The Mu

I promised last time that I would veer away from technology temporarily and talk about the people aspect of my new real estate career.

Meeting new people, talking about their aspirations and dreams, then trying to help them realize those dreams is a pretty rewarding way to spend time.  Take any one of those three activities and it remains rewarding on its own.

While real estate is fraught with competitive practices and is cutthroat to some extent, the people in my office have been wonderfully supportive.

Then there are the house hunters and sellers.  These are the clients in the business.  While I recognize that as soon as I identify myself as a “salesperson” many people immediately feel the bile rise in the back of their throat, I’m impressed at how friendly most people are.  The bad reputation attributed to salespeople of all stripes is something I fully understand, since I myself hate the schmoozy, schmarmy aspect of selling.  I joined this industry with a somewhat idealistic goal of helping people accomplish something they already wanted to do.  I grasp the concept of “closing” a sale being a process of addressing objections.  But I want to remove obstacles as opposed to sweeping them off the negotiating table onto the floor where they remain a tripping hazard.

All this wide-eyed idealism is something that I don’t apologize for, but my manager gave me a great perspective today by pointing out that learning the business involves taking cues from a variety of sources, while remaining true to our ideals.  In other words, she advocates ongoing learning in the sales process and adapting things like lead generation and closing techniques to our own personality.  I can’t argue with that.

I could provide many more examples of people I have met and situations I have found myself in where human behavior truly impressed me.  The more people I meet the more I realize why society works: most people are good and ethical.  Even salespeople.

Darryl Halse recently wrote about New Year’s resolutions.  I agree with his concluding observation that in general, if something is worth doing, what’s wrong with starting today?

In fact, I began my journey to a new career back in July 2009.  I had been thinking about different areas of specialty for my consulting business.  I had originally set my sights on newspapers as a place that could use content management and social media project advice.  But traditional media seemed so set in its ways that I was having difficulty with most of the conversations I was conducting with people in the newspaper business.  And to be honest, I wasn’t getting to the decision makers anyway.

Fortunately I met with a friend of mine who had made a partial leap from software development into real estate.  He was very enthusiastic and I started to see another industry that could benefit from information technology advice.  So, in an effort to increase my expertise in the business, I started taking the real estate licensing courses.  As I learned more, I realized that I was already surrounded by people who, in one way or another, are enamored of or involved in the real estate business.  (For example: My daughter is hooked on interior design and loves the idea of staging homes.  My wife loves analyzing the MLS and getting ideas from HGTV.)

So I started to see myself as a full-time real estate sales representative, with maybe a little IT consulting on the side.

Heeding Darryl’s advice: my New Year’s resolution is to continue down the path of becoming licensed to trade in real estate in Ontario.  I write the big “final” exam on 6 February 2010 (final is a relative term, since the education never ends, but it is the last exam before I can start to trade).

I have a catchphrase that I developed many years ago as a news editor for my university newspaper.  My dream was to start a company eventually that would help people craft their words for greatest impact.  I imagined people writing more concisely, conveying their meaning quickly.  My advertising slogan was going to be: “Make your point.  Sharper.”  I still love that slogan — the grammatical ambiguity is one of the intriguing things about it.  I started using it for my current company since I focused on editorial assistance and information architecture as well as content management systems.

Eventually though, I had to admit that the company was doing more than just word-crafting or even conveying information to others. It was more broadly based in content improvement: creating, storing, and retrieving content for a whole enterprise.  Content is the focus, but its application for business success is really what I am helping people with.  I also strongly believe that we should never “settle” for anything less than our best.  In fact, being better than our best can happen through collaboration.

So my company’s new slogan is “Content to overachieve.”  It still retains double meaning through two different pronunciations of “content” and it emphasizes business success.

These are tumultuous times.  The business landscape is changing and the ways in which people interact now is different than the last time the economy went through a big shakeup.

But there are some immutable truths that seem to be confirmed during “unprecedented” events.  One is that you never get something for nothing.  Hard work pays off.

Merlin Mann has recently set his blog and speaking engagement business on a new track.  He has denounced all the “productivity porn” he has been wasting time with since 2004 when he launched 43 Folders.  The sum of his conclusion is that we all need to bring our best to whatever endeavor we are doing and productivity alone will not accomplish this.  Creative energy needs to be harnessed and brought to bear on any problem or project.

You can’t just work hard.  You can’t just work efficiently.  And you can’t just think outside the box.  You need to draw on your experiences and apply your best to whatever you’re working on.

To every moment you carve out for yourself by applying time honored productivity rules like “eliminating interruptions”… you need to bring your “A” game.