“Most leaders think that they’re coaching when perhaps they’re actually managing… and the gap between the two (is) probably costing them millions.”
What separates a high-performing real estate team from everyone else? Is it raw skill? A charismatic leader? Or is it something more tangible?
For Mark McLeod, Chief Strategy Officer at Ray White, the answer isn’t a mystery—it’s in the data.
Mark oversees the strategic direction for over 1,000 offices across Australia and New Zealand. But his real superpower isn’t just motivating teams; it’s his access to over 15 years of proprietary intelligence on buyer behaviour, seller psychology, and agent performance.
In a candid new episode of the Thought Leaders podcast, Mark sits down with host Samantha McLean to reveal what that data actually shows—and why most of the industry is still focusing on the wrong things.
Here’s a breakdown of what you’ll learn.
Why “Skills are Highly Overrated”
One of Mark’s most challenging statements is that in real estate, “skill is highly overrated”.
He’s seen agents with exceptional skills make no money, while others with seemingly average ability build thriving businesses.
How? Mark explains that the industry is “a collection of tasks,” and a high percentage of those tasks require “little or no skill”.
“When I say skills are highly overrated, it’s more of a… tongue-in-cheek line,” Mark admits.
“Skills are obviously rated. You need to have a certain level of skill”.
But the data is clear: the tasks that truly move the needle don’t require genius-level scripts. They require resilience, consistency, and patience. The majority of tasks that build a business, he argues, are low-skill but high-will.
The One Metric That Matters
So, what is the most important task in real estate? Mark draws an analogy to the Olympic rowing team’s motto, “Will it make the boat go faster?”
“The number one metric to move a real estate business is appraisal,” he states unequivocally.
He argues that most agents’ goals are completely misaligned with their activity on this one metric. “Most agents’ financial ambitions are completely incompatible with their appraisal numbers,” he says.
The businesses that succeed are the ones led by people who are “obsessed with appraisals”.
The 400% Listing Advantage
At the recent Ray White Connect 2025 conference, Mark presented a staggering statistic from Ray White’s Nurture Cloud data: agents who meet vendors on-site for a face-to-face appraisal have a 400% higher listing win rate than those who send a desktop appraisal.
The reason is simple: “Homes don’t list themselves. People list homes”.
In an age of increasing AI and automation, Mark believes this human connection is becoming more important, not less.
The problem is, many agents see appraisals as a “waste of time” if they don’t walk away with an immediate listing. Mark argues this is a critical error in thinking.
At Ray White, they reframe appraisals as “RCMs”—Relationship Commencement Meetings.
“We work on… the premise that if I’m looking after a suburb and there are two and a half thousand homes and I’ve been into 1500 of those, I’ve actually commenced a relationship with half of my community,” he explains.
How to Earn the Right to Be in the Home
Of course, you can’t just walk into someone’s home. You have to earn the right. Mark explains this using his “Hierarchy of Communication”.
“For me, it goes letterbox, email, text message, phone, face to face,” he says.
The problem is that too many agents try to skip ahead.
“A lot of people wanna leave the lower tier… out and just go, ‘Hello, Sam, you don’t know me. Can I come into your house and have a look at it, please?'”.
The key is to use the lower tiers – letterbox drops, relevant text messages about local sales, and quick phone calls – to build familiarity and relevance.
When you operate in a tight geographic area, your calls and messages become relevant, recognisable, and welcome, allowing you to ascend the hierarchy to the all-important face-to-face meeting.
Are You a Coach or a Manager?
For leaders, principals, and department heads, Mark shares an “uncomfortable truth”: most leaders think they are coaching when, in fact, they are just managing.
So, what’s the difference?
- Managing is about tracking tasks.
- Coaching is about empathy, care, and belief. “I think to be a great coach, you have to be empathetic,” Mark states.
The most critical element of coaching, he says, is holding a higher vision for your team than they hold for themselves.
“You’ve actually gotta have a greater ambition and a greater belief for the person they do for themselves,” he explains.
“If I think Billy’s a dickhead, then… Billy will always turn up in my eyes, as a dickhead… you’ve gotta be careful as a coach, not to put people into boxes”.
When you combine this genuine belief with the “clean conversations” that data provides, you create an environment where change is inevitable.
Learn the Framework
Mark and Samantha recently collaborated on the Performance Coaching Sprint, a free five-day email course that distils what Ray White’s 15 years of data reveals about coaching effectiveness.
If you’re a leader who wants to bridge the gap between managing and coaching, this course is your first step.
Sign up for the FREE 5-Day Performance Coaching Sprint here:
http://CoachLab.EliteAgent.Education
Listen to the full Thought Leaders episode with Mark McLeod to hear more about:
- The “J curve” and why most people give up right before success.
- How to handle high-performers who resist coaching.
- Why the “number one important thing in a real estate business” is the one thing most leaders can’t even measure.
- How AI and data will transform performance coaching in the next 5 years.
Listen/Watch now
- Apple Podcasts
- Spotify
- … and on your favourite podcast player!
Connect with Mark McLeod
Elite Agent is the definitive platform for ambitious agents and industry players.
Thought Leaders is the weekly show where top operators reveal how they’re reinventing real estate.
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