We are headed into a crucial economic abyss where most people are filled with fear and uncertainty. No doubt this will have an impact on your clientele, but it also has an impact on the morale and stress of your administrative and sales team.
As the industry leaders, now is the time for you to support your clients, each other and more importantly, those who trust your leadership.
- It is important to remain honest with your team without making decisions out of fear. If your business has slowed down and your cashflow means you might run out of money, you cannot continue using the employee’s time without the ability to compensate him/her.
- How you handle your emotions, your stresses and your own financial uncertainty will have a long-term impact on your relationship to your employees and salespeople. Tread carefully as you can lose amazing people from your team who may face their own fears about the stability of your business. As leaders, expect to take a hit in profits – however, you cannot expect your employees not to make a basic living.
- Trust your employees while they work from home. It only adds fuel to fire if you begin micromanaging a long-term employee just because she is now working from home.
- Speak to one another – not just about work but allow yourself, your colleagues and your employees to share their fears and concerns during this global economic storm. This requires emotional intelligence and empathy, all the while sending out virtual hugs of support.
- Check in on your buyer agents/real estate sales partners on your team. Not everyone has the financial means to ride it out for the next four to eight weeks if there is no income. As a team leader, it is when the going gets tough that you will be needed the most. Likewise, if sales are dipping and your sales team won’t make enough to “ride it out”, don’t hold them back with false promises when you cannot guarantee future sales in unprecedented times.
Things will return to normal, but how we care for those we lead during hardship will last longer than the fears and uncertainty we are all currently experiencing.
Consider the following as we head into spring 2020:
Before you can care and lead others, you need to be is a positive, healthy state:
- Check your mental health. How are you feeling? How are you managing stress?
- Check your spiritual health. This may require you to take some time away to speak to a higher power so that you can adjust according to what is being sent your way.
- Check your physical health. Keep your immune system on guard by not only feeding yourself but nourishing yourself. A change of scenery helps like a walk in the park while keeping distance from others.
Your immediate surrounding or circle of influence:
- Check on your clients. This isn’t about trying to buy or sell their next home; this is a genuine concern for how they are weathering through this global crisis.
- Check on your immediate neighbours, especially the elderly.
- Check in on your vendors who have tirelessly supplied you in times of prosperity – the small mom and pop shops and self-employed service providers will likely be hit the hardest.
You are your business:
- Invest in yourself, your brand, tying up lose ends, fixing that database. This is the time to do it. Remember that book you wanted to read or that course you wanted to take that was on Audible? Now is the time. Proactively working towards success, even if the sales are not coming in at the moment, will prepare you for a faster recovery when the market bounces back.
- Be the voice of hope to whomever you speak with.
What are you doing to help support your administrative and sales staff? Share your stories, successes and ideas – it will help others in similar situations. We’d love to hear from you.
The former owner of Imaginahome Inc. and former Realtor at Re/Max, Aiman Attar is the managing partner of AGENTC: The Real Estate Recruiter. She has worked in the real estate industry for over 10 years with Toronto’s finest, most accomplished Realtors. She decided to dedicate her talent and experience to helping you hire the best candidates to build your business. Email Aiman.
