Talking or Responding.....

I have noticed over the years that the higher a particular person's work "title" is the more they enjoy talking and the less they understand responding.

I suppose much of this is from feeling they already know all the answers as they have climbed the ladder.

Part of it is probably from getting more accustomed to giving direction rather then receiving it.

Talking is about making a point or statement regardless of what the other members of the conversation are saying. It is about "you." Not about furthering the dialogue.

Responding is about making a point or statement based entirely on what the other members of the conversation are saying. It is about "them." No about your agenda.

Talkers are fairly annoying to communicate with as they are the "know-it-all" types. What you say doesn't matter and these people make that obvious.

Responders on the other hand are very pleasant to speak with as they convey a level of understanding and a desire to learn about you.

Very successful CEO's and other high level Management types never lose the concept of being responders. They may not agree with what you say, but they make you feel as though they understand what your view is. Which is precisely what leaders do. They make decisions, but allow their subordinates to feel good about it.

Fancy high level titles do not make people smart or more special than anyone else. The way they treat the people that work for them does.

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, "How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income," Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!

Sleepy Time Power Down

At what point do you check out mentally?

We all have certain things that we have a genuine non interest in doing, but we have to do them anyway. For the most part, we fight through the apathy of disinterest and do what we have to do. However, there is always that one thing that immediately results in a complete mental shutdown or power down.

• It could be that moment of a particular conversation where you realize the other person is not listening to you.


• It could be that when a particular required task comes up and you don't understand the purpose of it, the task then feels pointless.


• Maybe it's when someone is trying to motivate, but it is way over the top and seems phony.

The problem with the total power down is that sometimes when you tune out mentally, you could miss something substantial.

So how do you stay mentally checked in the majority of the time?

1. Understand that while every task may not be that important, until you are in a position to make changes the task must still be done.


2. When you realize that someone is not listening to you, either stop talking and walk away or ask them why they aren't listening.


3. If some is coming across as the "over" motivator understand they are trying to bring up the level of excitement in an effort to get a better result. If nobody seems to be responding to the message, perhaps a conversation with the person that hired the over motivator is necessary.

I have been guilty of letting myself power down on many occasions in the past, but eventually realized that I was only harming my future productivity by not being in control of my mental awareness.

Is it hard to always be at least marginally tuned in? Yes it is.

But it is worse to check out mentally and miss out on a huge opportunity that you didn't allow yourself to be receptive too.

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, "How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income," Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!

Assumptions are silly

Does everyone know what you know or what you are thinking?

Do you know what everyone else knows or what they are thinking?

I didn't think so.

With that being the case and seemingly very well understood, why is it then, that people are always assuming things about others?

One of the most common ridiculous assumptions is the way people talk. Within any given company there are people that have worked there forever and those that are fairly new. Many of the "old-timers" speak in some foreign code using acronyms and company slang speak all the time, including when they are "teaching" the new folks.

This isn't helping anyone. What happens in many cases, the new person doesn't want to look "stupid" so they will just nod and act like they have some clue as to what is being said, then they go back to their desk or work location and wonder what on earth they should have just learned.

The learning curve actually expands in these scenarios. The new person is trying to learn a new company, new system, new idea, or something else new....they don't need to try and learn a new language at the same time.

• Never assume someone knows the same things that you do.


• Never assume someone knows what you may be thinking at any given moment.


• When explaining things to people you do not know, speak in normal terms...not acronyms.


• When teaching someone something new, periodically ask if your message, "makes sense."

If you really know what you are talking about it is NOT demonstrated effectively in speaking over peoples heads. Your knowledge is ONLY demonstrated in how well it can be communicated and received by another person then put into action by that person.

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, "How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income," Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!

Course Evaluation Forms....Tell the Truth or Not?

Course Evaluation forms are a tricky proposition for many people.

These of course are the forms that an instructor typically hands out at the end of a seminar or training event in an effort to gain some form of feedback.

The actual goal of the form is different though for different trainers or speakers. Most of them ask for honest feedback so they can figure out what to tweak, change, remove, or add to a presentation which is great.

Some just want testimonials so they can add them to a web page or other marketing materials and don't really care to change up their presentation.

Others do it in an effort to simply gain a form of contact information so they can broaden their "network."

Then of course, there are the folks that do a combo of all scenarios.

The kicker is this. Most people fill these forms out in a very polite manner for fear of insulting the presenter. They will write nice things and leave out much of the improvement type feedback altogether.

There is of course, always the few that will totally light you up with negative feedback which also doesn't always help.

The real trick is getting people to submit honest and constructive feedback. That is the only way to really improve a presentation. The ALL positive stuff or ALL negative stuff is not really very helpful.

Next time you fill out one of these forms, be honest in an effort to allow the presenter to grow and improve, but also and perhaps more importantly, so the next presentation that person gives the audience will also benefit.

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, "How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income," Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!

You do WHAT for a living?

I wonder if people enjoy being boring or if they feel they have to be boring to fit their roll...

In any given week, I get a handful of business cards handed to me. The first thing I like to do is look at the picture to see if it looks even marginally like the person that actually handed it to me.

Typically it doesn't, but that is another topic for another day.

The next thing I do is read the "Job Title."

This is where I get the most interested. 99% of the people I meet have a horribly boring job title. When I read it, I immediately have an image in my head of what that persons normal work day must consist of....and truth be told, it makes me very sleepy.

There are lots of discussions out there about spiffing up job title names for various reasons. I'm not interested in creating a title that over inflates what someone does, but certainly there are ways to make you sound more interesting.

I love handing someone a business card and watching their face.

I have a few different cards I use, but one of the has the title of "The Likeability Guy" with a job title of Likeability Expert. The typical response I get is the person looks down, scans the card, then they look at me, then they look down again with a slightly perplexed look with a quasi half grin and they say..."What does a Likeability Expert do?"

BAM! There is my perfect opening. The ultimate ice breaker. The mood is immediately lighter and they are asking me about what I do. I didn't have to just blurt anything out that they weren't interested in.

My job title creates enough interest to where it extends or promotes a new and exciting conversation.

Job titles like the following are boring and illicit no responses or interest from someone else:

• Operations Manager


• Vice President


• CEO


• General Manger


• Team Leader


• Realtor

I could go on forever, but you get the point. Every start up company or small business titles themselves with the same names...it means nothing anymore.

Try something different. Be original. If you want new business or some random person to show interest in you, then you must be creative and exciting. Unless your company offers a true one of a kind can's miss product that everyone must have, you might want to diversify in other ways.

You WANT people to ask you about what you do. It is SO much easier that way.

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, "How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income," Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!

Managing or Empowering?

There are many different kinds of managing styles that get utilized each and every day. But there is one style that gets utilized the least.

Its called Empowerment.

Empowerment is managing to the individual strengths of each member of your team. It means that as a manager, you allow your employees to focus on certain sectors of the organization and allow them the latitude to lead, change, and make important decisions.

It means that as a manager you have total faith that the decisions an employee makes will be the right ones. Basically it means that you are more than just a manager. You are more of a visionary pacesetter that empowers your team to ALL be managers of their own little niches inside the company.

This is a kind of management philosophy that is extremely rare. However, it is the hallmark behind true greatness.

Many managers operate under a different theory.

They believe that it is their responsibility to manage to the weakest team member. What I mean by that is on any given team there is going to be a group of people that can handle almost anything. Then there will be another group of people that probably can do anything, but they lack some form of internal fortitude that promotes self motivation that drives them. Finally, there is a group of people that has a lower skill set and learning capability than the other two groups, but these people typically have a very good attitude and willingness to improve.

Having been a manager in various facets, I always enjoyed the first group that I mentioned and the last group. The middle group of the skilled but not motivated people is what can be frustrating.

So what happens is this. Many managers believe they cannot give certain "freedoms" in decision making to just certain groups for fear it will alienate the other team members. Specifically those that either do not have the knowledge yet, or those that lack the motivation to put the work in to make the best decision.

The theory behind this thinking is understandable. After all, the manager does have an obligation to keep a cohesive team in place that can produce consistent performance.

The inherent problem though is that the group of people you are not catering too is that group of intelligent and motivated people that are also typically your top performers.

Too justify the actions, the manager feels confidant in explaining to their top tier performers why they cannot have certain "freedoms." The manger feels that this group of people is smart enough to understand why they are not allowed to make certain decisions.

It's really more about keeping the peace and attempting to remain consistent.

This is the average cycle for many businesses which is why you see so many average to below average operating companies. They are only working at about half of their real capability, but they don't realize it.

The difference between managing and empowering is that empowerment is NOT about managing anything. It is solely focused on leading.

On any given day, there are many decisions to be made. Some big and some small, but they ALL need to be made.

The job of the visionary pacesetter is to discover and observe the strengths of the team. They need to decide which people should be responsible for what. The key here is about role definition. Ambiguity will lead to confusion and will not be good.

What the Visionary Pacesetter MUST do:

• Each person needs to have a specific core scope of responsibility. No crossover of job tasks amongst the team. This creates a lack of decision making and a lack of that feeling of identifiable responsibility that people need.
• NOT Micro-Manage the new responsibility. Make the decisions you feel are correct and be willing to live with the results. If an individual shows they are not a good decision maker, then re-evaluate their current role.
• In a weekly or regular staff type meeting, recognize those individuals that have shown excellence in their new position.
• Allow the flow of creative "new" thoughts to be recognized and discussed for implementation.

The rewards that you will reap from this philosophy shift will stagger you.

• Production will improve.
• Motivation will improve.
• Attitude will improve.
• Energy will improve.

Anybody can be ordinary and boring. Why not shoot for Extraordinary and fun. There is no rule that says work must be painfully boring and unproductive. Why would you even become a manager if you are just going to implement the exact same processes that the person before you did?

People want to feel important. They want to feel necessary. Be the catalyst that perpetuates the changing of the "old school" of thought. Be a Leader. Be a Visionary Pacesetter.

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, "How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income," Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!

Custom: The REAL Definition

One of the words that is overused to the point of confusing the public is "Custom."

The word Custom is often used in higher end Real Estate or other "perceived" high end products. The word is used by marketers to make consumers feel as though they are going to receive a unique and high quality product.

The problem is that most products including homes are not really custom.

For 99% of people that have ever built a home from a New home building company they had about 6-12 different floor plans they could build, with each home having various other "limited" options to add or enhance. Then, there is a specific amount of lots that person can select from to build the home on in a specific location.

That's not custom. It's ordinary.

• Custom is different


• Custom is unique


• Custom is one-of-a-kind


• Custom is both a product and an experience

Custom is NOT...

Providing the exact same service to ALL your customers. People are ALL different. They learn different, understand different, have different expectations, and feel different.

Saying "no" to your customers more often then saying "yes." Finding a way to say "yes" more often then not is what custom is all about. Custom is about them, not you

Telling your customers "when" they can call you or be able to get in touch with you. If you have a voice message that says when you return phone calls each day or your available hours totally coincide with the normal work hours of your customers, you are NOT custom.

Modeling your business plan after any other company. Most similar type business are copycats. Many home builders use the same philosophies, procedures, rating systems, etc. If you are not original, don't start business.

There is a Custom Home Builder that has been taking the North Texas area by storm. They have figured it out. They are unique. They are On-of-a kind. They are TRUECustom™.

Diamond R Homes does not design your home, pick your lot, or tell you how you will be communicated with.

They will change, tweak, create, or whatever it takes to design the home that you really want. You don't have to settle for a home being 70% of what you want. Diamond R Homes allows you to be 100% exhilarated with YOUR home.

Diamond R Homes does NOT own a slew of lots in any given location. They build on your lot, help you find a lot, and negotiate the acquisition of a lot on your behalf.

The Hallmark behind any great company or product is the manner in which you feel before, during, and after the experience. This, more than anything is the real value behind a TRUECustom™ home. At Diamond R Homes, it is ALL about the Individual customer.

Custom is about experience. It's about caring more about something or someone else before you care about yourself. Diamond R Homes believes that by providing selfless service first, the rest will take care of itself.

It's easy to be ordinary. Choose something Extraordinary.

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, "How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income," Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!