The ‘formula’ for team success — starting with who to hire 

It's no secret that the rise of teams in real estate isn't just a trend — in fact, teams are changing how the residential brokerage business runs.

But it takes strategic planning and execution for a team to be successful. As Verl Workman, CEO and co-founder of Workman Success Systems, explained during a recent webinar hosted by T3 Sixty, teams need agents who are hungry for work and able to operate as specialists. (Note: Real Estate News is an editorially independent division of T3 Sixty.)

"When we talk about teams, I think about systems and processes for everything, and specialization in every single area of the transaction," Workman said. Successful teams excel "because of the specialization."

Meeting consumer expectations: Consumers today are "trained to deal with specialists," said Workman, a real estate strategist who coaches teams. "And to me, that's why teams matter."

The industry has "moved from a fog-a-mirror market, where anybody who can fog a mirror can sell a house, to a skills-based market," he said. As a result, those "who drive professionalism at a higher level in their organizations are going to have a massive, unfair competitive advantage against a single agent who does it all."

An equation for success: So how does a team gain that advantage? By following a specific "formula," Workman said.

"For every listing you generate, you should close 1.5 buy-side transactions," he said. "For every listing that you generate, you should generate between six and eight leads a month, and then every 15 leads we generate, we add a buyers agent." He further advised team leaders against working with buyers directly because of the time investment. "They're time-sucking animals that will suck your life away," he said.

Rigorous attention to detail: Executing that formula has everything to do with communication and planning, according to Samantha Knoerr, COO for the Christy Buck Team.

"We check everything on our team, from how many phone calls they need to make, appointments set, how many people they should be out showing," Knoerr said. 

"The only difference between an agent doing one transaction a month and an agent doing five a month are the activities in their day."

Hiring smart: For the teams Workman coaches, a "target" agent hire should be someone who has been in the business for 12-18 months and is "realizing it's hard" after their supply of friend and family clients runs out — but is determined to keep going. "That's who I want, because they sort of know how to do a contract, they know that it's hard — and now they're open."

It's important for team leaders to remember that "we don't grow without failure" — and that "great agents aren't hired, they're developed," he added.

"When you develop a good agent, no matter where they go the rest of their life, they'll succeed — whether it's in real estate or anything else," Workman said.