Tag Archives: apartment leasing

What’s Your Superpower: Finding Your Competitive Advantage

Posted on April 10, 2014 by James G. Lenhardt, CPC, CTS

 

What’s Your Superpower?

Finding Your Competitive Advantage to Get Hired

In today’s competitive job market, standing out is essential to getting hired. One single open job can bring in countless applicants, piling up on a hiring manager’s desk and all looking the same. How can you stand out? If you learn how to work your competitive advantage you can be a manager’s pick over someone who has even more skills or experience. Here’s how:

 

Pick Your Strengths & Highlight Them

What’s your competitive advantage? Maybe you aren’t sure yet, or maybe you are new to the job search process—and that’s okay! Think of your strengths as the skills that have most allowed you to succeed.
Perhaps you are a persistent person, seeing projects through until the end when others have lost interest. Or maybe your strength is that you are detail oriented–always able to see the little things that others overlook.

If You Have Experience in the Industry:

If you have apartment industry experience, then your competitive advantage will be your experience and the parts of the job you are best at. Make sure to highlight these in your resume and interview, along with any special awards or recognition you have received. This doesn’t mean you have to toot your own horn; but when asked to discuss your experience, focus on where you have excelled.

If You Don’t Have Experience in the Industry:

If you don’t have apartment job experience—do not fear! You still have skills that are relevant. Perhaps you have worked in a sales job or another people-oriented position; and these will have equipped you with communication skills that apply to an apartment job. If you don’t have a set of professional skills to go on, perhaps you want to sell your competitive advantage as your hard work, determination, or passion to succeed.

Keep in mind: most job seekers will say that they are hardworking and motivated. Your competitive advantage will come when you can show in your resume or interview why you embody the strengths you claim to have. For example, it is not enough to just say that you are motivated. But if you can tell a story of a time when you had to accomplish something very difficult and didn’t give up then you will stand out as motivated.

Your competitive advantage is unique to you.

You know your strengths and weaknesses better than anyone, so when you think about what to highlight in your job application be sincere in what you are best at. Hiring managers can see through a candidate who lists a strength that they don’t show proof of. It will also be difficult to stand out if you try to emphasize too many strengths: they will just come out jumbled and you won’t be memorable.

 

Use Your Superpower…

If you haven’t done it already, take a moment to figure out what your competitive advantage is—the trait that would be your superpower if you had to pick. Highlight your unique strengths during the job search process and you will both stand out and convince a hiring manager that you are the one for the job.

Get started today by submitting your resume for a job placement: Apply now.

 

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Creating a Successful Staffing Plan

Posted on September 16, 2013 by James G. Lenhardt, CPC, CTS

3 Steps to Creating a Successful Staffing Plan

The best time to have a staffing plan is not when you run into problems, but ahead of time—now. While each company is different, these 3 steps cover how to create a plan that can be successfully adapted to your company:

1.)   Analyze Your Past & Present Situation

Begin creating your plan by thinking about what changes your company has undergone in the past year or so and how it plans to change in the near future. By determining what has and has not worked you can eliminate ineffective hiring methods and improve your current one. The apartment industry and market is constantly changing as well, and industry trends that may affect your company should be taken into consideration.

2.)   Know Who is Applying

Being aware of who is looking for apartment jobs in your area and how qualified they are will make your staffing process smoother. Holding interviews weekly and talking to a variety of candidates can determine your applicant pool’s strengths and weaknesses. Will most applicants need further training? Is there an overabundance of a certain skill? These and many other questions should become clear as you explore your applicant pool. Especially in large cities such as Houston and Austin where applicants are plentiful, knowing your applicant pool is crucial. Once you have established who is looking for jobs you can better know who to hire.

3.)   Use Your Resources

When it comes time to hire new employees do not limit your approach to one outlet. Finding candidates online may be one means to finding hires, but employee referrals or networking through industry associations could also lead to recruits. A staffing company can also provide an efficient means of staffing your company without added stress. A multi-faceted approach that combines company’s existing network with additional help will maximize the influence of your staffing plan.

The staffing process is integral to a company’s well-being and as such should not be left to chance or under-preparation. By analyzing your staffing needs, knowing who your applicants are, and using your resources you will be able to construct a staffing plan that is full-proof.

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What am I Paying a Staffing Company to do?

Posted on May 1, 2013 by James G. Lenhardt, CPC, CTS

When you have a need for a qualified candidate to fill a position, you may begin to consider using a staffing company to help you fill your job openings. Hiring a new employee requires a lot of work and labor costs. You may spend hours going through hundreds of resumes and cover letters and that is just the time spent before actually setting up interviews.

If you decided to use a staffing company, they take care of most of this work for you. Staffing companies provide a large variety of services which ultimately lead to reducing your workload and time for finding the right person for the job.

First, a staffing company is able to locate employees for a variety of job openings including temporary workers and permanently placed workers.  A staffing company collects a variety of resumes from employees looking for work, sorts through their qualifications to find where they would be the best fit and matches their job experience, job preference, and personality with your company’s needs.

If you are just looking for some temporary help, a staffing company can also provide you qualified employees to help with your short term staffing needs. In this case, the employee is employed by the staffing company and sent to you for a short amount of time and your company is saved the hassle of filling out tax forms, employment paperwork, and the overall cost to the company is greatly reduced.

A multitude of work goes into sending qualified people to interview with the company for placement. In a sense, you are paying a staffing company to weed out those who are not qualified and who may not exactly fit your community’s culture. Staffing companies interview prospective talented individuals to match them up with your needs as an employer and use your specifications and qualifications to cut down on the time you spend with prospective employees that may not be at all qualified. A staffing company specializes in people and maintains a data base of individuals who are suited for very specific work environments.

A staffing company can potentially reduce the amount of time spent finding the right employee down from weeks to just days. Hire Priority specialized in finding talented people for the healthcare and apartment industries. Their database of qualified people is very specific and can fill the void in the work place very quickly! So the next time you find yourself needing new apartment office or maintenance staff, Hire Priority can find you the perfectly qualified candidate for your apartment community.

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MY STORY: Patricia Paup

Posted on April 29, 2013 by James G. Lenhardt, CPC, CTS

Patricia has been in the apartment industry for many years. She began working in the apartment industry as a leasing agent in the 1960’s. Originally, Patricia intended to only work in the industry until she could find another job but the environment quickly grew on her and she decided to make a career out of it. Patricia soon realized that if she worked hard and was a dedicated employee, she could make a lot of money in the apartment industry. She took her knowledge and started showing others in the office how they too could be successful.

Patricia says the high point of her career was working as a leasing agent for lease-up properties. She had a small team and they leased five brand new communities. She loved the fast paced and excitement of that position.

Patricia moved to Houston in 2004 and was searching for leasing vendors when she came across Hire Priority. She worked for a company that used Hire Priority as well as other staffing agencies. When she was out of work, she knew where to turn to help her find her next career.

She describes her experiences with Hire Priority and their staff as “Wonderful, absolutely wonderful!” and would gladly use their services again if she ever needs another job. She worked for Hire Priority from May-August and was permanently placed in a tax credit community. Patricia wanted that position because she wanted the experience of working for a tax credit property. She says her and the manager hit it off quickly and then she was offered a full time job as a Leasing Consultant/Assistant Manager.

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Are you working in the Austin Apartment Industry yet?

Posted on April 22, 2013 by James G. Lenhardt, CPC, CTS

Austin is a proverbial boom town with a great night life, relaxed lifestyle, and the beauty of the University of Texas overlooking the city. The population of Austin is growing fast as professionals relocate to Texas. In 2012 the population of Austin was growing at a rate of 151 new residents per day in the metropolitan area fueling tremendous grown in the Austin real estate and apartment industry. That growth doesn’t show any signs of slowing down and some speculate that Austin’s population with double or triple in the next 10 years.

So where do all of those new migrants live? Apartments. The industry is growing with new developments being added every year. Not only are those developments needing new residents, they are also feeding the job market with open positions for leasing consultants and property managers on the rise.

If you are not considering a position in the Austin apartment leasing industry, maybe it is time that you take a look at the possibilities that are upcoming. Everywhere, the apartment industry is booming, rents are increasing and new developments are popping up all over the place. In Austin alone, the wave of new apartments being developed is exceptional. In 2011, more than 14 new apartment communities were planned and construction began. Now, the hiring boom is on. With all of those new communities servicing Austin, there is a tremendous demand for motivated leasing professionals.

And the potential does not stop there. The apartment industry may be one of the few industries left where there is a clear path laid out for advancement. Many leasing professionals who have the talent are promoted up within the company and can easily move up into management positions. With that experience, the opportunities for advancement continue into regional management, senior management, training professionals, marketing specialist, and on and on. So if there is an area that you are passionate about, you can absolutely find your path in the apartment industry and the doors are often wide open. This growth is projected to continue through the next several years with more new hires which make getting in now much more valuable.

Rents are at an all-time high and demand for rental property is not showing any signs of slowing down. That means that commission potentials are high, job opportunities will continue to open up and anyone getting a start in the apartment industry in Austin is poised for success.

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