How to Lead Your Real Estate Sales Team?

“If you want to build a ship,

don’t drum up the people to gather wood,

divide the work, and give orders.

Instead, teach them to yearn

for the vast and endless sea.”

– Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Take Your Sales Team Beyond Numbers

We spend so much time in coaching talking about accountability and tracking sales people’s numbers and making them report to us, but forget that the highest level of leadership is inspiration rather than oppression. One of the most important parts of leading a team is helping the people working for you put their role and their work into context.

Numbers and accountability are critical to cultivating a successful and productive real estate team, but it’s important to remember that those numbers don’t happen in a vacuum. They are the result of the level of drive and motivation that your ISAs and agents have on a daily basis. And their drive and motivation is largely the result of the company’s or team’s values and culture. This is where inspiration comes in.

What Drives People

So how do you inspire people to produce more value? I can definitely tell you what does not inspire people: fear. If the only thing driving your inside sales agent to pick up the phone and dial is fear of the consequences of not doing so, then they are not going to be successful on their calls and their numbers will likely fall even further. Fear of reprimand or termination if they don’t hit their numbers will increase stress and decrease confidence.

Instead of fear, offer your team opportunity and self-responsibility. What inspires people to work hard and consistently produce is the belief that their career and their life are in their own hands. That they are in control of their own advancement and have the real ability to improve their lives, set and meet personal goals, and be successful through working hard and constantly honing their skills.

Emphasize Value Creation and Productivity

In order to create a feeling of opportunity and self-responsibility on your team, you have to tie together them creating value for the company and creating value for themselves. One of the main things that can sap motivation of your employees and cause their confidence and numbers to drop is the feeling that they are working for the benefit of someone else instead of for the benefit of themselves.

By building a culture that emphasizes that when your employees are creating value for the company, they are also creating value and opportunity in their own lives, your team will be much more inspired and productive.

And how do you create value for the company and for yourself? Through productivity. Being productive, being creative, closing deals, bringing in new business—these are things to take deep pride in and are really nothing short of heroic acts. Your agents or ISAs are helping people sell their homes or get into a new home, but they are also improving their own skills, making a difference at the company, and taking charge in building the life they want to live. That’s inspiration.

Yearn for the Vast and Endless Sea

“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the people to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”

Use numbers and accountability to measure progress and success, but to motivate your team teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea. That is to say, teach them that they can build the life they want. They have that power and that ability. It just takes consistent and dedicated value creation.

Teach that being productive, being creative, and connecting people with products that help them are are things to strive for and take pride in. That the way they create value for themselves and improve their own lives is through creating value for the company and for the team. Their personal productivity and success is the way they get closer to the life they want to live, in addition to creating value for clients.

Help your agents and ISAs connect the dots between their work and their life and between the company and themselves. That’s how you’ll motivate them and make your team unstoppable.