Nick Brown: striking the right balance

For those of you who have followed along in my articles over the years, you will know I approach business a little differently to others in our industry.

While the fundamentals remain the same, I try to stay grounded to my ‘why’.

The reason why my business is the way it is – I want to provide a great service that is personalised and professional.

I try not to get caught up in industry hype, gossip, or others’ expectations of how I should operate.

I run my own race, have always stayed in my own lane and above all, always focused on doing the right thing by my clients.

Sometimes that approach has come at a financial loss to the business but, at the end of the day, I don’t regret the approach I have taken. 

When I look at my career, during the first 10 years I jumped around from office to office and believed the grass was always greener somewhere else.

In hindsight, some of the moves I made didn’t get me any further in my career, but I look back and understand that while I may not have “progressed” my career, they all gave me the opportunity to understand how different people and markets operated.

I am sure what I am about to say next may not be positively received by some employers out there but the biggest thing I have learnt personally in my career is that, whileI love real estate and property management, it is just a job.

It doesn’t define me as a human. It is a part of who I am, but it is not what I am.

If I had my time again, would I change what I have done in my career?

If I am honest, probably not. My decisions have got me to where I am now.

The one thing I would change, if I had a time machine, is to create more a balance between working and my personal life.

In some instances I would not choosing work over my personal life (as we all have done at some point in our careers, I am sure!). 

I love our industry and have a passion that continues to push me to be better each day, but I also know that we are not surgeons, we are not curing deadly diseases and we are not in an industry where anyone should expect us to be more than what we are engaged for.

Sure, go above and beyond within the scope of your work agreement but don’t ever put someone else’s interests ahead of your own.

That’s not being arrogant at all, it’s something everyone should be mindful of.

I recently spoke with a business owner who was proud of the fact that by paying an employee some bonuses in gift cards he knew he had the ability to ring the employee at 9.30pm to get something done before the next day.

He boasted about this as if it was a good thing!

I was shocked and thought, ‘If you really think that buying your employees personal time from them is a positive then you are not someone I want to do business with’.

Our industry certainly isn’t 9am to 5pm anymore, and has probably never really been that, but having employers and business owners that think everyone should be available 24/7 is why we have industry churn, have problems finding suitable staff and why it so hard to keep people.

I also look back and reflect, from a personal level, that I should have taken more time to simply be Nick, not Nick the real estate agent.

When you find something you are passionate about it’s so easy to get caught up in the hype and the moment but, when you look back you realise the toll it’s taken on other parts of your life. 

It’s about creating the best balance possible.

That doesn’t look the same for everyone so don’t set yourself goals or benchmarks on someone else’s achievements, work out what works for you!