During a recent interview with Brad Inman, mega-team leader and tech entrepreneur Ben Kinney shared how he’s preparing for the choppy economic waters that may lie ahead.
 
He used the analogy of a bear being on a hill outside of your camp to describe the challenges facing the real estate market.
 
No one can tell if the bear will come into the camp and cause problems or keep walking along the hill. But you must prepare for the possibility the bear will come your way.
 
To prepare for potential difficulties, he suggests that brokerages and teams focus on the three most important jobs of running a real estate brokerage or team:
 
1.  Attract talent in sales and operational roles.   You need to get focused and spend the majority of your time doing this.  Dedicate resources and time to this task.
 
2.  Once you attract the talent, get them into production.   It doesn’t matter if you have hundreds of thousands of real estate agents if they’re not productive.  You need to hire the right people and get them into production as quickly as possible.
 
3.  Plug the hole in your bucket.   Do everything you can to keep the mid-range agents (18 – 36 transactions /year) from leaving your company.   Let the bottom tier leave, and the top agents are your second priority.  The middle group are the most vulnerable and will hurt your business the most if they leave.
 
Recruiting and retention are the top priorities of high performing real estate organizations in all market conditions, but especially during times of uncertainty.
 
If the bear walks into your camp, what will he find you doing?

We recently learned that resilience is an important trait to look for in recruiting prospects.

But how about you? Do you see yourself as a resilient person?

According to business coach Jesse Sostrin, it’s a critical ingredient for all leaders and business practitioners.

You cannot overvalue your own resilience.

It affects everything about you, from your capacity to solve problems and innovate to your physical, mental, and emotional well-being.

Resilience is like a super-competency, influencing many other related skills and abilities that you need to deploy in order to work, manage, and lead well.

As a recruiter or hiring manager, there are constant changes, setbacks, and obstacles to overcome.

If you find yourself retreating in the face of problems and difficulties, you may need to strengthen your own resilience muscle.

The desired result of the application process is a live conversation with a viable recruiting prospect.
 
You can randomly call the prospect and hope to catch them, but it’s more productive to pre-schedule the call via a quick text-message exchange soon after they apply (ex. Do you have time for a quick call later this afternoon?).
 
The screening phone conversation should be short and focused on getting the prospect either scheduled for a face-to-face interview (in-person or video) or disqualified from moving forward in the process.
 
Here is a script used by some of our high-performing recruiting coordinators:
 
Hi, this is [your first name] with [your company].  Is now still a good time to talk? (if, yes) So tell me about your interest in becoming a real estate agent?
 
Can you tell me about your work history and what’s going on in your career right now (this answer will tell you a lot about where they are at, and how to proceed)?
 
Based on your work in the past, what skills and talents do you possess that you believe would apply to the real estate agent position (measures self-awareness)?
 
If real estate doesn’t pan out for you, what other career options are you considering (measures commitment)?
 
Obviously, a career in real estate is not right for everyone. The time it takes to get your license, to go through our training, and to close your first transaction is usually 3-6 months. How are you prepared to bridge that gap financially (measures financial capacity)?
 
I’d like to set an appointment for you to meet with our hiring manager for an interview. Are you available to meet this afternoon or tomorrow afternoon (the goal is to get a qualified prospect into an interview within 72 hours of applying)?
 
Using this script will help you make a quick in-or-out decision on who moves forward in the recruiting process.

Yesterday, we discussed the difference between extrinsic and intrinsic motivation.
 
It would be foolish to ignore reality that much of the real estate industry is driven by extrinsic motivation.
 
What’s my commission split?
 
How much of a referral fee do I have to pay for leads?
 
What’s the benefit of me working with your mortgage partner?
 
Do I get a signing bonus if I affiliate with your company?
 
Do you offer a marketing allowance to help me generate leads?
 
And the list goes on.
 
While it’s desirable for your agents to be intrinsically motivated, you can’t assume they’ll be unaffected by the forces around them.
 
In the real estate industry, most agents are going to be motivated by a combination of internal and external rewards.
 
As a baseline, develop a checklist of the extrinsic motivations an agent would likely consider when choosing a brokerage.
 
Compare your checklist to what your competitors offer.
 
You don’t have to win on every line item, but your external rewards should be generally equivalent (or better) when compared to your competitors.
 
When the extrinsic foundation is established, intrinsic motivation can kick-in as a hiring and retention differentiator.

More than 20 years ago, University of Rochester professors Richard Ryan and Edward Deci published their findings on intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.

Their research was summarized in an insightful podcast showing how individuals progress from disinterest (where most of recruiting prospects start) to excitement about joining and staying with your team.

Amotivated: At this stage, prospects don’t know you exist, don’t see the value in what you’re offering, or don’t trust you to deliver the value you promise.

Extrinsically Motivated: Things start to change when prospects can experience some immediate gratification by interacting with you (ex. getting a problem solved) or experience some social reward by connecting with you (ex. increasing their social status). Extrinsically motivated actions tend to produce valuable, but short-term engagement.

Intrinsically Motivated: Someone fully engaged on your team is experiencing intrinsic motivation. They have a genuine interest in connecting with you and your team, enjoy participating in your culture, and find satisfaction in helping others. Intrinsically motivated individuals are experiencing feelings of competence, autonomy, and relatedness.

From a retention perspective, agents who are extrinsically motived are vulnerable.

As soon as the benefit you’re providing changes, an agent will move on to the next person who can solve their problems or provide a social reward.

The goal is to transition them from extrinsic to intrinsic motivation.

From a recruiting perspective, your goal is to move someone from being amotivated to extrinsically motivated by what you offer.

Find a problem to solve or provide a social reward.

There is no way to skip this step and go directly to intrinsic motivation. 

Intrinsic motivation only occurs after they’re hired.

I was recently talking with one of my favorite hiring managers, and she told me about an interaction she recently had with an experienced agent recruiting prospect.

The prospect had previously worked in her office and defected to a competitor.

During a recent phone conversation with the prospect, she asked for some help.

If you ever come across someone who would benefit from what we offer, please refer them.

You know what kind of people I’m looking for, and I trust your opinion.

This interaction is packed with excellent recruiting execution. Here are some things to note:

1.  She stays in contact with agents who have left her office.

“Boomerang hires” are invaluable because they demonstrate to others in your office that the grass is not greener somewhere else.

2.  She asks her competitors for referrals.

It’s surprising, but competitors will often give you referrals if they have a clear vision of the value you provide.

3.  She builds trust by acknowledging the trustworthiness of the other person.

This is a great way to honor the relationship and lay the groundwork for future interactions.

After hearing “I trust your opinion,” the prospect felt safe enough to engage in additional conversation for the next 30 minutes.

The best recruiting conversations are built on trust and mutual respect.

Showing and acknowledging that trust is often a catalyst for making these conversations happen.

Here are a few common questions that new-to-real-estate recruiting prospects ask during a first interview:
 
How much money does a real estate agent make in your company?
 
How does a real estate agent get paid?
 
How does “full-commission” differ from a salary or hourly wage?
 
Don’t get me wrong. These are all legitimate questions that need to be addressed.
 
They just don’t need to be answered by you—especially during the first interview.
 
Why? Because these questions are so common an experienced interviewer can easily anticipate them.
 
Answers to such questions can be prepared (in written form) and handed to the candidate when the question is asked.
 
Answering the same questions interview after interview is not the best use of your time—especially if the answer requires you to take 15 minutes on a white board mapping out how commission splits work!
 
Great hiring managers know that successful interviews happen when the candidate does most of the talking.
 
Getting an individual to express their unique pain and see how working as an agent will solve his/her problem is what causes people to engage.

There are some fundamental questions (discussed yesterday) recruiting prospects need answered before making a decision to join your team.

According to Robin Dreeke, the answers to these questions have common themes.

Your recruiting prospects will want to talk with you, tell you things, and agree to follow-on appointments when…

They feel listened to and validated in a nonjudgmental way.

They feel accepted and liked.

They feel you understand and appreciate their goals, priorities, and aspirations.

They feel you truly understand the context of their situation.
 
When these happen, your prospects’ brains are getting rewarded for engaging.
 
They’re being told: This person is good for my survival.
 
It’s only after these prerequisites are met that recruiting prospects consider what they can do to help you.
 
For a type-A, transaction-oriented manager, this is a frustratingly slow process because it moves at a pace controlled by the prospect.
 
But it’s how the best recruiting is done—especially if you’re after the best and brightest.

Robin Dreeke is an expert on building rapport.
 
He originally learned these skills as an FBI agent and later taught them to hundreds of others when he was the Director of the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Program.
 
In a corporate keynote address, he explained the progression individuals go through when they make a commitment to another person.
 
People subconsciously want to know the answers to this series of fundamental questions:
 
Why should I talk to you?
 
Why should I tell you anything?
 
Why would I want to see you again (follow-on appointment)?
 
Why should I take actions for you?
 
Why should I follow you?
 
Working from top to bottom, a person does not progress to the next question until the previous one is adequately answered.
 
It can take weeks of building rapport to work through this list and finally arrive at the place where a competitive agent is willing to follow you.
 
Is it worth it? For the right agent, yes.
 
What’s not worth your time (or anyone else’s time) is attempting to hurry through the list at your pace (and not their pace).
 
You’ll come up empty-handed every time.

In a post from the archive, Adena Hefets, CEO of Divvy Homes, reminded her audience why recruiting is so important.

When I first started Divvy, I did everything and felt like I needed to maintain control.

But over time, I realized that spending 20% of my effort on five different “jobs” was not as effective as hiring one talented person to spend 100% of their effort on a single job.

The purpose of adding great people to your team is to multiply your efforts–it’s the most productive work you can be doing.

Any time you’re pulled away from this work, you’re giving up your opportunity to multiply and reducing your long-term effectiveness and ability to grow.

Later in the podcast, Adena admits that poor hiring will derail the multiplying effect. She focuses on these three principles to keep that from happening:

Hire talented people: invest more effort early in the recruiting process to find high quality agents.

Expect autonomy: hire people who are willing, able, and expect to be autonomous.

Give up control: let go of the things you hire other people to do with the expectation they will perform better than you.

Without the realistic expectation that recruiting will multiply your efforts, it becomes a mundane and unsustainable task.

You’re probably familiar with the important-versus-urgent quadrant method of organizing projects or tasks.
 
While this life hack is helpful, it doesn’t give much guidance on how to determine if something is truly important.
 
Professor Ellen Auster weighed in on this topic and offered helpful advice on how to designate something as important.
 
Ask yourself, does this project or task…
 
Have a high probability of success?
 
Have an impact on leading indicators?
 
Give you a competitive advantage?
 
Align with your long-term goals and values?
 
Carry consequences if not completed soon?
 
If you answer “yes” to all five of these issues, designate the project or task as important and focus on getting it done.
 
Notice that recruiting matches all five of these criteria, and it should always be on your task list.

Earlier this week, RE/MAX reported their second quarter earnings and issued a press release concerning growth forecast for the remainder of the year.
 
Like most press releases, it puts a positive spin on the news and paints a bright future.
 
But buried in the report was the admission that their agent count in the U.S. had dropped 2.6% over the last year.
 
How does a company like RE/MAX respond to a declining agent count? 
 
According to their CEO Steve Joyce, they focus on recruiting:
 
We’ve set our sights on improving growth…[by] continuing to increase our firm’s agent count.
 
They even detailed one of their core recruiting initiatives.
 
One such initiative is a pilot program designed to attract teams of six or more agents.
 
Through the program, teams will have free access to expanded education and technology specifically designed for teams.
 
Here are a few takeaways:
 
a.  Professional operators know that a reduced agent count directly corelates to a reduced number of transactions.
 
b.  Producing agents are in high demand and companies are sharpening their value propositions to recruit them.
 
c.  You can’t win by just playing defense. Retention is critical, but it’s only part of the solution.
 
When the going gets tough, the tough double down on recruiting.

According to columnist Ephrat Livni, not all high performers are equal.

This is especially true when someone attempts to make a transition into the rough and tumble world of real estate.

Getting pushed around by life forces you to become resilient.

Those who aren’t stars in youth and who don’t land the plum jobs early on, must cast about for direction and meaning.

When they find their way, they’ve already trained in the mental habits of managing difficulty and re-framing expectations.

The early achievers, by contrast, find later in life that not everything can go right.

They take this hard because they have little practice managing struggle.

If you have to choose between two seemingly high-performing individuals, select the one who had to struggle more to realize their achievements.

During screening calls and interviews, ask questions that would help you discover if a person has had setbacks, overcame difficulties, and demonstrated resilience.

For someone moving into a new career field or changing brokerages, resilience is one of the most important predictors of a successful transition.

Recruiting is about getting people to change their minds about where they work.
 
A small percentage of recruiting conversations relate to logical issues (ex. who has the best deal for a recruiting prospect’s unique situation), but most decisions are driven by emotions or personal beliefs.
 
For example, a recruiting prospect might feel an emotional connection to a beloved manager or mentor in their current company.
 
According to Harvard researchers, engaging in debates is futile when someone is being primarily driven by emotional factors.
 
Don’t jump in and try to convince the other person.
 
Instead, invest time in personally learning about and building rapport with them.
 
Here, it’s not about arguments or presentation, at least initially, but understanding their perspective and why they might feel antagonistic to what you’re offering.
 
This approach takes patience, empathy, and a commitment to the well-being of your prospect. And it can be difficult to execute.
 
Detractors can easily sense if you’re trying to manipulate the situation to get them on your side.
 
Authenticity is key: allow the other person to see who you are so that they can more fully understand your point of view.
 
Why go through all this trouble to employ these recruiting tactics?
 
Because it’s the arena where most recruiting prospects reside.
 
If you’re only engaging those recruiting prospects who can be swayed by logic, you’ll miss a majority of the opportunities.

In a classic HBR article, Laura Huang sheds some light on how individuals make decisions in the workplace.
 
Her research focused on how leaders successfully convince their business associates to change their minds on a topic of initial disagreement.
 
Dr. Huang’s research found that people tend to disagree with one another from one of three perspectives:
 
Logical Reasons. Individuals with this perspective articulate a logical set of objections and don’t appear to be hiding ulterior motives. This perspective is the easiest to detect.
 
Emotional Reasons. Individuals with this perspective are being driven by something under the surface that fuels an antagonistic response. It’s usually relational—I don’t like you or what you stand for in regard to this change.
 
Personal Belief Reasons. Individuals with this perspective have deep-held personal beliefs that make them opposed to your proposal. These beliefs could stem from issues such as their upbringing, personal history, or unspoken biases.   
 
To get someone to change their mind, it’s helpful to classify their decision-making perspective and use a different approach depending on their viewpoint.
 
The individuals with logical reasons (smallest group) are easiest to flip over to your way of thinking by presenting a compelling set of facts—especially if the facts are on your side.
 
But attempting to use logic to convince someone with an emotional or personal belief perspective is ineffective.
 
According to Dr. Huang, it’s a common reason many business discussions hit an impasse.
 
How do you convince recruiting prospects with non-logical perspectives to change their minds? We’ll cover that in our next Insight.