There are two recruiting traps that most team leaders fall into.
I'll share my story so you don't have to fall for either of them.
Fast Value: You can skip to the front of the line by learning from the mistakes of others. But that only works if you take the advice. Quality + Quantity = $$$
Most team leaders don't realize the actual business that they're in.
You're no longer in the business of helping buyers and sellers. You are entering the business of recruiting, training, and retaining sales agents.
Here are the two mistakes most team leaders make (before they decide to run a profitable business).
Mistake #1 - They're afraid to recruit to their team because they don't want to ruin their "culture".
This is something I hear over and over from team leaders who have businesses that lose money. 100% of these team leaders are still in production. Taking their commission checks from their production and pouring them into their failing business.
If this sounds harsh, it's because I did this for the first 3 years of my team. I would tell myself that I was "reinvesting in my business". Instead of facing the reality that I was running an unprofitable business.
Most teams are not profitable without the production of the team leader.
You do not want to be a non-profit. You work too hard to give it all away.
This also comes up when people say that they want a "seal team". This is the team leader with 5 rockstar agents who is running a profitable business. It just happens to be built on a foundation of sand.
Most people are shocked to find out that a navy seal team is actually 16 members.
Solution #1 - Recruit more agents (Quantity). Recruit to the culture you want, not the culture you have. Do the math to figure out what your minimum team size is. It's bigger than you think. (I needed to recruit 32 agents to replace my own personal production).
Once most team leaders get past the first mistake, they realize that they want to run a real business. They start recruiting agents to their team to grow to reach their minimum team size and go beyond it.
They don't want to be at the mercy of 25% of their production disappearing when 1 agent walks out the door.
Mistake #2 - Collecting bodies instead of hiring the ideal avatar.
Once a team leader starts recruiting, they will often start hiring anyone who will say "yes".
Just like a brand new agent who has to work with any buyer who will talk to them.
No standards. No expectations. Just winging it like they did before. Which worked fine with 5 agents. But not so much when you get to 15 -20+ agents.
I made this mistake as well. We recruited from 12 to 45 agents in one year. Only to find out that 30 of the 33 agents we recruited were never going to do any deals.
We pitched people on how wonderful we were, how easy we make their lives, etc.
and no surprise....
.... zero production.
In the beginning of 2022, we implemented standards around what made our agents successful. We reset expectations and benchmarks that agents had to hit in order to be a part of the team.
30 days later, 29 of the 30 agents quit on their own, and I only had to fire one.
Solution #2 - Create clear benchmarks and standards (Quality). Recruit to those standards. Reinforce those standards in onboarding. Consistently reward the behavior you want.
If you don't have your standards in writing, you don't have standards.
If you don't hold your standards, you don't have standards.
Standards aren't what you write on the wall, it's what you enforce.
Pro-Tip: The secret to growing your team faster, with more profit, is to recruit for both quality and quantity.
Bringing more of the right agents onto your team is going to make your business grow.
Once they're on the team, it's all about training (for production) and retaining (for lifetime value).
At the end of the day, there are only 2 ways to grow your team.
#1 - Add more agents
#2 - Make them sell more
or
#3 - do both
I'm a huge fan of #3.