Speaker 1 (00:00):
Real estate team os What's the OS stand for Operating system? What's that? You might ask. It's everything behind the agent. It's all of the people, processes and technology that we put in place to create leverage and to keep agents in dollar productive activities. People includes, well people, roles and positions and organizational structure process includes our standard operating procedures, systems and processes, even some cultural components, kind of the how we do it around here, aspect of our teams and of course we're supported by tools and technology to empower and complement our staff, our agents, and our clients. Adding efficiency and transparency and accountability and seamlessness to all of the work that we do. In this special episode of Real Estate Team os we go inside the OS of seven different team leaders and team rich owners from New Jersey, Virginia, and Florida over to Colorado, Arizona, and Texas. Specifically, I asked them please share one or two people, processes or technologies that you could not grow and optimize your team without. There's

Speaker 2 (01:09):
Two key hires.

Speaker 3 (01:10):
There's two roles in particular that I think are unbelievably valuable. We

Speaker 4 (01:14):
Used to have an ISA manager, we now call her director of opportunity. We can pretty much predict where we're going to be in the next 60 to 90 days.

Speaker 5 (01:21):
If we do something more than once, we have to document it and we have to document it the absolute best way that it can be done in the most efficient way.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
How we have things set up at the processes that we have in place. We'll really be able to highlight where the true difference is between how we operate versus maybe how an agent who's maybe not as experienced is going to be able to benefit the consumer. It was a

Speaker 6 (01:42):
Company that I felt that impacted my team because we grew together.

Speaker 7 (01:47):
Dollar for dollar has been the best investment that I've made in my business and that we've made in our team

Speaker 4 (01:53):
A solid enough technology to help maintain your database and maintain your own sales processes in one place.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
And now here are the team os insights from seven different team leaders and team or donors.

Speaker 8 (02:08):
No matter where your business is today or where you want to take it, you'll get there faster and more profitably with an operating system. Welcome to Team os, your guide to starting, growing and optimizing real estate team. Here's your host, Ethan Butte.

Speaker 1 (02:23):
First up we've got Dave Ness of Thrive Real Estate in Denver, Colorado, and independent team, rich and like many teams in hemorrhages, they operate via EOS, the entrepreneurial operating system. So that's related to one of the two roles he shares here and pay attention to the specific caution that he adds that things are always changing your, your operating system is a living thing that's constantly evolving. Here's Dave.

Speaker 3 (02:50):
Well, from the people standpoint, there's two roles in particular that I think are unbelievably valuable and they get titled in different ways across teams I've noticed, but it's the same general role. We're really big and kind of hang our hat on EOS, the entrepreneur's operating system. And so for us in our world, it would be the integrator, someone who I've heard it called general manager president, all these different titles, but essentially someone who owns and falls asleep at night and wakes up in the morning thinking about the entire organization, not just from an operational standpoint but also from a financial standpoint and being able to have the oversight to put all the pieces together and make the organization run well. I think that role is unbelievably critical. And then having someone who is a hundred percent responsible and owns sales leadership and understands what the company's goals are, both on a monthly, quarterly, annual basis and then long-term 3, 5, 7 years out as well. Those two, when we had the right people sit in those seats, everything changed. It was a really big deal. So from a people perspective, those two roles are critical.

Speaker 1 (04:04):
Are either of those harder to find than the other? Or what I'm really asking is how many iterations did you go through before you found that kind of match that you just described?

Speaker 3 (04:15):
Oh yeah. Well, 12 years worth

Speaker 3 (04:19):
It was a lot and I think that's important to actually test certain things and not, I think oftentimes it's kind of like an indictment like, oh, I tested that and it didn't work. It's like, no, you tested it and you didn't work and you learned and then you figured out what was the next best thing for you. But yeah, lots of iterations. It was probably four or five different iterations. We had a term called growth partner that we had that was more no salary, it was more of like a team leader except on a bigger level. And that worked well for about 36 months and we outgrew that for a myriad of different reasons and so quite a few different iterations to where now we're landing here and it's been about a year and we're already looking at it and projecting out going, the current structure has been amazing to get us where we are, but it won't be the structure to get us where we want to go. So we're already projecting that it's going to change again

Speaker 1 (05:15):
Constantly

Speaker 3 (05:16):
All the time.

Speaker 1 (05:18):
Throughout this episode, you'll hear more about the challenge of finding and keeping the right people in the right seats. You'll also get some tips to help. Next up, we have Micah Harper of Exquisite Properties in San Antonio, Texas, and he is using ISAs in a very unique and powerful way through a number of tips here. If you're not watching or listening and prepared to take notes, you should maybe do that. Here's Micah. What is a piece of your operating system that you couldn't do your business without?

Speaker 9 (05:48):
Oh, a hundred percent. The ISA department, we used to have an ISA manager. We now call her director of opportunities because we've changed the language from inside sales agents and appointments to opportunities because that's really what it is. And an agent heres appointment and they think, oh, I'm going to meet a person, they're going to write a contract and I'm going to have a contract in a week. And you're meeting a person. That's an opportunity. And that opportunity may be that person buying a house. That opportunity may be that person referring you, somebody that buys a house. There's an opportunity there for you and it's for you to uncover what that opportunity is. For us, the inside sales department is not just a bunch of people on the phone pounding the phone, setting appointments, they're building relationships. I always joke their labor and delivery, they're birthing relationships into our world and then the agent's job is to service that relationship, but the inside sales agent goes beyond the appointment and they follow up with the consumer after the appointment.

Speaker 9 (06:37):
So for us, they're at a level of accountability to the agent because they're also paid on commission. So they care a lot about what happened on that appointment. They care a lot about how the communication is and not just did the agent follow up, did they follow up effectively? Did they use what we taught them to follow up? Are they using the drip campaigns and all the things in the CRM, are they logging everything they're supposed to a sales manager to get to that level of granularity be very difficult. But if I have one ISA for every five agents that ISA can follow up with those agents because they're also following up with their compensation. So without the inside sales department, I don't think we could do what we do.

Speaker 1 (07:08):
So it's a base plus model, plus being the commission on performance, performing on some granular detail that makes the agents more effective and births more opportunities. Any other aspects to it that when you share what you're doing with other team leaders, they're like, oh, I didn't think about the ISA that way?

Speaker 9 (07:28):
Yes, the ISA is empowered to take the lead back without asking. They have rules by which they can take the lead back. So if it's not being serviced properly, if it's being neglected, if it's not a good fit, if the consumer just says, I met with so-and-so agent, they're fine. We're not looking for that. That's not what we're looking for. We're looking for, I have total confidence in this person. I really enjoyed meeting them. I'm very excited about my home journey. So the ISA has the ability to take that client and put them with a different agent if they feel like that's the right thing for the client. Now, agents aren't super stoked about that, but they understand our North Star is the client, right? And so we want to make sure that everything we're doing puts the client in the seat to win. So if the agent that they're with is not responsive or just even if it's just not a good personality fit, giving the ISA the opportunity and the authority to take that person and reassign them or take them back and work them is a game changer because the agent knows I can't just hide this in my database and every once in a while click a button and say that I talked to 'em and I didn't.

Speaker 9 (08:26):
They know somebody's checking and someone's actually going to talk to the customer and find out how their journey's going. And if I'm not doing my job, I'm going to lose that opportunity.

Speaker 1 (08:34):
Really good. I love this, especially in a team context. It makes me think about the way an ISA who's treated as some kind of assistant feeding appointments to an agent. Just the language that you've used here and the dynamic and the power in the relationship is more level and complimentary just really reinforces the team concept.

Speaker 9 (08:57):
It's a huge partnership and there's a huge level of trust and we talk a lot about that. So our agents, when they come onto the company, they don't get ISA appointments. They have to earn their way because the ISA needs to be confident that they're working with a professional agent who's going to do the follow-up and the conversion necessary to be successful. And in the beginning we put everybody on appointments and the ISAs was like, I love appointments to this agent and this one I feel like I'm throwing it in the trash and this one I know isn't going to do anything. And so now we have a team of agents that only do high production and that's what the ISAs are supporting and we talk a lot when an agent comes onto that team about the trust the is a may work for two years to chase that lead, they have to trust that I'm going to put that in your hands and you are going to service it and close it.

Speaker 9 (09:35):
And the agent has to trust that the ISA did everything they could to find out, do you have an agent? Do you understand what you're doing? Do you know why we're even meeting at the house or did you just click a button and end up at a house? The ISA has got to make sure that they set that mindset correctly and things go wrong. People show up with agents or people tell the ISA, they don't have an agent and then they do or they get to the house and they're like, oh, I thought it was for rent. There's miscommunication and if you trust, then the other person did the best that they could or the ISA may set an appointment, the person's super hot, they want to write a contract today, and then they see in the notes that that's not the case and they have to trust that the agent did everything that they could but the consumer's in control of their timeframe and it's not up to us to make that happen.

Speaker 1 (10:13):
If you're using ISAs, how would you describe the relationship or the partnership between the ISA and the agent? Are you doing some of these things or all of these things that Micah shared? I would love to hear from you. Go to realestate team os.com at the top of the page as a contact button. I get all the notifications when people fill that out. Again, realestate team os.com. Next up we have Becky Garcia, a team leader from Phoenix, Arizona, and she shares two key roles for her operating system as well as a key piece of technology and some of the challenges and benefits associated with it. When you think about where your team was when you started and where you are today, what are one or two of those things for many of those three categories that you couldn't have done it without?

Speaker 2 (10:59):
When it comes to people, like for me, a key hire, there's two key hires. One was operations manager who just oversees everything from payroll to accounts receivable, payable, tracking where the agents are production wise. Those are just things that are out I have no interest in. I know how important they're, but I'm not necessarily the best person to do that. So I'd say people with the production manager and then also my own personal assistant who can go in and read through my emails and determine, because email, I would spend three to four hours a day figuring out my emails. So she goes in and vets everything and what does Becky need to see versus what can I handle? So I'd say key positions, those are the two that either save me time or just took over, was just better at something than I was as far as a system for us, it would be follow up boss. We just moved over, we were on a system for over 10 years. I did not want to switch. I did not want to do it, but once we did that switch, then there were a couple key pieces in there that really made a difference for us and were able to automate. And so all the integrations we were able to do with it. So I'd say when it came to that, it would be follow-up boss.

Speaker 1 (12:05):
Cool. How long ago was that migration onto Follow-up boss?

Speaker 2 (12:09):
I just talked October, well final and we were all set and ready to start using it would be October of 2023. Okay, cool. So pretty recent. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (12:18):
And what was harder than you thought about that process and what was easier than you thought about that process?

Speaker 2 (12:24):
Harder was trying to get over 10 years worth of data from one system into the other. We did hire a third party that I went ahead and just paid the extra to have a third party do all of that for me. So I'd say even though it just took more time than I thought it would, I'm sure it would've been a lot faster if we didn't want everything moved over. So I'd say probably that was the hardest part. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (12:48):
Cool. And then what was from an upside perspective, like gosh, this is an unexpected benefit of going through that acute pain of making a switch.

Speaker 2 (12:57):
Some of the things that seem like it would be super easy, but having an email that looks like it's coming from a Gmail account, not like at this long email address that's hitting spam. So a lot of emails stopped hitting spam, being able to group text was really important. Being able to time text messages so that if I'm up working at midnight and I can time it to go at eight o'clock in the morning versus midnight saves me a lot of time. So just those little things that you think would just be automatic and one system, you don't realize how important they're until you actually start using 'em. So I'd say things like that.

Speaker 1 (13:28):
Cool. What are you looking for next? When you think about where you are and what your needs are for where the market is going for you and the way that you're running your business, is there anything that you're vetting or looking forward to? And if so, what is that process like?

Speaker 2 (13:43):
Yeah, I'd say where the industry is going to in terms of having to agents, having to show their value to a buyer when they're working with a buyer and having to actually have the conversation upfront. I've always pushed for buyer consultations with my team. We've gone over it, we've trained it, we've gone over everything. And then they're still not implementing it sometimes, but now it's like, you have to do this now. So I think just how we have things set up and how the processes that we have in place will really be able for us to highlight where the true differences between how we operate versus maybe how an agent who's maybe not as experienced or has it together is going to be able to benefit the consumer. So I just think being able to differentiate yourself is what's going to be important for me.

Speaker 1 (14:26):
I so appreciate the example and lesson that Becky closed on there specifically around buyer agreements. And when we think about a team operating system, sometimes we can focus on the rigidity of it, standardized, repeatable. That's what allows us to be efficient and scalable. But on the other side of that, when we have the right people on the team, when we have systems and processes and a culture of accountability, when we're empowering people with technology, there is some rigidity baked into that because we need things done a particular way at a particular time, a particular number of times in a particular way. But what it really does is it unlocks flexibility. It allows us to respond to changing conditions. It allows us to respond to dynamic conditions in the market, which of course are present all of the times a super powerful foundational aspect of a successful business. Next up, we have Marcus Lorea of Palm Paradise Realty Group, and he shares two key roles that he added early on when they went independent with their hemorrhage, as well as two key pieces of technology that they use all the time pay attention here in particular to the way that they're leveraging and the feedback that they're getting on cloud CMA in particular.

Speaker 1 (15:36):
So when you think back about like, gosh, I couldn't have gotten here without that lever, what are a couple of things that come to mind? So

Speaker 7 (15:42):
I would say one of our first hires was a transaction coordinator. It was kind of a do it all transaction coordinator slash ops manager. That was a key hire because we were developing the systems at the time as well. So everything that we were doing with that first hire, we tried to document so that way we could start building these systems out. That took me realistically about a year to make that first hire. After we went independent about six months actually after we went independent and very quickly we hired a marketing person because you have to be on social media, and that's one thing. It's like do as I say, not as I do because I personally have a love hate relationship with social media and myself, but it's a necessary thing that you should be doing if you're in this business. And so we hired a marketing person to help me out because that was one of my weak points, and we're consistently pushing out two pieces of content five days a week, and that's, we've been doing that for probably about three years now.

Speaker 7 (16:50):
As far as systems go with your tech stack, follow Boss has been great. Obviously Cloud CMA since day one has been clutch to this day. I always say Cloud CMA dollar for dollar has been the best investment that I've made in my business and that we've made in our team. We provide cloud CMA to everyone on our team from a buyer's agent standpoint, showing up with a bound packet of the buyer tour, and along with relevant information to educate the buyer, showing up with that, that's something tangible that someone can take notes in and everything. We attach one of our company pens and everything, we've gotten more compliments on that Bound Buyer Tour booklet than anything else we've ever done consistently. And to the point where back when there were multiple offer situations on every property and lines to get into see homes, it was like our buyers were bragging about our agent to other agents and other buyers walking into the property saying, did your agent give you one of these? And everyone, it's all about presentation though, and that's something Cloud CMA has been awesome with. I would think that's probably one of the best tools that I'd recommend.

Speaker 1 (18:09):
If you'd like to hear more and learn more with Marcus Lorea, be sure to check out episode 31, why Growth doesn't always look like Growth in it. Marcus shares a number of things including three specific times in his business when growth didn't look or feel like growth, where he had to take a step or two back before taking two or three steps forward. Again, that's episode 31 of Real Estate Team OS and YouTube in your preferred podcast app like Apple Podcasts or Spotify or@realestateteamos.com. Next up is Mercy Lugo Struthers who leads a team in Northern Virginia and like Marcus, she shares some people tips and some tech tips, and in particular, pay attention to what she shares about finding the right people for your organization. Kind of speaking back to Dave at the beginning on the challenge of finding and keeping the right people in the right seats, here's Mercy had love for you to highlight one or two people or processes or technologies that you couldn't build your team the way you want to build it, or you couldn't have the efficiency that you have or you couldn't operate the way you want to operate without

Speaker 6 (19:17):
Oh, absolutely. I have to please, but I'm going to give you a little bit of a, I mean, I think one piece that is missing in my mind because I made the mistake of not I'm running a team, I'm doing all of this, but people, process or technology will do no good within a team if you don't hire the right people, if you don't have the people that have the grit to make things happen and they really want to be held accountable and really want to be part of something larger. So that's very important. I will put that as a baseline, as an example of people, process or technology. I will have to pick two that have been essential, and I'm not saying it because who you are, but truly I'm one of the ojs for two things. I'm one of the ojs originals for Follow a Bus and for Zillow, follow a bus for us.

Speaker 6 (20:12):
I mean, I try many different things. We've been in the industry for about 15 years, so before that we tried and nothing really sticked, nothing really worked. We started Follow Up Boss, and back then I was talking directly to Dan Cor Hill and I was working late and it was like 8:00 PM and he will call me back. I was like, wow, this guy. And then I saw the transformation because Pro change, I'm pro what else is new? So it was a company that I felt that impacted my team because we grew together. Abu have been very attentive to what the industry, what the agents consumer needs and has put that together and it has been evolving. And I have been with Follow-up bus for long, long, long time, and I think that it's the glue of the team in many different, many different ways. The second one, I will definitely, I will say that is my business partner, Zillow. I've been with Zillow as well for about 10, 11 years. And in real estate or in any business, you grow, you plateau, you learn, you grow again, you plateau. And I can tell you that in every single time that I have Plateau, my business partner, Zillow has really helped me go to the next level without a doubt. And I can give you plenty of examples. Yeah,

Speaker 1 (21:43):
Give me one or two. Is it who they're connecting you with? Is it some of the guidance they're providing you? What takes you from a plateau, which a lot of people, I mean you could be satisfied and say, oh good, it's a new plateau, but you're the type of person who's like, what's next? What's next? What's next? Yeah, what kind of sparks are they generating for you or information or ideas or help are they giving you that allows you to push to the next plateau?

Speaker 6 (22:07):
It started way back then when Zillow started a program that, it was called Zillow, foreclosures long time ago. Zillow was like, mercy, you have the perfect area, the perfect skills to help us bring this to the next level. And that just increased my business that I was so ready for the next level. Another example that I can give you is Zillow Flex. We're a Zilla Flex partner, and even though I operate a team as a business, it's always good to have another at my level, an accountability partner. So the same way that the same fins that I require from my agents, I do have somebody above me that it's also requiring the same things and it's expecting me to run a business. It should be. So I think that it helped me. I was serious about it, but it's kind of taking it to the next level.

Speaker 6 (23:08):
It's like, yeah, we are running businesses right here because they are KPIs, they're expectations, there's information about consumers, what consumers really want. So all of that together, I think that just really, really has helped me throughout the year. Tools, I would say that the list is endless, but I think that those two being part of test, being open to new ideas, being pro-consumer understanding really, okay, how can we make an impact and how can we empower the agents to deliver a better service? I've been able to do that with both actually with Follow up bus and with Zillow.

Speaker 1 (23:49):
Awesome. Thank you for sharing that. And that's all any of us is looking for as a partner in the business. Before I let you go, I would love for you to double back to where you started in your key qualifier. I would love for you to share a recruiting or hiring or interviewing tip for everyone watching and listening to make sure. I mean, I remember grit and maybe perseverance. I forget exactly. You used three or four key words. I'm sure you know them, but I'd love for you to share, and whether someone uses those words or they're looking for different words or qualities or core values or whatever, give a couple tips about interviewing or recruiting or selecting or hiring the right types of people no matter what your 2, 3, 4 keywords are.

Speaker 6 (24:32):
I try many different ways trying to identify the perfect candidate from doing tests like disc profiles and stuff like that that really help. But I am the type of person that when somebody gets to me, I have all the people that interview before I do, I just want to get to know the person, production, all of those, I know that ahead. I just want to get to know who you are. But now in this industry, I want to know how serious you are about growing a business, how serious you are about collaboration, how serious you are about being coachable and being held accountable. Because if you are not willing to do that is not going to work. You really need to have the right mindset. And as much as I would like to give an advice to someone or to have a magic bullet or secret that says, okay, this is exactly what I do, I tend to be during those interviews, I get a lot.

Speaker 6 (25:35):
I think that people tell you a lot, sometimes even it's going to sound bad, but sometimes when people even cry during those interviews, I'm like, this is the first time that I go to an interview and I cry because I really want to dig deeper and get to know that person to see whether or not I envision myself supporting their growth and vice versa. Because it works both ways, but it doesn't end in the interview because as much as we try to get information and explain and see whether or not that person has the right qualities, I want to see action. So I have this seven day process where basically it's an evaluation, seven day evaluation, 30 day evaluation, seven day evaluation. I mean, of course I'm not going to be evaluating you on how good you're on the phone yet, but I'm going to be evaluating you like how committed you are. Are you here on time in the meetings, as you come on? Do you do your homework? That's so important because if you start giving me excuses at the beginning, if you don't show up, up late, whatever it is, that's the first thing you're showing me, the real person, not necessarily. It was somebody that interview,

Speaker 1 (26:44):
Not the person answering questions the way you want to hear the

Speaker 6 (26:46):
Answers. Exactly. So that is those seven days, and I'm very honest. I tell them when after I interview them, the first day of onboarding, at the end of these seven days, not all of you are going to remain. And that is okay. That is okay because this is not for everybody. That doesn't mean that you are not for real estate or a bad person, but you're not the right person for the type of agent that I want in my team. And then when I get to 30 days, there's other things that I'm evaluating. So I'll say that it's a process, but in that, going back to your question in that interview, the different, for me, it's just really getting to know them more intimately and asking those questions that are going to help me understand whether or not real estate, the way that I see it, the way that I want to serve my clients.

Speaker 6 (27:32):
The one I want to support is there. And the same thing thing with staff. I mean, I will say that even more so because a staff has to be ready, I believe, and this is cliche, but I believe that I am as good as the people that I surround myself, and they need to believe in my vision. They need to believe in my mission. If they do, and they can be the best cheerleaders that we have, my best promoters, that's what I'm looking for. Great people that are going to promote because I am not going to be here. Everybody has, we have a due date. So that part of legacy for me, I take it very, very seriously. And hiring, whether it's agent or staff, the right people that are willing to learn and be coachable to get to the next level and to really thrive in this new industry and understand that if we don't serve the client the right way, we're not going anywhere. It's extremely important

Speaker 1 (28:39):
When we do the hard work of finding and hiring the right people the right way, as Mercy just informed us, we need to invest in those people. And next up is Joe Oz, who remotely runs his New Jersey based real estate team from his home in Orange County, California. And he shares a great example and a great story of this. This one is a blend of people and process. Here's Joe.

Speaker 5 (29:04):
So we have a director of operations. This is a person that we hired as in the Red book that I just mentioned. They talk about hiring an admin. And so what happens in real estate is there's like when you're a real estate agent, I think there's a $20 an hour job and there's a $500 an hour job. Obviously the $500 hour job is the sales. We need to be out there doing the sales, and they'll list the putting, the ordering, the photos and the sending out the mailers and all that other stuff, which we, by the way, we're not very good at and we don't like to do. We shouldn't be doing it. So I hired an admin, and then the last admin I hired has really just transformed into our director of ops and really runs our organization. Her name's Lauren.

Speaker 5 (29:46):
Yeah, we could never do it without her. And so I believe that right now I don't want to do anything. I won't do something once. If I can't do it a hundred times, I want to be able to scale it and I want to be able to grow. And really, I believe that in the simplest form of all these things. So Lauren keeps everything just organized. And so also a book like Rocket Fuel, like the Integrator, and she definitely is a huge integrator part of this thing where I'm the entrepreneur part. And also she kind of keeps me in line too. And that book Rocket Field, they'll say an entrepreneur will have a hundred ideas and 99 of them will definitely be bad, and one of them might be a good idea, but we're not sure yet. And that's what the implementer's job is to do.

Speaker 5 (30:31):
But ultimately, as far as scaling a business, there's this thing that happens where if we do something more than once, we have to document it and we have to document it the absolute best way that it can be done in the most efficient way. And a lot of people don't do that. That's why they don't build a business. And so for us, my wife's cousin's a pilot, and to this day there's a checklist before the plane takes off old school checklist. And so that's all, when you really simplify everything, all a business is systems, and then you hear systems all the time and all a system is a checklist. And so really it's just putting those things together and then having a director of ops who basically runs all those things. She uses everything. Our tech stack is everything from Slack to Loop to Zillow to follow-up boss to she could tell you more, right? And so she just uses all those things to keep us all organized and help us scale. She

Speaker 1 (31:25):
Was your initial admin?

Speaker 5 (31:27):
Yeah, we hired an admin. Just an admin just to do TC work.

Speaker 1 (31:32):
Tell me a little bit about your investments in Lauren, your relationship with Lauren, her own knowledge and skillset that allowed her to elevate in this way and allowed you to be in a position where you can run a team from literally the other coast of the country.

Speaker 5 (31:46):
Correct. I think we just got lucky. And I mean, I believe in God and I believe in the universe, and I think, oh, and there's been a lot of really bad hires before Lauren, and I think it's fun. I think it's like you just can't give up. You got to keep trying. I remember we got so many apps for this role and we narrowed it down to two people and it was, I mean, I'm the boss, right? I have a partner, but it was up to me to make the decision. It was tough, man. And I chose Lauren, and like I said, she came as a tc, which is just transaction coordinating, listing coordinating and things like that because that's what everyone, the people in that role before her had done that. And she got to a point, she ran the roles she was in before this were big.

Speaker 5 (32:32):
She was running operations. She knew this and she came from, she was moving back from New Orleans back to New Jersey and I don't know, man, we just got her. But the thought, I'll tell you this, she outgrew the role very quickly and we saw the talent and we quickly, we almost didn't double it, but her salary went way up the next year. We kind of knew what we had and we didn't want to lose it. And so we kind of came to her and since then we've made other arrangements with her. So she's fully bought in. But yeah, she's ran other businesses, restaurants. She ran a zoo down in New Orleans, she's in the food and beverage department and things like that. So she's a super talented person. And when you see those people, I have seen enough non, I've seen enough non talented people where I think now I can see the talented people. And what happens is she really saves me for myself and she sees the issues before they happen. She sees the roadblocks kind of before we get to them and fixes them before we get there. It's pretty amazing.

Speaker 1 (33:43):
This ability to predict the future, see the future and solve problems before they happen, comes up in the next clip as well. Two book mentions there from Joe one, the Red book, the Millionaire Real Estate Agent from Gary Keller, the mega agent model. It comes up from time to time on this show. It was a key part of the 30, 35 year history of the advancement of the team model in real estate. The other one was Rocket Fuel. You might also be familiar with Traction. Both are written by Gino Wickman and are all about the EOS, the entrepreneurial operating system that Dave mentioned in the first clip in this episode. So next up we have Abel Gilbert of OnePath Realty and Independent Team Rich in Miami, Florida. He talks about the ability to use our CRM and its data to see the future and make adjustments as we need to in advance. Here's Abel,

Speaker 4 (34:36):
As you're asking me this question, I'm just thinking about different times during the beginning. Yeah,

Speaker 1 (34:43):
Please stage it up a

Speaker 4 (34:44):
Little bit. The middle and then where we are today. And the answer is yes, there's always something key, but that changes. That evolves the systems and the people because the people that for example, helped me at the beginning. Some of them are no longer with me, some of them, their abilities just didn't evolve with the way that the company and the industry and just how we evolved across the board though, one of the one systems that has remained, and this is not because we're here today, is follow a bus, is having a solid enough technology to help maintain your database and maintain your own sales processes in one place. So as far as key system or platforms, definitely follow. ABA has been one that has been with me since they won, and I've been lucky enough to have only used one CRM ever. And it happened to be Follow aba, so I chose W, right?

Speaker 4 (35:52):
And then as far as people, a business in my opinion has five departments. It has sales, it has operations, it has finance, it has marketing, and it has culture right now inside sales, you also have recruitment. So you can either sub, you can have a subdepartment or you can have a six department. But if we focus just on the conversation around sales, you got to have the right system to organize your database, to organize your productivity efforts. You also need a system for mainly leadership to track and be able to have the visibility at not just your lagging indicators, but also your productivity indicators, the ones that are going to dictate the future. Right? And that's one of the great things about Follow ABAs and the other systems that we use is that because they integrate, we can pretty much predict where we're going to be in the next 60 to 90 days based on the efforts that we see today. And if we see that the efforts are lacking today, then we can make decisions and we can then lead our agents and just our company in general on what changes do we need to do to improve our results.

Speaker 1 (37:16):
If you'd like to see more or hear more with Abel Gilbert, be sure to go to YouTube or to Apple Podcasts or Spotify or to realestate team os.com and check out episode 29 of this show culture as your key to Sustainable Success. It's an entire conversation with Able, he also offers a great people play in that one, a role that I haven't heard in any other real estate team. It was really critical for the growth of OnePath Realty again in Miami. Be sure to check out episode 29 with Able thank you for spending time in this episode of Real Estate Team os. I hope you found it helpful. We are now well over 60 episodes into this series. Our whole goal is to help you start, grow, or optimize your real estate team to build a very strong foundation to build a very strong team operating system with the right people, processes, and technology. I hope this is helpful to you. Visit realestate team os.com, hit that contact button on the top of the page. Let me know what you think or share insights into your team operating system. I'd love to hear from you. My name is Ethan Butte, your host of Real estate team os. Thanks again.

Speaker 8 (38:25):
Thanks for checking out this episode of Team Os. Get quick insights all the time by checking out real estate team Os on Instagram and on TikTok.