13: Reflections on 2024

In this episode, hosts Kim Borcherding and Rebecca Green reflect on their experiences in 2024, discussing the importance of evaluating both successes and failures. They emphasize the need to celebrate wins, build community, and take action as key components of personal and professional growth. The conversation also touches on areas for improvement, the significance of maintaining momentum, and setting intentions for the upcoming year.

Takeaways

• Reflection is crucial for personal and professional growth.
• Celebrating wins can motivate and energize future efforts.
• Building a supportive community is essential for success.
• Taking action is a key differentiator between success and failure.
• Setting clear boundaries helps protect energy and focus.
• Identifying areas for improvement is necessary for growth.
• Maintaining momentum is vital for ongoing success.
• Small, consistent actions lead to significant results over time.
• Intentionality in actions can make anything possible.
• Evaluating both successes and failures provides valuable insights.

Chapters

• 0:00 Reflections on 2024: The Importance of Evaluation
• 2:51 Celebrating Wins: Acknowledging Successes and Lessons Learned
• 6:36 Community and Alignment: Building Connections for Growth
• 11:17 Taking Action: The Key to Success
• 18:10 Identifying Shortcomings: Areas for Improvement
• 29:11 Momentum and Consistency: Maintaining Progress
• 32:54:00 Looking Ahead: Setting Intentions for 2025

Transcript

Rebecca Green (00:00.334)
Hi there, welcome to our podcast, How to Real State Today. I'm Kim Borcherding and I'm joined here by my cohost, Rebecca Green. And today we are talking about reflections on 2024. So for us, we feel like it's really important to reflect on the year and learn some lessons on what you did well, maybe where you did not do so well. And think about it, think about it, talk about it.

You know, there is so much to learn from your experiences. So we thought on this podcast episode, we would just kind of hash out our thoughts on our wins and maybe not some wins. So how's that sound, Rebecca? I love it. I love it. Great topic. You know, I hate to sound like a broken record, I always lately at the end of the year, I'm always tying things back into business planning. And, you know, that reflection is so super important.

But also like you mentioned, celebrating the wins. I think unfortunately people don't do that enough. So I love that you led with both of those, you know, sides. The good and the bad, sometimes there's an in between and it's important to evaluate both ends of that spectrum. Totally with that. Actually, that's a good piece because I actually do think most people do not celebrate their wins like at all. If I could say, hey, what did you do well this year? They probably don't know and they probably can't like

You know, I just prior to this recording, I mean, I've listed like 20 things, right? I'm not going to talk about my 20, but yeah, yeah, but but not even taking five minutes to reflect on that. So really important. Yeah, that's a big part of the business plan that I do with the agents that I coach is celebrating the wins. And I encourage everyone to do it, you know, once a month when they do a quick review. And if you can't get to it once a month, do it once a quarter, because it actually can be a motivating factor.

And when you really start asking yourself, well, what did I accomplish and what did I, know, lots of times people come to me and they're like, I need help with this. I didn't do this right. I don't know how to do this. Right. And so it can feel, it can put you in the wrong mindset. And so getting excited about like what you actually did accomplish gives you, I think, kind of the energy and the juice to get through some of the other things you still need to work on. Yeah.

Rebecca Green (02:23.466)
Absolutely. Okay, well, what's that? I'm going to start with you, Rebecca. Okay, when you tell me, tell me Rebecca, what were some of your wins and lessons? Yeah, some of your wins from the year. Yeah, I love that when you you suggested this as a topic for today, I thought it was so great. And I immediately wrote down the first thing that came to my mind. And I can tie that into lessons and things that I did well.

The first thing I wrote down was community. The second thing that I wrote down was alignment. The third thing I wrote down was momentum. And the fourth thing I wrote down was gratitude. So when you asked me about reflection on 2024, those were the four things that immediately came to mind. So like, if I look at each of those four things, and I think like, what did I do? You know, what positives do I feel like?

you know, I accomplished in 2024. Community, my gosh, so huge. So, so huge for me this year. You know, working with you through Clever Collective, our podcast, you know, that has been so fulfilling and that has created a whole new community, right? And I have absolutely loved the conversation and loved the learning out of that.

So I also change brokerages and put myself in different rooms. That's also community oriented for me. know, change can be scary, but so rewarding. So I think from a community's perspective, right? I did a lot of things really well on that front. I also built out my coaching business. I just recently, you know, this week kind of soft launched a new platform called the CEO Agent Community.

where it's a place for agents that I'm coaching or agents that I know in my sphere to just have conversation. Okay. Can you tell me more about that? What does that look like with this? Yeah. So I created it on the school platform. It's an Alex Hormosi platform. It's kind of like a private Facebook group without all the Facebook noise. You know what I mean? Like it is really a place where agents can chat amongst themselves.

Rebecca Green (04:45.982)
and I can post valuable content, right, that I talk about in my coaching or in my weekly calls. So that was born out of the value that I have found in the community, you know, aspect of what I feel has been such a positive in my year. And so really just continuing to seek out.

rooms and groups of people that are invigorating and that I'm learning from and that we can exchange ideas. That has been huge. And I will share, know, as you know, I, you know, I coach agents from all over some of the local folks that I've been mentoring, the clever collective meetings that you're hosting, where it's, it's not brokerage specific, right? It is people from all different brokers.

So many people that I've invited to that are like, Rebecca, this is just great. Being able to be, it's like being a fly on the wall in somebody else's business, right? And so community, I feel like I nailed community this year and that leads to gratitude, right? I'm super grateful for that. And really the community element kind of falls into the alignment. I think that I listened to my gut and I became

I became so much more aware of how important that alignment is with the people on your team, your brokerage, the people in your inner circle, your sphere. So, you I think that was a win for the year as well. Yeah, I mean, I think that those are the ones that come top of mind on the momentum front. You know, I think there were some positives, but I'm going to leave that for the negative. You know, maybe some of the things that I need to work on, I'm going to leave the momentum for that.

I'll let you jump in with some of the things that you feel were, you know, successes and reflections on 2024. Yep. So for me, I'd say my probably biggest success for 2024 is that I took action. I was very action oriented. I have a saying like always moving forward, always moving forward. Like I've been pressing and pressing and pressing and sometimes not quite know like where that

Rebecca Green (07:06.062)
is leading. most times not quite knowing that. But back to that, I did a lot of work in 2023 in the clarity and alignment space, I think for me. In 2023, I got clarity of what I wanted. then 2024 was all about action. So that I did really well. And I've been thinking about that a lot. And I've been talking to people. And in my opinion,

A big differentiator between success and not success is those who take action. I've actually a friend here I've been chatting with. Who's just interested in starting a little side hustle. And we went on a walk six weeks ago. She had this idea. loves cheese and she wanted to open up a cheese shop. And I was like, okay, maybe not, maybe not coming to a cheese shop, but how about a cheese pop-up?

You know, I was like, right now, if you're selling cheese, this is like your next two months. I got to tell you, this woman, I have never seen, I mean, I talk about, I love talking ideas with all kinds of people. 98 % of people do not fall through with the ideas that they have. This woman, what's this idea of this cheese thing? Got a name, got a brand, created a logo, went with the pop-up idea, went and procured.

like partnerships and collaborations with events, found a cheese purveyor, I guess, out of LA that she could buy this wholesale fancy cheese from, got cheese shipped to her, it, like figured out the packaging. She's hustling cheese now every like Friday and Saturday. And I was like in six weeks and I said, I gotta tell you, I have never met somebody execute an idea so well and just the action. And I was like,

in a way, this goes somewhere or not. And this was I told her, I was like, you're just going to learn so much from this experience. Maybe you want to have a cheese shop. Maybe you don't. Maybe there's a little, don't know anything about really cheese or logistics, but you will learn. And I said, here's one thing I've observed is that you are killer at execution. And I said, so whatever you do in life, and this is a woman who stepped out of the workforce for the last 15 years and is getting back. was like, that is,

Rebecca Green (09:30.294)
That is your magic thing because a lot of people don't. So, and so I've been thinking a lot about this and I've been listening lot of podcasts about action oriented. So in my opinion, the tremendous differentiator between success and not success is those who take action. Those who are not afraid to take that step forward. And of course you're going to learn and you're going to fall back a steps, but that forward action. So back to kind of to your momentum. So that is something I've been well, you know,

launching Clever Collective, making trips in my business. I have just been moving forward in many ways. And with that, I would say something that has really helped me, and this is another kind of thing I did well, I got really good at my boundaries this year. So yeah, I am a yes person. I'm yes, yes, I can do it. I'm a pleaser. I love to help people.

I love to be in community, you know, you need somebody to volunteer. I'm the first one to raise my hand. I'm the first one to say, how can I help in my personal life, my professional life? So this year, because I was so clear on what I wanted to execute, I said no to a lot. And I really said that I've say this saying all the time now, if it wasn't a hell yes, it was a no. that was very clear that

I just kept my boundaries and also with that, what I took on, whether work-wise, task-wise, relationship-wise, I just said no to a lot. I kind of distanced myself to some relationships again that I might enjoy, but for this season of my life that I'm in, it's not supporting me in the way that I need to, so I created some boundaries for myself.

That is hard for me to do. So that was something that I did really well because again, I was so clear on what I wanted to achieve this year that I knew I had to say, I had to protect my energy and my space. then, yeah, so, and then I'd say the other thing is like, I mean, for me, the thing I'm most proud of this year is that really launching Clever Collective. I had this idea that came to me in Breathwork.

Rebecca Green (11:47.178)
And I have a lot of ideas. I'm an idea generator. Guys, you need an idea? Call me. Like I got, I got, like, I just have this like flowing of this brain that flows with ideas. But the execution is not saying your husband, that's why your husband doesn't like you and I spending too much time together.

Because at the end of any session, we're always like, we can do that. What about the friends? What about that? That is so funny. So it is. Sorry I've said that, but launching Clever Collective really, really, and we're only- Tell everyone about Clever. Sorry for interrupting. Tell everyone who might not know what Clever Collective is, because I mentioned it as well. Yeah. Tell them about that. So Clever Collective is an idea that came to me again, as I mentioned in Breathwork.

It never occurred to me before. so historically I've been working in real estate for the past, I don't know, 12, 13 years. And I was kind of burned down production. And for me and my husband, my husband owns a mortgage company and he's an active mortgage broker and he works a lot. He's a high producing person, so he works a lot. I was a high producing agent. I worked a lot. It was really a strain on our family.

And it wasn't working. I had some personal things in my life, a family situation and health that really kind of again needed more of my energy and resources. And we were really just like fractured. Like we, I was so strained. I was losing my mind. And so I just knew I had to do something different, but I didn't quite know what. So I had this vision of putting down my real estate business, maybe for good, maybe from now, I'm not sure what that, what that looks like. But for now I'm too.

put down my real estate business and to build clever collective. And essentially it is sponsored by my husband and his mortgage company. So Brent Portioning, Associated Mortgage Brokers. And it's like the business development arm for him. I run it, it's my child, my baby. And it is a, I call it like a co-op for agents, brokerage agnostic, that it's invite only because I'm very specific of the

Rebecca Green (13:58.924)
the caliber of person that I want in this group, want to create a well curated space because I want growth minded agents that are interested in leveling up. And, and it's all about education, collaboration and community. I, it's a three events. you put out throughout the year? Yes. So I did, I think it was like 23 events, some big, some small.

So again, a handful of big ones, plenty of little small ones, events in person and virtual. those, and agents in my clever community, clever collective community get invited to participate in them. And those events range from, so a big event would be like a panel discussion. I just had one a few weeks ago where I had four amazing agents, four different businesses come and I moderated a panel and we had a little like, you know, social hour with it. So.

I'm a believer of again, we just all have a lot to learn from each other. You led an amazing workshop on profitability that was a packed workshop. And again, nobody talks about profitability. So you led a workshop on agents, to kind of really look at your business, not measuring GCI, not measuring units, but measuring it by profitability. So I've guest teachers. So I had some guest teachers teach on social media marketing. we have

People, what I love is again, it's kind of like a co-op where I offer people in the group to lead a discussion, teach a class or just participate. Again, I'll bring in other speakers, but essentially it's what I think agents need. They need community, they feel it. They're working hard, they're burnt out. know, most brokerages don't offer a ton of value from like the meetings. And so you go there, you're like, okay, not really.

And also maybe like some people, but this because this group is really again, handpicked agents that are invited, either I invite them in and or they get referred by another agent who thinks it's a fit. It's really creating a high caliber group of people who are excited to be there. without a doubt and your action that you took so well this year. You know, thank you because it really benefited my sense of community and it benefited.

Rebecca Green (16:24.142)
how I looked at community for my 2024. So like what you're doing and what you took action on is working, right? So that is definitely a positive. I mean, that is my clapping my hands and saying, thank you. And you're right. Your action was definitely a positive for 2024.

Thank you. Well, I'm so grateful that you said yes to participate in and have been a leader in the group. And I mean, most of them like everyone, like people need people, like people need without a doubt. And I've recognized that that is a strength of mine. I am a community builder. I learned this term from my friend Kristen. She calls it a room builder. I'm a room builder. It is a natural skill set I've had since I was young age. That's what I'm good at.

That's what I like to do. Put me in that lane. I will kill it. so sure. Yeah, I do it. And then my whole pitch with clever collective, I said, and this is that from sponsored by my husband and associated more key workers and our pitches. Hey, if we're positively contributing to you in your business and your life, we simply asked to earn a spot on your preferred lender list. Brent does a good job. He'll talk to you about that. I'm not going to talk about mortgages. That's his gig.

And it's kind of gotten him in front of agents that he would otherwise had. And again, you know, get the mortgage business like all real estate has been hit pretty hard. So that's been a tremendous benefit to him because now he's in a relationship with agents and earning referrals from them and get earning the best. He does a great job. His pricing's great, you know, but you know, but we're just trying to add value to agents in a way that nobody else is doing. I love that.

I love that. So what are some of the things that you feel you didn't hit the mark on this year or some of the things that are still on your list? Because if we reflect, we've got a yin and yang. We've got to at it. Okay. What is one of the things? I could have been more organized. I could have been more organized. my gosh, guys. So whatever you think, however you see me on the outside, however you think you perceive me, do know there's a

Rebecca Green (18:40.59)
Hot mess on the other side of that door. Hot mess, 100%. Like, you know, there's people when you like, as a real estate agent, you go to their house, they're like, I'm so sorry, my house is a mess. I'm like, I'm like, you should stay in my house. Like really, if you show my house right now, it's like a bomb house. So yeah, and it's something I continually struggle with, is organization. So with that organizing my bit, like my systems are weak. I could have been,

better. mean, my husband's about to kill me. Like I'm supposed to be tracking expenses in the business. I'm like four months behind on that. You know, my home, like my house, so that I want to be more organized. And that is a priority. Absolutely. For 2025 is that so for me, I just took action. And there was a lot of shrapnel on the side that I just was like, I'm just moving forward because I can't get way down for this. So

I lacked some organization and whatever. Yeah, and that's a priority for next year. How about you? Where did you fall short? Yeah, so I fell short in not saving enough this year, not prioritizing. We're still finishing a house renovation and I really wanted to be done with that. So saving and retirement planning, I've talked a lot about that.

on our podcast and with agents that I'm mentoring, I am so motivated to nail that component, right? To really solidify a retirement plan. And I fell short. I fell short. didn't meet my savings goals. So that was something that I'm re-evaluating and really prioritizing again in 2024. I'm sorry, 2025.

The other thing, and I mentioned this earlier, momentum was something that I gained a ton of momentum in so many ways, and I'm so pleased with progress. But one thing I learned in 2024 that seems maybe simplistic or like, know, duh, is the direct correlation between like our productivity on a daily basis

Rebecca Green (21:02.518)
and the momentum and the stopping and starting of it. know, as, and let me kind of back that up. So from a coaching perspective, right, when I am, as I've been communicating with people about coaching and I do sell some digital products, when I am productive every single day in communicating those offers, I'm selling. When I stop,

being productive and in conversation about that, the sales go from here to here. Like, even a little bit. Like here, here at all. Like, doors open, doors closed, right? And so the reflection component of that has been interesting because I just had a conversation on one of my group coaching calls. We have to constantly be at whatever it is that we're doing.

Because when you build the momentum and it goes like this, you're just like starting a new business over every single time. Right. And that's a, that's a cycle for real estate agents. And so watching it exist, because obviously I know from a real estate standpoint, you have to keep your pipeline filled. Right. But because it's not like a digital sale or the purchase of a horse or the purchase of a coaching call, right. It's not.

as like immediate and it's not as like finite, right? You building a pipeline for real estate. The aha moment in the coaching business was, my gosh, that's happening in real estate businesses too. Right? Because it was so definite. Like it was like, you know, we saw the invoice, yeah. Fossed it on, fossed it off. Like, so for me, like,

Although I accomplished a lot, I had too many stop and starts and the stop and starts were not, it was not intentional and it was because there was a lot going on and I was building so much. Like I was, you talk about taking action. I was so action-oriented and I was building so much. in that building process, I was letting that productivity component that I know is so important, that daily productivity component.

Rebecca Green (23:27.054)
you know, with huge intention, I was letting that slip. So momentum, my momentum slipped at times and I had to reopen the business. And so I'm really keen to not let that happen in 2025. And I've actually put a few things into like into place on a daily basis, you know, for that to make sure that I'm in constant momentum. And, you know, I'm kind of calling it my everyday challenge.

For myself and my everyday challenge is like five things that no matter what I'm doing these five things today, because it's going to keep the momentum going. And those are the productive activities and everything that I know generate income, sales, growth, whatever it might be. So I read those every morning. Are those the same five activities or are those different every day?

No, it's the same five things. Okay, it's the same fivefold. So like, it's like a task, like a task oriented kind of. Yeah, so like I coach my agents, you know, when I talk to them about productivity, I talk to them about, you know, you need to make sure you're making progress even on your worst day, right? Like even on your worst day, you have to know if I do these things, it's still making progress. And in the real estate world, like, what do we need? We need to constantly be

filling our pipeline, right? We constantly need to be getting people into the pipeline and getting people into the pipeline that are at different stages. So like when I coach my agents, I talk about like there are five key components every day that you need to be focused on. The first one is prospecting and growing your database, right? Like prospecting can come in so many ways, but that's the first one.

You know, the second one is your database, like, you know, really working your database, going back to people that you haven't talked to for a long time, reconnecting, making sure you're constantly top of mind for people. The other one is, you know, follow up wherever you are in a contract, wherever you are with a potential buyer or potential seller, you have to constantly stay in communication with those people. So if you're focused on that being one of your five

Rebecca Green (25:47.746)
pillars every single day, you know, you're in good shape. The other one is learning. My goodness, like learning and growth is so important. And I just I think everyone has time to listen to a 30 minute podcast in their day, or read read a couple of pages out of a book, you know, learning is so so important. So you know, doing that. And then the other one, which is, you know, I have a love hate relationship with it, it's social media. Like, it's just

Just do it. Just do it. It is like a world of, you know, the audience is so big, like, I'm not going to go down that rabbit hole. So when I'm talking to agents about, you know, staying productive and making sure they're constantly, as you said, moving forward, right, you know, to keep the momentum going, those are the things that I'm talking to the agents about. So for me, my everyday challenge, you know, for myself to keep that momentum going and not let my

my, my, peaks and valleys, right? You know, to eliminate those peaks and valleys, you know, my five things are post something every day. I'm just doing it. I'm just doing it. And if I don't do it tomorrow, I want you to send me a message and say you didn't do it. Right? Because it, you know, everything happens in conversation. And if you're only having conversations up here, guess what? Yeah, you're not getting anywhere. Right?

So that's one thing. I have some personal connections that I want to make. That's another thing. I've been writing my goals out every single morning for 2025 already. There are nine things I am going to do in 2025, and I've been writing them down every morning. As soon as I get up, I write it. You know what? The focus that it's given me, I'm so pumped up just from that simple exercise.

So that is something that's on my, you know, everyday challenge for myself. Shooting, editing, and utilizing my videos and my content is another one of my five, you know, things, everyday challenge, because I have so much content, but I'm not pushing it out, right? Right? But imagine what would happen if we did that, right? So that's one of the things that I'm working on to keep the momentum going like this.

Rebecca Green (28:13.237)
And then, you know, really marketing something every day, marketing something to sell every day, because this is my business, whether it be a home, whether it be my coaching, like really understanding that today I moved the needle somewhere to sell a property, to get a listing, to grow my team, to grow my coaching business. Like every day at the end of the day, I want to be able to close my eyes and say, yep, yep.

I might not have sold anything today, but I took a specific action in order to make that happen. I love that. And I love that you have your goals written. I don't have my goals for 2025 yet. I do too. Yeah. And you're writing them down. Every day. And I like that daily, that challenge. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So the momentum part, when I said that to somebody the other day, they're like, what do you mean momentum was one of the negatives? Like you've been like,

steamrolling through things and I'm like, yeah, but I've been steamrolling and then I've been backtracking and I've been steamrolling and that's kind of like, like dieting, you know, like you go on a diet, you lose, and then, know, and just like, or working out like you need to, if you want to build muscle, you have to keep showing up at the gym. I would say and one of my

Yeah, one of my favorite things to say too is like, this goes back to the celebrating the wins. And this is, I'm sure Jane's clear statement, but like small incremental shifts or small incremental actions lead to really big things, right? Really big things, but you've got to do the reps, right? And, and although I was doing the reps, I wasn't doing the reps every single day, right? I wasn't doing the reps every single day.

And I was noticing it so dramatically because, data is so great. My stats were like, I mean, it still black and white. you did all of these things last week and you had a $30,000 week in your coaching business. you didn't do anything this week. You had zero. Yeah. Like it was zero. is a net zero. Yeah. I mean, but also, but with this, okay, Rebecca, like what a tremendous lesson to have.

Rebecca Green (30:28.494)
what an opportunity to learn that, see it very clear, very black and white, and now take that into 2025. And you're like, okay, I'm never again. I learned from that, never again. That's not gonna happen. So, And I did say to all listeners, I'm gonna post something every day, but I'm gonna do it with intention, not just to do it. So I'm also a big believer of like, if you say it out loud, which is part of the writing my goals down every day, it has a whole different meaning.

And so I've been telling everyone that. So I'm sure at some point I'm at the bandwagon and I need somebody to say, hey, yo, where's your post today? some... Yeah, okay. I'm gonna be watching. I'm gonna be watching. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so what were some of the things you talked about? Are there any other things? We're almost ready to wrap up today, but are there any other things that you recognize for 2025 that you really wanna focus on? I mean, really, organizations by number one.

And again, I just want to keep doing some other big shifts. Like for me personally, I've made some big positive personal shifts in 2024 and I want to continue that. I started exercising consistently for the first time, I don't know, ever years. I'm not sure when. Yeah. But I made that commitment in July and I've been doing it and actually now I'm seeing measurable results. I'm very excited. I've lost like three inches in my

weight and I'm down like 4 % body fat. I've been making some that for me personally, I've been working on my relationships in my home. Again, I felt the last few years I was really kind of just strained. And so I want to continue that like my marriage is in like, I have a really good marriage, but it's in a it's in a great space right now. And probably I just you know, I just I just was not in a great place last few years. And so it's been

a tremendous priority. And I'm feeling it, my husband, my kids are feeling it. I'm like, you know, like my marriage is like critical, like here are my prayers. I'm number one, like my marriage is number two. So I want to continue that with time with my children. I've been so much more intentional with time with my children. So I don't have all of 2025 figured out. I'm trying to end this year strong. So I have some big action I'm taking still for the next 30 days.

Rebecca Green (32:54.414)
and then, and then I'll kind of figure out my 2020. So yeah, I'm just trying to fit it. I'm trying to just execute what I had for this year before I start focusing on next year. So that's amazing. I love this conversation. I love this conversation so much. you know, it is, important to look at both the positive and the negative. And I think sometimes what we see on, you know, Instagram is not necessarily.

super authentic or real, like no one hits, I mean, I think my closing statement here is no one, regardless of what you see online, hits everything 100 % all of the time. But if you're intentional in your actions and you have the clarity and the desire, really anything is possible. Yep, absolutely.

And with that, I'm going to make one more comment. If you are listening to our podcast episode out there guys on Spotify or an op-ed podcast, we would really love if you'd write us a review. If you're finding this useful and finding value of this, please leave us a review. We haven't been pushing hard for years, but that is a priority actually for like just, we've been doing this in secret a little bit, Rebecca. We haven't been marketing it really too much. But I would watch you today.

Yes, 2025, I'd like to put a little bit more focus on our podcast and the marketing and reviews would really help. if you find this useful, leave some reviews. So yeah, that's good. All right. Thank you. Hope to you guys later. Thanks. Bye.