Let’s make work far more enjoyable and a lot more lucrative

Firstly, an invitation: register now so you can join us for How Commercial Real Estate Agents Will Win in 2023.

Secondly, it’s time to recharge your love for commercial real estate!

You can make what you do far more enjoyable, and a lot more lucrative, by focusing on activities that meet at the intersection of:

1. What's in your zone of genius
2. What's dollar productive, and
3. What fires you up.

If loving what you do matters to you – and you want to make more money while you’re at it – then you’ll want to know how this formula works.

You can get all the ingredients by listening to episode 116 of CRE Success: The Podcast

Episode transcript:

Today I want to talk to you about rekindling old flames.

I'm not talking about dredging up relationships from the past, but I am talking about what you really enjoy doing at work.

So, if you've lost that loving feeling for what you do, this episode will help you find that spark again. 

Hello, welcome to episode 116 of CRE Success: The Podcast. My name is Darren Krakowiak. I help commercial real estate leaders to develop their people and to grow their business.

Thank you so much for joining me for today's episode, which is inspired by one of my old loves, which I've recently rekindled.

And that is the love of flying - that is getting on an aeroplane and traveling somewhere. 

Now I fell out of love with the activity of flying during COVID because of Draconian border rules.

The limited service that you'd get on Airlines was "Sorry, can't give you that because of COVID".

You know, just being stuffed around by airlines that were running on low staffing levels during COVID. And I shared that episode about Qantas in Episode 98.

I wasn't particularly a fan of wearing a mask for hours on end, etc.

And as a result of all of these, I actually thought to myself, "You know what, flying isn't fun anymore, and I don't enjoy it anymore."

But I have rediscovered my love for flying recently.

I think it's been on quite different terms to the way that I enjoyed flying in the past.

So, there's no more coughing champagne in the lounge before the flight. And if I don't have the luxury of traveling with my family, I miss them when I'm away.

But some things happened. I gained a status level with Virgin in Australia, which means that I get lounge access, the priority queuing and the extra baggage and all that stuff, which I do appreciate and enjoy.

And also, I've started watching TV on the flights, which is something that I wasn't doing before.

I was previously just sort of watching stuff on my iPad and not relying on their in-flight entertainment systems.

But I figured out that even though they don't have the little TV on the back of the seat, they've got a really good library of content. 

And I don't watch much TV and I found a really great show by accident on my most recent flight, which was somebody somewhere which I highly recommend.

A couple of other things that have changed for me about flying is I'm not so precious about delays.

I'm not so entitled about what status means. And by that, I mean, I don't think that I should be treated like a Lord just because I've got a status on an airline.

And I think that I've just sort of changed my perspective. And I've changed a little bit.

So, therefore I've started loving flying again, but for slightly different reasons, and I loved it in the past.

Now, I will put a little caveat on this in two weeks' time, we're going on holiday, and we're taking our 2-year-old daughter to Thailand.

So, perhaps that will give me pause to reflect on whether I still love flying, because that's a long flight with a 2-year-old. 

But nevertheless, I'm telling you all this because some things that I thought that I didn't like about flying are actually not so relevant now.

Because I've looked at it with a new perspective and also rediscovered the things that I do like.

And the pretext of all of this is to talk about commercial real estate and to ask you what excites you about commercial real estate?

Because some of the things that you love could have been lost or buried not just because of everything that's gone on in the world over the past two or three years, but because your role has changed.

I want you to just have a little think about what it is about this industry about your role in it that you previously loved?

That perhaps you've fallen out of love with, or you don't get as much time doing anymore?

Is it chasing business? Is it competing for work?

Maybe it's developing relationships with prospects and clients, delivering them great service and value.

Maybe you love negotiating or just getting deals done.

My advice to you is to rediscover your love for whichever part of the role it is that lights you up with a newer and broader perspective.

And also, you can do it on different terms.

So just like when you're watching a movie, and you see it again, many, many years later, and you realize, "I like it for different reasons now or it's a different experience."

The same thing can happen when you refocus on an area of work that you've been passionate about in the past, but it can be something that you enjoy for different reasons.

And that can also help you find new motivation to work to the best of your ability.

I've been thinking about this not only because of flying that was really just the story I came up with to set up this episode, but because a lot of the commercial real estate leaders that I work with feel that they have lost the passion for what it is that they do. 

Because they don't get to focus on the areas, which is the part of the job that they enjoy the most.

And they may feel like they perhaps shouldn't be able to do what it is that they want to do because of their new responsibilities. 

But my advice to them would be if you have a system to lead and manage your people and to ensure that is being done.

And as long as the business (not necessarily from you) is getting what it needs in order to grow, and for the people to be the best that they can be, then you could feel comfortable to be able to step back into the areas of the business that you truly love as the leader.

It doesn't need to get all of that stuff from you, you can just employ the people to delegate responsibilities to make sure the business is getting what it needs.

So, where is it that you should focus? And if it's an old love of say, chasing business, how can you put a new spin on that?

Well, I would say prospecting using technology is one way and I've talked to you in the previous episode about a sales cadence.

And I'm going to tell you, one vital time, how you can join us for the workshop, "How Commercial Real Estate Agents Will Win in 2023", in just a moment.

But a sales cadence is an excellent way that you can rediscover your love of chasing business.

But do it in a way, which is more systematic, more leveraged, and it also reflects the technology, the resources and the data that is available to us today.

I think also, developing relationships with prospects and clients is something that you can now do at scale, again, for the reasons that I mentioned, in terms of data and technology, but also, of course, using social media. 

And if you enjoy negotiating, well, you can now be an even better negotiator because of the plethora of data that is at your fingertips.

And that allows you to be insight rich, and to help your clients make the right decisions.

So, you can have, I guess, a stronger negotiating hand, that doesn't just rely on your negotiating now set skills, but rather, it's backed up by a plethora of data that exists to ensure that you can get the right outcome for your clients.

Now, the other area I just wanted to quickly touch on in today's episode is, "Where is it that I should focus?"

Because there might be some activities that perhaps it isn't a good use of my time to focus on and I believe that is true.

So, I want you to find, if you can, the activities that meet these three criteria.

First of all, we want to try and focus on our zone of genius.

And our zone of genius is just what you can do better than anyone else. 

So is this something that you're capable of, which almost seems like an amazing superhuman type of ability that positions you as credible, as competent and knowledgeable about the marketplace.

Next thing is, what's dollar productive for you to do.

And in Episode 60 of the Podcast 'That's below my paygrade', we introduced the concept of the rule of 2000 hours.

So, your job is to make sure that you're not focused on tasks, which are relatively low order priorities that you could easily outsource delegate automation, because they are quite simple.

But rather focus on those tasks, which really do add a lot of value to the process and to the business.

And the last part where you should focus is what lights you up, and what is it that you truly enjoy doing. 

So, if you can find your zone of genius, what's still unproductive and what lights you up, if there is an activity that meets those three criteria, then that is definitely an area where you can and should focus more of your activity.

And that's how you can make work great again, by focusing more on what makes work great for you.

In our new workshop, "How Commercial Real Estate Agents Will Win in 2023", we'll show you the four trends that you need to get ahead of, and we'll give you some specific ways for you to do that.

And this will help you find new ways to do more of what you love. Continuous improvement through learning and growth, I think will help you keep doing this.

If the content that we present in the workshop does not contain specifically the areas that you want to improve, I think just going through this workshop, which is only 60 minutes in length will hopefully inspire you to find more of the ways that you can find those tasks which fit those three criteria.

Your zone of genius wants to live productively, and what lights you up.

We'll also help you get very clear on what it is you want to achieve in 2023 and we'll give you a plan to make it happen.

To register for the workshop which is happening in a week's time from when we released this episode, go to cresuccess.co/2023.

That's our episode for today. Thank you so much for listening and I will speak to you soon.