There are lots of things that matter in life and business.
In life, we can say that the important things, the thing that matter, are family, finances, faith, health, friends, personal growth, etc.
In a real estate business, we can say the things that matter are lead generation, relationships with team members, profit, customer service, systems and processes, standards, etc.
This graphic is a good tool for us to use to consider whether or not something deserves our attention or focus.
One thing I’ve learned is that I can’t control what other people say and do. (This is one of those face palm moments!)
Right now, my role includes processing incoming offers on our listings which essentially means I extract the important details from each offer and put all the data into a spreadsheet which get shared with the sellers and the listing agent so they can choose which offer they want to accept.
I often get angry at the buyer agents who write their offers because they leave out information, or don’t follow instructions. It’s maddening.
The main reason I get mad at the agents is because they create more work for me. I’m the one who has to clean up the contract on our end.
What I’ve come to accept is the fact that there’s nothing I can do to control how the buyer agents write their offers. I can’t control how they submit offers to our team. I can’t control whether my listing agent or lead agent remembers to tell me about the offers.
I’ve had to let all that go.
What I can control, is myself. And I don’t want to be angry. So I’ve had to change my perspective. I’ve had to change how I think about the whole situation.
If buyer agents did what they were supposed to, my attention-to-detail skills would not be needed. And if I’m not needed, then I have no job. Therefore, these buyer agents are what help keep me employed! I love it when I see a contract full of holes and mistakes. It means I get to keep my job for another day!
You might say I’m oversimplifying things, and maybe you’re right. But it doesn’t matter how I look at things as long as what I’m choosing to believe serves me.
You see, it makes me feel good to believe that I am needed. It make me feel angry to believe that buyer agents should be able to write a clean contract. Get the difference?
I can’t control traffic, so I’m going to check the traffic on Google Maps and decide if there’s a way around, or if it’s still less time on the road to drive through some congestion. That’s what I can control: my own decisions.
I can’t control when my teammate gets upset about something. It does me no good to tell him, “Don’t be mad,” because I don’t control him. What I can choose to do is let him vent his frustrations without judgement or feeling the need to give advice. Or I can choose to avoid him completely. The point here, is that I control myself in the situation, and not the other person.
Email me (egilbert@kw.com) or leave a comment…Where have you decided to focus your attention?
