How SL Academy candidates are prepared for Real Estate
When it comes time to expand your offshore team, the obvious assumption is that someone with experience in the Real Estate industry will be the best candidate.
While experience is certainly helpful, it also limits the number of candidates available for any one position.
This is why we started SL Academy.
At STAFFLINK, we have an extremely experienced Property Management support team, each of whom have contributed to, and refined, our excellent training resources over the years.
These training resources have now been implemented through an online course that includes classroom style learning, so that enthusiastic applicants with little (or no) experience can learn about Australian Real Estate, the technology being used, and how to follow industry best-practices.
Why was SL Academy needed?
As wage costs have increased in Australia (and other countries), hiring additional staff onshore is becoming difficult for many business owners.
As such, the outsourcing industry is seeing unprecedented levels of demand.
As more businesses look to integrate offshore staff into their teams, this has led to less candidates being available, and higher wage costs for those with experience.
There are also many applicants looking to start work in the industry who have just graduated university or college and struggle to get early opportunities, due to their lack of experience.
With SL Academy, we are able to bridge that gap, and provide opportunities and training to candidates who might otherwise not get a look in, but who have enormous potential to succeed in real estate.
How does SL Academy work?
SL Academy was created to mirror the way in which we onboard team members in line our own real estate business, which is; we prefer to promote from within where possible, or hire them with SOME experience, where they will be keen to learn and progress their career.
The 21 Day Training Program for SL Academy candidates is designed to set your offshore team member up with the relevant The Hub, workflow and cultural skills to integrate with your onshore team.
Throughout the program, the SL Academy candidates are allocated Real Estate specific courses (via the STAFFLINK Agency Hub) in a classroom style environment.
These courses are taken with an educator present, who guides the learning through the course, and also notes the student’s willingness to participate and engage. They are then assessed on the skills learned in these courses.
In order to graduate, the student must have a minimum test score of 85% overall.
At the end of their traineeship, any business considering the candidate is supplied with a report card that outlines their assessment results, by week, as well as daily reporting.
What happens when you hire SL Academy Candidates?
Week 1 -4
The first week of working in your agency includes a number of check-ins with your new offshore team member, including a daily check-in where we are seeking a request for support.
For example, we will check they are successfully logging in and using all systems, and not having any issues that can easily be prevented.
Some staff may not feel comfortable raising these issues with a client on their first week.
We want to make sure this transition is as smooth as possible, so we’ll be checking in (in person) to ensure they are logging in, conducting processes and workflows etc. without issue.
We will also check that they have been able to communicate easily with the client. This would include emails and messaging software.
We also help them prepare their calendar so they know exactly what their ideal work week should look like.
If the offshore team member has settled in and all positive behaviours are being shown, we will provide an overall rating at the end of the week. If everything is on track, this will be communicated to the client CSM.
If the staff isn’t performing to expectation yet, we will raise this with the CSM, and look at implementing a coaching log to support and guide them in getting on track.
30 Days
At the end of 30 working days, the offshore team member will complete a skills audit, which includes technical and work based assessment.
The Learning Needs Assessment is conducted by an onshore STAFFLINK trainer. If there are any concerns, a performance plan (1 on 1 training) will be conducted, followed by reassessment.
Why experience isn’t everything when hiring
While you might look at hiring an offshore team member who’s been in a real estate agency before, the biggest change-management piece isn’t around the real estate process… it’s about our system, the workflows, the trigger points.
Experienced staff still have to learn all of this prior to starting with our clients.
Offshore team members may have been doing standard processes such as lease prep before, however they may not have been following best practice.
On some occasions, they have to learn all of this, and why we do it, so they’re still going through the same training as new SL Academy candidates.
If you are hiring an offshore team member with experience, they will likely come with a larger wage cost, as they are able to reference their tenure in the industry.
Regardless, they are still required to go through an 8 day training program to assist them with using our system and process. This is then followed by similar assessment to SL Academy students.
When the time comes to hire offshore staff, be sure to talk to us about your exact requirements, so we can suggest the best possible candidates for your situation.
