Adrian Butera: MC/Auctioneer #IWDMelbourneStyle

Managing Director, Compton Green

"Whether it's the people you work with or the clients you represent, you have to enjoy interacting & understanding what motivates others."

Making the transition to the real estate industry in 1990, Adrian was immediately attracted to the idea of becoming an auctioneer. setting about gaining experience & training to refine his skills. Adrian was rewarded in 1994 by winning the REIV Victorian Novice Auctioneer Competition.

He never looked back, subsequently winning the REIV Senior Auctioneer Award four times in 1998, 2001, 2004 & 2010.

A member of the REIV's Auction Chapter & having been on the Board of Directors at the Real Estate Institute of Victoria, Adrian has worked around Australia with some of the finest auctioneers, agencies & industry organisations in the country.

As the Managing Director at Compton Green, Adrian's focus is growing & leading an enthusiastic team in forming long-term relationships & ensuring your experience with property transactions is a smooth, stress-free & enjoyable process.

SKILLS & EXPERTISE

Specialities

Auctioneering is Adrian's passion, but he thrives on forward-thinking & innovation: effective communication & innovative marketing techniques as a must when selling property. Compton Green were recently awarded Best Digital Marketing Excellence by Real Estate Results Network. 

Awards

• Winner, Novice Auctioneers Competition REIV 1994
• Winner, Senior Auctioneers Competition REIV 1999
• Winner, Senior Auctioneers Competition REIV 2001
• Winner, Senior Auctioneers Competition REIV 2004
• Winner, Senior Auctioneers Competition REIV 2010
• Recipient, 2017 REIV President’s Award

The BIG GIVE (Elite Agent Magazine, 22 Jan 2018)

Someone who understands priorities - when things get tough, Adrian's team come first.

“The first thing I’ll do is go to an Italian supermarket & buy fresh ingredients – pasta, tomatoes, parmesan, herbs – before going back to the office & cooking lunch for my team. That’s what I do on days when real estate is really hard: I get practical, I get in the kitchen & I give back.”

"My success comes from two things only: sharing with others & growing my community"

Whether giving back with a bowl of pasta or by generously mentoring his peers, this former Director of the REIV understands the simple relationship between giving & success. 

An icon of the Australian real estate industry & recipient of the 2017 REIV President’s Award, Butera is not only sole director of thriving independent agency Compton Green; he’s also an award-winning auctioneer with multiple gongs in his trophy cabinet, having coached many of Australia’s leading auctioneers.

Under Adrian’s leadership, Compton Green have been named as AREA’s Innovation/Game Changer of the Year for 2018, having instituted multiple industry firsts – including their signature ‘Goes Green’ environmental audit for landlords, ‘Green Stays’ (their unique take on Airbnb) & ‘Goes Green Solar’ (an energy-positive, environment-positive offering in the works for the coming year). Needless to say, he’s a thought leader to watch.
 

SUCCESS LEAVES CLUES

Reflecting on Adrian’s 27-year real estate career, it appears that working within the property industry was written in his stars.

“Back in the day, I thought I’d be a lighting designer. My father & I ran a lighting business – both commercial & residential – for three years, before the late 1980’s recession hit. Afterwards, I entered the real estate industry, quickly realising it was a business that gave back to you what you put in. The harder I’d work, the more I’d earn, the luckier I’d get. I figured that to be successful, I needed to work as hard as I could.”

Despite the influence of technology upon the industry, Adrian remains optimistic about real estate as a profession of great potential, believing that effort equals reward, but these days also appreciating that burnout is a real thing. Today there’s more smarts to working hard & success leaves clues in its wake. Just as important as working hard is being smart. But is hard work paired with smarts enough to beat the demon of disruption, seemingly hot on the heels of real estate agents from Hobart to Darwin?

“I think disruption is life,” smiles Adrian. “The real estate is certainly being challenged – we’re reminded of that daily on social media & at conferences. We had disruption 30 years ago too, but we just called it ‘different tools’ or ‘new ideas’.

Like many principals, Adrian identifies property management as the area at highest risk from disruption as the systems & technologies that run rental databases & trust accounts – they’re not cutting edge. They don’t compare to sales databases. Somehow, property management been left behind. I’m aware that there are companies working aggressively to improve their digital platforms – but poor property management technology is a real threat to the marketplace, because an estate agency’s only asset is their rent roll. If disruptive players simplify property management, it may mean fees get cut, & our assets will diminish as an industry.”

THE CHALLENGE OF INNOVATION

So how will Adrian help set Compton Green’s compass for 2018? By constantly challenging the status quo. Every year, they run an Innovation Day to set the tone for the coming 12 months. Rather than doing this work going into holiday season, Compton Green hold Innovation Day in the middle of the year & off-site for maximum team focus.

As a principal, Adrian says Innovation Day puts healthy pressure on him: he knows he needs to have products to roll out & ideas ready to present to the team in July. Plus there’s a lot of infrastructure that goes into the event, to help launch new products, new tools, new initiatives.

SHARING THE VISION

Want to take your agency to the next level? You need your team to adopt your business vision. “There’s no easy answer to team buy-in,” says Adrian. “But one of the best ways to help people feel connected to goals is to involve them in their creation. For example, we had one of our property managers do a professional 15-minute presentation at Innovation Day. We asked her what she’d do if she were boss for a day, the insights she provided were really amazing.

“Dee Gibson – my wife who’s been in sales for 20 years – also did a presentation on ‘Great Words’, highlighting clever turns of phrase to be used in email & copy. If you hand your team creative freedom on what they can discuss, ask they use presentation tools & take the challenge seriously – you can learn so much & they get a new life skill. Everyone has a smile on their face!”

Beyond evolving your team’s culture, how does a principal set sales targets that don’t alienate or intimidate? Adrian suggests a collaborative approach gets best results.

“On Innovation Day, I’ll share our sales goal. It usually looks huge. But the team are aware that the goal is cumulative – not mine alone. It’s a number built from their personal commitments & professional goals, which comes from a one-on-one conversation with each team member. Each salesperson is asked where they want to be. There might be challenging conversations about what more they can try to make this month different, this year extraordinary. There’s no pushback on this collective goal, because everyone has contributed towards it.”