Working smarter, not harder

MOST conveyancers are working long hours and wearing too many hats. Many wrap their identities in their business and are reluctant to delegate. But that mindset is a trap, says business-coach-turned-conveyancer Trent Taylor, who has spent 20 years mentoring businesses and running several of his own.

“If I build the business all around me, I’m not having any holiday,” Taylor bluntly told more than 100 industry attendees at Australian Conveyancer’s Beyond Conveyancing event in Melbourne. “The reason you’re working 50, 60, 70, hours and making X amount of cash is because you’re trying to do everything. This business is here to serve you. Do not be a slave to your business.”

In 2022, Taylor bought Skilled Conveyancing – a Victorian firm started by his mother Dawn Barry – and rebuilt it from the ground up. By focusing on the fundamentals and taking a disciplined, methodical approach, he grew the business and its bottom line. “I didn’t even know what conveyancing was,” Taylor confided. “I had no idea where our holes were.”

When it comes to running a successful business, “bigger is not better”, Taylor says. What truly matters is having a clear grasp of your numbers and exactly what your business needs to deliver for you. For Taylor, a clarity plan he developed 17 years ago changed his life and net worth. By mapping out your time, finances and goals – including working hours, family time, holidays, profits and assets – you can align your business and personal-life goals, he says.

“From your clarity plan, you’ll know what you need the business to do for you in five to 10 years. It starts with you. The business is just a vehicle – make it drive better. Focus on progression, not perfection,” he says.

Taylor says too many business owners are making decisions based on gut feel when they “must know the numbers”. “I will guarantee 95 per cent of you are great at conveyancing. That’s awesome, but that’s one hat,” he says. “We need to know what’s going on in all areas of the business. If you can’t see what’s going on, how do you give your team a plan? If you keep making the same mistake and you see it, stop it and fix it.”

Taylor followed his mentors’ advice to “test and measure” business performance weekly to identify where things need work. “All I say is by the end of the week, we need to be 1 per cent better,” he says. “We imagine our business to be a bucket. All of us have holes in our buckets. No business is perfect, but how well you’ve worked on yourself and implemented knowledge determines how well you plug them.”

Taylor says people are the most important asset in conveyancing and staff need to be well looked after, because they’re looking after the clients.

To build a business that runs without you, Taylor says you must focus on growing confidence in yourself and your team. “Confidence is king. We’re a service-based industry. If our people aren’t confident, their actions are sporadic,” he says. “Cash is the oxygen to your business. But confidence makes us do the things we need to do more consistently and simply.”

The more you test, measure and apply wisdom, the more clearly your strengths show, Taylor says. And while business owners wear many hats, true freedom comes from empowering others to manage key areas. “As a CEO, my number one job is to grow people. If I grow people, guess what happens to the business? It goes up.”

By documenting your systems, you can ensure staff are trained in a consistent way, he says, and that leads to better service and greater team confidence.

“Most business owners are so scared that if I let go and let somebody else do it, will they do it as well as me? Well, train them,” he says.

Taylor urges the industry to take itself more seriously, saying conveyancers are specialists, but often undervalue themselves. Conveyancing businesses are also often selling for a fraction of what they should. “Conveyancers are specialists. We’re surgeons,” he says.

He also laments the loss of valuable experience as senior conveyancers exit, taking years of expertise with them. “One of the saddest things I’ve seen in this industry in two-and-a half years is that we’re not valuing enough grey hairs,” he said. “We’re letting a lot of knowledge walk out of this industry, and I don’t think we respect it enough.

“We’ve got to find a pathway to keep (the knowledge) alive in our industry, because the youth are going to need it.”