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Building a great culture isn't about butterflies, rainbows, and unicorns. It is about being caring, thoughtful and speaking the truth to people, even when that truth is hard.
Here are some thoughts on building a great company culture from our local leaders of Old Republic Title: Escrow Manager, Ryan Wood, and County Manager, Steve Yeager.
Show Notes
Justin Stoddart 0:00
Welcome to Think Bigger Real Estate show. I'm your host Justin Stoddart, very excited today to have with me two very close friends, guys, they look to as mentors, leaders, and bosses. These guys are fantastic.
Steve Yeager 0:13
I like the laugh.
Justin Stoddart 0:14
They are the leaders of Old Republic Title here in Oregon. And they have built an amazing company culture. And if you're a real estate agent and desire to scale your business, at some point, you're gonna add somebody, and you're gonna add somebody else, potentially add somebody else, and it's going to be requisite for you. If you want to keep good talent and attract good talent, then you're going to need to build the company culture, place where people want to work a place where people don't just get everything they want, but they get what they need. So we just had a great branch meeting, and I thought it'd be appropriate to have a lively conversation with you guys that make me laugh and inspire me about how to have a great company culture. So, Ryan, you mentioned something in the meeting, that gives people perspective, that it's not that their perspective isn't always right, would you share what that is?
Ryan Wood 0:58
Well, it's actually a line that you've used, so we'll steal it from him. But I basically, it's, when you're, and I can say this because I step up on my soapbox a lot, I get passionate about things. And I start, you know, putting my point of view out there and telling everybody, you know, what I feel is right. And, you know, Steve, made a really great point in the meeting, basically talking about the fact that all of us need to when we're in that position, also sit there and say, according to me, so basically do a little little bit of self reflection, which can go a long ways. And, you know, say, okay, am I right? Or am I doing the right thing? It's not all just about making you right, it's about making sure you're doing the right thing.
Justin Stoddart 1:41
Great stuff, Steve, any thoughts on that?
Steve Yeager 1:44
you know, Ryan, I have teased quite a bit, we have a mission statement on the wall, but taking the mission statement down and just putting the word communication, you know, seems like anything in life, whether we're going out or meeting with clients were handling internal issues when you're trying to grow anything, communications, the deal, right? People want to have to transparency and they want to have people that there's a level of respect that goes along with communicating with people. But I think it's, you know, if you take that a step further in it, it really is, you know, I might have this really strong opinion on something, but it's according to me, it's according to, you know, what my background is, what my thoughts are, what my reality is, what my perception is, it doesn't necessarily mean the people I'm talking with disagree with what I'm saying. But they've had an entire life where they have, they have been trained to think a different way doesn't mean the wrong way, just a different way. And being able to step back and actually think about that, when you're having a conversation with someone, it goes a long way with respecting them. And it goes back to another thing we're talking about today with ego. Right? I think, you know, sometimes as guys, we struggle a little bit because we like to lead with ego, you know that the puffed out chest. And I think it's super important, you know when we're having those conversations when we are trying to either coach train, teach, or just have a conversation with somebody that we are really listening, and we're really hearing it from their point of view.
Justin Stoddart 2:58
Great stuff. Iscrewed up a little bit, guys. And maybe the audio won't be as good.
Steve Yeager 3:01
A little concerned that I'm not standing on books next to Ryan, I'm concerned about that.
Justin Stoddart 3:05
And one thing that I actually had a thought this morning, that oftentimes building great company culture isn't always about just encouraging people. Sometimes it is, sometimes it's about telling them, Hey, I believe in you, you can do more. You've got untapped potential. You're amazing. I support you. Sometimes just having a fierce conversation with people, right? Sometimes it's telling them like, hey, what you did there was not the right thing to do for the group for the company for the whole? How have you guys come? Because you get to have both conversations, right? You get to see I believe in you, you're amazing doing a great job. And at times, it's like, Hey, don't do that, again, how have you kind of come to grips with being able to have those fierce conversations, without people taking it personally or without it being super heavy on you.
Ryan Wood 3:47
It's not easy. There's, there's no easy way about it, you're dealing with people, you're not interested in smashing people's opinions or, or making them feel bad about themselves. At the same time, you do have to think of the whole and you have to think and the whole doesn't just include your self that includes everybody else's in that environment. And I, you know, oftentimes will think of ego as everybody goes overboard. So you sit there and go, Oh, well, you know, everything about me is really what matters. And I think that it's hard not to it's I think there's a certain part of it. That's human nature. But I think that on the flip side of that it's really important to, again, do what's right, not necessarily be right. And so it's having that conversation to say this isn't about what you think of me or what I think of you. This isn't about, you know, what, you know, someone else might be involved with you, but it's more about what you're doing. Is it right, or is it wrong? And making that choice?
Justin Stoddart 4:43
Steve, any additional thoughts on that of how you have those tough conversations when they're not always fun? Right?
Steve Yeager 4:47
Yeah, you know, I think as a leader, a lot of times we ask questions that we already know the answer to or we think we know the answer to, we're looking to see how somebody responds. And I think it's going into each one of those conversations where it's a good conversation, a bad conversation, and we can be the good side to ham offering you a promotion, and here's, you know, your new your new salary to, hey, if we can't, you know, fix what this what's going on here. We might have to say goodbye to each other. You need to go in there with an outcome in mind or a goal in mind for the conversation. You know, a leader has thought more about it. They're not leaders aren't reactive, right? leaders are proactive, and leaders are, have already thought, hey, if I have this conversation that goes this direction, this may happen. If I have this conversation, it goes this direction. This may happen before and it helps you guide because you really are trying to help shape an outcome, whether it's a fierce conversation or not, you know,
Justin Stoddart 5:36
you obviously lead real estate offices for the better part of 10 years. So you saw real estate agents hire people, right? And they probably times struggled because they didn't, weren't willing to have to communicate well, with somebody, they just said, Hey, I'm gonna hire you. Your job is to be my assistant. Yeah. Follow me around and pick up this, like, pick up the details. Fix me, right. Yeah. What advice would you give to a real estate agent that's hiring somebody when it comes to communicating a lot of principles you've already talked about? But is there something else that you saw work really well with people that hired and kept and retained great talent to those that may be continued to kind of lose people?
Steve Yeager 6:11
Yeah, I think there are a couple of things. I think one, it goes back to what's the end goal? You know, leaders are a real estate agents, the teams, people have a very clear idea of the path where they're trying to go, it's a lot easier to pick up the people along the way to help you get there, right. But I think more than anything else, it is just natural for us to want to surround ourselves with people that are exactly like us. And we know there's only really needs to be one of us. We need people to complement. And we need people that do things that we don't know how to do or don't do well. And I think that the leaders that were able to kind of take ego out of it, right, be a little bit humble and say, you know, I don't know what I don't know, and able to surround themselves with people that might be experts more in something that I'm not very good at, or they're not very good at have the best. The best chance of success. But you see people fail forward all the time, right? It's a super common thing. You see some of the that's real estate agents you've had here in town, and you sat down with them, you could probably have a conversation all day long with people that have been on their teams that are no longer on their team's been. But they learned something along the way and didn't have to make that mistake twice.
Justin Stoddart 7:10
Ego is the enemy. I haven't read the book. I've heard great things about it. And I think kind of what I'm hearing you say is that that oftentimes gets in the way, right? people's inability to communicate or, like you were saying earlier, I like that, I've got to be right, it's got to be about me, right? You have to be in in the escrow world, right? Where it's always urgent, right? We have very short timelines, things are changing very quickly. And sometimes you have to step in and make something right. Like let's say, you know, something doesn't happen exactly how the client had expected. What advice would you give to a real estate agent? Who went to the transaction doesn't go perfect, right? Because 99% of the time, things go awesome, right? But occasionally, there's that one where it doesn't. I've seen you, I've got kind of my perspective on what you do in those situations. But I'd love to hear you say when, when something doesn't go, right, what's the opportunity? And what should a real estate agent do in those situations?
Ryan Wood 7:59
Well, called paraphrase, there's a TS Eliot, quote, basically, that you can't go back to the beginning and change what happened. But you can start from where you're at, and change the ending. And so I think that's probably the biggest step that anybody can take, whether it's on the escrow desk, whether it's the real estate agent, whether it's the consumer that's in the transaction, the problem is, is that in most cases, the consumer is going to have too much emotion in it. And we're all human. And escrow officers are naturally reactionary. So I think, you know because we were constantly reacting to everything and the first person to kind of step in. And what I always try to tell all of our staff is that you're the one to come in and calm it down, you're the one to come in and bring some level of sanity to it. So come in, take a deep breath, be the solution. Don't just be the one who's you know, adding to the frustration and the anger and the emotions that are involved in it. And I think, you know, coming from an outsider's perspective, anytime that real estate agent stepping in that, it's all the more helpful because it also comes to the client. We don't have as much contact with the client as a real estate agent does. And I get it. I mean, these are, these are important things, these are the biggest transaction someone's going to do in their life. This is their home, this is a very important thing. It's not trying to be dismissive of what the issue might be. It's just that nothing's going to get accomplished or at least nothing's going to get accomplished. Well, if the emotions are allowed to just kind of keep climbing up over everybody's head. So it's, it's it is just trying to bring it down a little bit.
Justin Stoddart 9:27
Steve, you've found to be very proficient at attracting
great talent, you look at like the escrow officer team that we have, you know, I'd put him up against anybody. If you're a real estate agent, and you again, part of having a great company culture is attracting people who are a good fit, right? Is there advice you'd give to a real estate agent on what that looks like to attract good talent to going to be a recruiter of people who will help build a culture?
Steve Yeager 9:53
Having someone like Ryan, that
helps a lot. You know what I think it's nice to say that about me, I think a lot of the reasons we have attracted great talent on the escrow side, especially is because of Ryan, Ryan is I would say player-coach is not the right word. But man, I even if a former company worked at comfortable enough, as I know, sorry, Ryan doesn't like compliments either. But Ryan would step in and sit on a desk as an assistant, a second or third assistant. If needed, he gets his hands dirty, rolled up his sleeves, he's he is the man of the people is what we call him around here. And that helps a lot. And I think as you're going out there, and you're trying to attract talent in any business, people want to see that they're going to go, they want to work for someone that would go to bat for them. They want to win, they want to work with somebody that can understand what they're going through what they're seeing. And we talked about those tough conversations, that's secondary. The first part is, hey, do you have my back? And I think leaders that are able to show that from the very beginning is working with me being on our team, not my team, not a lot of me and a lot of hours, right. And we, you know, I've got your back. And I think that's key. You know,
Justin Stoddart 10:57
I think you guys have both learned from someone who we all want bill Thomas, who was the former leader of Old Republic title here. And I remember he would correct me when I was introducing Bill to somebody, I'd say, you know, I worked for Bill and Bill say, No, no, no, we both work for Old Republic, Justin and I work together. And these two guys really personify that. And I think when you're the leader of an organization, people have to feel like, like, they matter that you're just not a pawn in their game, but that they put their game matters, right, and kind of where they're headed, you're going to help them get there faster than anywhere else. So I've learned that firsthand from these guys and really appreciate their leadership there. There's some of the best in the business, some of the best in the industry, it'd be a great leader. So any final words, guys, that kind of summing up?
Steve Yeager 11:38
Speaking about Bill, and I love saying that one of the things that I learned from Bill that I thought was just awesome. And I know we've talked about it quite a bit was bill says the definition of a leader is somebody that can remove obstacles for their so their people that they serve, right, turn that hierarchy upside down. At the top, they serve everybody removes obstacles for everybody else so they can do their job the best way possible.
Ryan Wood 11:59
Driving consumption. I mean, servant leadership has actually become much more of a thing you hear now. I mean, I see it all the time. People talk about it all the time. I mean, I think it's absolutely important. But for as long as I worked with Bill, that was his mantra, you know, for them, you know, 11 or 12 years that I worked with him. That was always what he said. So I guess before it was involved, he was there so
Justin Stoddart 12:22
he was living it. Very good, great stuff, guys, really appreciate you being on this episode of The Real Estate show. Let me ask just one more kind of question. In closing, to each of you kind of the signature question of the show, which is what do you do to intentionally think bigger? Like, what's a practice or an activity, or something that you do to where your possibilities are regularly expanded? If you don't get stuck inside this little box, this little paradigm? Thoughts?
Ryan Wood 12:48
Wow.
Something that is kind of natural to me. I question myself every damn day, every single day, I'm always saying, again, it is Is this right? Or am I just trying to be right? Am I is, you know, try to look at as many options as I can, recognizing that I don't have all the answers. And that, you know, trying to one incorporate as many other ideas as I can from other people, but also have their input on it. That's a fine line. That's tough because, on one hand, you don't want anyone to feel like they give their two cents, and then you've dismissed it because you've got another direction or you've gotten something. So you have to find a way to thank them. I mean, be grateful. And then at the same time, just keep questioning where that you know, where your perspectives coming from, and then all the other perspectives around it.
Justin Stoddart 13:41
Great stuff. Love it.
Steve Yeager 13:42
Yeah, I think it's, I think it's taking a step back and looking at all the different people that you associate with, and realize that you can learn something from everybody doesn't mean even if they're not involved in something that's very, you know, specific to what you do every day. There's something that they that has made them special, some unique gift that's been given to them, that they have grown. That is something that you can learn from him. I was on to a podcast one day and it wasn't Lance Armstrong's podcast, it actually. And he said The best part about being Lance Armstrong is that he can invite 10 or 11 different people over to break bread and drink wine that are experts in whatever they do. It could be art, could be an athlete could be someone on Wall Street, and they sit there and they all get better. Because they're they're telling each other stories and talking about what they do. And I think that's, that's how you get there. Make sure that you are very open to the conversations that are around you, like really open really listening to them. And you don't have to call the person a mentor to learn something from them.
Justin Stoddart 14:33
Great stuff.
I get the good fortune of being led by some giants. And I'm grateful for that.
Steve Yeager 14:38
One of us is more giants than the other.
Justin Stoddart 14:41
So anyway, I want to thank you again for tuning in to this episode of think bigger real estate show. This has been valuable. I would encourage you to go share it, share it with a friend and give us a review would mean the world to me so thanks, everybody.
Welcome to Think Bigger Real Estate show. I'm your host Justin Stoddart, very excited today to have with me two very close friends, guys, they look to as mentors, leaders, and bosses. These guys are fantastic.
Steve Yeager 0:13
I like the laugh.
Justin Stoddart 0:14
They are the leaders of Old Republic Title here in Oregon. And they have built an amazing company culture. And if you're a real estate agent and desire to scale your business, at some point, you're gonna add somebody, and you're gonna add somebody else, potentially add somebody else, and it's going to be requisite for you. If you want to keep good talent and attract good talent, then you're going to need to build the company culture, place where people want to work a place where people don't just get everything they want, but they get what they need. So we just had a great branch meeting, and I thought it'd be appropriate to have a lively conversation with you guys that make me laugh and inspire me about how to have a great company culture. So, Ryan, you mentioned something in the meeting, that gives people perspective, that it's not that their perspective isn't always right, would you share what that is?
Ryan Wood 0:58
Well, it's actually a line that you've used, so we'll steal it from him. But I basically, it's, when you're, and I can say this because I step up on my soapbox a lot, I get passionate about things. And I start, you know, putting my point of view out there and telling everybody, you know, what I feel is right. And, you know, Steve, made a really great point in the meeting, basically talking about the fact that all of us need to when we're in that position, also sit there and say, according to me, so basically do a little little bit of self reflection, which can go a long ways. And, you know, say, okay, am I right? Or am I doing the right thing? It's not all just about making you right, it's about making sure you're doing the right thing.
Justin Stoddart 1:41
Great stuff, Steve, any thoughts on that?
Steve Yeager 1:44
you know, Ryan, I have teased quite a bit, we have a mission statement on the wall, but taking the mission statement down and just putting the word communication, you know, seems like anything in life, whether we're going out or meeting with clients were handling internal issues when you're trying to grow anything, communications, the deal, right? People want to have to transparency and they want to have people that there's a level of respect that goes along with communicating with people. But I think it's, you know, if you take that a step further in it, it really is, you know, I might have this really strong opinion on something, but it's according to me, it's according to, you know, what my background is, what my thoughts are, what my reality is, what my perception is, it doesn't necessarily mean the people I'm talking with disagree with what I'm saying. But they've had an entire life where they have, they have been trained to think a different way doesn't mean the wrong way, just a different way. And being able to step back and actually think about that, when you're having a conversation with someone, it goes a long way with respecting them. And it goes back to another thing we're talking about today with ego. Right? I think, you know, sometimes as guys, we struggle a little bit because we like to lead with ego, you know that the puffed out chest. And I think it's super important, you know when we're having those conversations when we are trying to either coach train, teach, or just have a conversation with somebody that we are really listening, and we're really hearing it from their point of view.
Justin Stoddart 2:58
Great stuff. Iscrewed up a little bit, guys. And maybe the audio won't be as good.
Steve Yeager 3:01
A little concerned that I'm not standing on books next to Ryan, I'm concerned about that.
Justin Stoddart 3:05
And one thing that I actually had a thought this morning, that oftentimes building great company culture isn't always about just encouraging people. Sometimes it is, sometimes it's about telling them, Hey, I believe in you, you can do more. You've got untapped potential. You're amazing. I support you. Sometimes just having a fierce conversation with people, right? Sometimes it's telling them like, hey, what you did there was not the right thing to do for the group for the company for the whole? How have you guys come? Because you get to have both conversations, right? You get to see I believe in you, you're amazing doing a great job. And at times, it's like, Hey, don't do that, again, how have you kind of come to grips with being able to have those fierce conversations, without people taking it personally or without it being super heavy on you.
Ryan Wood 3:47
It's not easy. There's, there's no easy way about it, you're dealing with people, you're not interested in smashing people's opinions or, or making them feel bad about themselves. At the same time, you do have to think of the whole and you have to think and the whole doesn't just include your self that includes everybody else's in that environment. And I, you know, oftentimes will think of ego as everybody goes overboard. So you sit there and go, Oh, well, you know, everything about me is really what matters. And I think that it's hard not to it's I think there's a certain part of it. That's human nature. But I think that on the flip side of that it's really important to, again, do what's right, not necessarily be right. And so it's having that conversation to say this isn't about what you think of me or what I think of you. This isn't about, you know, what, you know, someone else might be involved with you, but it's more about what you're doing. Is it right, or is it wrong? And making that choice?
Justin Stoddart 4:43
Steve, any additional thoughts on that of how you have those tough conversations when they're not always fun? Right?
Steve Yeager 4:47
Yeah, you know, I think as a leader, a lot of times we ask questions that we already know the answer to or we think we know the answer to, we're looking to see how somebody responds. And I think it's going into each one of those conversations where it's a good conversation, a bad conversation, and we can be the good side to ham offering you a promotion, and here's, you know, your new your new salary to, hey, if we can't, you know, fix what this what's going on here. We might have to say goodbye to each other. You need to go in there with an outcome in mind or a goal in mind for the conversation. You know, a leader has thought more about it. They're not leaders aren't reactive, right? leaders are proactive, and leaders are, have already thought, hey, if I have this conversation that goes this direction, this may happen. If I have this conversation, it goes this direction. This may happen before and it helps you guide because you really are trying to help shape an outcome, whether it's a fierce conversation or not, you know,
Justin Stoddart 5:36
you obviously lead real estate offices for the better part of 10 years. So you saw real estate agents hire people, right? And they probably times struggled because they didn't, weren't willing to have to communicate well, with somebody, they just said, Hey, I'm gonna hire you. Your job is to be my assistant. Yeah. Follow me around and pick up this, like, pick up the details. Fix me, right. Yeah. What advice would you give to a real estate agent that's hiring somebody when it comes to communicating a lot of principles you've already talked about? But is there something else that you saw work really well with people that hired and kept and retained great talent to those that may be continued to kind of lose people?
Steve Yeager 6:11
Yeah, I think there are a couple of things. I think one, it goes back to what's the end goal? You know, leaders are a real estate agents, the teams, people have a very clear idea of the path where they're trying to go, it's a lot easier to pick up the people along the way to help you get there, right. But I think more than anything else, it is just natural for us to want to surround ourselves with people that are exactly like us. And we know there's only really needs to be one of us. We need people to complement. And we need people that do things that we don't know how to do or don't do well. And I think that the leaders that were able to kind of take ego out of it, right, be a little bit humble and say, you know, I don't know what I don't know, and able to surround themselves with people that might be experts more in something that I'm not very good at, or they're not very good at have the best. The best chance of success. But you see people fail forward all the time, right? It's a super common thing. You see some of the that's real estate agents you've had here in town, and you sat down with them, you could probably have a conversation all day long with people that have been on their teams that are no longer on their team's been. But they learned something along the way and didn't have to make that mistake twice.
Justin Stoddart 7:10
Ego is the enemy. I haven't read the book. I've heard great things about it. And I think kind of what I'm hearing you say is that that oftentimes gets in the way, right? people's inability to communicate or, like you were saying earlier, I like that, I've got to be right, it's got to be about me, right? You have to be in in the escrow world, right? Where it's always urgent, right? We have very short timelines, things are changing very quickly. And sometimes you have to step in and make something right. Like let's say, you know, something doesn't happen exactly how the client had expected. What advice would you give to a real estate agent? Who went to the transaction doesn't go perfect, right? Because 99% of the time, things go awesome, right? But occasionally, there's that one where it doesn't. I've seen you, I've got kind of my perspective on what you do in those situations. But I'd love to hear you say when, when something doesn't go, right, what's the opportunity? And what should a real estate agent do in those situations?
Ryan Wood 7:59
Well, called paraphrase, there's a TS Eliot, quote, basically, that you can't go back to the beginning and change what happened. But you can start from where you're at, and change the ending. And so I think that's probably the biggest step that anybody can take, whether it's on the escrow desk, whether it's the real estate agent, whether it's the consumer that's in the transaction, the problem is, is that in most cases, the consumer is going to have too much emotion in it. And we're all human. And escrow officers are naturally reactionary. So I think, you know because we were constantly reacting to everything and the first person to kind of step in. And what I always try to tell all of our staff is that you're the one to come in and calm it down, you're the one to come in and bring some level of sanity to it. So come in, take a deep breath, be the solution. Don't just be the one who's you know, adding to the frustration and the anger and the emotions that are involved in it. And I think, you know, coming from an outsider's perspective, anytime that real estate agent stepping in that, it's all the more helpful because it also comes to the client. We don't have as much contact with the client as a real estate agent does. And I get it. I mean, these are, these are important things, these are the biggest transaction someone's going to do in their life. This is their home, this is a very important thing. It's not trying to be dismissive of what the issue might be. It's just that nothing's going to get accomplished or at least nothing's going to get accomplished. Well, if the emotions are allowed to just kind of keep climbing up over everybody's head. So it's, it's it is just trying to bring it down a little bit.
Justin Stoddart 9:27
Steve, you've found to be very proficient at attracting
great talent, you look at like the escrow officer team that we have, you know, I'd put him up against anybody. If you're a real estate agent, and you again, part of having a great company culture is attracting people who are a good fit, right? Is there advice you'd give to a real estate agent on what that looks like to attract good talent to going to be a recruiter of people who will help build a culture?
Steve Yeager 9:53
Having someone like Ryan, that
helps a lot. You know what I think it's nice to say that about me, I think a lot of the reasons we have attracted great talent on the escrow side, especially is because of Ryan, Ryan is I would say player-coach is not the right word. But man, I even if a former company worked at comfortable enough, as I know, sorry, Ryan doesn't like compliments either. But Ryan would step in and sit on a desk as an assistant, a second or third assistant. If needed, he gets his hands dirty, rolled up his sleeves, he's he is the man of the people is what we call him around here. And that helps a lot. And I think as you're going out there, and you're trying to attract talent in any business, people want to see that they're going to go, they want to work for someone that would go to bat for them. They want to win, they want to work with somebody that can understand what they're going through what they're seeing. And we talked about those tough conversations, that's secondary. The first part is, hey, do you have my back? And I think leaders that are able to show that from the very beginning is working with me being on our team, not my team, not a lot of me and a lot of hours, right. And we, you know, I've got your back. And I think that's key. You know,
Justin Stoddart 10:57
I think you guys have both learned from someone who we all want bill Thomas, who was the former leader of Old Republic title here. And I remember he would correct me when I was introducing Bill to somebody, I'd say, you know, I worked for Bill and Bill say, No, no, no, we both work for Old Republic, Justin and I work together. And these two guys really personify that. And I think when you're the leader of an organization, people have to feel like, like, they matter that you're just not a pawn in their game, but that they put their game matters, right, and kind of where they're headed, you're going to help them get there faster than anywhere else. So I've learned that firsthand from these guys and really appreciate their leadership there. There's some of the best in the business, some of the best in the industry, it'd be a great leader. So any final words, guys, that kind of summing up?
Steve Yeager 11:38
Speaking about Bill, and I love saying that one of the things that I learned from Bill that I thought was just awesome. And I know we've talked about it quite a bit was bill says the definition of a leader is somebody that can remove obstacles for their so their people that they serve, right, turn that hierarchy upside down. At the top, they serve everybody removes obstacles for everybody else so they can do their job the best way possible.
Ryan Wood 11:59
Driving consumption. I mean, servant leadership has actually become much more of a thing you hear now. I mean, I see it all the time. People talk about it all the time. I mean, I think it's absolutely important. But for as long as I worked with Bill, that was his mantra, you know, for them, you know, 11 or 12 years that I worked with him. That was always what he said. So I guess before it was involved, he was there so
Justin Stoddart 12:22
he was living it. Very good, great stuff, guys, really appreciate you being on this episode of The Real Estate show. Let me ask just one more kind of question. In closing, to each of you kind of the signature question of the show, which is what do you do to intentionally think bigger? Like, what's a practice or an activity, or something that you do to where your possibilities are regularly expanded? If you don't get stuck inside this little box, this little paradigm? Thoughts?
Ryan Wood 12:48
Wow.
Something that is kind of natural to me. I question myself every damn day, every single day, I'm always saying, again, it is Is this right? Or am I just trying to be right? Am I is, you know, try to look at as many options as I can, recognizing that I don't have all the answers. And that, you know, trying to one incorporate as many other ideas as I can from other people, but also have their input on it. That's a fine line. That's tough because, on one hand, you don't want anyone to feel like they give their two cents, and then you've dismissed it because you've got another direction or you've gotten something. So you have to find a way to thank them. I mean, be grateful. And then at the same time, just keep questioning where that you know, where your perspectives coming from, and then all the other perspectives around it.
Justin Stoddart 13:41
Great stuff. Love it.
Steve Yeager 13:42
Yeah, I think it's, I think it's taking a step back and looking at all the different people that you associate with, and realize that you can learn something from everybody doesn't mean even if they're not involved in something that's very, you know, specific to what you do every day. There's something that they that has made them special, some unique gift that's been given to them, that they have grown. That is something that you can learn from him. I was on to a podcast one day and it wasn't Lance Armstrong's podcast, it actually. And he said The best part about being Lance Armstrong is that he can invite 10 or 11 different people over to break bread and drink wine that are experts in whatever they do. It could be art, could be an athlete could be someone on Wall Street, and they sit there and they all get better. Because they're they're telling each other stories and talking about what they do. And I think that's, that's how you get there. Make sure that you are very open to the conversations that are around you, like really open really listening to them. And you don't have to call the person a mentor to learn something from them.
Justin Stoddart 14:33
Great stuff.
I get the good fortune of being led by some giants. And I'm grateful for that.
Steve Yeager 14:38
One of us is more giants than the other.
Justin Stoddart 14:41
So anyway, I want to thank you again for tuning in to this episode of think bigger real estate show. This has been valuable. I would encourage you to go share it, share it with a friend and give us a review would mean the world to me so thanks, everybody.
Creators and Guests
Host
Justin Stoddart
What is Think Bigger Real Estate?
The road to success for real estate agents is well-marked. The road to significance is not. Here, we help you to Think Bigger than just your business. We inspire you to seek success AND significance, income AND impact. We do that by interviewing the biggest thinkers and highest achievers in the real estate industry, extracting the secrets to having it all.