How big does your real estate agency need to be before you hire a human resources manager to support your growth and your team?
Many real estate agencies begin as a one or two person show before scaling to have offices around the city or country.
It sounds exciting to have multiple storefronts and hundreds of people under your umbrella but any seasoned business owner will explain how challenging it can be to expand. It’s never a smooth process and is filled with learning experiences and setbacks.
However, if you want to grow, you’ll need to take the leap at some stage. This includes separating yourself from the day to day and hiring people to handle the separate moving parts of your business.
One of these areas is human resources.
Does your real estate agency need an HR person?
A small team can usually be managed with a few contract templates and some regular catch up meetings. Once you grow in size and relationships become harder to manage, dealing with the people side of your agency will start to take up more and more of your time.
One study from the US found the average small business spends about 18 hours a month on HR-related tasks. For those who also handle payroll themselves, the total jumps to almost 40 hours a month. It’s a lot of work, especially if you’re busy with clients.
There is no specific number of people which will trigger you to hire an HR person. You’re more likely to feel the need once you go from ‘all hands on deck’ to assigning specific responsibilities across your team.
If you’re dividing into admin, sales, rentals, marketing, etc. it’s probably time to find someone to take responsibility for talent management.
What does an HR person do?
Your human resources manager will take responsibility for the following:
Hiring new team members (usually with the help of a recruiter)
Onboarding new team members (dealing with contracts, etc. with the help of a lawyer)
Promoting people internally and defining career pathways
Creating and enforcing company policies
Determining remuneration and salary packages (with the help of the finance team)
Dealing with disputes between team members
Arranging training
Issuing warnings and terminating employment
Ensuring your business is compliant with legislation
Establishing company culture
Gathering feedback and improving retention.
It’s a long list of tasks for someone to take off your hands. And while your HR person isn’t revenue-generating, they can help you to scale more rapidly and hang on to your best people.
Consider a situation where two staff members simply aren’t getting along. Once your business reaches a certain size, you won’t have time to get involved. HR can come in handy to mediate and resolve the issue. An HR person also has the specific skills to ensure a favourable outcome.
In-house or outsourced?
If you’re in the process of scaling your business, you may not need a full-time HR person to sit in your office. There are plenty of providers who will support you on a contract basis, perhaps for one or two days per week. This gives you the help without the cost of an entire salary.
A contractor will charge a higher hourly rate but when it gets to the point where they are needed five days per week, you’ll know it’s time to bring someone in house. This can benefit your business because your HR person will be able to form relationships with the rest of your team and have an insider’s view of how to improve your business from a people perspective. Having someone on your team can also give you greater trust and transparency, although the decision is up to you.
You also have the option to self-manage HR using a software platform designed to make everything easier (https://employmenthero.com/ is one example). This may bridge a gap when you’re scaling but not quite ready for a headcount.
If you want your business to become a household name, hiring an HR professional is an essential move. While all real estate agents are ‘people people’, your HR team are the experts in people management. They’ll have their finger on the pulse of the latest trends in training and development, and will take the stress of minor disagreements and contract arrangements off your hands.
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