I blogged yesterday about how important it is to keep a sense of humour when it comes to business because it shows your human element, and it doesn't mean sacrificing your professionalism. Thinking about this made me realize something, and that's although people want you to be human, they seldom accept that you make mistakes. Interesting concept isn't it!
At Century 21 we pride ourselves on being real estate experts, but that doesn't mean each and every one of us is perfect or immune to mistakes. I've posted on this topic before too. Human error is everywhere – I am sure that's the reason I end up with so many speeding fines, for example. But seriously, when you are taking on the role of a professional service for someone else, in the case of Century 21 it's selling someone else's home, everyone expects you to already be perfect, and as if that's not enough, they then want you to improve on that.
In our day to day activities, everyone knows that people make mistakes, and everyone accepts that they personally make mistakes, regardless of how much it smarts to admit it. The problem about making mistakes when you're selling someone's home is that there is usually an emotionally invested person (or persons if you're really lucky) there to tell you just how big a mistake you made.
The best real estate agents are those who acknowledge when they've made a mistake, and know how to correct it – quickly. It's natural to want to do everything right, and this is heightened when you are working on behalf of another party and you are accountable to more than just yourself. Admitting you are wrong, or that you've done something wrong, takes a lot of self-confidence, and this is absolutely something you want from the person selling what is likely to be your biggest asset.
Learning to recover from your mistakes, and improve as a result of them, is a key component to being a successful real estate agent. The worst thing you can do is dwell on a past mistake, because it's likely to cloud your view of what you should now be focusing on, and is more likely to lead to another one. Don't let your past mistakes get in the way of doing the right thing by your customers in future. Your clients are people too, and they (hopefully) have made their own mistakes so will be tolerant of yours (to an extent.) It's easy to forget to return a phone call or run late for an appointment, but admit your errors rather than downplaying them or pretending you've done nothing wrong. Hey, you could even throw in the humour element I spoke about yesterday and chances are your customers will end up respecting you even more.