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JAMES HARRIS – THE STAR OF BRAVO’S MILLION DOLLAR LISTING LOS ANGELES

Having one expert educate you about your profession and life in general is already fantastic. Having two of them in one session is infinitely more amazing.

The GREATER PROPERTY GROUP Mastermind Meeting was lucky enough to have real estate greats Ricky Blair and James Harris in one session.

Blair founded one of the most innovative real estate companies in London. He had since sold the company and is now in North America bringing his brand of mentorship through Platform Seven.

GREATER PROPERTY GROUP, through Managing Partner David Morrell, also announced its partnership with Platform Seven to mentor the real estate agents to unlock their potential through knowledge and new skills.

Harris was also excited for the partnership as he, too, is being mentored by Blair, which was quite ironic at first because the Bond Street Partners co-founder never liked the idea of having a mentor.

Harris stars in the Bravo reality show Million Dollar Listing Los Angeles, which showcases his talent for closing high-end real estate deals.

Blair and Harris shared what they learned during the pandemic and gave new real estate agents advice on how to navigate the post-pandemic industry.

“What I did to stay focused was to stay relevant, and by staying relevant I stayed busy, and by staying busy I stayed consistent. You have to think outside the box and be creative,” said Harris.

“Every day, every week, and every month, the world is changing. You just need to adapt and pivot,” said Blair.

Harris and Blair, who obviously have mutual respect for each other, shared a lot of insights into the real estate industry during the Mastermind Meeting.

Here are some of the topics we covered:

1:45 – 6:39: Perspective on 2020 and what did you do to stay focused?

James Harris (JH):The biggest and most important thing that I did–instead of looking at COVID as a vacation or downtime, it was a time to actually restructure and reorganize.

Ricky Blair (RB): It was a year of adapting, changing, and pivoting.

7:20 – 10:44: What can you say to the struggling agents going into a post-pandemic industry?

JH: It starts with mindset. You need a plan and a strategy in place. Your mindset has to be right. You have to be passionate. You have to live it, breathe it, sleep it.

10:33 – 13:03: What did you do to help young professionals and new real estate agents reach their potential?

RB: Everyone is different and everyone has their own strengths. For us, it was about carving out and honing out exactly what made each person great and unique.

JH: You have to think forward and outside the box.

17:57 – 21:23: What qualities do you see in the most successful agents?

RB: A great agent will do all the right things but will think creatively and will think outside the box.

JH: There is nothing bigger and better than being more ethical. And there is nothing more rewarding than losing a deal because you were ethical because it will come back ten-fold. In this business, if you’re focused on the short-term versus the long term, you are over. It’s about building relationships and trust.

21:46 – 26:13: The importance of mentorship in young and new agents.

JH: Go and find yourself a coach, a mentor, and someone that you can bounce ideas off that can make you more successful. It is the best thing you can spend on yourself and it’s money worth investing.

RB: 80% of CEOs in America have mentors–from Bill Gates to Mark Zuckerberg. It’s a game changer.

28:32 – 31:17: What’s the most important thing for entrepreneurs to focus on in 2021?

RB: COVID taught us that you’ve got to live for the day no matter how hard you work because anything can change in a minute.

JH: It taught me to appreciate the smaller things in life and to actually slow down. Appreciate what you have and everything that you have. When we’re in this business, we move at a fast speed.

31:24 – 34:19: Importance of goal setting especially for fresh-out-of-school agents.

RB: In any walk of life, you’ve got to have goals, you’ve got to know where you’re going. Only 1% of the world population know where they want to go in life. Always have targets.

JH: If you don’t write down a goal, how the hell are you supposed to achieve it? If you don’t set out a goal, how are you supposed to achieve it?

The opposite of having fear is having faith. And fear and faith cannot coexist.

34:25 – 36:35: Platform Seven concept:

RB: Mentoring has been huge in my career. It’s my way of paying it forward.

Platform Seven is a mentoring business. You’ve got to get the foundations right, you’ve got to get those early bits right, and mentoring is there to give you a platform to basically succeed in business.

36:47: About the joint mentorship program of the GREATER PROPERTY GROUP and Platform Seven.

It was definitely a fruitful GPG Mastermind Meeting with two of the most successful real estate personalities in the world.

There will be more of these educational GPG sessions. You should join us regularly by signing up for our weekly Mastermind Meeting every Tuesday.

Contact James Harris

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First of all, I want to introduce Ricky Blair. You’ve seen them there.  Ricky Blair is the founder and director of platform seven, a Los Angeles and London based life and business coaching consultancy that helps unlock potential in young entrepreneurs. Young entrepreneurs and sales professionals and reveals the kind of truths that are never taught in school from a young real estate entrepreneur himself, and now to a life coach, business mentor, and my favorite phrase, success therapist, success therapist.

I love that phrase so much. He gives young people the self-belief skills and strategies to succeed. And then of course, some people know James Harris, not as well as Ricky, but James Harris is the star of Bravo’s million dollar listing loss. And I’ve said this multiple times, he’s a two time guest alumni, but he brings his perfect blend of British style and American drive to the show.

He and his business partner, David Partin specialize in high end, residential real estate, Southern California, no nonsense approach to closing deals coupled with their extensive network of high net worth international domestic clients means that they continue to close deals and set records with the listing portfolio in the billions.

With the be guys with the beat. So if James has something to say about,  listing houses,  generating business, I’m I’m, I’m all ears. So listen guys. Welcome here. Thank you very much for joining us today. Really appreciate your time.  you know, the agents have been looking forward to this for some time.

This question is for both of you, we’re going to start off with some perspective on 2020 James. I know you’ve always had tremendous success year over year and a pandemic. Didn’t stop you.  what did you do to stay focused and then the up Ricky, what did you do to stay focused on your business? So first off, thank you very much for having me,  you know, I’m a huge fan of yours, David, and obviously,   double huge fan of Ricky’s.

But,  you know, first and foremost, what I did to stay focused,  was stay relevant. And by staying relevant, I stayed busy and by staying busy, I stayed consistent. And I think in a year, like we had in 2020.  you have to think outside of the box and get creative with the way that you branded yourself or you marketed yourself or the way that you stayed busy, because I know out in Canada, you guys went into proper lockdown for a very long time, and we did for about a month.

In Los Angeles before real estate became,  essential, not in the month that it really went down. It was the month of jumping into action. And at that time it was thinking about right, how can I stay front and center in front of people? And it was at that time that I took to social media, started doing webinars.

Fundo seminars, social media on Instagram and Facebook and Twitter and getting in front of people like yourselves because instead of trying to sell, sell, sell rent estate, I was just trying to provide value and service to people like yourselves and anybody that wanted to listen. Because when you give back, you get back.

 and so last year was all about giving back in any shape way or form that I could. And then the second. That we were allowed out of our houses. I went out of his face,  observing all of the safety rules and whatnot, and we crushed it. But I think for me in 2020, the biggest and most important thing that I personally did was instead of looking at COVID.

A vacation or a downtime. I looked at COVID as a time to actually set up. I looked at COVID as a time of reflection. How could I grow? How could I bet on myself? How could I restructure my business? What separates me from everybody else? And this is really where quite frankly, Ricky comes into it for at least me, because it was at that point that Ricky joined our team as a business coach, if you will.

And we kind of sat down and we looked at. Right. This is what you’ve done over the last five to seven years. And maybe everyone out there thinks, Hey, you’re doing great, but here’s where you could go in the next five to seven years. If you do this, there’s a mess. And we can get into that later. So 2020 for me to summarize was about restructuring.

Getting organized, understanding what my strengths and my weaknesses were, and still are playing to my strengths, letting David play to his strengths and setting ourselves up for the best 2021 we’ve ever had. And we’re on track right now to absolutely crush any year we’ve ever had. You know, I think sometimes you have to take a beat slow down and really think about you where you want to go, where you want to be.

 and that was my 2020 in a nutshell. Yeah. That’s big talk like you got a $1.5 billion listing portfolio, right?  Ricky,  same question. Sorry for interrupting. But,  same question to you. I mean, you did a pivot in 2020, right? Where I go from an answer like that. But for me, it was a very, very different year.

2020 was a year of change. As you know, I left, I left an industry which was commercial real estate after 20 years. I also would have London, which I’d lived in my whole life and moved to Los Angeles. I think what I took for 20, 20, 20 20 was the year of adapting, changing pivoting. And it’s, it’s funny. I was actually, I was listening to a Floyd Mayweather, the boxers interview the other day.

He’s got the greatest record of all time. He’s never lost a five 50 and over, and they asked him, what was his, what was his secret? What separates him from the other great books is his own. So was in every single fight he’s up against a different unique challenge and what he can do better than anyone is pivot and adapt and change.

And I think that was, that was the biggest takeaway for me, 2020, and I think going into 2021, and I was asked this question the other day, my advice for 2021. Every day, every week, every month, the world is changing. Everything’s new. You just got to be loose, nimble with that pivot where required. Yeah. Yeah.

We’ve said that many times, right? Like the industry, especially in real estate, you have to be like a speed boat. You have to adapt and change really quickly. Now can’t be like these big cruise ships taking forever to make a decision, you know, not to name certain brokerages, but changing a font is not relevant.

That was meant for a laugh. I know it’s different. But there’s a certain, I thought it was good too. I thought that was a good one.  okay. Listen,  James teams, I’m looking at, you mentioned you guys did. Okay. And,  but, but the thing is, I, I know you guys put in the work, I know how hard you work, you and David work, and it’s not a fluke that you were closing deals, setting records.

 however, the pandemic did affect some agents. You know, we were talking about this. What can you say to the struggling agent coming out of this lockdown coming out of,  or looking at a post pandemic? You know,  industry, you know, an agent who had been struggling before and now they’re coming out of the lockdown.

They’re going okay, what do I do to kickstart things? What do I do to get started? Yeah, I think that’s a great question. And I think that the best answer starts with.  you know, I think so many agents are like, I gotta make money. I gotta make money. Go, go, go, go, go, go, go. A lot of those agents, aren’t really thinking about where they’re actually going.

Right. And so for me, I think even today versus when I first started, when I first started. I always had a plan and strategy in place. If I was going to go door knocking, I knew exactly which streets I was going to door knock. I knew exactly how many doors I was going to knock. I knew that David would do a hundred and I would do a hundred.

I knew that we wouldn’t go home until we at least got one or two solid leads. And I knew exactly what my pitch was going to. There’s a lot of people that go door knocking and just random knock doors. Don’t really know what they’re going to say. How are they going to say it when they’re going to say it?

So I think to the agent that’s really coming. Hey, your mindset has to be right. You have to be passionate. You have to live it, breathe it, sleep it. And I’ll be completely honest for me. I see 42 participants. I only see 10 people with their camera on. If I were an agent, whether I was established or new, and I was showing up to something like this, I would have my camera on.

I would be camera ready, and I would be ready to listen and take advice from people that have done this. And,  during the. You know, and I’m not taking away from those that might be showing houses or doing what, but I think it’s about showing up. I think it’s about being present. I think it’s about dressing for success.

I think it’s about being around successful people. Success breeds success. You’re obviously a great brokerage. You should be using the tools of the brokerage. And I think as a new agent coming into that, You guys need to get together and figure out how you guys can make more money together. Because I look at this business as an industry where we can come together and as a unit become more successful instead of going against each other.

I’m trying to take a commission from this one or that one. So for me, if you’re a new agent, start with the mindset, dress for success, surround yourself around good, solid, successful people that are going to uplift your spirit and make you a better person. And I think at the end of the day, have a plan, have a strategy, know exactly what you’re going to do.

And then more importantly than anything, we all have a unique setting. Right. The way I do things is going to be very different to the way you guys do things and the next person, so really understand. What is your unique selling point? What separates you from everybody else? Right. For me, it’s high energy.

It’s going for it. It’s having confidence. It’s, it’s all of these different things that might not be for you, which is absolutely okay. But try and understand and figure out what it is that separates you from everybody else. And then use that to your advantage, to go out and get more business. And whoever just turned on their camera.

Thank you.

James, you took the words out of my mouth. I try to encourage everybody to turn on the cameras in the morning. And I agree with you wholeheartedly. We played that clip last week,  from  from the podcast member, he was saying he showed up in a suit and tie when everybody else would have. Yeah, it’s an absolute fact, well said James well said.

 okay.  Ricky,  you took the words out of my mouth. You know, the GPG was,  you know, founded on unique selling propositions. James, just reiterated that double down on that.  Ricky specifically though, Ricky has a really interesting story and,  I’m super proud to know Ricky for a number of reasons.

 he had a brokerage that was quite similar to the greater property group.  they,  tended to focus on the mentorship of young and new agents in the industry.  we talked about this at length a few times now, what did you do to help young professionals, new real estate agents reach their potential because you did that, right?

What did you do to help them be selected?  we had, we had a mentoring coaching sort of proposition within our business and for us, my, my two business partners and I, we were all given an opportunity at a young age. We all left school at 16. We all had mentors that showed an interest in us and literally got us on, on our pathway in the industry.

 so we, I guess it was our way of sort of paying it forward. We wanted to bring in young, hungry, ambitious agents. And I think what we did was it was, it was a, it was a combination of things. We going back to what James said about your own unique selling point. Everyone is different and everyone has their own strengths for us.

It was about coughing out and honing in on exactly what made each person great and unique. Some were very analytical, some were big on the, some of Greg on the phone. So I’m a good salesman, whatever it was, they were great that we focused on. And the other thing was. We had a mentoring program where we literally, we, we gave, it takes me as things on post I, I was a solid agent, but what I was good at was understanding how the power of the game worked.

What, what, what was the difference between a good agent and a great agent? I had that talk to of instilled in me. So we, we, we, we implement implemented that and we took that to our.  and it was just about work. I think we had a big thing about continually striving. Like we never, ever, ever, ever stood still.

That was a big thing that my business Paul’s, I instilled in them. I gotta, I gotta jump in very quickly. Please forgive me, but Ricky is frustratingly humble. Okay. This is a guy and I’m putting you right on the pedestal and I’m Ricky took and I grew up in London and I watched this firsthand guys. Ricky did the American dream in Britain.

So we’re going to call it the British dream for right. Ricky took a completely unsexy, not really very well-regarded commercial business in London, which in London, real estate is very different, especially commercial where it’s straight up numbers and digits and buildings, nothing sexy about it. And he and his business partners took a completely unsexy business and made it the sexiest business in London that you wanted to become a part of that.

God’s on this truth. Everybody was talking about their company. They had these young successful agents that the competition probably thought didn’t have a leg to stand on. And these boys, literally, we witnessed, it just went like this and they kept going and they kept going and they kept going until they just dominated.

Half of London to the point that Kali is a very big company, came out and said, you guys are too much of a threat to us. You guys have covered too much of a market territory in London. The only way we can keep up with you is by buying you. And he took a bunch of youths, a young group of people. Sold the company and made a massive success of these people.

So I’m sorry to interrupt you

check, but guys, this is like, like, this is my dream today and I’m just going to put it out there. This is why. We’re so different because Ricky was probably is the mastermind of that. Then you have the lead sales person, the lead marketing person. And I think the main reason I, I love you, Ricky, is, you know, we talk about unique selling points.

I’m a sales. Right. That does not necessarily mean that I am the best at business. Right. I want to make knee jerk decisions. I don’t know. Who’s a salesman and this rep, they ultimately get sold. Right. And I’m loving like a quick decision. I want to make a quick decision, but where you’ve helped me so much, Ricky and I have to imagine you did the same for your business is just allowing me to stop.

Think about something, write it out, understand it, understand where it could take me and then making a decision that decision in 24 hours. And I, and I just think that you just described your company beautifully, but if everyone in this zoom knew what you really did.  James, I’m going to interrupt you.

Firstly, thank you for your kind words, but I think true. If I’m going to talk about the business a little bit more detail, and I’m not saying this just to Pete, you David and Nathan, but what sets us apart and what was instilled in me as a kid was it’s all about niche. It’s all about changing the game.

It’s all about finding your own lane and the reason why I love what GPG is doing. And they haven’t liked me to say this, but this is the real. We changed the industry in central London because we just went different wherever everyone else was doing. We went the other way. And every single poll of this business I’m seeing from, from you guys, it’s you, you’re doing exactly the same thing and listen, a big part of it was giving young, young agents and opportunity.

That was, that was a key component, but the way we behaved, the way we operated, the way we conducted ourselves, everything was different. Yeah.  that I’m super important. You know, the, the,  the, the phrase we always hear actually to James’s point about our company is sexy. It’s just a sexy brand. It’s just, you know, the marketing sexy when I’m scrolling through Instagram.

And I see one of your bloody podcast segments, and there’s some Maddie’s hip hop song, I guess you go in, it’s like, it’s sexy, pounding, it’s sexy logo. It’s, it’s cool. It’s catchy, it’s contagious. You want to be a part of it, you know, and, and that’s. When you started this meeting, like talking about having an NFT.

I’m just thinking about that and broken. I knew nothing about NFC is two weeks ago and now I bought a ton of them. But like, that’s the coolest thing is like, you’re thinking forward, right? You’re you’re, you’re thinking outside of the box and like, people are gonna recognize you. They’re going to know you and they want to be a part of it, period.

That’s just.  we’re going to bring this full circle,  at the end, kind of what we were talking about. And,  some, some things that are like-minded here and, you know, some, some missions that are aligned here in a minute, but guys, Ricky and James, both of you, what qualities do you see in the most successful agents?

What quality do you see in the most successful agents?  from my perspective, I think. If you’ve got the bread and butter things that most agents will do, most agents will work hard.  most agents will follow up. Most agents will be efficient. Most agents will get on with their clients and other agents.

But the key, the key differentiator for me was always, there was two things, actually, one. It was always a positive side. When I would see my agents work, like helping out their colleagues, like it just, it just kind of gave you an idea as to what they’re all about the person behind the person you were dealing with.

But the other thing is a great agent, in my opinion, you’re doing all the right things, but they’re the extra that the extra sort of 10% that magic sauce is just thinking creatively, like thinking differently, thinking outside the box, adding value to your clients because in the day that’s what we’re in this business to.

Yeah, not that, yes, James. Yes. So I always, it’s funny. He’s like my whole thing in business is being creative and thinking outside of the box. Right. We have so many agents in this country, I believe 1.6 million. And I’m not sure in Canada, how many? So I always think to myself quite deep, why should somebody work with me?

Right. If I don’t knock a house, if I get the opportunity to speak to someone, if I meet someone at an open house, whatever it might be, why should they work with. And you have to ask yourself that repeatedly over and over and only you can really answer that question. But for me, I know you’re going to get hard work.

The most important thing to me is being. Okay. And that is huge. I think so many people in this business because the commissions are so high, think that they have to be unethical or they have to screw someone over to make the next paycheck, or they have to take a shortcut or they have to lie or they have to cheat.

There is nothing. Bigger and better than being more ethical. And there is nothing more rewarding than losing a deal because you were ethical because it will come back tenfold. And in this business, if you’re focused on the short term versus the long term, you are. This business is about a long-term relationship.

It’s about building relationships. It’s about building trust so that you’re in a position 10, 15 years from now, when that person that you built trust with has sent you to their friend who sent you to their friend who sent you to their friend. But if you break that chain early on, Mistrust someone, you broke that chain.

You’re not getting that person, that person and that person. And so for me, this is all about being ethical. As Ricky said, thinking outside of the box, having a plan, being strategic, I do believe in having a mentor, coach, someone that you can bounce ideas off and, and really work with to better yourself.

For me, I have a business partner. I love that idea. I have the Ricky, who’s the best to help me structure. And I have a little team now, so I know who I can go to for certain things, because again, we all have strengths and weaknesses and we’re not built and designed to be strong at everything. Play to your strengths, not your weaknesses, build a solid team and,  be ethical.

Yeah. Fantastic advice. You know, especially if you’re going to have longevity in this business, you know, you can identify the people. Kill the town and move on, you know, typically on ethical, you know, th th th these are the guys that you want to stay away from, but if you want longevity in this business,  be ethical, you know, to James’ point.

 okay. You guys brought it up. I think this is a really important segue into the next question, which is the importance of mentoring.  mentorship, coaching and training in young and new agents. Can you speak on the importance of that? Maybe we’ll start with Ricky. Can you, can you speak on that? I mean, it was pivotal to your business, right?

Oh, hold on. I gotta go first. I got to put it out there. Sorry. No, no, no. Ricky, I have to, if somebody had told me a year and a half ago and I’m just being completely blunt here right now. If somebody had told me a year and a half ago, or two years ago, I needed a mentor. Or a business coach I’m not going to lie.

I was the person who was like, I don’t know, use any rude words as a child here, but I was that person that was like, I use hand signals. I don’t need that. Like, I got this, I closed this and I’ve never had the ego, but it’s like, why am I going to change anything if I’m already doing so well, that was my mentality two years ago.

And I’m just being completely honest because transparency. I have started working, as I said to you guys in the middle of COVID with a coach and for all intents purposes, Ricky,  and I’m only going first, cause I’m actually like smiling cause I’m beaming.  because this is how I feel. We wrote out a business plan.

Okay. And I didn’t even tell my business partner, David. Okay. Because I wanted to create this plan that he put on me, Ricky, to create and come up with and wouldn’t help me to the sense that he wouldn’t do it for me, because I’m the kind of, God’s like, you just do it and I’ll look at it. And if we all agree, then yeah, we’re good.

But he made me sit down and do it. And fast forward this 40 page business plan is starting to come to life. And I’m saying it because there’s things happening in my day to day and my business and my marriage and my day-to-day relationships that I never even thought could exist. And already we’re in third month of the year, we’ve just added two more people to our team.

We’ve completely restructured. We’ve completely reorganized. We’ve cleaned show. We have a clear idea. We have goals. We have a vision. We know where we’re going. We’re very much accountable. I sent Ricky a long email last night as promised, which my job is to write, you know, long bullet points on how everyone’s doing on our team.

Yeah. Fine. I’ve become more accountable. I’ve become a better person and becoming a more successful businessman. I’m growing my team. And if there is one thing and I’ve always been into like motivational talks and speaking, but if there’s one thing I can recommend today, and I know this is probably awkward for Ricky, but if there’s one thing I could recommend is go and find yourself a coach, a mentor.

 and someone that you can bounce ideas off, that’s going to make you more successful. It is the best time you can spend on yourself. It’s money worth investing. I don’t even know how that will work, but it is. And I really, I couldn’t be happy at today with, with where I’m at. So thank you, Ricky and sorry.

I decided to go first, but, but I felt very, very passionate about that right now. So I had to get that off my, well, thank you, James. You can go first pleasure to get us. Yeah. From my perspective, mentoring has been huge. I mean, I left school like Jane, I left school at 16. I was obsessed and desperate to succeed and find a way I was lucky enough to have found what I was looking for at 17.

I found a mentor that literally changed my. And I’ve been obsessed by studying success in business, in, in, in all sorts of fields. And what I find found mindblowing is the amount of successful people who have mentors. And it’s almost like this caboose thing. I mean, in England, if you have a therapist, you don’t talk about it with, with mentoring.

It’s just amazing. If you dig under the surface, I think it’s something like 80% of the CEOs in America have had a mentor, have a mentor. And then you’ve got the likes of bill gates, Zuckerberg,  Oprah Winfrey. You’ve got, you know, the founders of the Googles, the Amazons, the apples, everyone has a mentor and a big part of, I guess, why I’m bringing platform seven to life?

Is it shouldn’t just be for the select few of the very fortunate ones that stumbled across a mentor. It’s it’s it’s it’s the game changer I felt. Yeah. Nathan, how much have we spent on coaching and training? Oh, it’s six figures, if not higher. I mean, you know it, but how much has it made us? I guess the real question I was going to say, don’t tell Ricky that

over decades.

We’re long in the two old men. Yeah. Yeah. It’s true agents. I know in, in California, in Los Angeles and I always used to wonder they all work with somebody and I used to just think that’s not for me. Like, I respect that, but we’re just different.  and I used to do other things like Tony Robbins or, or something else along those lines.

I used to just think that’s not for me and God I could have, I was so. But it’s okay. Cause I’m very happy and content and success has to graduate. No, but seriously, it doesn’t happen overnight, but like I’m thinking about decisions now, you know, and that, to me, for me personally, guys, I love just doing, I’m a deal junkie.

I want to do deals. If my biggest deal, which was 120 million, my goal is like, how do I do 125 million? That’s like, that’s where my head’s at. You know, I’m thinking about deals, deals, closing, closing, closing. But now I’m actually thinking about. Like, where am I going to be in 10 years from now? And that’s a really exciting picture.

If you sit down and think about it and everything’s relative, I’m not like sitting there like, oh, I’m going to be wearing the muskets. No, but I’m like, I’m really thinking about where am I going to be? And I’m writing it down and I’m understanding it. And now I actually have a path of how many get that.

And I’m telling every single one of you, I’m going to get that. And if you guys do the same and you’ll pass. You’ll get there too, period. Yeah. That’s, that’s the thing about real estate. It’s really tough sometimes, especially for young agents to think five or 10 years out. That’s the tough thing. We’re always chasing the next.

So to put a business plan in place is critical. And the nice thing about coaching, is it challenges, you, you think about things differently or maybe you’ve plateaued and you need to be asking yourself different questions that you haven’t thought of. That’s the importance of entrepreneur or of, of coaching and mentorship.

Right. Super important. Okay.  what’s the most important thing for sales professionals and entrepreneurs to focus on in 2021, guys, both of you.  the most important things to focus on, I would say are firstly, firstly, I don’t see a huge difference between 2021 and any other year. I think you’ve still got to do the fundamentals, right?

The work I think it’s got to be there. I think, I think if it’s taught me two things, one is, as I said earlier on pivots. We’re all saying we’re all experiencing it. Every single week is different. So I just think it’s being loose, nimble, flexible, adapting. And the other thing I think is actually a way from real estate.

If, if this pandemic, if COVID has shown us anything or talk to us anything it’s, you’ve got to live for the day, no matter how hard we’re working, how much we’re enjoying our business, how successful we’re doing. I think anything can change at him. And I just think it’s a bit, you’ve got to be in the now. I think that’s what it’s taught me in.

I agree with that. Absolutely. For me, it’s actually taught me to appreciate. The smaller things in life and to actually slow down, you know, people are like, wow, things are getting back to normal and by the way they are, and I’m working like an absolute dog,  and I’m loving it. But I think for me, what it taught me is to appreciate.

What I had instead of just trying to go and get what I don’t have.  you know, I remember in the height of COVID where I was at home, my kids were at home. My wife was at home. We were cleaning the bathroom windows and we were sweeping and we went back, came in and we were cooking and we were cleaning. I kinda miss that now.

Like I want to get back to that moment. It was such a special moment where we were all together, but I think the 20, 21 for me, it’s about slowing down to appreciate the smaller things that I have in life. And I don’t mean smaller as in family. Cause that’s the biggest,  when I say smaller, it’s just appreciate what you have.

Right. Appreciate everything that you have. Because when we’re in this fast paced business of selling real estate, we move at a fast speed and we’re movers and shakers and we’re closes and where we’re focused. And we go out, we do this, do this, do this. And then we come home and say, oh, I’ve got to go to bed now and do it all over again, smart, like slow down and focus on family.

Focus on friends, focus on things that you enjoy. Take a hobby, go with your hobby, do things that you, that make you happy. And, and I know that that’s not the advice you may want to hear, but that’s how I truly failed from the home. It’s like, I want to appreciate things to the max, to the fullest. And that’s my advice.

And that’s great advice.  in one last question here, before we talk about specifically about platform seven for a minute, the importance of goal setting, why is it so important, especially while for everybody to set goals, but especially new agents fresh out of. I think, I think in any walk of life, you’ve got to, you’ve got to have goals.

You’ve got to know where you’re going. I think it’s something like, I think it’s 1% of the world population actually know where they want to go in life. Whether it be in terms of goals, aspirations, dreams, my business Paul’s and I found the. Always having targets, whether that be financial targets, the amount of transactions you want to do, it may be a skill or a quality or something was struggling.

Do you want to work on the way you want to be in a year from now? It’s you’ve got to know where you’re going in the whole time. I think it’s one of the, probably one of most important things you can implement goal setting. For sure. So I could not agree with you more rec I will say this. If you don’t write down a goal, how the hell are you supposed to achieve?

If you don’t set a target, how are you supposed to achieve it for so many years? And I know you’re a lot of you are going to resonate with us for so many years. If I was working on a deal and this goes for anything in my life for so many years, if I was working on a deal, I’d come home to my wife. I’d say, I’m working on this deal.

It’s not going to happen. And the reason I’d say it’s not gonna happen was because I had this fear in my way so that if the deal didn’t happen, I’d already said the dealer wasn’t going to happen. So I didn’t disappoint myself. We all do it. Okay. You try and put up a wall to protect yourself so that you don’t let yourself down.

And then I started to learn about manifesting and accepting and learning that the opposite of having fear is having faith and then hearing. Fear and faith cannot coexist. And then starting to realize that if I don’t believe in myself, fuck else is going to believe in me. And so now that mindset has shifted.

I believe a deal’s going to close. I’m going to close that deal, that deal’s going to close next week. I’m going to get that buyer. I’m going to negotiate everything I do in my life. Is I will, I can, I am. Instead of, I won’t, it’s not in those type of things. And I think if you can go with that mindset and that mentality and believe in yourself, Yeah, I have to manifest it.

You’re going to become more successful. And so it starts with setting goals. And I know for me, I probably didn’t do it for so long because I was so scared of letting myself down. Well, if I write down that I’m going to do 500 million shit, what if I do 400, then I didn’t do a hundred extra. And I look.

Well, that is the role mentality. You have to have big expectations. You have to have big goals. You have to write them down. You have to see it, believe it in vision it and go get it. And I will end it right there. Incredible. Yeah, really, really good advice on goal setting now,  platform seven. Ricky, can you tell us about the concept of platform?

And then we’ve got an exciting announcement to bring it full circle. Everybody’s a little giddy about this, but can you tell us about,  platform seven?  what it is, why it was founded and what the main objective. So, as I said, they’re wrong. Mentoring in my career has been chewed. When we change the game with our business, with, with my, with my agency, a big part of business was mentoring and coaching.

When we sold the company in our, as about four years ago, now we had this reputation as giving for giving young, young people in business, young entrepreneurs, this mentoring give, giving them a shot effectively. And we just noticed that there’s more and more demand for mentoring. So when I moved out to Los Angeles, I decided to sort of build a business around it, which is, which is platform seven.

And it’s basically it’s,  it’s my web paying it forward. There’s there’s there’s demand for it. And he’s basically giving people the tools and what it, what it takes to succeed. That that is, I mean, I’ve run a course. I go into agencies and actually teach. This course is literally the key fundamentals. A lot of the things I, I go for on the course, I’ve actually, you’ve covered today.

Gold center. Manifesting. I mean, manifesting big on the, the, the, the, the tools and the attributes was the skill. Was that the basic differential I’m gonna, I’m gonna bring this back to, to, to, to, to James as an example. I mean, people will see his success. People will see him on the show, et cetera, but it’s for Highness scenes, like, well, he’s, you know, it’s not just turning up and selling homes is.

There’s so many things he’s doing, which is changing the game, the work ethic, the F I do it doing the right things.  he’s I know how big he is with his reputation. The amount of agents I’ve seen over the years who will literally do a big, big, big, big deal, which will tarnish their reputation, the process it’s it’s it’s it’s, it’s the long game here.

And I think platforms have an effect. It’s a mentoring business. You’ve got to get the foundations. Right. You’ve got to get the early bits, right. It’s like building a house. You want to get the foundations in place and mentoring is there to give it a platform to basically succeed in business. Yeah. Yeah.

It’s fantastic. So let’s,  let’s just announce it here.  we we’ve had multiple discussions over the last few weeks. I’ve talked to James, I’ve talked to,  Ricky.  what we’re going to be doing is launching a P a mentorship program at the greater properties.  partnering with platform seven. Now we’re really excited about this because you can see the success.

James is having, I mean, the guy, I mean like, Ricky, you don’t know this, you don’t know this, but,  James and I were talking,  I think a week ago or a week and a half ago, something like that. And James was. Really excited about what’s going on with is Ricky, is James coach essentially, right? His mentor in a way.

Right? So,  we’re going to be partnering with platform seven. We’re going to be launching a mentorship program at the greater property group. Now, keep in mind guys, this, I need you guys to pay close attention to this. Did we actually forget.  wrap horn for this. Did we?

so excited for you guys. Seriously. I wish like, I wish you guys knew what well you willing to call us. I don’t hate talking about people. Like I actually prefer talking nicely about people behind their back instead of when they’re sitting, right. You guys are in. Such a tree, just mark my words on that. And I don’t know how any of this is working, none of my business, but whatever these boys here, Nathan and David are working on.

Like, I wish this was something the agency would provide them to me quite frankly. And that’s truly how I fail. I don’t see this in brokerages at all. So when we, and I want to do this, I’m going to set this right now. David, if we, I don’t know when you guys start working or how it’s going to work. But I would love to meet with your team three months after you guys have all met with Ricky and done some work, because I want you guys to get goosebumps that I’m getting now, because I know how much this has helped myself and David.

And I want to see how you guys fail 30, 90 days from whenever this whole thing starts. And I’m really excited for all of you. And I really mean. It’s awesome. I like, I like when I say it’s, you know, it was eerie, right. Ricky, when we were talking about this, the similarities between the London firm and the GPG, it was like, it was eerie.

We saw the synergy there. You’re literally replicating what we did over in London. But again, this is gonna, this is gonna be. You and Nathan look good. No doubt, but it’s, I just want the guys here on this quarter to appreciate what GPG I’ll doing, the platform you’re giving your agents to get, get them and give them an opportunity to mentor, coach them, to make them better.

That doesn’t happen often. I mean, we were, we were unique and a bit of a freak in London and we only do. Because my phone has not experienced that meant ourselves, but not every, not many businesses actually give as much shit as, as you guys are the amount of the, the platform you’re giving them to, to, to, to push on is it’s amazing what you guys are doing.

Yeah. Well, we’re excited to do this now. Listen, guys, this is really,  we need to be very clear about this. First of all, this is an exclusive,  Canadian exclusive. So we are the only brokerage in Canada. There will be offering this mentorship,  training,   at our brokerage, we’ll be the only ones, correct.

 so that’s what we’re going to be doing here. Secondly, here’s the other point? This is a cap.  there’s a cap on this, so not everybody can participate here. We’re running a, there’s a limited membership in here on this. So if you want to participate, you’re going to have to sidebar with,  myself or Nathan.

We’ll explain how it works. And we’re going to be looking at, I think we said like a May 1st launch date. It’s going to be a three month. Right. So a 90 day run. Yeah. So we’re looking at a May 1st launch, a May 1st launch.  if you want to get your ducks in a row, if you want to participate in that, please let us know.

 and then we’ll explain how it works, because we’re really excited to do this. We think this is I’ve looked at the topics I’ve, I’ve looked at kind of the roadmap, generally the broad stroke on it that Ricky,  sent over. And I gotta tell you, man, like, like to James’s point, it gives you goosebumps. It was topics.

I never even thought. Right James, like you’re, I mean, you probably think in the same thing, I was looking at him, like, what I’ll say is just, just, just you guys. Wait, that’s all, I’ll say that’s all I’ll say, but by the way, David, and I think, cause I know you’ll appreciate this. I’ve had two meetings with my team,  and Ricky, since he met new and within our two hours now, every time he’s like, look, guys, I don’t want to talk about GPG again, but I’m just going to start telling you about data.

I’m like shut up. I’ve heard it. I’m sorry. All these guys, we get it there, Greg, that doing great things like with the lights said, let’s move on. So I want you to know he holds you boys in a very high regard

and you all referenced a lot. Is that as the benchmark, for sure. It’s all fairly excited. Like, I don’t know. Who’s hungry to get better and more successful in the zoom. If you all and you’re willing,  nine guy was, and even if you’re reserved, try let’s chat in three towns, see where your business Lilly.

Oh man, you guys can’t. Thank you enough for your time today. Really appreciate it. Santiago says hi. Amazing. My boy. That’s someone else by the way, another great speaker. And it’s been so lovely chatting with all of you. It’s Sylvia. I seen you smiling the whole way through and Taylor and Presto and Chris, all of you.

You’re all awesome. And I think I say this is, it should run. You take off for the best background man like that.

I mean, you got it all going on. I love that. And, and Byron Manville only you, I, I love all of you guys. You’re all hungry, great people. And  I hope I get to come to Canada and hang out with all you guys soon. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, absolutely. Thanks, Ricky. Thank you, James. Really appreciate your time. Feel free to log.

Yeah,

it’s taken care of all the best. Bye guys.

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