What do you consider full time in running your Real Estate business?

[Mitch]

I had this conversation with one of my Agents a week and a half ago and I thought I would share it with you. She has been struggling the past 3 months and I'm ready to let her go. Before I do so, I like to discuss with an Agent what is going on in their life that would be affecting their production. Over the past 3 months she has no sales.

My goal was to find out what is wrong and hopefully be able to tweak something or other to fix her. I'm usually able to fix most agents issues with the exception of one. Work ethic. I can't make someone want to be successful which took me until this year to really accept.

My first question is always the same...do you work full time? The answer is always the same...yes. It is my belief that if you have great systems, which we do in our 100MPH Marketing system, and work full time with integrity, then you will be successful. So when I ask this first question and they answer yes, I know they are not being honest with me...more importantly they are not being honest with themselves.

So how do you handle an Agent or yourself if they think they are working full time but you know they aren't? Here is what I do. I told her how I believed her average day went. I told her that she might be busy all day long, but she is not accomplishing anything. That's easy to do. We have all found ourselves reaching the end of the day and not having a clue what we finished that day. I told her that for the next 7 days she was going to have to do a research test for me. I assured her this is to help her, not humiliate her. I had her document every single minute of every day for 7 days. This starts first thing in the morning and goes through the time to go to bed. She said fine and we met a week later.

A week later, which was Friday, we sat down to go over her findings. Before we even started discussing her research, she said that she was amazed to find out she didn't work full time...she barely worked part time. In the end she was working an average of 3.5 hours per day. She had thought she was working 8 hours per day. As with all Agents that I am about to let go, I gave her a 30 day chance. She now has 30 days to prove to me she is worth keeping as part of our team. She has promised to work full time and be productive...will she? I don't know. Of the 10 Agents or so I have let go over the past 4 years, only 1 so far has made it past the 30 days. Out of the 10, 8 of them were deemed only to be working part time and none of them had any desire to really work harder.

So what's the purpose of this post? The purpose is for you to realize that most Agents are failing because they don't know what to do, and more important, because they don't work full time. In this market, especially the high foreclosure areas, it's imperative to work full time. To me full time is 60 hours or more per week. I think you might be able to get by at around 50 though. I'm kinda a workaholic! Even when I did the test I learned that out of the 16 hours a day I work, I really only worked 10.5 hour days. Knowing that info gave me the power to change...and I did. I now limit my work days to around 12 hours per day with virtually no play time. I highly encourage you try this test too. I had all my Agents do this last year and most of them realized they could do a better job. The ones that learned, have done a better job this year. Working full time and Time Management are huge. That's the purpose of this blog.

[Cleo]

Very good post Mitch. That is one thing I wonder my self, how many hours do I really work? I am not really sure. What would you consider reading this post in an attempt to learn, work or not?

[TheRealOBX]

That was a great post Mitch. It really has me thinking about how much I work everyday. It probably is a good thing to go back and evaluate your work habits from time to time to see where you can make an improvement.

[DMG]

Good post - we have done this with our team for years, I learned it from my coach. We have a sheet made up that is labled "time tracking" and we have one by the hour and one by 15 minutes, you would be suprised in a 10 hour day what you are really doing.

[Mitch]

Cleo - The idea of this post is for Agents to realize that in order to become successful you must put forth the effort/energy to accomplish your goals. Most of us feel we are actually working full time. However, once you actually clock your actual work, you will be surprised to see how few hours you actually work.

I have been evaluating my time management about once a quarter for a while now. It's very easy to get off track. The key is complete focus on your goals and how you are going to get there...the plan.

[Ryocheck]

Mitch, this was a good post and it makes me want to reevaluate how many hours I really do work each week. On one hand I would like to think I work a lot because I am always on the computer working on marketing and doing research but on the other I need to be sure I am completing set tasks.

Thanks for sharing.

[tsteuwer]

Mitch, this was the best post I've seen this year. Thanks for your tip, I will talk to our team leader about this and see if we can try this out.

[Mitch]

My Pleasure! If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask!