life, he says, should be considered the economic engine for the life plan. I really like this. The Economic Engine that pulls the train in the direction we want to travel. Every day I see so many agents sitting on a side rail, paralyzed in analysis, negativity, or effect, going nowhere, or screaming down the track at 100 miles an hour with empty boxcars, no goals, passion, values, or life.
I take every teachable moment to share that in order to grow in success and happiness, we must prioritize our values and build a personal strategic plan. Most people claim I dont have time to sit and write a plan! Well, maybe its because you dont have a plan that is congruent with your values, I answer. So many people fail to see that the foundation of success and happiness is not just hard work, it is smart work! Smart work defined as, Doing the basics better and more often than anyone else. And the basics of anything is to have a plan.
Recently after 3 months of directing one of my ASPIRE™ (Activate Success Patterns Inside Resolute Effort. Creation, activation, and implementation of a Personal Strategic Plan, an associate paid, personal strategic coaching program created to assist real estate associates in building lifetime success habits) groups on prioritizing values, creating a personal strategic plan, identifying self imposed obstacles that hold us back, I had an after workshop on FSBOs and Expireds. One of the students came up after class and said, We are all glad you finally got into the meat. Even though I know that the statement all glad was used to divert personal accountability, I smiled and slumped, thinking that my lesson had missed its mark. Later when discussing this with my mentor, Dick Matthews, President of Matthews Young and Associates in Chapel Hill, NC, he said, Few people want to sink their teeth into the real problem in life, that being self. Most want to take a bite out of others instead. The meat of life will always be the individual and only a few will ever be convinced of this. So with shoulders high and esteem bolstered, I press on trumpeting the message that first we must prioritize our true values; second, set out what we want to accomplish; third, prioritize our projected goals and desires; fourth, 5 sense (see, hear, touch, smell and taste) the outcome in writing; Sixth, create and prioritize strategies necessary to accomplish each outcome; Seventh, define all the tasks required to accomplish each strategy; Eighth, validate that they are congruent with your values; and Ninth, place them into our subconscious by reviewing and working our plan every day.
As J. Lennox Scott said, Unfortunately, very few of us were taught about life plans in school, so its imperative that managers and other real estate leaders teach practitioners about their importance. Thanks Lennox, I could not agree more.
Keeping your Economic Engine fueled and rolling and your Life Plan on track daily for success is a Choice. I look forward to our triumph.
