Who's Managing Your Business...
Determination or Desperation?

By Scot Kenkel, GRI CRS DAD
Scot@SuccessLearningInstitute.com

Click here to Print Out This Page

Take a moment before you read this article and answer this one question as honestly as you can; “How much time did you spend last week reviewing your Success Plan and/or planning your activities to meet your objectives for the week ahead of you?”

Go ahead, answer the question. Be honest with yourself. I have no way of knowing whether or not you tell the truth.

Over the last twenty years or so I’ve asked that same exact question to hundreds of small business owners just like you. Yes, real estate agents are small business owners. At first, when I began asking the question, the answers I got literally shocked me. But after a short while I began to accept the fact that most people, and most business people, simply don’t have any type of plan. That’s right, like you they don’t have one either, and they don’t review their plan because they just don’t see the need for a plan. They just DO whatever they feel needs to be DONE whenever they decide to do it, unless of course someone else decides for them --- which is more likely than not.

And yet time and again, it’s been proven that those that do plan, that work their plan, that regularly review how they’re doing according to plan, tend to succeed more often than those that don’t. That isn’t to say you can’t succeed without a plan but the odds are in your favor if you simply HAVE A PLAN.   

Learn How YOU can Take a FSBO Listing
Each and Every Week!
www.FSBOMasteryBootcamp.com

So who really manages your activities each week? Who’s keeping score of how you’re REALLY doing? Is your broker deciding what you should be doing? Is it your nearly empty checkbook that’s making the decisions? Is there someone else in your life, perhaps someone you love that’s doing the deciding for you? Are the circumstances around you deciding? Are your customers taking charge or are you in control of your decisions?

You might be good at organizing a birthday party or planning a vacation, but general business planning may not come naturally to you. That’s quite alright; it just means you’re normal. Look, most small business owners tend to do what they know how to do, the actual work, and they shy away from what they don’t know how to do, the planning part. This is common. But without a plan how do you know where you’re really heading? How will you know when you’ve arrived? How will you keep score? How will you improve? Remember, it’s hard to improve something you don’t measure. So start measuring.

A plan doesn’t have to be complicated. It doesn’t have to conform to any type of advanced general accounting practices. It doesn’t have to be five, ten, or even twenty pages long to count as a plan. All it has to be is YOUR plan and ideally, it needs to be in writing. It should answer the question of “Where do you want to go and how soon would you like to get there?” That’s it. Don’t overcomplicate it.

(If you’d like to see an actual example of my
“Super Simple Planning Tool for Real Estate Professionals”
go here: http://www.tinyurl.com/jcwpf )

A working plan can serve so many different purposes; it can direct your activities, it can keep you focused, it can keep you on track. It can motivate, stimulate and even inspire behavior, the right kind of behavior. It can give you a strong sense of hope. It can help to define who you are as a person and as a professional. It WILL help you to achieve whatever it is you want to achieve. It’s just that simple.  

In fact, our society often describes that sort of person, the type that seems incredibly focused and motivated on a single objective, as being a very ‘determined’ individual.  Determination, as defined by the American Heritage Dictionary, as “the act of making a decision” and a plan is nothing more than the act of deciding, once and for all, what it is exactly you want to accomplish and by when. We all have to decide on what we want or we have to decide not to decide. Either way it’s still a decision.

Whether in business or life, we all pretty much know what we want; we’re just not always willing to acknowledge it to ourselves or others. And because we’re not willing, or determined, to make the decision on what it is we want, we tend to run our businesses, not to mention our lives, without any true compass, directional beacon or a plan. This can lead to a feeling of hopelessness, frustration and even despair, not to mention that sick feeling you get when there’s no money in your account and nothing coming in. Ouch!! 

Learn How YOU can Take a FSBO Listing
Each and Every Week!
www.FSBOMasteryBootcamp.com

Desperation is defined by Dictionary.com as “a furious struggle against adverse circumstances with utter disregard of consequences”.  A determined individual does not act in desperation, only someone that lacks determination, or a plan. We all have to deal with ‘adverse circumstances’, it’s just a lot easier when you have a plan to help direct your activities otherwise you may find yourself repeating the same mistakes over and over.

So here’s the decision you have to make; either create a plan and act with determination or don’t create a plan and risk repeating the same mistakes over and over. Look, you’ve got nothing to lose by trying and everything to lose by not trying. Either way it’s still your decision; decide to decide and put it in writing or decide NOT to decide and keep doing what you’ve been doing. As long as you’re happy with what you’ve been getting you’ve got no reason to change. But if you’re not happy with the results you’ve been getting maybe it’s time to do something about it. It’s your decision. Good luck.

Scot Kenkel is the President of the Success Learning Institute, LLC, an organization focused of promoting Success through Learning. Scot’s a self-professed, recovering dad-a-holic, training humorist, and overall smart guy that’s been involved in edu-taining small business owners and professional real estate agents for over 15 years on how to grow their businesses using cutting edge sales and marketing techniques. Scot’s style of teaching is energetic, fast-paced, down-to-earth, easy-to-follow, sometimes hilarious and always informative.

Find out more about Scot's other topics and courses by visiting his site www.SuccessLearningInstitute.com.
You can also contact Scot directly by email at Scot@SuccessLearningInstitute.com or by calling his East Tennessee office at (888) 831-5945.

Learn How YOU can Take a FSBO Listing
Each and Every Week!
www.FSBOMasteryBootcamp.com