On Agent Learning Styles
No professional experience or career journey is ever identical. In my recent blog: ‘Recognising Your Agent Style With Michael Love’, I explore the notion that not all agents are alike, discussing three distinctive types of agent practice and pinpointing the strengths of each.
Today’s blog expands on the idea of diversity – illustrating that the modern real estate sector has room for a wide range of personalities and agent styles, offering all those who apply themselves ample opportunity to excel. Whilst being inspired by talks and coaching has its benefits, it’s important to move beyond theory and to get practical with ongoing education and application.
This piece explores four key agent learning styles. It’s likely you have a natural learning style – and identifying the one you resonate most closely with will help you decide which type of professional development and training activities will benefit you most significantly.
The Visual Learner
The visual learning style – otherwise known as ‘spatial learning’ – best absorbs information by physically seeing or observing the relationships between ideas. Agents with a preference for visual learning are likely to find themselves creating handwritten to-do lists and taking close notes from vendors and purchasers.
Incorporating visual tools such as infographics, diagrams, pictures and video are effective in engaging a visual learner and ensuring they reap the benefits of their training.
Encourage visual learners to curate mind-maps subsequent to team-building days or professional developmental seminars, allowing them to visualise the information they retained and highlight key points.
YouTube training and/or live training seminars have been effective in providing estate agents with this learning style relevant information in a succinct format, enlisting elements of video and/or animation to keep them engaged and visually stimulated.
The Auditory Learner
Auditory learners absorb subject matter best when information is reinforced by sound. Whilst this style is ideal for agents attending presentations and training conferences, many auditory learners are most effective when engaged in conversation. They display exceptional memory retention for dialogue heard either directly or in passing, and for information from media sources including television, radio or – a favourite amongst my team – podcasts.
Some of our top podcasts for estate agent training are:
- Elevate by Elite Agent Magazine.
- Secrets of the Top 100 Agents by Real Estate Business.
- Kevin Ward’s YES Talk
Agents displaying a preference for auditory learning techniques find the study method of engaging in small groups useful, allowing group members to share information with one another.
The Reading and Writing Learner
Agents who favour the reading and writing learning style find written information the most effective approach for retaining material and market data. The reading and writing learner can speedily retain information by reading books, guides or manuals.
This style of learning is particularly useful in the real estate and property management category. It can be strengthened by taking notes from books on leadership or negotiation and training agents to speed read and quickly get through significant amounts of material.
The Kinaesthetic Learner
Kinaesthetic learners – often referred to as ‘tactile learners’ – learn best through experiencing or performing a practical task first hand. Agents with a particular preference for this learning style can achieve real estate success by receiving mentoring sessions, or ‘ghosting’ an agent on the job.
“Did Mike just suggest I cut communication and stop returning the calls and messages with no explanation?” Quiet the contrary – ‘ghosting’ in this instance refers to accompanying a senior agent for a portion of their work day. Observing a qualified agent on the job offers direct insight into common situations that arise and how to best tackle them.
Another suggestion for agents with a kinaesthetic learning style is to incorporate elements of role-play into training. Allowing agents to deliver a performance – whereby a real industry situations is imitated and a solution is provided – will support rapid learning.
Understanding the learning style/s you and your team resonate with most allows you to learn more, quickly and with ease. It’s important to appreciate the importance of all four styles, and to consider individual instances in which each of them can be utilised and reinforced.
Michael Love | Love&Co