Use Programs and Strategies to Purposefully Create Your Company’s Future Leaders
How does your brokerage identify future managers and leaders? Basically, there are two approaches to this issue: having a program in place to identify and develop a “bench” for future leadership, or simply finding replacement candidates as the need arises. Unfortunately, many companies that I have observed take the second approach.
Implementing a leadership development program is a much stronger option. It is a simple yet powerfully effective approach to ensuring continuity in your company’s leadership when openings arise. Failing to have one often results in myriad problems, including prolonged vacancies, loss of sales production, decrease in company culture, reduction in recruiting and agent breakage.
All levels of current leadership should follow the following three steps on a consistent basis to develop future leaders and ensure continuous peak performance of your company:
Review your current team. While not all management openings can be predicted, many of them can, so you should be continually assessing your management team and determining who may need a replacement sometime soon. Whether a change will occur due to retirement, underperformance, promotion or any other reason doesn’t matter; spotting the need for replacements in advance will give you a jump on prioritizing where a replacement will be needed.
Seek and identify talent. Each manager in your company should have a “bench” of three to five future management candidates. These may come from their staff, from current agents or from numerous other sources, and they do not have to be in the mold of the current manager. Also, their current interest in management is not even a requirement at this point; only that they may be a good fit, and that consideration should be given to developing them for that possibility.
Engage and foster your future leaders. An effective leadership development program will engage future leaders well before they officially assume any future positions in your company. This part of development runs from early conversations through formal training and is part of an established and proven program that I have helped initiate with great results for multiple brokerages nationwide.
Your company and your agents need consistent, effective leadership to drive maximum performance, propel recruiting and maintain agent loyalty. A leadership development program will achieve those objectives. Following the three key steps above within that program is a good start to guaranteeing that your management team will be as strong as it can be, now and in the future.
To learn how Sherri Johnson has helped brokerage clients nationwide develop future leaders, including proven systems for new manager orientation, schedule a free 30-minute discussion with her here.
Sherri Johnson is CEO and founder of Sherri Johnson Coaching & Consulting. With 25 years of experience in real estate as an agent, broker and executive, Johnson now shares her proven methods through coaching, consulting and keynote speaking services nationwide. She is a national speaker for the Homes.com Secrets of Top Selling Agents tour and is the Official Real Estate Coach for McKissock Learning and Real Estate Express. Johnson has also been named an RISMedia Real Estate Newsmaker in 2020 and 2021 as an Influencer and Thought Leader. Schedule a free 30-minute coaching strategy session or visit www.sherrijohnson.com for more information.
