After working with over 1,200 commercial real estate professionals, I have found there are 2 major challenges that many mid-career commercial real estate brokers face. More importantly, I have learned how they overcame these challenges to move their careers to places they knew they wanted to get to – but simply didn’t know how.
I am familiar with challenges myself. I have faced them in both my commercial real estate career, and in building the Massimo Group – which started as a vision, and is now the leading commercial real estate coaching and consulting organization in North America.
I can tell you unequivocally, you are not the first to hit these obstacles in your career – and you certainly will not be the last. I can also assure you there are proven approaches to assist you – not only in overcoming these challenges, but in propelling your business to the next level.
The number one challenge: You have hit a plateau and are stuck.
You have been a commercial real estate professional for 5, 10, even 20 years, and what you have done in the past simply isn’t creating the results you know you can achieve. You see others (often with less experience than you) winning assignments that you know you should win; you are frustrated and angry because you simply don’t know how to break out. The first step is to acknowledge that it is you that needs to change. It’s not the market, your partners, prospects, or clients – it’s you.
The second major challenge is experienced by those who have overcome the first.
You made it, you are successful, you are doing more business than ever before – and the only thing you don’t have is a life! Unfortunately, you now find yourself drowning in your own success. The problem is that you are not creating a business, you are just creating more work for yourself. You don’t know where your time goes, and you can’t recognize how to remove yourself from this velocity of work without losing the bulk of your business.
As I said previously, I have faced both of these challenges. In 2008, I was laid off. Let’s face it, the market was down in the dumps, Wall Street was falling apart, and employment was anemic. I found myself downsized, with no job – and most of my career I had focused on commercial real estate (as a broker, owner, manager, and corporate executive), so what was I to do next?
Ultimately, I was determined to build a commercial real estate coaching company. Imagine that. Our prospects are telling us no one was going to lease, their clients weren’t going to grow, and no one was going to buy or wanted to sell. And it was now that I was attempting to create a commercial real estate coaching company, when our targeted prospects were very cautious with their money?!
I present Challenge #1. I was stuck. My career hadn’t just plateaued, it had grounded to a halt. But the answer wasn’t to ‘wait for the market to shift’, or for our prospects to decide to invest in themselves with our coaching; the answer was to enhance my value so I could become more valuable to my prospects. I had to change me.
The market did not get better, but I got better. My new clients didn’t magically have money, but through specific changes I made to myself (my market presence, my value proposition, and my prospecting) – they recognized the value I could bring them. First a few, then several dozen, and before I knew it – I had scores of clients.
This success brought me quickly to Challenge #2.
Now I had all the clients I could handle, but I was also focused on keeping our pipeline full – so I was constantly working to find and win new opportunities. I built a team, but I was still working 12 to 15 hours a day just to keep our clients, and to keep the cash flowing. I felt if I stopped, the earth would open and my company would fall into a dark abyss. I was exhausted, I was stressed, I barely saw my family and I was unhappy. I was drowning in my own success. I had everything I worked so hard for, but I didn’t have what I wanted the most – I wanted to be in control. Unfortunately, my dream became nothing more than a job – and my job controlled me.
Again, I recognized I had to change. I needed to rethink my role in the company, how I spent my time, and where I spent it. I had to learn to let go, and empower the right people to help free me from working those long hours. I had to focus on only what I truly enjoyed doing, and where my individual skill set was best utilized for me and my team.
I’ve leveraged what I learned along the way to build a company, and hire a great team. I have also been able to maintain a healthy work/life balance – I have a lot more quality time with my family and friends, and am able to do many of the things I love.
I’m not sharing this to impress you, that’s not the point. I’m sharing this to impress upon you that there are answers to the challenges you are facing. There are specific strategies and tactics to get you to move your business forward, and yes – there is a path to a high quality of life while earning more money than you ever imagined!
If you’ve gotten to that point in your career where you are kind of stuck, you are the only one who has gotten yourself there. Unfortunately, you in your current form will not get you out of the rut you’re in – you’ve got to change what you are doing to get to the next level.
If you are a top producer and generating high commissions, but you are too busy to enjoy the fruits of your labor – likewise, you got yourself in this position and won’t get yourself out in your current form. You’ve got to change something – strategies, tactics, approach, whatever it may be.
Whichever challenge you find yourself facing, I invite you to join me, and my Executive Vice President, Bo Barron – for our ‘Mid-Career Master Class’ on Wednesday, September 13 at 1:00pm EST. During this free, live webinar session, we will share proven approaches and Massimo Coaching Methods to get you back the on the road to production, or simply take the next step to increase your already stable income.
Click Here to register for this Free Master Class, we hope to see you there!
