One of the first things a new EA or Director of Operations is told is that their job is to create an “Ops Manual”. I’ve been in the business for 23 years, and I have to admit my “Ops Manual” stinks. Like many operations people, I got busy working “in the business” and didn’t always make time to work “on the business”. My manual is cobbled together with long, detailed explanations that make my eyes spin when I read it. When our Transaction Coordinator recently had to take 9 months off for health reasons, it was enough to get us through – but it wasn’t the easiest to follow. And LOTS of things are still missing.
So, this year, when my partner and fellow coach Stephanie Brackett showed me her manual, I was blown away. Last year, her Ops Manual was her ONE THING. She patiently and consistently worked on it and it’s SO amazing, I asked her if I could share it with you.
I also asked Steph how she went about creating her Ops Manual. Here’s what she said:
“My Ops Manual is a working, online manual housed in waywedo.com. It has links to how-to videos, team forms, checklists and more. I started with a brainstorming session and made an index card for each item I wanted in my manual; I had about 200 cards to start. I organized them into categories logically and then created a Trello board to do final organization and project planning. Once I had it all laid out in Trello, I started creating the content in Waywedo. I’ve continued to add additional procedures, policies, and team standards as I’ve thought of them or as situations require. It will never be ‘done,’ but it’s probably consistently at 95%.”
Since this post was originally written, Stephanie has moved her Ops Manual into a Google Site. Here’s a video so you can get a peek “under the hood” of the latest version:
Here is The Anderson Group’s Table of Contents:
Company Organization & Position Responsibilities
1.01 Welcome
1.02 Organization Chart
1.03 Anderson Group Training and Review Process
1.04 Training Outlines By Position
General Office Information
2.01 Basic Building Information
2.02 Employee Services
2.03 Team Contact Information
2.04 Team Member Birthdays and Hire Dates
Professional Standards
3.01 Vision – Mission – Values
3.02 Code of Conduct Policy
3.03 Workflow Expectations and Next Action Thinking
3.04 Work Hours and Attendance
3.05 Vacation and Personal Time
3.06 Company Dress Code – Sales Positions
3.07 Company Dress Code – Non Sales Positions
3.08 Employee Policy for Purchasing, Selling, and Referring Real Estate
3.09 Answering Phones & Responding to Voicemails
3.10 Additional Agent and Realtor Standards (Local & National)
3.11 Team Apparel and Car Wrapping
3.12 Team Book Club
3.13 Initial Licensing and Dues
3.14 Anderson Group Email
3.15 Referring Team Members to the Team
Lead Management
4.00 Graphical Lead Flow Matrix for Incoming Leads
4.01 New Lead Pipeline
4.02 Attempted Contact Pipeline
4.03 Contacted Pipeline
4.03 Lead Eligibility Guidelines
4.04 Completing a Buyer or Seller Interview Form
4.05 CINC Label Definitions
4.06 ISA Daily Lead Gen (Commissions Inc)
4.07 Setting and Processing Appointments (Taken and Missed)
4.08 Working with Expired, Withdrawn and FSBO’s
4.09 Outbound Lead Generation
4.10 Working with Out of Town Buyers
4.11 Inbound and Outbound Referral Process
4.12 ISA Assistance for C and D Priority Prospect Nurturing
4.13 Changing on Call Rotation (Ring Central & CINC)
4.14 Our Ideal Customer – Internal Document ONLY
Listing Sales
5.00 Seller Process Overview from Lead to Close
5.01 Listing Appointment Preparation 5.02 Compiling a Complete Listing Presentation Packet
5.03 Conducting a Listing Presentation
5.04 Returning From a Listing Appointment
5.05 Executed Listing Agreement Hand Off
5.06 Servicing Active Listings
5.07 Receiving Offers on Listings
5.08 Turning in an Accepted Offer
5.09 Agent Closing Responsibilities
5.10 Square Footage Use and Verification
Buyer Sales
6.00 Buyer Process Overview from Lead to Close
6.01 Scheduling Appointments and Showing Properties
6.02 Responding to Feedback Requests
6.03 Turning in an \Offer Only\” (not yet accepted)”
6.04 Turning in an Accepted Offer
6.05 Inspection Process
6.06 Buyer Agent Responsibility During the Closing Process
6.07 Inspection and Final Walk-Through
Operations
7.01 Processing a New Listing from Hand Off through Pre-Listing
7.02 Scripts for Pre-Listing Processes
7.03 Staging Process
7.04 Scheduling Pictures and Matterport
7.05 Working with Matterport Camera and Software
7.06 Working with Title One Corp for Taxes, Plat Maps, and CCR’s
7.07 Title Work for Special Circumstances
7.08 Requesting Utility Usage
7.10 Processing a Listing From Launch to Contract
7.11 Using Navica to Enter New Listings
7.12 Listing Syndication Through Major Websites
7.14 Showing Feedback Process Overview
7.15 Weekly Vacant Property Checks & Sign Checks
7.16 Preparing for an Open House
7.20 Processing a New Sales Contract
7.21 Conducting Welcome Call and Sending Welcome Email on New Sales Contracts
7.22 Loan Commitment
7.24 Working with Title Commitments
7.25 Well & Septic Inspections
7.26 Closing Preparations
7.27 Reviewing Settlement Statements
7.28 Closing Gifts 7.29 Working with Home Warranties
7.30 Cancelling a Contract
7.31 Coop Agent Satisfaction Surveys
7.32 Client Satisfaction Surveys
7.40 Box Exchange Program
7.41 Moving Trailer Protocol
7.50 Instructions for Pulling a Contact List for Past Clients
7.60 Paid Referral Sites 7.70 Using Google Maps to Map Showing Route
7.90 Dropbox Set-up and Naming Convention
7.91 External File Storage
System Instructions
8.00 Anderson Group 3.0 Sales Database Instructions
8.01 Cole Realty Resource 8.02 Creating CMA’s with Toolkit CMA
8.03 Forms Simplicity for Electronic Signatures and Contracts
8.04 Getting Scoreboards in Quad Area Working
8.05 Keller Williams Listing System (KWLS)
8.06 Listhub for Listing Syndication
8.07 Showing Pulse and Supra System Instructions
8.08 Top Producer Action Plans
8.09 Top Producer System Instructions
8.10 Using Dotloop for Office Compliance
8.11 Using Landvoice to Obtain Phone Numbers for Expired and FSBO
8.12 Using MoJo for Auto Dialing 8.13 Using SurveyMonkey to Request Reviews
8.14 Using Trello for Listed Property Tracking
8.15 Working with Allworx Phone System 8.16 Working within CINC to Switch On-Call Rotation
8.17 Working within CINC Using Custom Filters
8.18 Working with Navica (Snake River MLS)
8.19 Working with Tour Factory
Team Reports
9.01 Updating and Printing Daily Reports
9.02 Creating a Net Sheet
9.03 Creating a Neighborhood 6 Month Data Report
9.03 Pending Tracker
9.04 Showing Tracker
Meetings and Events
10.00 Daily Scripts Practice
10.01 Daily Team Huddle 10.02 Team Staff Meeting
10.03 Annual Pie Giveaway 10.04 Annual Client Appreciation Event
10.05 Annual OffSite Planning Meeting
10.06 Annual KW Off-Site Events
Management
11.01 Career Visioning Process
11.02 Commission Splits and Bonus Structures
11.03 Company Paid Fees by Position
11.04 Conducting Weekly One-on-One Meetings
11.06 Minimum Aptitude Standard per Role
11.07 Procedures for Off-Boarding a Team Member
11.08 Procedures for On-Boarding a Team Member
11.20 Team Passwords
11.30 Updating the Market Share Report for Weekly Team Meetings
Scripts
Email Footer for Gmail
Email Script for Moving Trailer
Email Script for Partial Listing Review
Email Script to Seller for Listing Launch
Phone Active Client Management
Phone Buyer Prospecting
Phone Past Client Prospecting
Phone Pending Client Management
Phone Post Closing
Phone Recruiting
Phone Script for Annual Pie Giveaway
Phone Script for Scheduling Photos and Matterport
Phone Seller Prospecting
Phone Sphere Prospecting
Voicemail Script for Phones (Office and Cell)
THIS is what an OPS BOSS® does!
We’ve shown you ours, now let’s see YOURS!
P.S. – Stephanie has added a new coaching spot. If you’re interested, please fill out our form to schedule an exploratory call. Steph will also be featured on a panel talking about “Rocket Fuel Leadership” at the Ops Boss™ Leader Retreat in October. Have you registered yet? Prices will be going up again soon. Register TODAY!)
P.P.S.
We hosted a Coffee with Christy and Crew Mastermind session about Google Portals. You can watch the replay on the Ops Boss Coaching YouTube channel for even more Google Sites Team Portal ideas!