PM Collective - The ART of property management
The ART of property management with Ashleigh Goodchild is a leading platform supporting collaboration not competition through an online community and events throughout the year with one purpose: to create happier property managers. She creates connections for property managers looking to create momentum in their careers and personal life. Join Ashleigh and her guests as they discuss challenges, struggles, mental health, mindset and give advice to property managers and anyone in the industry. To get the support in your property management career, join our PM Collective Facebook and Instagram community.
PM Collective - The ART of property management
Growth opportunities for scaling your business
Sherrie Storor, an exceptional business coach and former sales agent, joins us to unravel the often-overlooked business intricacies of the real estate world. Wondering how to ensure consistent income and asset growth?
Sherrie offers invaluable advice on how robust systems and the right team can transform your business into a profitable enterprise.
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Learn about our groundbreaking training initiative that combines growth coaching with legal expertise, designed to elevate business management skills. Sherrie also guides solopreneurs on the mindset shift required to update essential business documents, emphasizing the importance of proactive management for sustainable growth.
Balancing business growth with personal wellness might seem elusive, but it’s critical. We touch on the importance of this, to have a clear business head to make decisions.
Sherrie Storor | The Principal's Masterclass | Agency Structure, Growth + Scale
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Today we have the lovely Sherry Storer joining us and we are going to be talking a little bit more about the business side of things today, as opposed to directly property managers like we do in previous conversations. So, sherry, welcome to a property management podcast.
Speaker 1:Woohoo Hi Ash great to be here. Probably a little bit different. I know that you do dabble in the property management space, but you are well-known in the industry with your work in the sales side of things. So for those property managers and business owners that maybe haven't heard about you, can you just fill us in a little bit about who Sherry Store is? Oh, wow.
Speaker 2:Okay, I love that. Thank you so much for throwing it over to me. I suppose what most people know me as a sales agent before becoming a full-time business coach, but the reality is that prior to this business, I actually had my own chain of agencies. So I had a business where we were on-site selling off the plan in 10 locations, from Cairns all the way down to Byron Bay on the east coast. I built up and sold my own rent roll. I had a cleaning division as part of that. I also had a PR division, because when I was launching these big projects, you know we would need a big marketing and a big PR campaign, and that's actually what I did at uni. So we had all of that side. And then I have three residential offices. So in my executive leadership team I had five managers and then I had 45 salespeople plus then all the support staff.
Speaker 2:So most people, if they know me, they often just know me as being a sales agent, but the reality is that that is actually my background when it comes to residential real estate. So I've been business coaching since 2008,. But I've had this business, Real Estate Nation now for seven years and I work with business owners. I work with selling principals, I work with businesses that are PM only, I work with businesses that are sales only, and I do work with a lot of high-performing agents in terms of building out their EBUs. But rent rolls. I love them because essentially that is what's giving us regular income, but also it's what's building an asset. So I'm all things property management.
Speaker 1:And I'm going to sort of throw you onto the bus with this question. So if you are coaching and I hope this one's okay to ask you but when you're coaching sales clients is having a rent role important to a lot of people, or do they not really have that mindset?
Speaker 2:I think this is a good question, because what I tend to find is that we focus on what we know, and so if you're a property manager and you have your own business, but you only have property management, you're thinking I should have sales, but I don't really know how to do it, and, because it's kind of scary, it's just easier to stay in your own lane. So I think it's often the same thing for salespeople too, to be honest with you, and they just hear about all these problems, or maybe they previously worked in an office where there was a whole lot of problems. But you know, there is a way to do property management well, just like there is a way to do sales really well, and it's a matter of tapping into those system structures, those templates, the tech stack and really getting kind of really good at it and making sure that you're making a profitable business. So, yes, I would absolutely answer that question 1,000% yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's all about getting the right people on your team as well, and I think that that is probably since that's the first part of building business that people do find that actually quite hard, like yeah, that's actually more daunting than actually the rent roll itself probably.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I agree with you. I think when you have a small business, a small to medium business, every single person is absolutely vital and you kind of need this unicorn, hero person who's absolutely fabulous. When you start getting to a medium to a large size business, essentially you sort of need people who can plug in, because if they go, you can plug somebody else in and they can just follow your systems and procedures. So, depending on where you're at, you know it's really important to understand your recruitment processes and making sure that you're finding those hero people who are absolutely incredible at what they do. They've got great culture, they're a great fit for you, they've got amazing skill set, they're great with clients. But at the end of the day, you want to make sure that you're looking after them and that you're retaining them so they don't walk away with all of your IP and your clients to potentially your competitor down the road.
Speaker 1:So this is we've done well, you and I, because this is a beautiful segue into the conversation that we wanted to have today. And exactly this like in businesses, whether you're a property manager or a sales rep, you are generally very good at what you're doing and that's the reason why you start a business. And then you start a business and then quickly you realize there's a lot more to the business that we've got to look at than our role. But we just want to do our role. We just want to be that property manager or just be that sales agent. And so what happens is we find that we can have a lot of poor quality business owners in the industry because there's no way really they can be trained and upskilled.
Speaker 1:And I love upskilling property managers and I love upskilling BDMs, and I know you love upskilling sales agents and you love upskilling business owners. So this is a perfect, perfect combination for us to talk about today. And you have got an upcoming masterclass plus an upcoming course for people which I these aren't your words, these are my words, but they are sort of upskilling, upskilling those business owners and looking at the whole business. But I want you to put it in your own words and sort of talk about what this masterclass is about and why it's going to be beneficial for a lot of people around Australia.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you so much, ash. Well, I think you know leadership and business ownership is something that's very important to me because, you know, in my career and in my businesses I've learned a lot of what to do, but I've also learned a lot of what not to do, and I've learned some really hard and really uncomfortable lessons, and so I've tried really hard to give back to the industry so that other people don't follow negatively in my sort of shoes, follow negatively in my sort of shoes. And you know, even if we have a look at Lita last year, well, this year I should say, which you came to and thank you so much for doing the little podcast and the wrap-up afterwards I was so loved, the shout-out. But I think you know this has just been a big part of my mission that I really want to upskill the industry in whatever you know avenue that that looks like within the residential division, and so in business ownership we just don't really talk about how to build a profitable business, how to sort of make it scalable. You know how to get off the tools to being constantly chained to the business and then you know how to look at, you know, making a profitable business that has a long-term sort of view. So, whether that be that you're looking to, you know, grow somebody from within your business for a succession plan, or whether you're looking to sell that business, but often we don't talk about these conversations, and so for me, I think profit should not be a dirty word and I think we should be very, very comfortable in talking about building up a business that is a saleable asset and we should be very proud of that, instead of working until the day that we die and being on holidays but constantly checking our phones or not being able to take holidays or being concerned about, you know, not being at the office at a certain time or being able to go away, and these are just the things that I constantly see.
Speaker 2:So this masterclass I am hosting with Kristen Porter and it sort of came about from a couple of years ago where we just got together and we were talking about, you know, the issues that her clients are having, you know from her legal practice and what my coaching clients are sort of having, and so it was like, well, we need to scale up these businesses. They're constantly coming to Kristen when there's problems instead of actually trying to kind of solve them before it kind of gets there, yeah, and so we put together this brainwave about let's do something about this. And so we've got the masterclass on the 4th of December and so basically, it's all about how to really, you know, scale your agency, how to structure it and really how to grow it. So that's really what it's all about. So we're going to be covering recruitment, we're going to be talking about retention, we're going to be talking about the various different ways that you can grow your business, including how to build out EBUs.
Speaker 2:And you know that is for sales businesses, but also for property management businesses, where we should be having pods and looking at how we can grow people for the long term instead of just having burnout. And then, you know, looking about organic growth versus, you know, acquiring rent rolls. So these are some of the things that we're going to be talking about in the masterclass, and you know, even one of my coaching sessions that I had today, you know this business owner has been in business for 15 years, has business partnerships. They're in their, you know, in their early 40s. They don't really they've never had a conversation around what the future looks like, and so it's like let's get talking about these conversations, let's get thinking about what business is going to look like in six months, or whether it be six years or in 20 years. But to actually be thinking about what can we do to build a business that you're not chained to.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you mentioned before, you know, when people come to you like with problems and I just want to touch on that a little bit because that's the thing Like I want people to upskill themselves whether they've got a good business or whether they've got a problem business Like this isn't just for people that are struggling, this is for people that are running good businesses to stay up with the trends that are happening, to continue moving forward, to continue to just keep an eye on what the industry is doing as a whole, and so I don't want people to think, oh, my business, like that's be like me saying, well, I've actually got a good business, I actually think I've got a good business.
Speaker 1:We've got I think it was like a 38% profit and I think that's pretty good, that's incredible. Well, but who am I benchmarking it against? I don't actually know Someone else out there might be getting a 50% profit and I'd be like, oh, okay, maybe I have got room for improvement. So you can't. So you, unless you, you know, do these things, do these masterclasses, do these courses, even if you think you have a good business, it's really good just to check the trends and just what is happening and staying up to date. Yeah, just as much as the people that are having definitely pain points where they need that support as well.
Speaker 2:That's right. Well, I think you know, for us this is an industry first training. We've never seen you never seen a growth coach or a business coach like myself come together with a lawyer who's designed to sort of protect the business, to come together and do principal training. So we don't very often see principal training, we see leadership training, but we don't very often see business training like this as a whole. So we're really excited, we're really proud of it and we're super pumped.
Speaker 2:We're really proud of it and we're, you know, super pumped and it's totally free and I think we're, you know, for people who are going to be tuning in live, there's going to be some free giveaways. So there will be like a recruitment checklist with all the questions that you need to have when you're recruiting people, and there will also be a rent roll due diligence checklist. So you know, these are things that obviously it's over a thousand dollars, but I, you know, we're really encouraging people to be there live so that there can be conversations. But you're right, it's designed for everybody in the industry who is in business ownership or aspiring to be in business ownership.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and also same like whether you're a solopreneur or whether you have a big team. It's good to sort of be open, because I know many a solopreneur who was like I just want 50 properties and then that's all I'm ever going to take, or I only want 100. And I was one of those people as well, and now I've got 1200 properties. So what happens is actually they're probably the ones that need to be a little bit more careful, because you have that mindset of just wanting 100 and you never prepare yourself for that growth and you never have that plan because it was never your plan in the first place. So I just want to touch on that, because there will be people listening that have that mentality, and I also once had that mentality. So, yes, it's really important, and I guess I just don't want people just to assume that they don't need it. I just want everyone to know this is something it's really important and I guess I just don't want people just to assume that they don't need it. I just want everyone to know you know this is something that's really beneficial because I love the business space as a whole.
Speaker 1:I was speaking to Kristen and there's a podcast for those that are listening to this, one last week or the week before last week or the week before, and I had actually reached out to her about a month ago because one thing in our business is that we were just doing some insurances or readdressing our business insurance against each other. Now that the value of the business has gone up quite a bit and it got to a point where we actually had this discussion, my business partner and I thought you know what it's actually not viable for us to have insurance anymore. We made a decision that we aren't going to go down that road and instead, what we realised at the time was that our shareholder agreement was actually out of date. When I say out of date, Bill and I didn't agree with what was in that anymore and we had a discussion about it. We decided what would happen if one of us would pass, and then we've had her do an updated one for us. But it got me thinking, like the number of people like so I run a good business. Yeah, I hadn't assessed that since 2010. So that was 14 years old and the time just flies.
Speaker 1:And it was funny because Kristen said last week she goes to me oh, like good practice would be just to redo it every time you do your will. And I laughed because I was like there's people that haven't done their will either. You can't use that as an example, because people need to get that back also. Yeah, so it's just something that we don't. We just don't focus on it enough. Now I want to speak a little bit about growth with you, because we sort of because there was it's the masterclass was can you just tell me what the three things were?
Speaker 2:again, they were yeah, so it's called. So basically the principal training is agency structure, growth and scale.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Sorry, that's what I was saying structure, growth and scale. So we spoke a little bit about the structure and the scale and I just want to talk a bit more to you about the growth and sort of what you're referring to there. Are you referring to the growth of a portfolio or the growth of a team, or what does growth mean to you?
Speaker 2:All of the above. So I think you know, when we're talking about growth in a business, it's not always based on revenue, but it is typically based on profit. So you know, and different people are looking for different business owners are looking for different things at various different stages in their life. So you know, if they're sort of in that time where they're winding down a little bit more, they don't want to be spending as much time hands-on in the business, you know their wage costs might be a little bit higher because they've got, you know, more people in the business and themselves aren't being as hands-on. So I do think you know there is a time and a place for different business owners at various different stages. But I think when it comes to growth, you know it does go hand in hand with revenue and profit. But often you know we get very caught up in this revenue conversation in the industry but really the real number is profit and how much money you're actually banking at the end of the day, and so I think that's really the number that we need to be looking at. So there is a time, if you are in growth, where you might need to be spending more money, let's say, on BDMs. So if you're spending more money on BDMs, initially you may not be getting a return for the first 90 days while they're learning and kind of getting up to speed, but then after that period of time, you know, obviously, and kind of getting up to speed, but then after that period of time, obviously your income is going to be increasing in terms of the increasing managements and the revenue that's coming in every month, but on top of all of that, the increase to your asset and to the bottom line. So you have to have a look at those sorts of things.
Speaker 2:Growth could be in terms of various different joint ventures. So you might have, let's say, in your property management portfolio. You might have a really great relationship with a builder who does a lot of property maintenance. So you might have 1,200 properties, like you mentioned earlier, ash, and saying, okay, well, when was the last time I sort of called through everyone and had a conversation with them about okay, well, how can I really help them in terms of growing their own wealth and property portfolios? So the conversation could be around okay, well, what can we do to make sure that we've got the right insurances there, which is something I did with one of my property management clients in Sydney just before the fires actually, which was a godsend right in the end for all of those clients. So it could be looking at the insurances where you're getting a referral fees. It could be having a conversation with them where saying, listen, you've owned this property for 20 years but you have actually never done any improvements to the home or to the lot. So you might say, listen, I've got a relationship with this builder, so you might then decide to actually build up a joint venture with this particular builder or property maintenance company where they might come in and they might redo kitchens, they might redo bathrooms, they might redo paints, they might, you know, whatever that might look like, and so then you've kind of got a separate entity in a separate company that is working there.
Speaker 2:You could also have that same you know avenue with a cleaning business, which is what I mentioned in the past. So you know, when I had my cleaning business and I was very focused in Brisbane City at that time so I loved focusing on high rises because essentially you don't need to worry about maintenance of, you know, the external, or you know worried about stairs falling down or maintenance because the body corporate mows the lawns or takes care of all of the facilities and so forth, and when you're doing, obviously, inspections, it's in one building, right. So there's a lot of benefits to that. But, you know, instead of a two-bedroom apartment renting at $650 per week, you know we would do a clean and we would put a short-term tenant in there and so then essentially getting $950 per week. So when I sold my rent roll which is way back when in 2007, slash 8, you know my average rental at that point was $1,000. So it was inflated because I was getting this additional rent which wasn't actually kind of there, right. So you know you could have then a cleaning business. You could also have a removalist business. You know there's lots of different avenues that you could have and various different joint ventures, so you don't always have to be the person who's in charge of that. Sometimes it's giving an opportunity to somebody that you're already working with, that you already have a relationship with. So that's one side.
Speaker 2:The second side of growth is obviously looking at growing the numbers. So you know, increasing volume, increasing transactions. So whether that be, you know, more properties under management, and whether that be through organic growth and making sure that your property management team is very sales focused when it comes to KPIs, because I see that a lot of businesses are not. And that's one of the things that I do when I'm coming into their business one-on-one coaching. And it's the same thing with getting the property management division and the sales divisions really talking and working together, making sure that those referrals are coming into the business instead of perhaps referring it to another agency that you may not even be aware of because they're getting a better slice over there. So you know these are the kind of things that we're talking about.
Speaker 2:And then you know building these kind of mega teams or these you know super teams, these effective business units, so that you know one person's out there that's the salesperson, that's out there, that's meeting everybody, that's finding the opportunities, that's signing up new business, and then you know somebody behind in the back end is literally doing all of the paperwork and basically arming them so that they can have more conversations. And I find that in life in general, people love to be a part of something, they love to be a part of a team, they love to belong, they love to do things together, and so, whether that be in property management or whether that be in sales. You know that's something that's proven to work and we know we've been hearing this for a number of years now that teams are the way to go, but often they're not really built in a very profitable way or effective way that works for the long term. So I think you know they're some of the things that I think are important when we're talking about growth.
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely. I find. For me personally, with what I see, is that a lot of well, there's two things. Number one the business owner is generally either a very you know high value sales agent, and so they're very busy doing that, so they don't have the time to be putting into setting these things up that you were just talking about, which are fabulous ideas. I actually tried doing the cleaning one and just trying to find just to hire a full-time cleaner. Could not find anyone, but it is hard.
Speaker 2:It is hard, I don't disagree with that. The best cleaners here's a, here's a red hot tip it's generally people who are burnt out. So you know, even um my past cleaner of a property, um a holiday home on the gold coast that we used to use. They owned a Jim's franchise and they're a husband and wife team and they were actually police officers who were really burnt out and they just wanted to get on the tools, have a, you know, a job that wasn't really thought, you know, required no thinking. And so a lot of people who I see who are in that slightly middle-aged state of life, they have had some great career or they're a little bit burnt out and they just want something that's kind of not really thinking. So they're your best kind of people because they've got great work ethic. They just, you know, want to partner with the right person.
Speaker 2:But it's hard. I'm still in conversation with my cleaners and I mean, it's what 15 years ago, when I had my agencies, you know, and I love that they were just really good people who generally loved cleaning. I think Des his phone ring was ACDC Dirty Deeds he just was one of those crazy people who love cleaning. But you know they're unicorns. They're few and far between. You've got to search really hard for them, ash.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I always do keep an eye out, but you know, that's the thing. It is a full-time business to work on your business. And so where I think people will struggle is if they are that high-earning principal, they're not going to have the time to put these great things in place. And the other thing that I sometimes see as well is that principals tend to put pressure on existing staff to do multiple job roles. So, to give you an example, I see a lot of business owners who want to have a rent role, so they'll hire a property manager and they get them to manage the property and do BDM, because I mean, technically they've probably got the time then, but there's no clear plan as to when do you get that next person in and also no understanding that the actual role of doing that BDM work takes up. Especially with new business coming through, it takes up a lot of time.
Speaker 1:So sometimes business owners would say, oh, why do you need any help? Well, you've only got 50 properties. You should be able to handle that. But it's like, yeah, but I've also got that BDM and the trust account and the leasing to do, and so I find that there's a lot of misunderstanding in that and hesitation to actually hire a BDM straight out and to have that. I wouldn't say it's a cost to the business. Have that as an investment to the business from day one and let the property manager do what they need to do. I just yeah that. Because if you the way that I see it is that if you've got a property manager, only you know doing, you know splitting their time between business development, property management, you're never going to have full-time results. You're only going to have part-time results if that. So you can't expect a full-time result when they're only doing half of the allocation. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2:I 100% know what you mean. I also think, too, that a BDM is very different to PM. They're two completely different personalities typically. One it needs to be very sales orientated. The other person is very meticulous and very, you know, system needs to be very sales orientated, the other person is very meticulous and very, you know, systemized and very operational. So you know that's why they work in really well together.
Speaker 2:I think you know, once you start getting to those magical numbers where you can afford to do that and I understand that there does come a time where there needs to be some you know strong decisions to be made. But there are other opportunities today, such as VAs, to handle. You know various different components, whether it be trust accounting or whether it be paperwork or appointment forms or whatever that needs to look like. But I think the critical part and I want to you know, just kind of step back into a comment that you made earlier which is you know we are trained in this industry to be constantly busy, to fill every single moment of the day with dollar productive activity. Now, that is fine if you're an on-the-tools property manager, if you're an on-the-tools BDM, if you're an on-the-tools salesperson, but if you're a selling principal, or, if you're a business owner, where things start to look a bit different is that you need to get out of this mentality about listing and selling and negotiating to suddenly managing the business.
Speaker 2:So you actually need to start having capacity to think about the business and to think about what the vision is for the business, and then you know what are we going to do in order to achieve that vision. What do our goals need to be? You know how do I communicate that to the rest of my team? And then how do we implement that? How do we track that? How do we hold people accountable to making sure that we are moving the needle forward?
Speaker 2:So I think one of the hardest things to do is to almost unprogram ourselves in terms of what made us successful to get us to this point, to then, okay, well, if we want to get onto the next stage of success, we really need to start understanding. Well, we need this capacity to think freely to allow ourselves to do that. And you know, ash, listen I'm a you know Gen Xer, so we love to keep all of our time super, super busy doing lots and lots of things. I think this is one of the hardest lessons for my generation to learn, which is actually just to allow you to be and for ideas to come in and to explore those ideas and have that space where actually the space in your calendar is space to work on the business, and you may not even know what that looks like when you're sitting down. So that's a crazy concept, but so true.
Speaker 1:I know, and I've heard you talk about that before. I am so I've had the business for 20 years and only now am I starting to give myself that and I wouldn't even say that I'm doing a very good job. But I will say that I did and it's funny. I was booking, I wanted to book myself in for a massage and I was umming and ahhing and you know you're at that, you're at Descartes, you know you're ready to do the booking, and I just couldn't press, like, like go, because it was like it's a Tuesday and it's like Tuesday nine o'clock and I just I honestly it was this weird thing where I just and I ended up going, fuck it, I'm just going to book it. But what I booked is and I've never done this before and I'm actually really excited, so this is everyone's permission that you can go do this too.
Speaker 1:There's this new place in Perth called Ember Bath House and it's like an actual, like traditional bath house and it's like three hours. It actually is an absolute bargain. So for those in Perth, I'm pretty sure it only cost me $220. But for that I get time in this bath house where they limit the numbers going in, and you've got access to the ice bath, the sauna, the hot tub, the bath thing, I'm assuming. And then I got a 90 minute massage and facial as well, but the whole thing is like three hours.
Speaker 2:Well, ash, now what's going to be happening is you're going to be there and you're going to end up talking work, because everyone else is going to be there as well, well, that's right, and I'm going to have to have my phone handy with all those, you know, great, bright ideas that I'm going to have.
Speaker 1:that I'm going to have to write down. But I've got nothing to write it down because I'm sitting in the middle of this bath, so I'm going to have to work out how I'm going to deal with that. But I get what you're saying with creating that capacity and that space, but it is extremely hard. So, yeah, it's.
Speaker 2:It's a new skill set that needs to be developed and you need to really hone and it takes a while to sort of practice it. And you know just giving kudos to you for doing that. So well done. Number one, and I think you know bathhouses, and we love going to day spas because essentially your phone's typically away from you, so that's often quite a good thing, because if it's ringing we'll think, oh, we'll just take it.
Speaker 2:For me, a lot of my really great ideas come when I'm doing yoga. Actually in the last 10 minutes when you're doing, you know, when you're literally just sort of laying there and you're waiting for ideas to kind of you're trying to meditate, but that's where my best ideas are coming in. And I think you know, often you're sort of taught to. You know, let those ideas come in and then let them go, but I'm really grateful for those ideas. And that's often where, you know, I don't want to say brilliance comes, but certainly it makes me rethink. And then I pop out and I literally write them all down and then I always make sure that there's time booked in my calendar every single week and month where I'm working on the business and I'm exploring those ideas. So you know, even in my business now I typically work week on, week off, but I still have, you know, six days a month that I'm purely working on the business and on content and various different ideas, so that my business is moving forward and not staying the same.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, amazing, interesting. So I get my. So I find yoga and meditation and all of that extremely boring, like which probably means that I should be doing more of it, but I find myself finding it very hard to focus, and I actually get my great ideas actually by talking to my partner Linz. Get my great ideas actually by talking to my partner Linz when we have those conversations over dinner about work and just that general thing. That's actually where I get mine. Well, actually I say I get my ideas Actually. They're his ideas that are really cool that I go hold on a second. Let me write down that. What you just said.
Speaker 2:Well, an outsider's point of view is often quite fabulous, because I think sometimes we do get very intrinsic in our industry. So, you know, seeing things from customer service point of view and I think that's one of the problems that not to get off topic, but that I do see that has happened in our industries We've been so caught up in trying to be super productive that we've forgotten who the end product is, for which is it should be about the customer experience and the customer journey, so that people actually want to stay with us and that we retain them and that we get more business and we do get more referrals. So, but you know, on the yoga thing, honestly I really struggled with yoga for absolute years because I'm, I think, most people in our industry and I put you in this bucket, I certainly put myself in this bucket. We're go and stop, we're all or nothing, we're go broken. You know it's like all left, all right.
Speaker 2:So I think it's again one of those skills that it's taken me a long time to finesse and I'm still working on it every single day but to really try and understand okay, well, what are those boundaries for me? And to try and learn how to slow down and to not always be either at full speed ahead or completely off. You know it's okay to have the balance in between. So that has probably been one of my greatest lessons in life and certainly it's one of the things that I'm often, you know, talking to a lot of business owners and high-performing people about for that particular reason.
Speaker 1:And I think, not waiting till you have that health scare or that pain point or that thing. That is the one thing that makes you pull back and stop and go. Okay, I need to reassess. I think we need to put a really bad cold, because I really need a rest in bed this week. That's literally the mindset that so many people have, and it's like why do we do that to ourselves? If I want to have a week in bed, I could do that. My business is fine for me. To ourself If I want to have a week in bed, I could do that. My business is fine for me to do that. It's not about. It's such a personal issue that we create for ourself, isn't it? So we don't wait for this.
Speaker 2:But I'm saying that when I need to take a leaf out of my own book, though, but I think it's lovely that you're voicing it because I think for a lot of people, this is the way that we think and you know, when we're with our children I don't have children, I wish I had children, but you know, I see a lot of people where they feel they're telling me that they feel so guilty when they're with their kids that they are thinking I should be at work and then, when they're at work, thinking I should be with my kids.
Speaker 2:You know, very rarely, order to be the best version of you, both at work and with your family, you actually need to replenish yourself, because if you're not replenishing yourself, you're not going to be the best partner, you're not going to be the best leader, you're not going to be, you know, the best person in terms of closing the business. You're not going to be the best mum. So I think you know we just need to prioritise those things and understand it's a bit like when you're on the plane that you know you're attaching your own mask before attaching others, that you know we do need to recharge ourselves and we do need to spend this time, you know, being very conscious in terms of what's going to fill us up before we can help. You know, fill others, because I think our job is very exhausting in terms of helping so many people, whether it be in our business or with our clients, so you need to make sure that you're okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely so. On that note, this upcoming Masterclass, I'm going to have the link in the show notes for everyone to register. It's free. This you know, not that you shouldn't go have that massage, but you know what. Take this one hour out of your day, regardless. Like I hate, you know one of my I actually haven't said this to you before. One of my pet hates is when there's so many great courses, webinars and stuff that's available free, you know, unpaid or paid and people say stuff that's available free, you know unpaid or paid and people say I'm too busy, I can't do it this week, and I call bullshit on that, because you know what like these are so important. And if you are feeling so busy that you can't take an hour out of your week to do something really productive on your business, then that actually means that you need to do this even more.
Speaker 2:That's exactly right. You're probably stuck on that hamster wheel and you're probably chained to your business and you're probably lying awake in bed at night going how am I going to balance the book and how am I going to pay everybody? You know this next month and having all those kind of conversations. So you know, I remember when I was in business ownership, you know I didn't really have great people in around me and I think if I would have had some time where I did find the right sort of accountants, I did have the right lawyers, and I mean they're two people you should really pay well for to make sure that you're getting the best advice. But you know, then I probably would have had some different worries.
Speaker 2:But the thing is you only know what you know. So you know here is an opportunity because we don't see training like this to kind of. You know we're doing it for a reason, because we want to give back to the industry. You know it's part of what Chris and I want to do. So it's an opportunity for you to kind of expand your thinking, even if you go away and you think, hey, listen, there's nothing there for me. Perhaps we may have tested some of your boundaries or the ways that you're sort of thinking. But you know, obviously we want you to be walking away with a whole lot of things that you can implement into your business, whether they be mindsets, whether they be structures, and you're going to have some physical takeaways that you can implement immediately.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm super excited. I'm very much looking forward to it. So, just as a summary, it's an industry first principles masterclass for sales and property management principles who want to unchain themselves from their business, scale their teams and expand faster. I don't know anyone that that isn't going to suit, so I expect to see lots of people there. So the link is in the show notes and I'm really excited. I think it's really wonderful what you guys have put together. So thank you for doing that for the industry, and it's always an absolute pleasure chatting to you. I'm going to stop the recording there because you and I will probably me as well just like chat for hours and I'm conscious of your time, so it's always a pleasure having those really great conversations with you. So thank you so much for sharing all of that with us today.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you so much, ash, and listen before you do hit stop on the record. Can I just say thank you for all that you do for the industry, because you do give so selflessly to many and I just really want to acknowledge that and thank you for that. It's actually really lovely to see and you know, I would love to see you doing a whole lot more for yourself, but, you know, for the industry. Thank you so much for all that you do.
Speaker 1:Oh, thank you, Sherry, it's lovely. Well, I'll be thinking of you and enjoying that massage and bathhouse when I do it, and I'll do some stories on my social posting to prove to everyone that I can do it every 20 years. Thanks, sherry, thank you.