If you are an broker in Westchester County New York, you know that it is difficult to find high performing agents. Once you find them you want them to continue to be productive. And if they become performers you want them to stay.
You need a Value Proposition to attract customers to your business, right? Well guess what, you need an Agent Value Proposition to attract and retain team members which would include getting an agent to work with you. Your agents really want opportunities to grow and develop. They want to do the best they can do and be the best they can be. It is important for you to engage that.
Create a platform for Agent Development and Results.
We start with expectations but before we measure expectations we need to set expectations. It is not merely enough to tell an employee here is your job description and see me if you have any questions.
Establish expectations from the start.
Help orient your new agent by helping him or her to understand the big picture for your organization. Share your organization’s vision, values, and mission along with the organizational goals. You will have more success if you are as transparent as possible. In order to have team “buy in” each member needs to first know what he or she is buying. Make sure that your expectations are clear and concise. If you don’t set the baseline of expectations your future criticisms may seem arbitrary.
Feedback and evaluation should be continuous.
One of the biggest mistakes made by management is to only conduct annual performance appraisals. If you only communicate annually with your employees you will have lost the opportunity to develop them and, at the same time, create improved results. The best way for you to insure that expectations are being met is by continuous feedback. People learn incrementally and by spaced repetition. This learning is helped by continuous feedback. And don’t forget to recognize positive performance. Be sure to recognize your employee when you catch him or her doing something right. As an example, I worked with a service company that wanted to reduce unnecessary service calls by having their call agents help the customer trouble shoot the problem when they called over the phone. Before long the call agents had developed the new habit which had been reinforced by the recognition for helping the customer immediately and saving a service call. By far, people are more receptive to positive reinforcement because it provides the opportunity to focus on positive outcomes.
Conduct a formal appraisal on a regular basis.
Although you have established expectations you should have developed a work plan with standards. This will be far more successful if you involve your agents in planning and setting goals. Begin with your organizational goal so that they know the critical part they play in the achievement of those goals then talk about individual goal achievement and goals achieved. You can measure intangible performance areas as well. Don’t neglect those areas. For instance, you can measure dependability activity records. Or you can measure initiative by the number of suggestions or independent solutions.
Don’t forget performance development.
The purpose of the appraisal is development of better performance and results. This is the opportunity to address weaknesses and inadequacies and develop a plan for improvement. At the end of the meeting you and your agent should have not only a record of individual performance but also the record of progress toward group goals.
Many owners and managers do not realize full potential in their team because they do not involve them in the development process. You can avoid that by practicing performance development rather than performance management. See a similar post on our web site titled DRIVE YOUR WORK TEAM'S PERFORMANCE THROUGH ACTIVE ENGAGEMENT.
Learn how create an agent value proposition through active engagement.
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