Here’s a fun way to shake up the daily grind at your brokerage and give your team a chance to practice their skills: a one-day sales challenge.

Choose a random day of the week to cancel all other plans and have the competition. It will be even more fun if you don’t warn your team – just spring it on them. Before you do, make sure no one is working up to any pressing deadlines.

How to play

Divide your staff into teams and give them the challenge of selling a tangible product. One group in Chicago sold bottles of water. Have the teams decide how much inventory they would like, with the rule that they can’t buy more later. It’s up to the teams to decide how much to charge for each unit.

This will challenge the teams to estimate how much inventory they think they can move

Overconfident teams may end up with too much inventory, while others will sell out quickly and may wish they had sold at a higher price, or had bought more to start with.

If you’d like, you can let teams that sell out quickly negotiate to buy extra inventory from teams that overbought.

Send your teams out to the streets and see how much they can sell in one day. Celebrate with a happy hour at the end of the day where you compare remaining inventories and net profits, congratulate the winners, and discuss lessons learned.

The benefits

This is a great challenge for encouraging teamwork. Teams have to communicate, make decisions, and make sales cooperatively. The competition and the time limit put the pressure on, but since it’s just a game, it’s also low stakes and there is no real risk.

Teams have to rely on their own skills, rather than the pre-existing systems of your business.

A sales challenge is obviously a great way to practice sales. Many Realtors are great at marketing or negotiation, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they can nail it when it comes to sales. The challenge can also help identify star salespeople, even in departments where you might not expect.

What’s to lose?

Bonus points for blogging about the challenge. Show your customers some of the personalities behind your company and celebrate the unsung sales heroes of your team.

When Ross asked Rachel and Chandler (Friends TV show 1994-2004) to move a couch, many of us will never forget his voice inflection and how many times he yelled “PIVOT”! It’s actually a really funny scene and if you’ve never seen it, it might be worth 3.5 minutes of your time. Ross had the best of intentions by starting with a sketch and enlisting help from friends but even that ends up in hilarity as getting his couch into his apartment doesn’t work and he ends up being offered $4 when he tries to return it (stay for the end of the clip).

The best plans and intentions for your business are often met with what the market and customers demand, where technology grows, and where your ROI is the best. You often know that your original plans will grow and evolve, even in the uncertainty and now… a global pandemic.

Many entrepreneurs and small businesses have had to lean on technology to add virtual services (or expand their offerings) to meet our current norm where people are just not out and about like they used to be. Some have seen this work well and others have had to completely re-design their offerings to maintain safe and socially distanced considerations.

The thing is, businesses that have pivoted are being highlighted. But it is also worth looking at what has worked for some businesses that didn’t have to completely shift their strategies in 2020. It is likely that they had to adapt but maybe not a ridiculous Ross-type “pivot” that resulted in a complete failure of the mission.

Harvard Business Review (HBR) shared an incredible article, “You Don’t Have to Pivot in a Crisis” with great insights about what to consider if you think you need to make changes or if you want reassurance you are still on the right track.

HBR shares a powerful thought:

“The lesson here is that when a crisis hits, it pays to resist knee-jerk reactions on how to handle external shocks and ask what is going to work best for your company, based on the particular realities of its business. Ignoring the playbook of rapid cuts plus strategic pivoting can be the smart move… However, staying the course doesn’t mean inaction.”

Here are three thought-starters you may want to consider for your business:

1. What product line or service is best serving your customers right now? Is that one of your strongest and/or could it use some attention?
2. What product line or service is not quite meeting your needs or customer demands at the moment that had seemingly always worked (not forever! Just right now)? For example, in-person gatherings and promotions like events, conferences, trade shows.
3. Is there something you’ve always wanted to explore? And could now be a great time since people want things more virtually? Examples: Selling branded swag, workbooks, content subscriptions, educational webinars.

These are three simple things but could help point you in the right direction of where to focus your time and energy – at least for now. You may not need a complete re-design or to take a new road, it might be some tweaks and adjustments to hang on to what you’ve worked so hard to build.

If you’re a real estate professional looking to take a familial client under your wing, you may be wondering if you’re legally obligated to disclose your relation, and to who.

In general, it’s encouraged that if there is a personal relationship, it is disclosed, however, it is only required if you are a Realtor. The National Association of Realtors states in Article 4 of the NAR Code of Ethics that,

“REALTORS® shall not acquire an interest in or buy or present offers from themselves, any member of their immediate families, their firms or any member thereof, or any entities in which they have any ownership interest, any real property without making their true position known to the owner or the owner’s agent or broker. In selling property they own, or in which they have any interest, REALTORS® shall reveal their ownership or interest in writing to the purchaser or the purchaser’s representative.”

When reading between the lines of industry jargon, we see that this clearly states a Realtor must disclose the relationship as it could be a conflict of interest on either side of the parties’ transaction.

What types of relations must be disclosed?

The NAR’s Code of Ethics says the disclosure relates to immediate family members, but who all is included in this statement may differ depending on state law. The agent can ask the broker for clarification, though it typically includes those related by blood or marriage such as the following:

• Spouses
• Children
• Parents (including in-laws)
• Siblings (including those with adoptive, foster, step-, or half-relationships)

Yet, in some instances, the definition of immediate family can be expanded to the following:

• Grandparents
• Grandchildren
• Aunts and uncles
• First cousins

To cover all bases, it’s best to disclose the relationship early and in writing. Nicholas B. Creel, an assistant professor of accounting and business law at Georgia College and State University in Milledgeville says,

“Listing agents should even consider disclosing this information up front in the MLS.”

In addition, many states include a required written form regarding the disclosure of the relationship to the client, and as Brittney Dale for DH Realty Partners in San Antonio, TX says,

“Disclosure is always the best policy.”