By Cliff Hockley, CCIM, CPM with assistance by Jeremy Boardman
Successful managers reduce time lost to meetings but still get the insight needed to support their teams through implementation of effective KPI dashboards, workflow management systems and task tracking.
One on one meetings with subordinates have been a fixture of team management for many years.
Over time, managers and employees have argued that these weekly meetings take up too much time, especially for a manager who had ten or more direct reports and then had to report to a manager or two as well.
If you include the one-on-one meetings with weekly team and interdepartmental meetings, you wonder if actual work will ever be accomplished?
All these meetings often leave no time to talk to customers, recruit new business or interact with people that can send you business.
It’s a recipe for disaster and as a result unfulfilled managers quit.
Options
As new technology has advanced, managers at all levels have been looking for new systems to reduce meetings and free up more actual work time. This has spawned a new generation of work tracking and communication software to reduce the person to person contact that chews up a lot of our workday.
There might be some exceptions to reducing one-on-one meetings, especially when it involves new hires. Weekly meetings have the greatest impact is during employees’ first three months. Being new and needing training, it makes sense to track training and reinforce good work habits, . create continuity and develop good job tracking habits:
During those early months, a sample agenda may include:
a. Review skills training
b. Review pending and completed projects
c. Ensure understanding of and alignment between job duties and company goals
d. Tie into individual and company one page business plan
e. Discuss and resolve challenges and blockers
f. Calendar weekly, monthly and other recurring tasks and timelines
g. Pulse check: Is the employee happy?
Once the employee has acclimated to their new role, weekly meetings can be replaced with KPI monitoring and exception-based reporting, allowing the manager to focus on deliverables and giving the employee more freedom.
Exception Based System (example)
Friday
Employees submit KPI updates to dashboard and flag any issues or problems (5 minutes)
↓
Monday
Manager reviews dashboard.
↓
Green:
No meeting.
Yellow:
Manager sends a question/message.
Red:
15–30-minute meeting is scheduled.
↓
Monthly
Actual one-on-one focused on:
Skills Development
Performance and additional training needed
Successes & Challenges Nagging problems – advice and direction needed
Alignment with corporate goals and expectations.
Is the new employee alighted with departmental and companywide goals
Additionally, individual one-on-ones are complemented by more frequent team meetings to keep everyone focused on deliverables.
Team meetings
The following KPIs and their variance from established targets should form the core team meeting agenda. A dashboard may help managers and staff more easily identify areas that require attention.
a) Vacancy rate
b) Unit turnovers
c) Lease expirations
d) Delinquency above target
e) Work orders (days open; high priority)
f) Expenses below budget
g) NOI above budget
h) Client escalations
i) Review of leases expiring within 90 days
j) Maintenance backlog
k) How long is it taking to turnover a unit
l) Tenant complaints
m) Communication / Response time stats How long it is taking to get back to a tenant or a client
n) Capital projects on on budget and on schedule and are being planned
o) Insurance/tax issues
With AI, it is relatively easy to create your own dashboard using an AI agent to web fetch from the property management software (high token / data use) or read and parse automated customizable reports, (more efficient; often easier and fewer mistakes / distortion).
Beyond the KPI dashboard, additional team meetings may focus on:
o Department policies
o Best practices
o Interdepartmental updates
o Celebrating group successes and individual wins
To accommodate these systems, you need to implement new tools and procedures.
Tools
It is important to find a workflow or task management tool that is priced reasonably and is easy to use. There are lots of options here but be sure to check what your existing software ecosystem already has, such as Microsoft and Google have solutions that vary from basic to fully featured.
Your property management software might have workflow and task tracking options as well. For example, AppFolio offers robust workflows and project management features.
Additional and alternative SaaS products can complement, and augment office and property management software offers. Popular options include Any. Do, Evernote and ToDoist. Or you can find other ways to manage your tasks..
Summary
Managing your team can be complicated, and you can get stuck “managing by meetings”, which can get in the way of work getting done. Successful managers reduce time lost to meetings but still get the insight needed to support their teams through implementation of effective KPI dashboards, workflow management systems and task tracking.
All of that said, feedback loops are critical to success and meeting with individuals and teams on a recurring basis. Remember you are working with humans and not machines. These humans need regular feedback, so it makes logical sense to still be in reach of your direct reports on a regular basis, even with all of the new tools that can save you time.
Employee problems? Can’t get your department managers to reach their goals? Contact us (503) 267-1909.
Clifford A. Hockley is Principal Broker at SVN | Bluestone, as well as the managing member of Cliff Hockley Real Estate Consulting, LLC. As a Certified Property Manager & Designated Managing Broker, Cliff has 42 years of experience in the brokerage and management of Real Estate companies. Bluestone and Hockley Real Estate Services managed condominium associations, multi-family, and commercial properties in the greater Portland area. He was focused on running the company and involved with investment property brokerage. He worked with financial institutions, governmental agencies, private investors, and not for profit organizations. He also has vast knowledge in budgeting, organizational management, and building structures. His previous experience includes over five years in accounting, production supervision for a manufacturing company, and work for state agencies in California.
Cliff grew Bluestone and Hockley Real Estate Services into a 100 employee company that managed over 2 billion dollars of real estate assets before he sold the company in 2021. He also supervised a sales team of over 15 real estate brokers for over 35 years. His monthly newsletter, QuickFacts has over 2,300 subscribers. He has been involved in numerous real estate transactions that include industrial, retail, office, and multifamily properties. Cliff has also written a book called “Successful Real Estate Investing; Invest Wisely, Avoid Costly Mistakes and Make Money” published by Morgan James Publishing in 2019.
Cliff has successfully coached real estate investors and CEOs located throughout the United States since 2015. He has acted as a sounding board to help untangle knotty issues that need an experienced outside opinion. He guides leaders who find it is “lonely at the top” and need an experienced hand to help set a strategic direction, sort out operational problems and want to talk through challenging business decisions.
He has served as an adjunct professor at Portland State University from 2028 – 2021, teaching classes in: Intro to Real Estate, Basic Real Estate Finance, Property Management as well as Real Estate Investment Fundamentals. He has instructed hundreds of students and believes that substantial preparation and active student engagement are crucial for learning and appreciating the field of real estate. Students appreciate his candor and real-world experience.
Among his many civic activities, Cliff served on the Board of Directors for the Portland Chapter of the Institute of Real Estate Management (IREM) and the Rental Housing Alliance of Oregon. In 2014 he was recognized by IREM as board member of the year, and in 2015 he earned an achievement award in brokerage from SVN International. In the years 2000 & 2003, he was recognized by IREM as Certified Property Manager of the Year.
