The Smart Broker

The smart broker will not create obstacles or establish an adversarial position with agents. The smart broker will realize that the success of a real estate business depends on trust and communication. Nothing profound, but then why is it almost always the case that agents have problems with their brokers? Perhaps it has to do with the difficulty of living by principles.

It's easy to talk about principles, especially when you are marketing your business and bringing on agents, but the test is in the day to day practice and living the principles. Most problems almost always surround money issues and internal politics. It's the rare broker who can maintain honesty and fairness when it's not financially advantageous to do so -- people can rationalize anything. But rationalizations are the beginning of the problem - it's where you begin to compromise on principles one little lie at a time. Say the broker has a policy where he (and yes, yes, yes, she, too) hands out leads on a rotating basis, but a lead comes in that is high dollar, so he breaks the rotation and gives it to Sandra. Let's say the real reason is because he likes Sandra and thinks she would be good with this client for subjective reasons he can't even really explain. So, Tom complains, and then the broker begins rambling trying to rationalize his decision, trying to make good sound judgement out of a poor decision. No matter how good the broker is at spinning situations, Tom knows deep down it just ain't right. The beginning of distrust.

Distrust is like a cancer, because it sharpens your awareness of negatives and can even engender a little paranoia, at least unhealthy suspicion. It can breed a slow smouldering resentment and eats away at trust. The smart broker knows this and respects his agents to a point of not playing these games. The game playing sets up the distrust, the negative talk in the office, dissatisfaction and eventually turn-over. The smart broker knows that respect and trust lead to success. Living by prinicples 24/7 is tough. It's so easy to manipulate for a few extra bucks, but what have you gained? The smart broker thinks long term and realizes that immediate gains from compromised principles are very expensive in the long run.

The thing is principles can't be faked. You can't say, Okay, I'll act principled and the agents will trust me. If you aren't principled you will fool your own self, but no one else -- principles are real and others can detect their natural display in your day to day actions, and they can detect a phony just as well. It's the subtle things and the things an unprincipled person doesn't even grasp -- "What? I'm principled!  What do mean I didn't handle this right?" Doesn't even have a clue, because he never developed the character for it -- it can't be faked. The delusion of an unprincipled person trying to fake it is a sad spectacle -- the agents then have a diminished view, not even angry, just saddened by such a clown. But they leave anyway.

The smart broker knows he is nothing without good agents. The smart broker knows he is less then nothing without principles.