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A Few Pointers for Hectic Times
Title companies are rocking. More orders than can be handled with any kind of style. Overtime, double time, Saturdays, Sundays, and evenings. Closings everywhere. Closings at all times and not just during the last week of the month but on everyday of the month.
High intensity and high stress. Complaints of burnout. Delayed vacations. Tempers frayed from internal friction. Strange illnesses. Employee defections, sometimes en masse. Angry spouses and families. Angry customers, too.
There are other, more systemic, manifestations. Increased production but decreasing productivity. Increasing profits but decreasing profit margins. Increases in the frequency of errors and the seriousness of errors, and decreases in error avoidance and awareness.
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What does a hotshot manager do at a time like this?
Remain calm. This is a test of your managerial ability and leadership. Whatever you do, don't panic.
Accept the proposition that this situation is temporary. It has little chance of settling into a permanent state. It is certainly possible it will settle into a permanent state - more astounding things have happened, but you have no business counting on it.
Decide who your best customers are and take care of them. These are the people you want long term. These are the people who will insure your successful future. These are the people you don't want to see giving a few jobs to one of your new competitors just to test them out.
Be discriminating about the others. Which have staying power? Which offer you work of the kind you like to do? Which have values and ethics like yours? Which permits you to do what you do best at a good smart profit and are happy to see you successful?
Do not increase your fixed costs. Unless you are Bill Foley at Fidelity National or Ken Lingenfelter at Metropolitan Title, this is not the time to experiment with new locations, new products, new machinery. Make certain every increase in operating costs is volume-related and/or reversible.
Be wary of solving your problems with new employees. Most new employees in this era are new to the business and will require heavy training, reducing the productivity of your best people (always their trainers) at a crucial time. What does a hotshot manager do at a time like this?
Resist the temptation to close as many deals as possible while deferring post-closing cleanup policy production, archiving, etc. for a later time. If you really want to increase your file processing costs the best way to do it is to stretch out the period over which they are processed. Get 'em done and closed and outa there.
Be particularly wary of fraud. Especially if you are an independent agency, you are particularly vulnerable, the population of fraud artists has never been higher or more sophisticated, and this is the height of the fraud season. Pay particular attention to the escrow closing department where most schemes focus.
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Periodically ask all your closing people to tell you about every deal in which disbursement is to be made in an unusual way. Ask about every deal in which the parties are new in the city, every deal in which closing personnel are not comfortable with the parties, etc., etc., etc.
Reduce or retire debt but do not sever your access to lines of credit.
If you are an independent agency, resist the temptation to distribute all the firm's profits at year end. Investors want it distributed, owners want it, but a company without cash on hand is vulnerable to everything and anything. Establish some level of cash reserves (based on monthly expenses) and create a sensible investment program for them.
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