If Giving Up is Not Your Option….

What if there’s a magic measurement of success? Would you be willing to meet that measurement? You know that the Beatles attained pop music mastery. You know Bill Gates did the same with technology. But, did you know what they have in common-and that you may have, too?

Before I tell you that, let me share something that happens to me often. I’m a pianist-and have been a musician since I was four years old. In my speaking, I often tickle the ivories-just a little, of course…..Invariably, someone comes up to me and says, “I’ve always wanted to play the piano.”  I tell them, they certainly can. How? here’s the simple answer:

Practice one half hour a day for one year. You’ll be able to play well enough to play simple pop tunes at parties.

You’ve heard the old chestnut, Practice Makes Perfect. I certainly know that as a musician. But, how well do we apply that principle to our business lives? Is this something that is a key to our attaining our goals? I think so. Read on.

The Commonality between the Beatles and Bill Gates

In his fascinating book, Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell studies performers-from Mozart and the Beatles to Bill Gates. The commonality he found was that high achievers spent an average of

Ten thousand hours practicing and honing their craft to get to mastery

In other words, it isn’t talent, it isn’t just circumstance (although Gladwell points out being at the right place at the right time is important, too)-it is just slogging it out, practicing your craft, logging in ten thousand hours.

The Beatles-Having to Work Seven Days for Eight Hours a Night Was the Beset Thing that Could Happen to Them

When I read that the Beatles played in Hamburg 8 hours a night, 7 days a week-for 2 years, I instantly felt tired! I know what it’s like to perform in bars for hours! But, the Beatles said that experience was key in making them the performers they became. In an interview, John Lennon said, “We got better and got more confidence. We couldn’t help it with all the experience playing all night long…..we really had to find a new way of playing.”

Bill Gates-Practically Living at the Computer Lab

Gates describes his early years: “It was my obsession….I skipped athletics. I went up there at night. We were programming on weekends.”

Isn’t There a Shortcut?

For those of you who have never attained high performance, you don’t–and can’t-realize the importance of practice. You think that it’s just a matter of talent or luck. But, haven’t you known extremely talented people who just extinguished themselves like a flaming rocked? Haven’t you known people with all the advantages who just didn’t attain what you thought they could-or should? Of course.

Are You Willing to Put in those Ten Thousand Hours to Excel?

From the many examples in Outliers, and from my own experiences as a pianist (I have a degree in piano performance and a master’s degree in music theory), I know that practicing your craft provides the only true competence and confidence. You don’t gain mastery by talking about it. You don’t gain mastery by someone trying to motivate you. It’s practice. So, get out there, and practice and perform. Rack up those ten thousand hours, and you will achieve your goals. If the Beatles and Bill Gates didn’t take shortcuts, we shouldn’t try it that way, either.  Isn’t devoting enough time to your goals important enough to you to feel the joy of attainment-of mastery?

Personal note to you: Be sure you’re practicing the right things the right way. You can put in 8-10 hours a day and get nowhere. To be sure you’re practicing right, use the right start-up plan. Up and Running in 30 Days will work for you!

In his book on motivation, Daniel Pink says that we are motivated by either autonomy, mastery, or purpose. Here are questions to uncover what motivates you.

About Your Autonomy

Are you in charge of your own business, or are you waiting for someone else to tell you what to do?

Do you expect your manager to make you go to work, or are you self-directed and self-starting?

Are you disciplined in your business, so you can enjoy that autonomy?

Seth Godin, author of Tribes, says about autonomy: The art of the art {of autonomy} is picking your limits. That’s the autonomy I must cherish. The freedom to pick my boundaries.

Are you just playing at being your own boss? Do you expect someone else to hand you success? How much ownership have you really taken about that autonomy?

About your Mastery

Are you working just to get by, or are you consistently working to get better? What do you want to excel at? How does that translate into your business?

Have you ever done something to mastery? How did it feel? Is it important to you to do some things well? What things?

Have you considered mastering selling real estate?

About your Purpose

What excites you so much you can’t sleep at night?

Is there a way to translate that to your real estate business?

The desire to do something because you find it deeply satisfying and personally challenging inspires the highest levels of creativity, whether it’s in the arts, sciences, or business. Teresa Amabile, Professor, Harvard University

As you can see, today, people are motivated by inner drives. How strong are these inner drives in you?

Question: What insights about your behavior did you get from this post? What do you want your manager to do to help you ‘drive’ your motivation to succeed? Is your manager helping you do that?

We’re Not Motivated by What We Think We Were…..

In his new book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, Daniel Pink lays out a persuasive case, backed by extensive scientific studies, about why the traditional ‘carrot and stick’ motivational methods just don’t work for us today. It’s especially true with real estate professionals. Why? Because we in effect work for ourselves. We have to be self-starters, initiators, and tenacious in our pursuit of our goals. That means we have to be motivated by things other than promises of material things.

Why Money Doesn’t Work as a Motivator

First, as Pink points out, money and/or material things are good short-term motivators. (Read MacGregor’s and Herzberg’s studies on short and long-term motivation). In fact, just take a look at the number of real estate agents who are motivated to visit an open house when there’s food! But, as Herzberg and others have pointed out, money is a lousy long-term motivator. You know that if you’ve tried motivating your kids with money—or threats (the carrot and stick).

I know. You’re thinking, “If I just had more money, I would be fine.” So, let me ask you, what are you willing to do to get that money? Lead generate more regularly? Make more sales calls? We all know that lead generating is the answer to that money problem. Yet, the vast majority of agents avoid lead generating as if it gave us some chronic disease! So, money is just not an effective long-term motivator.

The Best, Deepest, Strongest Motivators We Can Use to Motivate Ourselves

Pink shows, via extensive studies, that there are three driving motivators which we should put to work today to fire ourselves up, keep those fires lit, and achieve what we want to achieve. They are:

1. Autonomy
2. Mastery
3. Purpose

Questions to Ask Yourself to Fire Yourself Up

About Your Autonomy

Are you in charge of your own business, or are you waiting for someone else to tell you what to do?

Do you expect your manager to make you go to work, or are you self-directed and self-starting?

Are you disciplined in your business, so you can enjoy that autonomy?

Seth Godin, author of Tribes,  says about autonomy: The art of the art {of autonomy} is picking your limits. That’s the autonomy I must cherish. The freedom to pick my boundaries.

About your Mastery

Are you working just to get by, or are you consistently working to get better? What do you want to excel at? How does that translate into your business?

About your Purpose

What excites you so much you can’t sleep at night? Is there a way to translate that to your real estate business?

The desire to do something because you find it deeply satisfying and personally challenging inspires the highest levels of creativity, whether it’s in the arts, sciences, or business. Teresa Amabile, Professor, Harvard University

Webinar on Motivating Yourself/Others

More about effective motivation today: I’m doing a webinar on motivation for the National Association of Realtors on motivation–March 17, at 2 PM EST. Click here for more information.

Want expert, professional support and motivation? Check out our unique coaching programs. Click here for a complimentary consultation.

 Too Much Energy, Too Little Results

 Worse yet, we bounce off that ceiling and hit a new low every thing we get up the energy to try to break through it. Not only that, the last few years have been discouraging for many in real estate. Don’t give up on yourself! You do have the talent, the skill, and the determination to succeed at a much higher level again.

 All Performers Hit ‘Ceilings of Achievement’

 As a long-time performing pianist and flutist (I spent the first thirty years of my life playing and teaching music), I had to learn how to constantly change up my playing for the better. In these next few blogs, I’m going to share what I learned as a musician that will change your 2010 performance dramatically—for the better.

 You Aren’t as Good as You Can Be—I Promise

 I just did a talk for our area’s Women’s Council, on how to have a much better 2010—how to smash through that ceiling of achievement. (Title: Everything I learned about Achievement I learned from Tickling’ the Ivories—also the title of my latest keynote).

 As a four-year old, I climbed up on the piano bench and figured out, by ear, how to play “Sue City Sue”—with bass notes, chords, rhythm, melody—the whole shebang. I was acclaimed as a little kid. However, as I got a little older, I found that playing by ear just wasn’t getting me to be a better player. Here’s what I did to get to concert artistry level, and earn a bachelor’s in piano performance—and how you can translate these performance principles to your real estate business.

 Get from ‘By Ear’ via your Talent to Conscious Systemization

 As a musician, I know that no one can play very well when they try learning only by hearing (playing ‘by ear’). To progress pass a ‘whiz-bang, aren’t you wonderful’ amateur level, musicians must learn to read music, get a great teacher, and learn to practice perfectly. Generally, their teacher/coach will teach them how to practice, and provide the best editions of music. They will teach them will a specific system. The better the system, the coach, the music, and the practice, the higher the performance—the sky is the limit.

 The First Time You Do Something Isn’t As Good as it Gets!

 What does that mean to a real estate professional? Most of us started selling or managing ‘by ear’. Some of us were talented, and that carried us pretty well for quite a while. But, then, we hit our ‘ceiling of achievement’, and found we were working 24/7 and expending way too much energy—and money. The way out:

1.  Grasp systems (the best systems you can find)
2. Follow processes and checklists
3. Get a great coach
4. Practice as perfectly as you can

 Practitioners—Watch Those Actions, Not Just the Words

 Unfortunately, we real estate professionals don’t realize that we are judged on our performance, not our knowledge. So, when you get all antsy because you think you need more classes, stop and think about your performance level, not your knowledge level. Spend more time evaluating your performance, and pay someone to coach to you get better (all performers, whether musicians or golfers, do this, by the way). Critique your systems, and keep refining them because they will subconsciously affect your performance levels.

 If I had a piano, I’d demonstrate these points (I do use the piano in the keynote!).

 What Do You Want to Work on This Year—from ‘By Ear’ to Systematic?

 Do you have some business plan goals for yourself this year to raise your ceiling of achievement? What do you believe is most valuable for you to work on?

Remember, if you’re a newer agent, you’ll be tempted to hang back, keep your fingers off the keys, and wait for something different–or better–to happen to you. Don’t get tempted! Put to work these performance principles and see your 2010 improve dramatically.

 I’ve compiled 10 questions you should ask yourself. In the last post, I gave you the first five.  In this post , I’ll give you the rest of the questions.

Ask yourself:

1. Do I know how long it will take to get a sale? To get a listing? To get a listing sold? (so you can project your income) (New agents tend to wait, and wait, and wait, to get into the business ‘stream’, thinking that there is no time frame to buyers’ decisions—wrong!)

Key point: Use the time lines in Up and Running to project your income. You don’t want to run out of money before you run out of time!

2. Do I have a method of setting goals and tracking accomplishments in the areas above—so I can analyze my specific strengths and challenges in this business? (Most agents never track what they do, so they don’t know what worked—or why what they’re doing isn’t working).

Key point: If you know how many listing appointments it takes, for example, for you to list one marketable property, you can project with confidence your income. You have truly become independent.

3. Do I have a budget so I know how much money I should be spending in marketing myself/marketing my listings?

Key point: Creating a marketing budget from day one assures you get paid for all that work you’re doing in lead generation (Up and Running has a prototype marketing plan for you, too).

4. Do I have someone to talk to regularly, to coach me, to keep me on track, and to help me if I fall off my start-up plan (to keep me from failing)?

Key point: Most new agents drastically over-estimate their mental toughness in the face of adversity. Studies show that having a mentor, a coach, someone on your side, greatly increases the chances of your success.

5. Do I have a method to keep myself motivated and inspired to keep on keeping on (like a coach or your manager)?

Key point: All the successful people I’ve ever met have a method to ‘keep themselves up’—diaries, logs, inspirational notebooks, readings, CDs, etc. That’s why I put so much inspiration and motivation in Up and Running—we all need it!

Give yourself every chance to succeed to answering ‘yes’ to all of these ten questions. You deserve success! Quit stumbling and get Up and Running!

Inspiration can come from unlikely places. I just got back from a reunion with my sorority sisters….no, don’t ask the number of years since I graduated from college. Let’s just say it’s more than a few! I thought it then and I think it now: I was really lucky to pledge the DG (Delta Gamma) sorority at the University of Oregon. (Especially because I told the college alumni magazine shortly before I started college that I didn’t intend to join a sorority–and threw in several outspoken comments about it, too! Any of you that know me know that I’ve never been afraid to express my opinion……). The girls I knew and regarded as accomplished so many years ago have attained wonderful things in a wide variety of areas. One, though, stands out to me.

It’s What You Become When You Weren’t Looking

How many of you reading this intended to do exactly what you’re doing as a little child or teenager? Probably not many. The woman I’m going to introduce you to started as a music major, as did I. She graduated to a teaching career, and took the opportunity to work with educating children through a religious organization all over the world. As I listened to her tell of her trials, tribulations, and adventures, I thought, how inspiring, how gifting, how critical her contributions are to the less fortunate. She truly inspired me, and started me asking myself, “What inspires others?”

Your ‘Inspiration Props’

Every one of us needs ‘props’–those things and people that provide impetus, motivation, and inspiration when the going gets tough. My observation is that, the more successful the person, the more apt that person is to have gained several ‘props’:

1. People they can count on that will remind them of their uniqueness (includes your manager, your family, your co-workers, your friends)
2. Inspirational quotes (keep a notebook with your favorites)
3. Inspirational books (re-read your favorites frequently)
4. Inspirational CDs and DVDs

Your Inspirational List

Do you have your arsenal of inspiration? Are you careful to read and put yourself around positive, inspirational people, people who encourage, not discourage you?

In Up and Running in 30 Days, I advise new agents to keep a journal of inspiring sayings and stories.

Where does your inspiration come from? Start building your ‘inspiration fortress’ now to help achieve your lofty goals. The bonus: You may become the one regarded ‘most inspirational’ by your peers–what an honor! (and, your inspiration won’t be hidden, it will be shared!).