Whenever you’re starting a new recruiting program or recommitting yourself to a program you’ve let slip for a while, remember the hiring process works like an old-fashioned hand-pump.
 
You’ll have to pump like crazy for a few weeks before you see the first bit of water come out of the tap.
 
During this initial stage, it will seem like your efforts are not working and you’ll be tempted to give up.
 
How long will you have to wait?
 
In one longitudinal study we conducted with a large brokerage (4000+ agents) on the west coast, the average time between first contact and hire was 120 days.
 
This is why it’s so important to make the commitment before you start.
 
There is some good news.
 
Once results start to materialize, you will reach a steady state where it seems like each pump is producing a corresponding result.
 
It’s easier to stay motivated once this happens.

Change kindles anxiety in most individuals. And real estate agents are no different.  
 
Changes in the economy, the culture, the housing market, and personal lives all contribute to the uneasiness agents are feeling.
 
In a post from the archive, Stephanie Vozza shows how to counteract anxiety through optimism. 
 
Researchers have long documented that optimistic people are also more successful, enjoy better health, and live longer, more productive lives. But what if you’re not an optimistic person?
 
True, some people are naturally more optimistic, however someone who is negative or pessimistic can control it and improve upon it. Like any healthy habit, optimism is something you need to practice every day.
 
If you’re responsible for recruiting, this is great news. Optimism can be learned, diminishes your own anxiety, and attracts others who want what you have found. 
 
So how do you foster optimism? Here are some of the ideas Stephanie outlined:
 
Listen and show interest in others. People often think they’re alone in their struggles, such as divorce, cancer, or financial problems. When they hear about people who’ve experienced the same thing and came out on the sunny side, it can give them hope, and hope is the foundation of optimism.
 
Donate your time and energy. Whether it’s helping at the local soup kitchen or being available to people you know, giving back is a habit optimistic people practice. No matter what you’re going through, be good to others and help when you can. The spirit of altruism can make you feel optimistic about your own life.
 
Surround yourself with upbeat people and ignore naysayers. You’re the sum of the people you spend time with. If you’re with other optimists, it’s easy to absorb that energy and it can be powerful. When you happen to be in the presence of a naysayer, get in the habit of ignoring these individuals.
 
If optimism is your signature strength, recruiting success will follow close behind.

If you’re an owner, team leader, or manager, you have a perception of how loyal your agents are to you and your organization.
 
But according to new research published by MetLife, your agents have a different perception.
 
87% of employers that say they have a strong sense of loyalty to their employees, and they believe their employees feel the same.
 
But, only 55% of employees believe their employers have their best interests in mind.
 
When asked similar questions to validate the data:
 
86% of employers say their employees have a strong sense of loyalty to them.
 
But, only 39% of employees would recommend their employer as a place to work
 
This data was collected across various organizations who listed attraction and retention of talent as their top challenge. While they were not exclusively real estate companies, they were focused on similar issues. 
 
There are two things to take away from the research:
 
1.  It’s bad. Since real estate agents are independent contractors (not employees), these gaps in perception are probably worse than what these metrics illustrate.
 
2. And it’s getting worse. These gaps in perception have been steadily widening over the past five years.
 
Don’t fool yourself into thinking (like 80+% of those surveyed) that your agents are loyal to you. 

Every organization has retention vulnerabilities, and the first step to solving the problem is admitting it exists.

We all know that retaining your productive and profitable agents is even more important than recruiting new ones.
 
And yet many hiring managers are surprisingly passive about retention. 
 
They quietly tell themselves: If I don’t’ say anything, perhaps my high performers won’t notice any of our deficiencies and recognize what our competitors are offering. 
 
Here’s a news flash—they are noticing, and they want you to notice too so problems can be fixed before they grow into reasons to separate.
 
How should you notice? According to recruiting expert Penny Fletcher, a retention interview is the most useful tool for bringing problems to the surface, and it provides other ancillary retention benefits, as well.
 
Here are a few of these benefits:
 
Feeling Heard and Valued. Agents want to be noticed and recognized for their ideas. This is a safe way for them to express their thoughts. 
 
Patterns Emerge. After a few of these interviews, some patterns (both positive and negative) may become apparent. If multiple agents are saying the same thing, it’s worth listening.
 
Source of Testimonials. Since recruiting is competitive, it’s helpful to have a reserve of testimonials from real agents who love working on your team. Retention interviews are a natural way to capture these testimonials.
 
Interestingly, pay issues rarely surface during these interviews.
 
You’ll typically hear things like a need for more recognition, more opportunities for leads from the company, and more hands-on support.
 
These are the things you need to hear and improve if you expect your agents to stick with you over the long run.

There are two career windows worth considering to increase your chances of converting your next new-agent hire into a high producer.
 
Window #1: Individuals in their early 30s often start looking to settle into a career that can provide generous income during their peak earning years.
 
Prospects in their early 30s are still willing to try something new. They also look to apply what they learned in their 20s by working various shorter-term jobs.
 
Window #2: If someone in their late 40s is established in a career where wages have stagnated, they may want out. Also, they may be very motivated to make up for lost time.
 
Becoming a real estate agent is one of the few opportunities where an individual can become a top wage earner within a five-to-ten-year period.
 
If you sense a candidate is in one of these age ranges, steer the interview and follow-up dialog towards these income-related issues.
 
Helping your recruiting prospects solve their career and income problems will make you the manager of choice.

Last week, we discussed the importance of making your recruiting process more engaging and enjoyable.
 
It’s a great way to differentiate yourself from competitors and increase the chances that the most talented prospects will choose to work on your team.
 
Of course, that prompted the question: How do you make these improvements?
 
Here are some quick ideas to make the process better:
 
Application: Make it short and easy to access via a mobile device. You can collect more information from the prospect later in the process, if necessary.
 
Screening: Start the screening process immediately after an application is submitted (think minutes, not days). Chatbots and other automated tools can help improve response time. Craft your screening questions in a conversational tone so your first contact doesn’t feel like an inquisition.
 
Assessment: An assessment can help you zero-in on the prospects with the highest chance of success, but it should also benefit the prospect. Make sure the prospect is learning something valuable, too.
 
Interviewing: Keep initial interviews to 45 minutes or less, and make sure the prospect is doing more than 70% of the talking. Near the end, purposefully close the interview and discuss next steps.
 
Offer: Make your offers clear, concise, and compelling. Prospects tend to experience frustration with delays and ambiguity.
 
Pick one of these areas and start working on it today, and then consistently work through the rest of your list until your recruiting process becomes one of your team’s signature strengths.

Yesterday, we discussed Stephen Karpman’s Drama Triangle.

Drama is pervasive in many real estate organizations because managers often act as “rescuers” to agents who have a victim mentality.  

So, how do you get out (and stay out) of the rescuer role?

As Bob Newhart once said, you could just, “stop it!” But according to Forbes magazine contributor Remy Blumenfeld, it’s not that easy.

For years, it was generally accepted that the only way to deal with the Drama Triangle was simply to be aware of it and to exert a huge amount of willpower over the roles one played.  

But more recently, a new outcome-focused management model has emerged that directly address the unhealthy nature of the rescuer role.

It’s called The Empowerment Dynamic, and it transforms the rescuer role into the coach role.

Instead of seeing your duty as being to rescue someone, a coach asks questions intended to help the individual make informed choices.

The key difference between a rescuer and a coach is that the coach sees the individual as capable of making choices and solving their own problems.

For the rescuer, the victim is broken. For the coach, the agent is creative, resourceful, and whole.

This positive mindset change puts you in control of how much drama will exist on your team.

In the hyper-competitive world of real estate recruiting, companies look for every advantage to attract the attention of recruiting prospects.
 
But garnering the attention of a prospect is just the first step of the recruiting process.
 
What happens next, according to researchers, is profoundly disappointing to most individuals.
 
At every subsequent stage of the recruiting process, prospects report being dissatisfied:
 
Application—only 27% report being very satisfied
Interviewing– only 23% report being very satisfied
Screening– only 20% report being very satisfied
Assessment– only 22% report being very satisfied
Offer– only 20% report being very satisfied
 
If you want to separate yourself from your competitors, take a look at improving your recruiting process.
 
There is a lot of room for improvement, and prospects who find the hiring process engaging are more likely to identify you as their employer of choice.

Much of the real estate industry is transaction-based. And transactions are either “go” or “no-go.”
 
You either get the listing, or you don’t. Your client’s offer is accepted, or it’s not. If you don’t close the deal, the opportunity evaporates.
 
But recruiting operates at a different cadence and treating it like a transaction diminishes results.
 
It often takes several months for an experienced agent to leave their broker, and there are usually fits and starts along the way.
 
When you’re concluding a recruiting appointment, it’s important to close (big ask), but have some options prepared (small asks) in case your prospect is not ready to move forward.
 
Big Ask: Based on what we discussed today, can we get the paperwork started to get your license transferred?
 
If the prospect says no:
 
Small Asks: I understand this is a big decision, and you may need to think about it some more. Would you be open to attending our sales meeting next week, so you get a better feel for our culture?
 
Or:
 
We have our circle prospecting training on Friday, you could join online and see how we train our agents to get more listings. Are you available?
 
If a prospect says yes to the big ask, you scored a hire.
 
If they say no to the big ask, they’re much more likely to say yes to one of the small asks because they want to alleviate the discomfort the first rejection caused.
 
For you, it’s a double win. You get to find out if the prospect is ready to move and keep the opportunity alive if they’re not.

People explore new opportunities and change careers because they hope to find something better.
 
Catching a vision for a better future has inspired some of the greatest accomplishments in human history.
 
And the same energy is behind the most remarkable accomplishments in the real estate industry.
 
As you talk with your recruiting prospects about making changes, lead with hope.
 
Hope for more income.
 
Hope to scale your business to the next level.
 
Hope for a better work-life balance.
 
Hope for working with others who share the same values.
 
Hope for ____________ (let your recruiting prospect fill in the blank).
 
Try starting your recruiting discussions with a simple question:
 
What are you hoping for between now and the end of year?
 
Once an individual reveals what they’re trying to accomplish, it’s only natural to then ask: 
 
What are the obstacles keeping you from getting there?

It’s difficult to go a day without seeing multiple articles in the real estate press about the crisis of low inventory.
 
It’s affecting every aspect of the real estate industry, including recruiting.
 
How do you react when a crisis comes your way?
 
In a post from the archive, Shawn Achor reminds us that a crisis creates stress for most people, but there is always a group of positive outliers who see the opportunity in what’s happening.
 
Shawn did a study of bankers right after the huge banking crisis hit. Most of them were incredibly stressed. But a few were happy and resilient.
 
What did those individuals have in common? They saw the changes in the landscape, not as threats, but as challenges.
 
So, these people are just wired differently and our duty is to envy them, right? Not so fast.
 
Shawn did a follow-on experiment that proved this attitude could be learned.
 
Shawn’s second experiment was based on something surprisingly simple. The stressed-out bankers were shown a training video on how to see problems as challenges rather than stress producers. 
 
The results? Those who watched the video saw a 23% drop in their stress related symptoms.
 
Was there something magical about the video? I don’t think so. Not sure about you, but I’ve never seen a magical corporate training video. They usually put me to sleep!
 
So, the magic must be the principle itself.
 
Shawn came to the same conclusion. He also concluded the principle is not hard to teach. If a video produced a 23% improvement, think of the improvement one-on-one coaching would have produced.
 
First coach yourself, and then try integrating this principle into your upcoming coaching sessions with a message like this:
 
Problems are challenges. A resilient person who focuses their attention and effort on the challenge with a positive attitude experiences less stress and performs at a higher level. Let me help you see your problem through a new lens.

Real estate companies work hard to establish a consumer brand that is known, admired, and respected by everyone in their communities.
 
An employer brand is closely related to its consumer brand sibling but serves a different purpose.
 
According to recruiting expert Kimberlea Kozachenko, a good employer brand should repel as much as it attracts:
 
A bold, clear, and unique employer brand isn’t always established to attract. 
 
Sometimes it serves to push talent away, to deter individuals who would ultimately be unhappy, unfulfilled, or not have all their needs met by a particular work environment.
 
This doesn’t mean the environment is bad; it simply means that there’s a misalignment between what the company offers and what those candidates are seeking in an employer.
 
Your employer brand (and ultimately your unique agent value proposition) should clearly define who would flourish on your team.
 
We want our talent to be fulfilled, motivated, and have a sense of belonging within our teams.
 
And if we can give such a good window into what life is like in our organization that prospective talent can self-select to opt-out early, that’s indicative of a truly powerful employer brand. It really turns out to be a win for everyone.
 
The true objective of recruitment marketing is getting the right prospects to raise their hands.

Last Friday, I encouraged each of you to participate in a nationwide survey on issues related to agents, teams, and brokers. Thank you to all those who took the time to contribute to his effort.
 
One of the questions asked agents to rank their biggest frustrations. Here are their top five frustrations:
 
Staying consistent in prospecting.
Lead generation (in general).
Time Management.
Creating/using marketing that produces real results.
Delegating non-revenue-generating activities.
 
Here are some of the issues that were cited as the least frustrating: 
 
Appointment setting.
Appointment conversion.
Follow-through on communication.
Working with technology (ex. CRM).
Managing finances.
 
It’s no secret that agents often change brokers to alleviate frustrations.
 
Your recruitment marketing should be emphasizing solutions to their biggest frustrations and ignoring the issues they care about least.

I often advise recruiters and hiring managers to be selective when recruiting and hiring.
 
Since you only have a limited amount of time and energy, it must be focused on those who have the highest chance of success and who are a good fit for your team.
 
The same principle applies to retention.
 
In a private webinar, Steve Harney described the three types of agents who are in real estate today:
 
Money-Oriented. These are the agents who got into the business because of the short-term financial opportunity.
 
Business-Oriented. These are the agents who saw a great opportunity to build a business which allows them to take care of their families financially. They also love to help their clients and are dedicated to doing so.
 
Calling-Oriented. These are the agents who are “called to the business,” and their first and foremost goal is to help people. Being a business owner is a secondary goal, and making money is a side-effect of their profession.
 
The real estate industry has the habit of attracting money-oriented order takers during the good times. 
 
And when things get difficult, they’re the first to leave.
 
The real estate industry does need agents from the last two categories. Investing in these groups only makes sense.
 
They help your company survive during all marketing conditions because they make long-term commitments to your clients.
 
When thinking about where to spend your retention resources and attention, ask yourself: Is this a business-oriented or calling-orientated agent?
 
You only have so much time and energy—invest it wisely.