Apartment Leadership
People Want to Learn New Stuff
As a multifamily property management company, it’s important to prioritize the development and growth of your team. This can help to improve job satisfaction and performance, leading to better service for residents and property owners. Mills Properties focuses on three critical areas in the coming year: talent, customers, and owners/clients/investors, with a particular emphasis on talent development. By providing ongoing training and education, and fostering a culture of learning and growth, multifamily property management companies can create a positive and customer-centric environment. This can ultimately lead to improved satisfaction and loyalty from residents and property owners. It’s essential to listen to the needs and feedback of your team and work together to find ways to make their jobs better and more fulfilling. By investing in your team, you can ensure that they are equipped to deliver the best possible service to your customers.
At Mills Properties, we focus on three critical areas in the coming year: talent, customers, owners/clients/investors, with a particular emphasis on talent development. We aim to create a positive and customer-centric environment that benefits everyone involved by investing in our team and providing the resources and support they need to succeed.
In addition to providing ongoing training and education, it’s also important to listen to the needs and feedback of your team and work together to find ways to make their jobs better and more fulfilling. By prioritizing the development and growth of your team, you can ensure that they are equipped to deliver the best possible service to your customers and meet the needs of your property owners.
If you’re a multifamily property management company looking to improve the satisfaction and performance of your team, consider focusing on talent development and investing in ongoing training and education. This can ultimately lead to better service and satisfaction for your residents and property owners.
Your Excited About Talent Multifamily Maniac,
M
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It’s a New Year
It’s been a while.
I took the better part of six months off from writing. The chief reason; time.
Mills Properties, the company I work with, is emerging from some deep and excruciating growing pains. Pains that caused me to take time away from the things I love most. Writing be among them.
We still have a long way to go before we become the organization that we want to be; a journey that will no doubt be rich with reward but also rife with struggle.
Getting out of your own way and going void from breathing your own exhaust is often times the hardest work a company can do. Having the courage to embark is necessary. And shying away from monologue is central to building a great organization.
Not understanding that entrepreneurialism and leadership are two very different things can and will divide mediocre companies from great ones. With that in mind; the more time I spend at Mills the more I truly understand the absolute difference. I also understand the necessity for dreamers, strategist, managers and those who do the hardest work of all; the people who stay compelled to work with all the characters listed above.
Very few people can pull off both roles – entrepreneur and leader and the responsibilities that go along with each.
My hope for this year is that we find our way. And the writing I do from this point will be focused on scaling up progress and greatness all the while pushing for excellence.
A word I’ve pulled back from using (may the gods bless Tom Peters – I still love the guy).
It’s utopian and quixotic to think a company or a person can be excellent across disciplines such as heart, body, mind and soul. Across operations, marketing, accounting, capital improvements, and human resources. Across curb appeal, tour routes, landscape, product, pricing, leasing, etc.
Anyone who thinks otherwise is back to breathing their own exhaust.
With that – here I go. I will have fits and starts with my writing no doubt but I’ve penned a 2015 intention to keep it up as best I can. And the overarching intention is to capture the journey of scaling up a company for progress and greatness. And from time to time a hint of excellence!
Your thankful for the lessons of 2014 and looking forward to 2015 Multifamily Maniac,
M
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Complexity in times of Adversity
Mike Brewer · · 1 Comment
Over the course of my career in the Multifamily space I have dealt with my fair share of complexity and adversity. Be it missing expectations, getting a property back on the rails or exercising triage during a fire. No matter the nature, there are a range of things than can and do happen when managing apartment communities. And in those times of adversity, there are a number of personalities that present themselves. And they each bring with them a level of complexity. Excepting one.
Multiple Personalities
You have ‘the sky is falling group,’ known for its doom and gloom, scorched earth, the world if falling apart tomorrow propensities. This is the group that creates reports that track reports. When you think of stall points in a property management organization – this person holds the – I’m that guy/gal trophy high and proud. Complexity.
Next you have the ‘whoa, this is too much for me to handle so I do nothing group,’ know for its complete ill-regard for action. They see the problem so loud and clear that it stumps their ability to move. It’s very akin to the old deer in the headlights saying. Complexity.
Then you have the Stoics, know for their non-impulsive, simply observed, cut to the chase, mindful strategize propensity for reflection before action types. I love these people. They look at a situation – innately know what to do and they simply act. Never shaken by emotional whims; they simply see the solution, rally the players and work the underlying things that make up the larger picture and produce results. No Complexity here.
Your always looking forward to working with the Stoics Multifamily Maniac,
M
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I Love Meetings; I Hate Meetings
It’s late and I’m winding down my work day. Or so I thought. For some reason my mind is shifting to the topic of meetings.
The Good
I think it meetings are good for getting people together and discussing topics that are necessary to move your business forward.
Meetings are necessary to make sure that people are on the same page.
Meetings are good for getting information out in a consistent fashion.
They are good for course correction.
They are good for forecasting.
They are good for keeping heads up when they would otherwise be buried in the busy work of the day.
They are good for rah-rah.
They are good for no-no.
They are good for reminding.
They are good for defining the future.
They are good for morale.
They are great for creating disciplines.
And sometimes; they are a good alternative to sleeping pills.
The Bad
Every single person in the meeting room has something valuable in their head; many times that is where it stays.
People are afraid of confrontation.
People are afraid of push-back.
People don’t believe their voice carries weight.
People are afraid of moving their business forward.
People are afraid of accountability.
People are afraid of defending an unpopular place.
People are afraid of losing momentum.
People are afraid of rocking the boat.
People are not confident.
People don’t like what others have to say about this or that or the other.
People just want the meeting to end.
People are not present.
People use that time to catch a nap.
Your thinking that I need to stop thinking about meetings Multifamily Maniac,
M
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Multifamily Culture
Eric Brown penned a question that caught my eye today: How much is company culture holding YOU back?
He further amplifies the point by asking if it’s just a myth. I am presupposing that is to imply that culture is a mythical quixotically utopian fantasy land ripe with heaps of pixy dust for times when people go rogue. That is to say they attempt to carve some choice Chateaubriand out of the sacred cows that roam the hallway of we’ve always done it that way.
It sharply reminds me of the young woman who promptly chops three good inches from each end of the family holiday ham. When asked why: the answer traces back to great grandma – “honey, I used to do that because the pan I had back then would not hold the full ham not to mention my stove was a far cry smaller than this mega-hunk of stainless steel madness you call a Viking.” Ugh-a-ruga – right. It’s one of those head slapping moments followed by a choice of keenly place curse words.
Culture in the Multifamily Space
Culture is not a place, person or thing. It’s that something. I tried to some it up a couple of years ago here.
While I would not suggest that it is a myth; I would go so far as to say that it is the most elusive of all necessary intentions that a company has to get right. They have to align values with purpose. Values with Vision. And values with Mission. Everything the company does from decision-making to policy crafting to rewards and recognition have to ladder up to the Mission, Vision and values of the organization.
Time
Here is the crazy kicker – it takes a ton of time to get it right. In my head – (10,000 unit company with 300+/- employees) – it takes no less than 12 months and likely up to 18 to get it 100%. And then it takes a lifetime to keep it alive. It can’t become a piece of paper that hangs on the wall or worse yet falls in the drawer of doomed to never see daylight for as long as I run the broken show of mindlessness.
It is alive and well in everything. If everything is marketing; everything is predicated on the mission, vision and values.
Is it holding YOU back?
Here is what I have to say to that; there is a little space between (sing the Dave Matthews tune in your head while reading this – it makes for great imbedding) catalyst and response called choice. Is it holding YOU back? Your choice! How do you change culture. You choose to do it. How do you change people? Two ways: 1. change people 2. be the change you want to see in the world. It’s the same way you change the world – by the way.
#gorockit
Your fully convinced that culture is worth the full faith and effort of the people Multifamily Maniac,
M
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