Happy Sunday Everyone:
We had our company monthly meet up this past Wednesday. First 30 minutes is our leadership team giving updates, last 30 minutes is me interviewing a person or a group of people. Usually it’s a top producer, or someone that has a certain skill set. This time I interviewed our COO and 2 highly capable branch operations folks (Erica being one of them). The overall concept was how our sales teams can work better with operations/underwriting. It’s the age-old challenge in the mortgage business (and I’m sure others).
Any time you’re doing a call like this, it can easily turn into a complaint session, which is the last thing we wanted. We always have to remind salespeople that we don’t exist without ops, and we have to remind ops, they don’t exist without sales. If everyone can appreciate this thought, and one another, you’re going to have a better operation overall. Before we jumped into specifics on the call I wanted to cover 3 big picture concepts; concepts that are useful to consider before everything we do at work; asset vs. liability, peek around the corner, and go slow to go fast. None of these are new but reminding ourselves of them often is hugely important.
Asset vs. Liability: We are one or the other 24/7, to yourself, to others, in everything we choose to do, we’re choosing to act as an asset or a liability. I like to visualize to bring more clarity. Imagine walking down the hall and all assets are wearing green hats, and all liabilities are wearing red hats. Imagine it being that obvious. Imagine sitting in a meeting or on a zoom call, and the assets are sitting on one side of the table/screen, and the liabilities on the other. Imagine every email you send and receive is coming in one of two colors, red or green. Every call you choose not to answer, every incomplete email you choose to send, every problem you 1/2 solve, red, and the opposite is also true. So, the biggest picture thought is how are we all choosing to show up each day? As an asset or a liability.
Peek around the corner: Setting our team members up for success as we pass them the baton. If we just asked the questions: Does, this person have what they need to do their job well? Am I setting them up to not have to guess? Is my information both clear and concise? Have you ever had someone send you a 10,000-word email that has been forwarded 20X saying “can you help me with this”. People downstream from you are required to help you because it’s their job to do so, the question we should all consider is do people want to help us? Whether or not its someone’s job to help you doesn’t mean that you can’t help them by setting them up for success.
Go slow to go fast: People default to go fast, and it actually makes everything slower down the road. Don’t do your research but get the email out quickly. Call the client back quickly with 1/2 the information. Don’t do that. Be the person that answers completely. I struggle with this one personally.
I’d like to believe most people want to be better. Anyone that wants to be a liability, should be found out and snuffed out quickly, but I don’t think that’s the normal case. What does happen however is people take their eye off the purpose ball. What is the purpose of what I’m working to accomplish? Am I conducting myself like an asset, am I peeking around the corner to set my team members up for success (and vice versa), and am I taking a little extra time to get it right. If more people considered this, we’d all be better for it.
We had 500 more people on the call than normal by the time we ended. That tells me people are hungry for this stuff. So, take a second today, walk down that hallway in your head. What color hat are you wearing and how are you going to show up tomorrow?
Have a great week ahead!