Empowering and Strengthening the Property Manager - Service Manager Partnership

Within site based multi-family operations the property and service manager relationship is the one connection in my mind that holds the most impact on the success of a team, community, and organization. The results of this management team are seen through many metrics: leasing performance, curb appeal, move-in's, renewals, service repairs and most importantly team retention. All of which are measurable through data, team and resident surveys. In order to gain alignment between these two key positions, I have listed 5 elements for you to consider as you continue to focus, grow and strengthen this partnership and your community team. If you are a property manager or service manager reading this article, I encourage you to designate time on a regular basis to review, discuss and coach your assistant manager and/or service lead in some form of leadership training to prepare and equip them for future leadership roles within your organization. We best serve our teams and individuals who demonstrate a desire and passion for growth through our ability to prepare team members for advancement. Be tactical and strategic in creating advancement training plans. As an organization and team leader, your strength is found within, and I encourage you to honor the ones in your organization who are working to improve themselves and grow their careers. Actively include them into practical situations where they have an opportunity to apply what you are teaching them.

The 5 elements we will review are the drivers that have provided me with success throughout my career as I work with community based teams; my desire is that you give thought to the information and apply or incorporate what you see as value to you, your peers and the teams you lead.

5 Elements to Strengthen Manager Alignment

1) Goals

2) Huddles

3) Property Manager and Service Manager Walk

4) Communication

5) Coaching/Mentoring

1) Goals: The success of any task, project, or initiative you take on whether personal of professional requires a goal, a plan. Goals simply define, map out and measure what you seek to accomplish. Keep the format as simple as you can, don't over complicate it.

From - To - By When - Steps - Results

The concept is quite clear. No Goal - No Plan; "if you don't have a plan then you (intentionally) plan to fail". Goals are the foundation to your short and long term success. The Property Manager and Service Manager should have goals set up for each member of their team and they should reflect both team and individual goals. There's effort here, and yes it takes time to prepare and manage goals, but as you begin to build this behavior into your day to day you will quickly realize the benefits and find yourself in a better place to execute.

2) Huddles: The preference is a daily morning huddle. A morning huddle provides the managers the opportunity to gather a busy team in one place before the chaos begins to align everyone on the priorities for the day. Review the goals for the week and provide the team with a measure of where the team stands in achieving desired results. Examples consists of the property manager talking through the current occupancy vs. goal, verifying target units, discussing advertising adjustments, renewal contacts for the week, and overall team successes. The morning huddle also allows the service manager to speak to current open service tickets, scheduled preventative maintenance for the week, contractor projects, verify move-outs and Turn schedule. Past the team debrief of what has been accomplished for the week and the expectations for the remainder of the week, this time allows you to provide admin updates, listen to the team as a group as they reaffirm their priorities and everyone walks away aligned. Be the captain of your ship, but also ensure the team knows you trust them and they are supported and most importantly - empowered to carry out their responsibilities.

3) Property and Service Managers Walk: In my career I served as both a Service Manager and Property Manager, in this I fully understand and appreciate the connection these two roles have with one another. Carving out 1 hour every afternoon to come together and walk the community is key! This hour can be used to walk Turns for the day and sign-off on market ready product, balcony inspections, check for abandon vehicles, review current and pending capex projects, check for exterior lights vs. faulty photocells, shop inspection, landscaping, etc., etc. You can not manage a community from behind a desk (property manager) and you can not assume the property manager is aware of your facility challenges (service manager). Coming together and visually inspecting the community will allow both managers to be more engaged and aligned with the needs of the community, increase confidence in each other and elevate their leadership skills in enhancing their ability to hold a higher level of self-accountability peer to peer. Make the hour work for you. You will quickly see the value and benefits of coming together.

4) Communications: You can not over communicate. However, I want you to consider the manner in which you communicate and the importance of listening. These two roles carry a lot of pressure and you will undoubtably face situations where you may over-react and lose your poise. If you go into your day understanding the needs of the other it is much easier to control the tone and emotions. The more you work towards common goals and lead with patience and humility the more you strengthen the trust in one another, and this is seen through the eyes of your team as they listen to how you are communicating. Effective listening and demonstrating empathy is something we speak to a lot when it comes to our residents; this is true in our team conversations at every level as well. As you go, the entire team will follow. In addition to the detail of the communications, understand the delivery is as or more important.

5) Coaching and Mentoring: Once you obtain the level of manager, you become the team coach and mentor; it is not a choice, it is your responsibility. Managers are responsible for creating an environment and community culture where the entire team is focused on meeting and then exceeding expectations. The property managers and service managers set the expectations for the team through goals, huddles, connections & interactions and clear communications. You tie the "why" to all we do into your coaching and mentoring. I see people in our industry and on my teams in two distinct ways: (1) they are content in their roles with no aspirations of advancement or (2) they have the skill-sets to master their current role and they outwardly assert themselves into investing into their future advancement.

Those that are content, it is our responsibility to ensure they are growing and an expert in their current role, we recognized their efforts and reposition them from plateau to plateau - steady growth where they can see and experience the value they bring to themselves and the team. The team members looking to elevate their careers are depending on you to engage and take the time to assist them in their advancement. If you do not recognize them and meet them in this endeavor they will leave. Not only will they leave, they will let as many people as they can know of their poor experience.

I encourage leaders to take full advantage of team member surveys, stay interviews, exit interviews, Glassdoor reviews, etc., to help in understanding the themes of opportunity in your company. We also have opportunities to coach through performance reviews, onboarding surveys, and one-on-one team meetings. Through your coaching and mentoring you are instilling the importance and at the same time you are providing our future leaders a road map in the fundamentals of coaching.

I hope this information provides you with topics to think about, improve upon what you currently have implemented or maybe pass along to someone on your team that may benefit from the information.

Please feel free to leave your comments, I look forward to hearing your feedback!