21 Aug How NOT to lose your top performer

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that recruitment is all about the money.  It is not even about leadership.  You need to take a holistic view of your business to recruit well.

Topic – #RealReach – Recruitment

Mentor – Penny Tarrant

• Ask questions to find out about them
• Show interest
• Get to know them first so you can work out how you can fit into their business not the other way around

Property Management Matters with Tara Bradbury – How to handle the presentation when you do not have all the decision makers present.

Transcript:

Kevin Turner: This week in the shows we’re going to be featuring a variety of experts. These are experts that we’ve drawn from the #RealReach platform, which is online coaching and training for real estate principals. Exclusively devoted to principals. So if you want to know a little bit more about it, just go to realreach.com.au.

Kevin Turner: One of the experts that we feature on that platform is Penny Tarrant. Penny is deeply involved in recruitment of experienced agents, has a tremendous business in Australia and also New Zealand. There are links to both of Penny’s sites, Australia and New Zealand on today’s show. So that will take you straight through to her website. Penny, good morning and welcome to the show.

Penny Tarrant: Kevin, how are you?

Kevin Turner: Very well, thank you. Now Penny, I want to ask you about why people will move. This is obviously going to be something you’re very mindful of as you’re recruiting people. We do know that it’s not always about money. But what do you find are the key reasons an experienced agent will move from one office to another?

Penny Tarrant: Look I think that’s a very good point. It’s not always just about money. What we see out there is that experienced agents are looking for a lot of other things. Often leadership gets put up as the reason people move. We do see that to a large extent, that people … You hear people say they’ll leave managers not jobs. But good leadership is a great reason people move, but that really defines how a business is run as well. So in breaking that down, we also see people move for great lead generation, great marketing, great admin support. So lots of other things as well.

Kevin Turner: So when you’re interviewing someone with the prospect of recruiting them, what are the sort of questions you ask to find out what their hot points are?

Penny Tarrant: When we’re meeting with experienced agents, the first thing we’re actually doing is actually finding out about their lives. Because what one person is looking for may be the complete opposite to what another person’s looking for. So it’s really important to find out what stage of career but also what stage of life someone’s at, and their personal circumstances. Because that’s how you really make a very bespoke office for someone, is really getting to know them as people first. So I have that caveat first.

Penny Tarrant: But then after that, in terms of really getting to know their business and how you could make a difference to their business. You really want to be getting to know their business intimately. That is also a very personalised thing. What one experienced agent does to be successful is different to the next. Asking the right questions to elicit where are they now, and what’s going to really help them grow their business is very very important.

Kevin Turner: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Because recruitment can be looked upon as almost like speed dating, which is to me a big mistake. Getting to make the offer on the first appointment, it’s like kissing on the first date, I guess. You’ve really got to get to know the person and then you can actually work out how they can probably best fit into your team.

Penny Tarrant: Yeah, definitely. I think cultural fit is really important. Because you want people to stay in your business for a long period of time. In sales, especially, the best results come for agents often in their fifth year to their tenth year in real estate. So really, really important that they are staying in your business for a long period of time.

Kevin Turner: Yep.

Penny Tarrant: It’s important to get to know them.

Kevin Turner: In your recruitment strategy when you’re looking to recruit someone, do you have a system to it? In other words, is it a stepped process, or do you just really do it as you go?

Penny Tarrant: No, absolutely there’s a definitely system. We are very niche, professional recruiters. But I would say … And we are very systemized in what we do. That’s so that we don’t miss anything. But I would also recommend to principals who want to just improve their recruiting internally is to systemize it. To get a real process to what you’re doing. Because then it will land better, you’ll make a better impression with potential sales people and candidates of all varieties in your office; admin, property management, every role in your office benefits from that systemization.

Kevin Turner: Smart business owners or smart leaders are looking on recruitment as a bit like farming, you’ve got to have a system to it, you’ve got to be consistent with it, and keep following up.

Penny Tarrant: That’s definitely how you get the best results, I agree.

Kevin Turner: Okay, there’s a lot more information. Penny’s done a number of interviews. We recorded one with Jacob Aldridge just the other day. It’s a great Skype video that goes into a lot of detail about Penny, her business and how you can develop some really great recruitment strategies into your business.

Kevin Turner: Penny Tarrant is from rerau.com.au and rernz.co.nz. Did I get that right, those two of them?

Penny Tarrant: Yeah, yeah, they’re right.

Kevin Turner: Okay, they reflect the Australian and New Zealand businesses for Penny Tarrant. Penny, thank you very much and once again I’ll just remind you that those links are on today’s show as well. Penny, thanks for your time.

Penny Tarrant: Thanks, Kevin.