A couple weeks ago at Jackson's birthday party my friend Mike noticed the robotic way I tilted my entire body when I went to turn my head.

"What happened, did you swallow some glue and it settled in your vertebra?"

I grimaced as I responded, "Funny line if my neck didn't feel like 16 jagged bits of lumber grinding into stone."

"That bad?" he continued.

"Nothing I can't live with." My response sounded oddly like what I figured the Marlboro man would creak as he picked himself up after a night where only a thin blanket separated him from the frozen Montana ground.

Mike and I have known each other for about 15 years. He's a good friend, maybe one of my best friends, and without prying he simply suggested, "I've got a guy for that."

Not one to make random suggestions or recommendations, Mike simply said "Brian Chambers."

It took me a few weeks to move forward on Mike's suggestion, but, with Nicole's gentle prodding, I followed up yesterday. And the results were good. Quite good.

I have respired for long enough to know not to clamber to the mountain top and zealously proclaim that this guy is the ace of massage therapists. But he is good. Just as Bob King, the guy who started the Chicago School of Massage Therapy is good. Just as Kurt Hill at Holistic Health Practice is good. Just as Matthew Sweigart who started Ohashiatsu is good. Just as my profoundly talented wife Nicole Hilario is good.

But anyway, I appreciated Brian's approach and his technique. And I will see him again next week. But as I sit here in my home office in Edgewater, waiting for realtors to respond to 12-hour old requests to see Chicago condo listings in the West Loop, the South Loop and River North I ponder what separates good from bad? I don't mean in the biblical sense. But in terms of how someone does their job.

My point here is not to fully and completely answer this question. I am neither an organizational nor a spiritual guru. I am this morning a Chicago real estate professional waiting for other Chicago realtors to respond to requests to show properties that my condo buying clients want to see tonight.

In other words, I am waiting for these Chicago realtors to do their job.

So what makes somebody good at doing their job? Commitment. Passion. Knowledge. Anticipation of needs and responsiveness. The right tools personally and technologically. A desire to not stand still but to continue to learn and grow and apply.

Even lacking some of these skills as far as the real estate conundrum is concerned a step in the right direction is picking up the phone to respond to a voice mail or  replying (quickly) to an email.

By the way - the quickest response I received came from an agent whose business is concentrated in the South Loop. Within minutes of my initial inquiry she had gotten back to me. On the other hand, several agents simply haven't gotten back to me. I guess they have better things to do than show the residences that I guess their clients would like to sell.

Hmm, one of the oldest truths in real estate - you can't sell if you don't show.

If only I could get in touch with the sellers directly I might give them Brian Chamber's contact info so they could alleviate some of the stress associated with their condo not selling (since it's not being shown).