Do you know one of the best ways to be your most productive in your property business? Do you work harder, faster…? It may sound counterintuitive at first but bear with me on this because I think you’ll like it.

In previous blogs I’ve shared the 4 pillars of productivity as they were taught to me: specificity, measurement, deadlines and accountability. [I’ll share the link to it at the bottom if you missed that post]. Just over a week ago I was massively leveraging a holiday departure deadline to crunch through a list before sinking in to a much deserved break. 

Deadline hit and the holiday began, this is where the 5th pillar (or 5th key ingredient for productivity) comes in. 

It’s one that’s often overlooked or not given enough attention. And here it is, the hidden fifth pillar of productivity is PLAY. What we mean by this is completely disconnecting from the busy world of your property business and letting your inner child just play. It’s crucial for your mental state, your family and your business to make time for this stuff. This is where you may need to challenge your current perspective on productivity to put a greater importance on scheduling time for play (whatever your version of play is).

I’ve played full out and been present spending quality time with my wife & kids, parents, siblings and some old friends for the entire 7 days. We’ve laughed, learned, discussed goals and dreams, danced, ate, drank, played games, and of course PLAYED on the snow. We’ve created rich and memorable experiences that are captured in our minds and in the pictures and videos we took. This in itself is crucial to invest time and money to do, as I wrote about in a post titled ‘THE 4 KEY THINGS SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE SPEND THEIR MONEY ON’ – no.4 being that they invest in memorable and inspiring experiences.

When I checked my screentime app on the phone I’d only clocked up 14 hours of screen time on my phone for the 7 days I was away and over 10 hours  of that was used for taking and sharing photos (of us all having fun on the slopes) within our family whatsapp group. I had 1 business call with Chris (business partner) and reviewed/responded to emails for less than an hour across the entire week.

So what’s the benefit of all this and why is making time for play is so important for productivity?

• Disconnected time away from the business actually makes you hungry to get back into producing mode and working at being the highest leverage version of yourself in moving your business forward. I can honestly say I’m hungry to get back to business.
• Having let the proverbial ‘inner child’ out to play I can happily put the head down and focus on the hard work for another 90 day sprint without feeling frustrated or the higher risk of procrastination had I not taken time out.
• Changing up my environment and routine for a week has removed me from the day to day blinkers and made way for some creative thinking thanks to inspiring sights and new conversations- for example it’s reconnected me to a big goal Chris and I have to build a spectacular ski chalet where we can host mastermind retreats and gift holidays to causes that are close to our hearts – like families dealing with illnesses can come away to create wonderful memories.
• I’ve continued to feed the virtuous cycle – ie when we spend money on experiences for loved ones it not only creates wonderful memories but it inspires us at a different level to continue to produce results and create a life we are proud of for our family.

I’d encourage you all to be intentional about scheduling time for PLAY, even better, share with us what play you have planned.

Link to post on 4 pillars of productivity: http://adaeroproperty.com/week-11-leveraging-the-power-of-deadlines-and-the-3-other-pillars-of-productivity/

Link to post on the 4 non-negotiables:

THE 4 KEY THINGS SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE SPEND THEIR MONEY ON

Does anyone love property paperwork? Whilst some do, I’m imagining it will be very few. 

There is so much about property that is just fantastic, from the value we can add to the end users of it, the joy of creating the end product, the jobs and wealth it creates….and so much more. 

However, one thing we can’t avoid is the admin that comes with it. And the more property you have, the more paperwork you have – utilities bills, business rates forms, refinance applications, planning related admin, legal paperwork for purchases, invoices from trades people, forms, forms and more forms. 

At every stage in the value chain from buying, financing, holding, building, managing and selling, there will be a pile of paperwork that we have to work through and keep on top of. 

Seeing how much paper mail a property business owner receives could put you off, but it shouldn’t have to. The benefits of property far outweigh the admin burden 😊 

So I’m curious, have you tamed the ‘property admin beast’? 

I can’t say that I have ‘mastered’ my admin per se but I’ve certainly come a long way in the last few years and figuring out how to be a higher leveraged version of myself (i.e. by delegating lower value tasks and focusing on higher value tasks) is a key theme of this year. 

Here are 2 key things I’m working on which may be helpful for others – 1 mindset thing and 1 tactical thing:

THING #1 – THE MINDSET TOWARDS ADMIN

A recent conversation with a coach I have gave me a real ah-ha moment and reframe that is serving me well. This is what came up in our conversation – the goal is not to be an admin superhero and get it all done everyday. Instead it’s about finding a way to feel good about NOT doing it all because you’re confident that you’re not missing anything.

So, it figures then that in order to feel confident about not missing anything, you need some sort of system and/or person in place. 

THING #2 – A SIMPLE SYSTEM

When it comes to the mountains of paper mail that I get, here’s the simple system that I’m experimenting with right now. 

-paper mail comes in and is sorted into 3 filing trays labeled as follows:

• Top tray is ‘TODAY’
• 2nd tray is ‘NEXT WEEK’
• 3rd tray is ‘NOT URGENT’

Then it comes down to the execution, so lets say I have 1 item in the ‘TODAY’ tray, the night before I need to schedule time in the diary to get it done. At the end of each day I am forming a habit to quickly review the progress of the ‘TODAY’ admin item – if it’s not fully done, it stays in and more time needs to be scheduled tomorrow. 

If it’s fully completed I need to move something else up, so scan what’s in the ‘NEXT WEEK’ tray and pick the 1-2 things I might want in the ‘TODAY’ tray for tomorrow. Once again, a little time needs to be scheduled in the diary or it ain’t gonna happen. And so the merry dance begins again with the aim. 

The key thing for me mentally is not to feel overwhelmed by seeing a pile of open mail with no order, or worry about missing a deadline for something important. 

So, this is what I’ve been trialing and have to say I quite like it.

How do you master your property admin?

Don’t know about you but I like to keep an eye out for what people at the top of their industries are saying, especially when it’s property related. 

In this post I’m sharing with you the 4 types of hotel offering that are expected to survive and thrive in the new post pandemic market. Why is that important to you? Well, as many of us are in the hospitality space through serviced accommodation, it’s important to understand what the wider accommodation market is doing and how other property related businesses are pivoting to be and stay profitable. 

So where have these insights come from? This week an article about Ian Schrager caught my interest – he’s the guy behind the famous Studio 54 nightclub and referred to as the inventor of the boutique hotel. What I didn’t realise is that few people have had as big an impact on popular culture as it relates to the entertainment, hospitality, food and beverage, retail and residential industries, as Schrager. His pioneering concepts and innovations with bars, hotels and various residential developments have become standards and continue to be imitated around the world. 

That’s why I paid attention to what I was reading. 

When asked, “What does the future hold for the travel industry?’ Ian Schrager responded with, “It will come roaring back – a V-shaped recovery”. However he also said that, “Only four different, distinct types of hotels will survive in the new post-pandemic market.”

The four types are:

#Type1: AFFORDABLE HOTELS – because family and corporate budgets will be squeezed.

Here are some notes from his predictions and comments:

-new hotel brands will leverage changes in consumer behaviour during lockdown to reduce hotel prices

-they will do away with restaurants and provide room service via remote “ghost” kitchens that have sprung up to service food delivery apps like Deliveroo and Just Eat. 

-housekeeping will be cut back

-the hostel market will boom

It is in this space that Schrager is investing heavily in launching a new mixed use offering called PUBLIC

#Type 2: THE BOUTIQUE HOTEL

He says it won’t just be about nice design alone. ‘You need to have an original point of view and stand for something contemporary, innovative, like we did at Studio 54.”

#Type 3: SUPER LUXURY – ie full service hotels for the one-percenters.

He says, ‘you’re going to start seeing people regularly paying $10,000-15,000 a night for nothing but the best level of service.”

#Type 4: AIRBNB – not a hotel of course but the short stay rental model is continuing to eat at market share from traditional hotels. 

Knowing this, he says the best way for hotels to compete with home-renting offerings “is to continue to innovate and focus on public space, which airbnb cannot offer”.

It is for this reason that his new offering at PUBLIC, he prioritises communal areas to work and relax – ie a coffee bar, restaurant, grocery store, nightclub, garden, gym and an outdoor bar. The writer of the article paints a great picture with this summary – ‘think Starbucks meets Studio 54, meets Whole Foods, meets WeWork, meets the local park’.

I certainly found all of this interesting. Most of us use these different types of accommodation and many people in the property community are investing in old hotels to repurpose them. So, we may well be consumers of these mixed use concepts or we might want to borrow ideas like this to apply to our own mixed use developments.

What have you read recently from an industry leader that has relevance to your property business?

The topic of decision making is a crucial one, and a process none of us can avoid. Whether it be deciding what to cook or what property strategy to commit to, it’s something we all face, everyday. And in many cases, arriving at a decision can be a painful process. 

Winston Churchill referred to decision making as ‘the long road of agony’- that agony being the period before deciding should I or shouldn’t I, this path or that path. 

I first wrote this post a year ago when inspired by a Darren Daily message – at that time I was deciding on and mapping my quarterly project plans for my 2021 property goals. Recent conversations with many property entrepreneurs has reminded me how many decisions we continue to face at the various stages of starting and growing our property businesses. That is why I thought sharing these 4 filters again would be a helpful guide. I do hope it proves to be.

I’m a firm believer in investing significant time over December and January (or whenever you choose to punctuate a year end) to do the heavy mental work of decision making about what you want for your year ahead, and to create the implementation plan behind it. Doing this in advance prevents you from beginning a week mid quarter wondering what to focus on. 

Darren Hardy said ‘more failure has been caused by indecision than by poor decision’, and his mentor before him, Jim Rohn, is quoted as referring to indecision as ‘the great thief of opportunity’. Don’t let indecision be the ‘thief of opportunity’ when it comes to your property business. 

So, whether it be arriving at a strategic decision for your property business, or addressing more in the moment questions, here are FOUR powerful filters to help you make great decisions quickly and easily (I’m going to paraphrase my notes I took from Darren’s video, so all credit to him for this). 

FILTER #1: MINOR OR MAJOR

We need to quickly discern whether a decision is a minor one or major one because way too much time is taken up with minor decisions. For example, what food to eat or what family movie to watch from the thousands on Netflix (or is that just with my kids in our house?). So to cut through the minor stuff quickly, ask yourself this:

-5 years from now, will this decision have significantly altered my life?

If it’s a no then its a minor, so decide and move quickly on as wasting any more time deliberating WILL alter your life 🙂

FILTER #2: COST OR WORTH

I love this one, and it’s particularly relevant for what might be investments in yourself. Darren reminds us that we need to be asking ourselves – ‘How much does this decision cost, not in money today, but in subtraction from your overall wealth?’ To put that into context he gives the example using compound interest that £1 today will be roughly worth £5 to me 20 years from now.  If an item costs me £50 it really costs me £250 in future wealth. So that’s the actual cost side. 

But we also need to evaluate what something is WORTH ie not what does this book cost, but what could it be worth to me through applying it? Not, what does this course cost, but what could it be worth to my future, my wealth, my health, my ability to positively impact and be of value to others? Getting clear on that completely changes the equation.

So to help with your cost v worth purchase decisions:

-first recalculate the maths of the cost by increasing it by 5 times, then recalibrate the worth because sometimes the worth skyrockets beyond the cost and sometimes not. That’s what you’ll need to figure out. 

So for example the cost of renewing an older but functional consumer item is something where the cost will likely outweigh the worth. However with something like a specific course or mentorship, where the cost today feels high, with commitment to implementing said course/mentorship actions, the worth will far exceed the cost. I’ve actively invested in personal development, courses and mentorship for years and the real terms worth (ie equity, income streams, value I can add to others)  from having implemented what I’ve learned far far surpasses the cost. 

FILTER #3: WISH OR GLAD

I learned this one a few years ago and it’s been incredibly powerful in helping our family make decisions. Ask yourself, 

“Years from now, am I more likely to say, I wish I hadn’t or I’m glad I did?”

The answer will hit you clearly and quickly. Jeff Bezos referred to this as regret minimisation- during an interview with Business Insider he said,

“When you think about the things that you will regret when you’re 80, they’re almost always the things that you did not do. They’re acts of omission. Very rarely are you going to regret something that you did that failed and didn’t work or whatever,”

So ask yourself, when I’m 80 years old will I regret not trying to start or scale a property investing business? Or will I regret having tried property strategy XYZ?

This question takes your mind away from the bits of short term daily confusion and turns a seemingly difficult question into a very easy one, because your 80 year self clearly tells you what you wouldn’t want to have regrets about having tried or not tried. 

FILTER #4: GOOD WOLF OR BAD WOLF

This final filter relates to the Cherokee folklore tale that Darren has shared many times before- we each have 2 wolves living inside of us; one is the best of who we are ie our core values, our best selves when it comes to character, love, kindness etc; the other is the worst of who we are ie our fears, doubts and needy ego desperate for acceptance. 

So the question to ask ourselves is this:

-”What choice would my good wolf make?”

Essentially that’s evaluating the decision through the filter of your best self, both now and in terms of who you want to become.

CONCLUSION

Either one of those filters on their own, or maybe even a combination of them will help you make decisions quickly, easily and without guilt or anxiety.

Circling back to that opening quote from Winston Churchill about agony, he concluded by saying, 

“Once the decision is made all the agony goes away”. 

It’s the indecision that causes the agony, not the decision itself.

So, which of those filters can help you with a decision you’re facing in your property business now?

So here we are 6 weeks into 2022 already, half way through Q1!  This last week was dedicated to masterminding so checking progress on people’s Q1 goals and holding them to account was the order of the week. 

All too often, human behaviour around this time of year follows a typical pattern -the intended good practices with exercise and business goals can slip away by February. As property entrepreneurs working towards lofty goals this year, we definitely don’t want to succumb to that. So, if you’re interested in making sure your good intentions for your property business don’t dissipate, here are 12 questions to check in on yourself. I learned these from Darren Hardy a few years ago and after having noted them in my journal I check in on them periodically. I hope you can benefit from asking these of yourself also.

HERE ARE THE 12 QUESTIONS TO CHECK IF YOU ARE DOING WHAT YOU KNOW YOU SHOULD TO GROW YOUR PROPERTY BUSINESS

[the short sentences in the parentheses highlight the reason for the question and highlight harsh truths that may be going on inside your head, hopefully not however]

#1: Do I have a weekly calendar with slots booked for my most valuable property business priorities, before each new day starts? [so I can create rather than react]

#2: Do I allow too many interruptions during the day from friends, family, customers, prospects, team members to interrupt my flow and deep concentration work? [because it’s a welcome relief from the hard work of creating and finishing something]

#3: Do I talk a lot, extending conversations into longer chit chats when unnecessary? [because it’s seemingly justifiable to delay the hard work of creating]

#4: Do I multi-task? [even though I know it reduces my intellectual ability and causes me stress and anxiety]

#5: Do I love the adrenalin buzz of being overly busy? [in order to feel a sense of importance and self esteem even though it’s at the demise of my actual productivity]

#6: Is living in chaos and constant motion more comfortable to me than stilling my mind and single tasking? [because I might fear to be alone with my own thoughts]

#7: Do I find it really difficult to say no? [because I am too needy for approval and lack the self confidence to stick to my own priorities]

#8: Do I often find myself in a crunch to finish projects because I’m in over my head? [because I allow myself to be everyone else’s whipping boy/girl and don’t protect my own priorities]

#9: Do I spend hours needlessly on social media? [to escape and distract me from what’s most important]

#10: Do I waste time doing repetitious, non-vital and inessential tasks? [because I haven’t put systems in place to automate or eliminate]

#11: Do I maintain control of nearly everything because I believe no one else can do it as well? [which makes me an egotistical and delusional narcissist]

#12: Do I believe I can’t afford to hire someone to help me? [because I don’t actually value my time, my family and my health appropriately]

You might be thinking woah- those questions can be quite harsh and cutting (that’s what I thought the first time I saw them). They are, but answering them for ourselves will only serve to help by shining a light on what we need to keep us progressing in an optimal way. For me personally, I’m consciously working on actions related to questions 10 and 11 (this time last year I worked on and improved areas 4, 7 and 10). 

Which question(s) have prompted some proactive refining work on your part?

I don’t know about you, but the idea of consuming a book a week has always sounded great to me, yet it’s not something I’ve ever actually done, or even got near to doing.

I love personal development books covering topics like high performance, wealth creation and entrepreneurship, so naturally the thought of being able to consume 52 books a year of those subjects is very appealing. Just think of all the wisdom one could absorb from 52 of the top business and personal development books. Does that appeal to you too?

Well, reflecting on my learning habits over the last few years I can see a pattern emerging. Whilst I love the idea of a book a week, the reality is that I only actually read/listen to a handful of books a year! However, with the books that resonate with me, I go deep with them and really do them justice. My phone and journals are full of notes I take from the few books a year I commit to. I will listen to a book two or three times and do so with the intention and commitment of implementing key ideas into our businesses.

Here are a few books from the last few years that I’ve read/listened to twice or more, taken copious notes on, and applied to our businesses.

2019 PROFIT FIRST by Mike Michalowicz

I love the simplicity of the core concept in this book – it’s really about allocating income into a few ‘pots’ to ensure that ‘profit is a habit, not an event’. So every month you get into a habit of putting set percentage allocations from the overall monthly revenue into the following pots:

PROFIT

OWNER’s COMPENSATION

OPERATING EXPENSES

TAX

Such a simple system, but do many actually do it? We implemented this across all of our company bank accounts and keep a monthly spreadsheet tracker for it too. I can’t tell you how satisfying it’s been to see the money in each pot neatly allocated each month and know you have everything covered, especially the profit and income piece 😊

2020 – PERSONALITY ISN’T PERMANENT by Dr Benjamin Hardy

I’ve always been fascinated with psychology and this book introduced me to and validated so many concepts that resonated with me. Concepts to do with goal setting, with reframing failure, progress and confidence, and much more. One of the lasting takeaways for me was wrapping my head around the concept of your future self, and investing time to design your future self so that you can experience a better present.

I went on to read, digest and action a lot more from Benjamin Hardy and his work on the future self has helped me enormously in my goal setting and day to day implementation in our property businesses. The wisdom from the book has also equipped me to better mentor people I work with in property masterminds. 

2021 – WHO NOT HOW by Dan Sullivan and Dr Benjamin Hardy

Here’s the book summarised in 3 core lessons:

1. Ask yourself “who can help me accomplish this?” instead of “how am I going to get this done?”
2. Getting the right ‘Whos’ in your life will free up your time.
3. You will make more money when you find Whos to complete your Hows.

This book really did start to shift my thinking in 2021 and it influenced us by either hiring more people into our team or finding additional professionals for our property power team. The key themes are carrying through strongly into this year too as most of my time in the first quarter is focused on people i.e. the ‘who’s’.

2022 – OVERSUBSCRIBED by Daniel Priestly

I am only half way through this book but I absolutely love how the author frames his points around the key concepts in the book, which is essentially all about making the supply and demand relationship work for you. 

This book is industry agnostic but very quickly, property people will start to see how the concepts can be applied to their property businesses, whether that be in relation to finding JV investors, recruiting team members or marketing campaigns. 

It’s still early days with this book but I’m excited about drawing out the nuggets and applying them to our businesses. 

In closing, I couldn’t write an article about applying the wisdom from books and not mention the book I wrote in late 2019. The concepts and D-I-C-E model I wrote about in PREDICTABLE PROPERTY PROFITS (https://www.amazon.co.uk/PREDICTABLE-PROPERTY-PROFITS-GUESSWORK-CERTAINTY/dp/1527253732)  covers our story from SA failure to success and it shares the investment and business philosophy we live by year on year. 

What about you – what wisdom from books have you intentionally applied to your property business?

This post highlights the importance of aligning your weekly priorities with your property and business strategy depending on where you are on your investor/business owner journey, and where you want to go. 

We are already at the end of January and while everyone will have big dreams for 2022 and beyond, it’s wise to be clear on how our weekly priorities are aligning with the bigger picture. 

To help emphasise the point I’m making and paint a visual picture, I’ll borrow these wise words from Stephen Covey – 

“If the ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step we take just gets us to the wrong place faster.”

Had I not invested the deep thinking time to thoroughly consider and discuss with Chris what we want and why, that could have been us starting the year with the ladder not leaning against the right wall.

Here’s a bit of context:

Towards the end of last year part of me was thinking that we needed to scale our SA business and hire the right team that will help us do this. In other words an investment now in a bigger team for a future payoff of bigger revenue and bigger profits. But why would we want to scale our SA business to be even bigger when it’s already successful and profitable and generating consistent good cash flow?

Would we just be adding more ‘noise’ to our lives by having more properties and more associated operations for a little extra profit? Is that what we really want?

Quite fortuitously, I listened to a podcast on business strategy one morning in the gym at the start of January.  Hearing that solidified my thinking on strategy for the year ahead and I instantly felt lighter about the decision NOT to scale big. I had clarity of thought on how we would prioritise our activities to align with the bigger wealth creation strategy. 

The gist of the message that helped confirm my thinking was acknowledging that once a cash flow business is serving it’s purpose i.e. covering overheads and paying for living expenses then there’s no point wasting any more time on it. That may sound counter intuitive but it’s incredibly liberating.

Anyone who has a trading business knows that whilst they are great for providing monthly income, they come with an amount of proverbial ‘noise’. In other words things like managing customers and suppliers, staff, operations etc etc. 

We set up a great wee SA business in 2017 and have gradually grown it, predominantly with R2R and a handful of owned properties. It has taught us a huge amount about combining property investing with entrepreneurship and business. 

Trading businesses in property might be R2R for SA or HMO, property management or sourcing for example…typically something where we exchange a degree of time for a decent sized cash flow that replaces any need to have a job. This is the logical first step for anyone looking for property to replace employed income in a relatively short period, and without a significant capital pot to invest in multiple BTLs. 

One can carry on running a trading business for years, and for many that may be the desired end game. However if the bigger vision is serious long term wealth, and time freedom then at some point there needs to be a conscious focus on creating large profit events that provide the funds to invest in multiple assets that provide growing equity and passive income. 

MJ DeMarco describes a similar process in his book Millionaire Fastlane where he talks about first creating a ‘Business System’ (ie your primary income source from your main entrepreneurial endeavour) that pays your income and feeds into a ‘Money System’ (ie a way to earn interest off your capital) which eventually takes over the need to run a business. I’ve summarised DeMarco’s WEALTH CALCULATION in a past blog post here and I recommend you check it out to figure out your own property wealth calculation, its a fun and essential exercise.

Figure out your property wealth calculation here:

YOUR PROPERTY WEALTH CALCULATION

Back to my point -whilst Chris and I have been slowly building up the asset base alongside running the trading business, the clarity came that this is where our focus needs to be – prioritising time on longer term projects that have the options of delivering big profit when sold and serious equity and long term passive income when held.

With clarity and focus we can move forwards with conviction and confidence, without second guessing or FOMO. Most importantly we can set priorities that align with our wealth strategy. 

So, instead of trying to double our SA business, which would have been incongruent with our bigger picture, we can instead focus on the longer term projects. We have an exciting land development project kicking off now and once that’s ticking along we will be able to allocate some focus on pipelining the next multi-unit development. 

What are you currently prioritising?

I shared a message this week in a power hour coaching call that was so well received I wanted to re-share it here. 

This is a reframe that will help you figure things out along your property journey, helping you become the type of property entrepreneur/investor you want to be, with the results you want to have. 

The original inspiration came from Darren Hardy talking about a ‘no fail resolution’ for hitting your goals this year. I’m borrowing his words and applying them to me in property, and those reading this can choose to do the same. 

Here’s the cut through message for what we all have to do in order to hit our goals….

“STOP thinking about what you need to do (that’s when you get lost in tactics and overwhelm), instead FOCUS on WHO you need to BE.”

That’s it! That’s the big takeaway. I could end the post here because living that sentence holds so much power. However, I want to elaborate further and focus this on property for as many people reading this to benefit as possible. 

The follow up sentence to the one above from Darren that really hit me was, 

‘WHAT YOU NEED TO DO BECOMES SO MUCH CLEARER WHEN YOU LOOK AT IT THROUGH THE LENS  OF WHO YOU NEED TO BE.”

I find the more I digest content in the personal development space, the more I recognise patterns and similarities coming from different leaders, it might just be packaged up a little differently. There’s a psychologist I follow called Dr Benjamin Hardy, no relation to Darren, who’s work on FUTURE SELF ties into this message so I’ll weave in some insights from him too. 

Without going into lengthy detail, the reason why this focus on WHO you need to BE is so powerful is because it taps deep into our psychology at an identity level. Dr Hardy explains that ‘our IDENTITY is defined as the way you explain yourself, and that informs your behaviour.’ This explains why when we can get clear on the future identity we want for ourselves, our behaviour in the present will be driven by our future self. 

Dan Sullivan, a leading coach to Entrepreneurs has a great quote which goes, 

“The only way to make your present better is by making your future bigger”.

So, if you’re serious about hitting your big hairy audacious property goals, here’s the big question you all need to answer-

WHO IS YOUR FUTURE SELF (AS IT RELATES TO PROPERTY INVESTING AND PROPERTY BUSINESS), AND WHAT IS THE IDENTITY YOU WANT TO DRIVE YOUR BEHAVIOUR?

So top help with that, here are some prompts to work through – think of the best property investor/entrepreneur version of you. Imagine it, picture it, then ask yourself:

*How would you show up on a day to day basis? (think of all the property related activities, interactions and conversations)

*What attributes and characteristics would you demonstrate?

*How would you walk, talk, dress?

*How would you prepare for meetings, viewings, phone calls? (think through contact with everyone from agents to investors and more)

*How would you analyse property opportunities?

*How would you arrive at investment decisions?

*When you sit down to work, how focused and disciplined would you be?

*What annual, quarterly, monthly, weekly and daily routines and rituals would you have in place?

*How would you structure and allocate your time?

*What would you measure and how would you hold yourself accountable?

*What standards would you set for yourself?

*Who would be on your team to help you achieve your desired results?

“Our view of our future is actually the thing driving who we are today.’

To summarise the actions that can be taken from this post, here’s a great set of 5 steps from Dr Benjamin Hardy:

1.  Decide who you want your future self to be

2.  Do what your future self would do NOW 

3.  Start telling people who your future self is

4.  Start investing money in your future self

5.  Measure the gain, not the gap

My closing takeaway for you is quite simply to decide who you want your future property self to be and then……

ACT NOW LIKE THE KIND OF PROPERTY INVESTOR/ENTREPRENEUR YOUR ARE STRIVING TO BECOME!

Will 2022 be your best year yet? Will it be the year that you create positive lasting change?

If, like me, this is what you continuously strive for each year then you’ll want to read and implement the message in this post. 

I wish I could say the 3 magic words came from me but alas, they did not. Here, all credit is due to big Tony Robbins. What I’d like to do is share his message with people in property – and I’m confident that for those people who resonate with this message, you will take these 3 magic words and make great things happen this year……and well beyond. 

Are you ready for the 3 magic words? Here you go……

For lasting positive change……RAISE YOUR STANDARDS

If we want to change our life for the better, the foundations and key component of making that happen is to raise our standards.

What does that actually mean?

Tony reminds us that, “ lasting change is different from a goal, people don’t always get their goals, but they do always get their standards”.

To frame standards another way, everybody in life gets their ‘musts’, they don’t always get their ‘shoulds’. 

If you think about it, everyone has a list of things that they ‘should do’, especially property investors ie I ‘should’ find more deals to analyse, I ‘should’ network more, I ‘should’ work to a clear set of investment criteria, I ‘should’ plan my week/day before it starts, I ‘should’ speak to more commercial agents….

You get the idea, however the ‘shoulds’ rarely happen. 

BUT when you decide something is an absolute MUST for you, no excuses, you commit to yourself that you will find a way or make a way, that’s when we really can find a way and make things happen. 

Is there an area in your life where you need to shift a ‘should’ to a ‘must’?

Here’s the powerful thing at play when we make a ‘should’ a ‘must’ – it doesn’t require any willpower. Tony explains that when we commit to a must it becomes part of our identity and the powerful force at play is that human beings absolutely follow through on who they believe they are. In other words, ‘we all act consistent with who we believe we are’.

‘The strongest force in the whole human personality is this need to stay consistent with how we define ourselves’.

That line there is gold, read it again and think about it. 

Who do you believe you are? What kind of property investor/entrepreneur do you believe you are and define yourself as?

If you define yourself as the kind of property entrepreneur who only deserves to do small single unit deals, or the kind who tells themselves I can’t source rent to rent deals then guess what, that’s where you’ll be stuck. 

Most people are living their lives based on the standards and beliefs they made choices about at some point in the past

Whatever people have their identity attached to, they live – ‘we live who we believe we are’.

OK, so now you know the 3 magic words, how do you apply these in your life and in your property business?

You need to decide what your standards are for important areas of your life, and back those standards up with rituals.

We don’t get results without rituals ie some sort of action that we do consistently.

The people who get these rituals done each week don’t have more time than anyone else, they’ve just made it a MUST. 

So as an example, physically – if your standard is ‘I am an athlete’ then you will do whatever is necessary to maintain that identity and your ritual will be to complete certain workouts X number of times per week. 

Another example:

For me as a property entrepreneur & investor, one of my standards is to raise my hourly rate from my 2021 level. So the ritual to back that up will be to identify lower value elements of tasks I currently do and delegate or outsource them, and to consciously ask myself – ‘is this thing I’m working on at the level of my target rate?’ (Thanks for the awesome podcast on that Dan)

‘Wants don’t get met consistently, standards do.’

So, here’s a quick 3 step summary for you to action:

1. Define your standards
2. Stack up your reasons why those standards need to be a must for you
3. Create and design weekly and daily rituals that deliver your standards

I’d love to hear, what STANDARDS will you set for yourself starting now.

If you followed my post last week on ‘Intelligent Reflection’ then you will have neatly put a metaphorical ‘bow’ on 2021. In other words, the point of last week’s post was to highlight the fact that there is so much value in what you have done, experienced and accomplished in the last 12 months that you need to go harvest that gold through intelligent reflection. 

If you missed that post and want to go back you can find it here: 

THIS 6 PART REFLECTION PROCESS WILL SUPERCHARGE YOUR ANNUAL GOAL SETTING

WARNING: This post requires some heavy mental lifting but if you’re serious about your growth this year then read it to the end, and more importantly, take action on it. 

So, with the reflection bit done, the natural next step is to follow up with some deep thinking around setting the right kind of goals for YOU, and creating an implementation plan for them. That’s what I’m going to outline here.

So, what do I mean by the ‘right kind of goals for YOU?” Well, before jumping in to write out your goals, please be clear in your mind that they are psychologically optimised goals that are congruent ie your conscious and unconscious mind are aligned in relation to the goals you set. Getting this right at the beginning is essential!

By way of quick explanation, if you were to set the goal of doubling the revenue of your business, on the face of it that sounds great but what would the reality of that mean, and what would be the secondary and tertiary consequences of pursuing it? Eg. would it mean working twice as many hours, sacrificing weekends with your family, less sleep, more stress? Or can you genuinely see how to accomplish the outcome on your terms. 

All I’m saying is just be careful to choose goals that are aligned with what you really want. This quote from Stephen Covey captures my point perfectly:

“If the ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step gets us to the wrong place faster.”

In the goal setting process it’s easy to get excited in the now by writing down a big goal but the science of achievement requires us to connect the dots between a Big Hairy Audacious Goal (BHAG) and what exactly we need to be working on quarter to quarter, month on month and how we’re using our time each day.

The big rationale behind artful implementation is to take the time to do strategic planning now so that at no time during the quarter are you at the desk on a Monday morning wondering what to do to get started (or at least it will be significantly minimised).

An implementation plan prevents that brain fog, but sadly investing the time to create such a plan is the most common part of goal setting that people skip. But not YOU, and not this year! It’s often looked at as too much like hard work-  and you know what, it is hard mental work! Most good things do require some uphill struggle, but it’s also where we can get most clarity. I heard a brilliant quote a while back from one of the greats that ties into this point, it goes;

“People have uphill hopes, but downhill habits”

– John C Maxwell

In other words, we all want the things that require ‘uphill’ efforts, but are we willing to put in the work that builds the ‘uphill habits’ that will get us there?

You need to take your big 2022 goals and translate them into a project plan. This part of the process is uncomfortable, which is why people skip it but having a well thought through plan will keep you aligned, in the zone and knowing what you have to do next. BHAGs don’t manifest on their own, it takes real intentional work to dream them up, plan the road map, and then of course execute on that plan.

Here’s a quick summary of the process for artful goal implementation that I’ve been taught and continue to use each year. (Chris and I do invest multiple hours in goal planning in the opening days of Jan)

IT’S TIME TO BUILD THE FOUNDATION OF YOUR YEAR!

STEP #1: List your key projects

Taking everything into account, list 5-20 projects that would have an immediate impact on your property business. With this list you are thinking up all the growth driving activities that move you closer to achieving the BHAG (ie various strategies and tactics you want to try that would/could result in a net positive to the business).

STEP #2: Now eliminate all but 3, and ask yourself:

– are you able to complete each of those shortlisted 3 in a 12 week period if you focused on one at a time (ie allocate each project a full 12 week sprint)?

– can you complete these with your current resources ie time, people, money?

– prioritise those projects that can feasibly meet the above

STEP #3: BUILD THE OUTLINE PLAN

Now for each project, build the outline for your implementation plan by completing a handful of answers to these 4 foundational productivity questions:

For project 1

#1 What specifically needs to happen…to get started? To continue? To finish? Can you specify now what your completion point will look like (really push yourself to do that)?

#2 How can you measure progress along the way? (ie no. of viewings/offers per week. Booking revenue, occupancy by month..) When answering these questions think about what can be ritualised/repeated by you and/or your team. Think about the input activity required to achieve the desired property outcome.

#3 What deadlines need to happen within 12 weeks? Think it through and allocate deadlines you can put into your diary (and physically PUT those deadlines into your diary). These will serve as milestones and checkpoints towards your completion point and get your mind clear on hitting them by certain dates.

#4 How can you stack multiple layers of accountability onto this project. In other words, who all can you inform, involve, make a pledge to etc that will help you follow through on your promise. Think mentors, family, advisors, peers. It’s a fact that getting things done is a social phenomenon so enlist the power of public declaration. 

Do the same for Projects 2 and 3. It’s a good idea to have no more than 3 projects in a quarter, and if one is particularly all consuming then stick with just that one project for the entire 90 days.

STEP #4: 12 WEEK PROJECT PLAN

The final stage to this is creating your 12 week project plan where you literally create a grid with 84 days and then populate it with dates, specifics and deadlines (as per your answers to the Q’s above) to work to each day and week. Schedule this stuff in using the mechanisms that work for you, phone, outlook calendar, a wall chart or whatever. Allocate sufficient time and protect it in your diary.

And there you have it. With clarity on what your goals are and your planning complete, now its all about taking action consistently each week, measuring the progress and feeling good about showing up to put the effort in. [HINT – one of the keys to sustained productivity is feeling good about what you do. So please don’t look at what didn’t get done or how far your dream lies in the distance, instead show up, put the effort in each week and celebrate that step of effort input and the progress it creates]. 

I’d love to know if you complete this exercise, let me know if you do and you will massively increase the likelihood of following through. 

To your growth and progress in 2022!