Show Notes
Nate Joens: [
00:00:03] Welcome everybody. My name is Nate Joens. I am the CEO and co-founder at
Structurely we've got a really exciting episode today of the
ISA radio with our friends at Hatch coaching Hatch realty Erik Hatch Robby Trefethren guys. Can you tell us a little bit about your business. Robby I I'm very bad at pronouncing your last name Colorado everyone is you crossed it and there's a reason I sort of go by Robert T. Yep. It's the first time I've actually tried to pronounce it live. So we did you that well and the guy's house as he says it.
Erik Hatch: [
00:00:38] His last name sounds like a pharmaceutical drug trial here. I've heard that one. It's great. So thank you for the introduction.
Erik Hatch: [
00:00:46] And it should be known that Robby and I are huge fans of Structurely you're not even paying us to say that we just simply like you guys a lot and we think that what you're doing in the ISA and artificial intelligence world are game changing. So really elated to be partnering with you on this here at here in Fargo North Dakota. We have a couple of different ventures that are rolling out and it all started with Hatch Realty. We run our real estate company as a team. So our
team consists right now of 35 people that includes three expansion markets. We run a different model than most people do even that are running teams. In 2018 we did six hundred and sixty foreclosed transactions just a hair under 5 million in volume 5 million of GCI and just over 150 million in volume. So we've had a fun run of things so far about three and a half years ago I had been getting coached and I was doing some coaching on the side and really felt like we had a unique voice in the market and it was different than what other people were doing and so especially with Robby by my side and I'll let Robby share his story and his journey. But what happened is we saw that there was a need and an opportunity for us to try to influence an impact in the best possible way. And so that's We curated Hatch coaching now. We we catered to some of the top coaching clients some of the top realtors in the country and we are honored to be a part of it. So Robby Your journey has been similar but different.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:02:24] Yeah I started up a team back. Jeez it would be January of 2014. Does that sound right. I mixed up all the years a while ago and I started on the team as an as an ISA which is why we created this whole of the ISA radio and everything goes along with it. And when I came into the game I remember my first day I walked in and Erik kind of gave me a remember the script book right and old school script book filled with I would refer to it as a bunch of junk because it was all focused on I like to say manipulating and coercing and really trying to take advantage of the other person.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:03:05] And what I found was I wanted to create a way that really put the other person first because I think that's a better way and a more sustainable way to do business. And in my heart it felt right. So went down that route and now we had some major success. We have an ISA Department now with five full time ISAs of course.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:03:26] And they were featured on one of the other podcasts as well. And I have the privilege and honor of coaching most or a lot of the top teams and ISAs teams throughout the country. So that's awesome.
Nate Joens: [
00:03:41] Yeah. For everyone listening. Definitely check out the sixth episode of the ISA radio so you can hear firsthand from from these ISAs with hatches as we referred to them on the episode. The actual rainmakers.
Erik Hatch: [
00:03:56] Thanks for that. Yeah I agree 100 percent man.
Nate Joens: [
00:04:00] Yep awesome. So we're we're switching this one up a little bit today not necessarily ISA focus not necessarily script focus but kind of giving you the inside look into the culture that has been built at hatch from the rainmaker himself. Mr. ERIK Hatch I want to do a rainmaker or I may go. We'll just get everyone's kind of a rainmaker right now so we're gonna kind of dive into culture and how you can build culture successfully.
Nate Joens: [
00:04:47] Like the guys that Hatch have they might not agree that they have had it had it figured out from the start.
Nate Joens: [
00:04:55] But as we like to say every time here we've kind of fumbled forward and figured out the right culture to attract and retain some of the top producing talent in the industry. So guys can you kind of tell me a little bit about the culture at hatch and kind of how you got there where you're at today.
Erik Hatch: [
00:05:13] So let me interject first if you are watching live right now I encourage you to ask some questions in the comment section. We would love to answer any questions that you might have. As we go through this and if we can't answer during this we certainly will answer afterwards. So please make this interactive instead of just a one way conversation. Here's the story. Nate Jones as best as I can articulate it is I got into real estate full time in 2011. My previous life was involved in ministry. I worked at the local church that I was baptized and raised in and I spent eight years out of college pouring into kids love the gig hated the pay and my family really was at a place where we needed to make some financial moves in order to actually be parents. We had some major infertility and I had to pay for it out of pocket. So I jumped into real estate full time in 2011. I sold 52 houses on my own with a part time college student as an assistant. 2012 I started the teams we were four people as of January 1st and 13 people as of December thirty first. I had expanded into the commercial world and across the state of North Dakota. We sold one hundred and ninety two houses that year. I was one hundred and thirteen of one hundred and ninety two. So I was 60 percent of our production as well as running in every direction.
Erik Hatch: [
00:06:34] And in 2013 I was given the wonderful opportunity to start over as my company kicked me out and and what happened in that Nate's is I was so egotistical and cocky and I thought my crap didn't stink and I was in a place where I thought we had a great culture because we just preached culture and we use that word culture and by the way the word culture is completely watered down it is overused and the fact that having a culture conversation here gets me fired up and also diluted at the same time. But what happened is when I thought my culture was great and after I got kicked out my 13 team members turned into myself and two other people just three of us overnight because I thought my culture was creating an environment that everybody wanted to be in and it wasn't. It was instead creating an environment that everybody ran from except for two people. And so I realized that something I was doing was wrong and what I was doing is I was creating a culture where everyone was a sidekick a crony. They were riding my coattails essentially and when given the opportunity they ran from it pretty quickly and so I realized that we had to get intentional with our culture and it wasn't about the number of transactions that I did it was about the number of transactions they could do. And it wasn't about the life that I could live. It was the life that I could empower them to live. And so when we started over in April of 2013 this was just nine months before Robby came on nine months before we opened up Hatch Realty and created our own brokerage. We really did it differently. And I want to I want to transition to Robby because you came into our world by having not known the previous only hearing horror stories of what I heard previously but I think that we did pretty well by you in terms of building a runway for you. But with you. Realistically So what did that feel like. What did that look like.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:08:35] I think I've been trying to think of just some some key words and I just want to contrast most places in real estate is it's a workplace.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:08:46] And I think the first thing from the moment I walked in and if you ever heard about an interview process on my final interview with Erik was three hours and in that interview from that moment I could tell that the culture of this place was something radically different. And what I mean by that is Erik. By the end of those three hours my whole life story. The the good the bad the ugly my dreams my aspirations. He took my whole mask off. It took a couple swear words coming out of me as Erik as you said the F word at least five times in your interview.
Erik Hatch: [
00:09:24] And I have no idea why I kept you around.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:09:27] Oh man I'm still trying to figure that out but it was something different and I think what I could tell that moment was I was entering into a workplace so it wasn't just an 8 to 5 job or where I go to work with people. When I joined the team it quickly became my family. And I think if there's really one word that is abundance and in our culture if you were to walk in there's a lot of love for each other. There is a ton of hugs and connection and it's not this normal workplace where you just go there and you check out. Jim one of our ISAs I think put it best he said that he hates Fridays and loves Mondays because he wants to be around these people because in our world you know beyond love other things we challenge each other. We're constantly trying to grow and become better versions of ourselves. And with that comes a lot of opportunity and trust. But the core tenant is really I would say Love which isn't talked about enough.
Erik Hatch: [
00:10:34] Robby you said that there's a lot of hugs but you have to know that the difference between a hug and a chokehold is merely arm placement. And so those that you love are those that make you the most crazy is he you can quote that one all day long. OK. Is the difference between a hug and a chokehold is merely arm placement and and realistically those that we work in close confinement with.
Erik Hatch: [
00:11:00] You have to make sure that you love them not tolerate them not put up with them. These have to be people that you can trust. Patrick Lynch she only has the five dysfunctions of a team and the core dysfunction is a lack of trust. And the people that I trust the most are the people that I love the most. Yeah they maybe make me that was crazy. But as we circle back here to the crux of the conversation Nate you had said basically what is what is the culture of our company and what's happened now. Come come 2013 and 2014 is it wasn't Erik and the rockets anymore.
Erik Hatch: [
00:11:40] We instead when we were down to three people and rebuilt I realized that my core function as a leader had to be to help our team members succeed. It was no I knew how to sell houses but I had to transition my energy even more so than it ever had been into leading people and helping them build runways. We are an airport and we are a hub for amazing talent and of course I think of us as a country clubs exceedingly exclusive to get into an amazingly inclusive. Once you're there. And so for us our culture has an energy to it. But the piece de resistance the the the thing that most people don't assimilate with their culture is the culture of high production. Most people will say our culture is warm and gooey and touchy feely and we love each other we have fun and we have a ping pong table and that means we have a great culture and a ping pong table is a thing. It's not a culture. And instead the piece that has gotten me I think to this place now and I love where I'm at. I'm not satisfied with where we are. I am hungry and tenacious as the day is long but I am so thrilled as as to where we find ourselves today. It's because we've created a culture of high production and high performance. So let me break that down if I may. But let me I think I mean like going to the engine here and Nate Robby what am I doing.
Nate Joens: [
00:13:10] He said Robby mentioned was you know other than love which is obviously an important factor of culture is the fact that you're challenging each other. I think that from from my perspective I don't work at Hach but being close to you guys that's the number one thing that I've seen is you know when we were in the mastermind in Los Angeles sitting around the hot tub you guys before talking about you know what you want to do on the weekend and hide and seek out with each other it was it was genuine challenging conversations with one another in your passive time. And I think that that is the one from an outsider's perspective. That's what I can take away from. From your guys company.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:13:51] Yeah I want to add to that I think to kind of later in before you get into high production that was one of the things that was very self evident was Erik was very intentional in creating a business that was going to do real estate very differently.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:14:08] And Erik you always said that we're in the business of helping people we just happen to sell real estate. And now that's of all to coaching and many other things. But we we are a place that's really focused on growth and challenging each other and I think we never had it in our minds to just be another real estate company in Fargo that was never part of our M.O. and that required us to be a culture of high production to bring things to the next level.
Erik Hatch: [
00:14:39] It boiled down to this. I didn't want to look like everybody else. I didn't want a world that had the continual churning of people. I've heard other real estate industry professionals and major influencers talk about how let's say a buyer agent right.
Erik Hatch: [
00:14:57] Let's say a buyer agent is on a team and they start right here and they get to 10 15 20 maybe 25 deals that they can do with the team and then almost always they are gone and they don't stay with the team.
Erik Hatch: [
00:15:14] Where in our world the average production of our agents they start right here and they come on board as showing partners or listing partners and they earned the right to actually have the privilege of selling real estate on our team and as they earn their first year the standard that they have to adhere to is 36 transactions.
Erik Hatch: [
00:15:34] When realistically in our world our average buyer agent sells over 60 homes a year and our average listing agent sells 90 homes a year. These are nearly on matched in the industry ISA. We've had a crazy 20 18 it's 20 19 now in twenty 2018 we learned a lot of lessons because we didn't have the retention that we had of previous years. In previous years we had held onto everybody that had ever started with us.
Erik Hatch: [
00:16:06] And I can say probably that any agent that's ever started with us in real estates outside of the ISA department anybody who started on the buy side of the listing side are still in the business even if they're not with me and with us. And so we figured out how to give people in our culture the possibility to have exceedingly big lives. But right now I promise you somebody is watching this or listening to this and saying Yeah but.
Erik Hatch: [
00:16:34] And that yeah but is saying I want to keep people right about here or so because if they come here they're bigger headaches if they come here they go to leave if they come here over to this massive amount of production they're not going to stay with us.
Erik Hatch: [
00:16:52] They don't desire to be here anymore because our value proposition that we think exists is we're gonna help you sell some houses and there's an amazingly different thing that happens when the leaders and the rainmakers and the influencers of an organization show up and ISAs every day Nate Jones if you're on my team every day I'm gonna do whatever it takes to help you get to your goals and that looks so different than anybody else same. All right what's your goal. OK here's what we're gonna give you. Good luck. It's it's a slight difference but it's everything. And so as we've created this culture now we've had people earn the right to be a high producer. The real estate industry as a model and in and of itself is a broken model because I think that people sign up and they get thrown to the wolves and if they know how to fight they're gonna make it. And if they don't know how to fight they're gonna get eaten and what does it 75 or 80 percent of people don't make it past their first year. And I think that's unacceptable we have to do better for our people. This is not. Now I can tell you this Nate if I wanted we could open up the floodgates and hire three or four times as many agents as we already have.
Erik Hatch: [
00:18:10] And I actually think we would sell more houses. We need some more houses because we would have so many more people in the batter's box taking swings. But I would have no all stars and if I have no all stars in the world and people watch from the top you can get influence from the bottom. And if all you have are new folks and folks who can't sell more than 20 or 25 homes in a year which is still a respectable deal of homes then you have people that are selling 20 or 25. That's all you're ever going to have. And for me I get the most obscene amount of joy from influencing the influencers. It in fact is why we're coaching in the first place and why we've built our infrastructure with Hatch realty as such that people start here and they can climb all the way up and all the way up and then this forces me to continue to make our world even bigger and even more grands so that I don't lose people. I'm not giving them the keys to the kingdom but I'm opening the door with them and showing them what's possible now.
Erik Hatch: [
00:19:22] The people who seem to stay in our environment are those that are massively high in production. As an example we have a guy who is a younger agents. He was a teacher previous and then came to us through some connections and then his second full time year of being a buyer agent. He sold seven houses for one point seventy two million dollars worth of volume last week
Erik Hatch: [
00:19:47] Has one week of real estate seven houses and five boats seven houses were from his sphere.
Erik Hatch: [
00:19:54] What a bait and book by the way that was five of those seven houses were from his sphere. The company gave him two of those. One was a five hundred thousand dollar deal and one was a two hundred thousand dollar deal. But he brought in a million we brought in seven hundred thousand and he's not going anywhere.
Erik Hatch: [
00:20:12] And the reason why is because I'll go to him and I'll say Tyler you crushed it last week. How can I help you. To get what you want. It's it's it's such a small change but we have a culture of excellence now. And the problem the whole topic is is your culture wrong. And I believe that if your culture is wrong it's when you have more of the people over here than you do over here. And these people if you want Navy SEALs you have to have a navy. That's a banking quote. I'm not that's not an Erik Hatch original but I'm happy to stay up is if you want a Navy SEAL you have to have a navy and they earn the right to move this away. And as they move this away and they start producing more they now have influence on the people over here. And giving somebody not only permission to crush it. As a producer but also giving them influence within your organization creates an ambience that I think people are drawn to and you can give them more than they exceed and they could create on their own.
Erik Hatch: [
00:21:15] Let me pause and take a drink.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:21:18] So I want to add into that. I think I'm a big fan of the quote. You either innovate or you die. And the reality is this there's really two different models from what I've seen and Erik you're describing one where you actively try to create a players. And I have heard from many people and they'll say don't get a players because a players always leave. And the problem with that is this is that Erik we would be stagnant if all the innovation only came from you. And I think you would be the first person to admit that all of the ISA innovation came from me and others other A players that are in our world. The innovation on the buy side is coming from these eight players. And here's the reality. I love our model because it's one that encourages and cure rates innovation at all levels of the organization. And my biggest fear if you are just the a player at the very top and you're like I'm not going to get those eight players because I don't stick around. And the reality is it's easier because in order for you to retain a level talent you've got to be an A level leader. There is no A level talent.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:22:39] So some would say that again. Say that again because you see a lot of dumb things. But that was not one of them. I don't even know what I said. You said you said A level talent won't stick around unless you're on a level leader.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:22:53] Yes. If you're if you're a level talent and you're stuck behind to be level leader you're going to leave and create your own thing. And that's tough because leadership is is a nasty tough thing to do but it is one thing that allows you to create innovation at so many different levels. And again to get off and on the call I mean that was that was incredible.
Nate Joens: [
00:23:17] I'm just like an op ed like listening to all of this and how how clearly different your your culture is from from the unsuccessful I mean from from an outsider's perspective I see I see a ridiculous amount of turnover in real estate and in companies we work with. It's it's alarming to me but I've never been in the industry before so that's probably why it's so alarming to hear you guys say that you're keeping the amount of people that you are in. You know I think that I want to counter that with in our previous episode Episode 7 in our previous webinar YOU GUYS YOU GUYS DIDN'T HAVE IT ALL FIGURED OUT WITH YOU. YOU GUYS LOST YOU GUYS LOST what three of three 3 five buyer's agents was that right.
Erik Hatch: [
00:24:12] Yeah yeah yeah. I mean you that last year I lost five of our eight Bye.
Nate Joens: [
00:24:16] I would highly recommend first listening to that webinar followed by this webinar and just kind of you know comparing and contrasting and I think you'd learn a lot if you're listening now by comparing those and just hearing the journey that Hatch went through because they didn't have it all figured out you guys didn't have it all figured out. You guys. We still. But I think that kind of leads me into to one question I'll go. MAN 2 Were there any were there any early indicators that you know those five or eight would leave. Why. Like were those people not a culture fit. Did they not buy into what we're talking about here. What are the indicators of potentially the you know I wouldn't say low producers but if we're if we're saying the people that shouldn't be in your company are quote low producers. What are some of those those indicators of potentially not a culture fit.
Erik Hatch: [
00:25:16] So I have to isolate yes because a low producer in our world is traditionally a high producer in someone else's world. Our are our lowest producer. And let me go back to 2017. Our lowest producer did thirty two deals. Our standard was thirty six so that person was under our standard and thus got put on a Performance Improvement Plan. The five that we lost in 2018 one we had to remove from the company for falling out of culture one blindsided us and surprised us. Her life had changed and as her life had changed we hadn't necessarily adapted and met her where she was at. She was immediately tied to one of our agents that we knew would go with her. And so one day when one goes usually two goes and the same was with the first person he had someone that he was closely tied to and so that person went. Also the fifth moved across country and so let's take those things and to your question name your your challenging to ask about culture issues and when does somebody fall out of culture right. When are the early indicators and the easiest thing if we're talking about culture in terms of production is very much understanding the lead indicators of what's going on in our world. This is this is of everything I teach on everything I coach on. This is the baseline 100 level yet so important type of piece.
Erik Hatch: [
00:26:53] So at the foundation here we have standards most teams believe it or not Nate don't have standards. They instead have suggestions. We suggest you sell twenty four homes a year and then if you say well what's the consequence that comes from not meeting that suggestion or that standard.
Erik Hatch: [
00:27:16] And if they don't have an answer of what the consequences. You don't have standards you just have suggestions. So a standard is nobody's allowed to fall below this. Everybody has to be at this level no matter how you do it. Everybody has to be here now.
Erik Hatch: [
00:27:33] You of course allow a couple months of grace when somebody is coming in that they're not going to produce in their first month like somebody will on their 13th month. And so you have to crescendo that in. But after standards that everybody needs to adhere to our goals and the goals are those of the individual agents not of the company. The standards are just the rules that everybody is agreeing to play by. And if you break a rule there has to be a consequence associated with it. Otherwise it doesn't it doesn't work. Then you have your goals here in the middle and the goals are those of that individual agents. That is how you will best lead that person my coach told me that if you hold somebody accountable to your goals they'll resent you but if you hold them accountable to their goals they'll thank you. And so great leaders mirror and match and they find out what Robbie's goals are and if I was goals are here in the middle we're going to make sure that this is what I'm reminding Robby of. This is where I'm creating all of his daily tasks and everything else that needs to show up and then above this up here are expectations and great leaders pour into people with exceedingly high expectations. If I were to say to you Nate.
Erik Hatch: [
00:28:48] You know what Nate. I know that you wanted to sell 40 homes this year. Yeah I think you can probably do it.
Erik Hatch: [
00:28:54] Good luck or if I said Nate your goal is to sell 40 homes our standard is to sell 36. Dude I don't know if you see it in you but I think you're amazing and I'm betting on you big because I think you can do huge things in our world and I bet you can get to 50 this year. Now if you want to get to 50 if you do I'm gonna help you get there but I'm gonna tell you that you have something inside of you that very few people in this world have. And I'm going to do everything I can to pour into you. Those are high expectations and those high expectations are usually met with some resistance and yet it will rise the tides. And so to your original question Nate how do we indicate that people are maybe out of culture or what are some of those lead early indicators is of course if they are not meeting standards let's just make the assumption everybody is meeting standard that they're showing up when they're supposed to show up to lead generators that your best practices and remember when we're working with independent agents which most most of our team members are they are not adhered to with standards that we can't say you have to do these bare minimums you can't hold them contractually to it or you will be in a legal mess. Instead you create best practices and you can give birth and taketh away any opportunities that you'd like.
Erik Hatch: [
00:30:15] And so we monitor people's lead measures and if they're not doing their job they have consequences and their job is to meet the standards to strive for their goals and to believe in the expectations that are set for them.
Erik Hatch: [
00:30:31] Robby I know you're chomping at the bit going.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:30:33] To say that that's that's the only way I have figured out how to give a natural consequence and it's not a punishment it's a natural consequence when people fall below standard. We do everything we can to help them get above standard. And there's got to be something that you know eats away. And the reality is you own the opportunities that are created by your company through marketing and you can give those to have whoever you want. So that's the only carrots I know that you can control that once is behavior.
Erik Hatch: [
00:31:10] I. I heard a quote recently and I'm gonna butcher it but you go ahead and say great quote Erik worth of information people person so these that make me feel good after it but a race horse and a donkey are together and a donkey can't become a racehorse but a racehorse can become a donkey and everyone has influence.
Erik Hatch: [
00:31:38] And oftentimes if we think that our culture is as such where we're gonna have one superstar and we're gonna have ten mediocre players or ten people at standard at best there's a good chance that that superstar is either going to go and leave.
Erik Hatch: [
00:31:57] It's the LeBron James story they're going to go and leave and find another place or they're surrounded by superstars yes they make other people better but the people who are better do not foster the right environment for the superstars. And let me declare with every fiber of my being that your organization is better and more difficult with superstars. They're there merely choice. There's not a right or wrong way to build a real estate team. They're merely choices and consequences. Choice number one is this as you go wide and you have 20 agents and each one sells 10 to 20 homes and you can have a great life at that. I have a number of friends in the industry that have a life like that and they're smiling from ear to ear. I am endorsing that if that's the life that you want the life that I want is I want to be surrounded by race horses and I want innovators in my world and I want people to challenge me everyday to get better instead of just seeking that out elsewhere. And it creates headaches because we're consistently what feels like reinventing the wheel because we're inviting people to have voice and they have voice because they have influence and they have influence because they are far above the standard and they are massively influential in my life and this industry.
Erik Hatch: [
00:33:18] So let me pause there because I have one other piece I want to get to but I want to welcome your green boxes.
Nate Joens: [
00:33:25] I'm alive right now. Always been interested. Your first night in your wild versus kind of diva approach. There's there's obviously extreme like you said choices and consequences made in each model. I think from a leadership perspective as a team leader it's probably a lot of headache to try and continuously stay on top of your of those those race horses but it allows you to go deeper
Nate Joens: [
00:33:55] In those individuals rather than the wide model. And I think from from what I've learned from you guys this is that that breed of leadership is is most suited for the deep. Deep model because you can invest you can. You can set standards goals and you can go in and talk to those race person every day about those extraordinarily high expectations and say hey I think you can do one hundred deals this year and they'll you know they'll say no way but then they'll go do it.
Erik Hatch: [
00:34:28] Your culture has to support that to Nate like. You can't just say you're going to go. Like what resources. When we talk about building a room that that so has to sell the houses. But what can I create that gives them the best possible environments that no other company on earth can give them. What kind of leverage what kind of mentoring what kind of guidance what kind of energy can I share with them and pour into them so that 100 is possible because the resource still needs all the right nurturing it needs all the right nutrients and it needs the right race track in order to run exceedingly fast.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:35:09] I like that one because I want to add this as well. And Nate I don't know if you're frozen or not but you might be. But we're gonna continue anyways. It's something that I call I call it.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:35:21] But I started called the Bannister Effect and I think that's what's been really cool about our team going super deep was really with a lot of players as I remember the days Erik when selling 50 homes as a buyer agent was just unthinkable right. And then we had 50 and now we're talking you know I think title and Kyle as you push now 80 90. And you know the Bannister Effect basically is named after a guy Roger Bannister who was the first guy to run a four minute mile. And really what that means is this is that human beings wait for the first person to do it and then once that's done people buy and do it. And what happened with Roger. Roger Barstow ran the first minute mile was like in the next month or two afterwards a ton of other people did it and that's what keeps happening in our world is because we have those eight players setting that pace and showing and being the living rendition of The Master effect. People keep pushing the bar higher and higher. And that's one of the I would say the advantages of recruiting and trying to retain a players. The other piece is this is that I'm sure you guys have maybe noticed put it out as Erik and I rarely rather rarely talk about this one word and it's management. There is very little management in our world. Instead there's an incredible amount of leadership and leadership goes deep and I think when you go wide and being more managers manage things when you go deep management's not as big a deal.
Erik Hatch: [
00:37:02] We manage systems and we lead people right.
Erik Hatch: [
00:37:07] The final piece that we're going to wrap with here and I Nate jumped off. Can anybody still hear us. Just type in I want to make sure that we're not just talking to each other. Oh hey Izzy great to see you. OK. We're good to go.
Erik Hatch: [
00:37:20] This piece is a thing that I have studied in pretty great depth as a real estate coach and it is the rule of 20 to 1. Please write that down if you're taking notes right now because this rule of 20 to 1 I believe shows health in an organization. I believe that a solid real estate team can do 20 transactions per team member not per sales person per team member because we're all built differently have different pieces of leverage from that you have extra expenses that of course come in and there are just consequences and choices that we're making throughout this rule of 20 to 1. I believe tells us if we're airing on the side of a deeper model or a wider model. And once again let me tell you that there are benefits to both and there are consequences to both. But that wider model of having each agent do 10 or 15 or 20 deals each has you under that 20 to 1 ratio because of course there's some support staff that's a part of that also. So quickly I'd imagine some of you are doing the math on your team trying to figure out how many total team members and if you have a part time person that does 20 hours a week figure that person has a point five. Right. As you do your numbers and I'll share with you Hatch Realty is numbers. We did six hundred and sixty four transactions last year and we finished with 34 team members. So if I take thirty four times 20. That should tell me that six hundred and eighty is the number of transactions that we should have done but we did six sixty fourth. So we were right where we were about 19 and a half to 1.
Erik Hatch: [
00:39:09] But I think that a real efficient team and in fact my friend Chen Chad Lindemann and Brainerd Minnesota. He has like a 30 to 1 ratio seen anybody with a community of like 60 thousand people to and his team nearly a thousand transactions last year. Crazy numbers. What it comes down to is this is if you want to know if you're efficient and if you have a pope and you're sure and the culture is a culture of high production we need to expand our minds no longer talk about culture just as important nice good people and we like spending time with them. But it's also the culture of are we pushing one another and our we're creating an environment that helps people win all day every day. If that's the case then you're 20 to 1 ratio I think is the way in which you measure that. If you're like one or twenty two or twenty three to one I think you're hitting that culture's nail on the head. If you're 14 or 15 or 16 to 1 you have some inefficiencies and some opportunities I think to run a very deep model that supports people winning the crux of all this I think relates to back what Rob to what Robby said a couple of moments ago and that is a level talent won't stay around a leaders who aren't a level at least for very long. OK. So if somebody is an A level talent unless you as a leader are creating that kind of environment for them to be loved to have exceedingly high expectations for them to win and everything else. I think the opportunity is ripe for you right now to jump in and to win. Robby give me your final thoughts.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:40:57] Yeah my my final thought is it looks like a snowstorm and Amy's got a lot worse than we thought it was gonna be in a crash the internet. No I think you're you're you're exactly right. And I want to add just one more perspective I want to talk about the hot tub that mate brought up earlier when we were down in our mouths to mine. We love the hot tub that at Hatch Realty and coaching.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:41:20] What's really cool is this is that the people that are driving hash realty frankly is not this guy. It's not Erik. It's not me. It's a group of individuals that are more talented than us.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:41:37] And I think that's what's so cool about this is you're talking about 20 to 1 ratio but each of those people especially a ton of them are the drivers of what's coming next in that world. And I've always said that the whole goal of our company is to build something worth.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:41:58] Erik were to disappear tomorrow but the company keeps running and frankly runs better and I think that doing that in a wide model is extremely difficult. It's tough to have that as a saleable asset in our world. And this sounds really gross. What if Erik were to disappear tomorrow if he were to go on a vacation for a year. I personally believe Hatch realty wouldn't miss be because we have great people that are there that are more than equipped to run the show.
Robby Trefethren: [
00:42:33] So that's that's what I think we're trying to build here and that model is something that's sustainable and well there's.
Erik Hatch: [
00:42:43] There is a scarcity mindset around not letting a players into your world or giving them an environment to grow exceedingly well. And that scarcity mindset is related to ego and I'm like King ego guys. Sometimes I am this interesting blend of like super egotistical and like the most insecure person you're ever gonna meet. So it's it's a really it's a really great thing. Every time I look in the mirror. Well what it boils down to in its simplest form is how in the world can we create for our folks a place for them to step in and win and win means we have to get out of the way and our true measure of success is not the amount of money I have in my bank account although that's important. The true measure of success is the amount of influence you have and the influence that you give to other people because realistically Hatch Realty and just remember I started real estate in 2011 Hatch realty open in 2014. And as of today I spend two days a week with Hatch Realty and I kind of get in the way a little bit. And so I think what Robby said is true as I can get out of there right now because we've bred great leaders. We've given permission for a players to exist and now I get to go and build some other things. So selfishly it's a great move for me. But you have to get past that first step of ego. So let me wrap with this since Nate isn't able to jump back on. I want to say thanks first to Structurely there an artificial intelligence ISA company. And if you haven't looked into them you really need to do so.
Erik Hatch: [
00:44:27] Well maybe maybe Iowa can get Internet soon it'll be great.
Erik Hatch: [
00:44:32] It's not the kind of diner I was doing just fine.
Erik Hatch: [
00:44:38] But Robby and I with Hatch coaching and Hatch realty are huge believers in and Structurely they've been massive for our business and so consider looking into them. You can check us out of the hatch coaching dot com or go to Structurely dot com and see all the goods that are out there. So on behalf of Nate Jones and Izzy and Robby T and myself Erik Hatch have a beautiful Tuesday and much love peace yall.