Inman is exploring what the future of real estate leadership should look like through a series of articles, Q&As with industry pros, and an upcoming five-part series called Leadership Week. Please send your feedback to leadership@inman.com. If you’re a leader who wants to join us for our exclusive Disconnect in The Desert event on March 26-28, or want to recommend a colleague, send a note to brad@inman.com explaining why.

Tiffany McQuaid, president of McQuaid & Company, is not only a broker, but has a marketing and promotions background, which explains her unique approach when it comes to running her business.

An Ohio native, she has particular expertise in capitalization and commercialism. Four short years after opening her doors, Tiffany has continued to grow the company and is now recognized globally as a rising top producer and innovator in the real estate world. Tiffany has a true gift for maintaining her boutique style real estate Firm, which focuses solely on the client’s needs, adding value to the experience. And she has hand-picked every Realtor.

We recently had the opportunity to sit down with Tiffany and ask her thoughts on where real estate leadership is headed.

As a leader, what keeps you up at night?

Redefining the role of “our” Realtors to meet or exceed the customer expectation. As a boutique style brokerage, “my” expectation for every aspect of what we do is very high, but I believe that plays a large role in our growth and community support of our team.

As a leader, I have no desire to become the largest brokerage in town, but I do strive to be known as the best at what we do. We tend to take the core of the industry and figure out how to push each element higher and make it more memorable and pleasurable than the norm.

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Ultimately creating moments and powerhouse marketing that allows for “top of mind” recognition of both our company and our Realtors. We call this “Real Estate to the Mth Degree” which translates nicely to “No sleep for me …”

Tiffany McQuaid

If you could change one thing in real estate, what would it be?

The perception, period. It has always bothered me that the perception is that “anyone can sell real estate!”

This industry is a craft that needs to be perfected daily and requires constant self-education, more education and even more real world education in order to truly offer a fantastic service/experience to the customer.

I have always believed that in order to be successful in real estate you have to have that fire in your belly, the excitement of waking up early because you cannot wait to see what the day is going to bring. Our value begins at “home,” and that simple word can mean so much:

It can mean providing an atmosphere of culture and excellence within the brokerage, which encourages and embraces Realtor growth — their “home” base.

It can mean a safe zone for the customer to exhale and know that they are in great hands with their Realtor of choice — their “home” team.

But most importantly, adding value to the experience, performing above expectations and going that extra mile — a true industry “home” run!

How have your expectations of your management team changed over the past two years?

I believe my core management team and I are ready for “Dancing with the Stars” as a result of all the pivoting and tap dancing we have done over the last few years.

The huge asset that comes from being a smaller company is that we can react quickly and use our creativity to corner the market. While the larger companies may have the edge on financial backing, making major changes or adjustments to a larger operation may present more logistics issues and challenges.

Although we have a growth strategy and plan, we remain flexible and open-minded to risk so we can react quickly and jump on voids that we may see or find in our marketplace.

How do you keep your team competitive?

Our office culture is not competitive in nature, but more supportive of one another. With that culture, the dynamic of the team reflects the idea that we are more powerful together — as a unit — than we are individually.

We have learned to work hard to outdo ourselves and use our own standards as a guide to push forward. In addition, we have learned to block out the noise of naysayers or other competitors in the marketplace, we recognize that anything innovative or fresh can be met with resistance and we want to stay true to our marketing sense.

We let them “do” them, and we “do” us, and plan to win the hearts (and business) of the customers.

With so much disruption in real estate, what’s your best advice for managing change?

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead

I recognize that my team and I may not be the ones responsible for changing the course of real estate as we know it, but we will use the changes that happen as a guide; a simple way to catapult new thoughts, ideas or risks necessary for my company to put our innovative twist; to stand out; and, most importantly, to make a difference in this industry that ultimately results in raising the bar and redefining the expectation.

Change is always good for business, and my company will continue looking for our own shiny pennies amid all this change!

Want to connect with Tiffany? You can find her on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

Email Matthew Shadbolt

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