Paris in December: C'est la vie!
The twelfth month is the perfect time to take a walk and plan ahead for even more success
Many things make December a month worth remembering. We review our year’s efforts, recall challenges, and celebrate our successes. Holidays offer opportunities to reach out, catch up, and reaffirm relationships. The weather, holiday playlists, and even pumpkin spice make us nostalgic during the most wonderful time of the year.
And sometimes, we look even further back, to plans once made, best kept, and still to come — like that time I took a walk in Paris in December.
Let me tell you a story.
Ten Years Ago in Paris
Back in 2015, I was invited to address an international conference of real estate brokers, technologists, and futurists held in Paris, France. My job was to share thoughts on where the industry had been recently, point out exciting achievements, and answer questions about “what’s coming next” in our business.
I remember many things from that event: The number of speakers encouraging people from different countries to share ideas and best practices without regard to borders; the ideas for how technology could expand marketplaces and share information greater than traditional “closed” systems; and generally how optimistic attendees were to try new approaches to leads, marketing, sales, and collaboration.
It was such a refreshing event, especially since America’s housing industry was just overcoming the hangover from the financial crisis.
Hosting the event in Paris presented a perfect, if somewhat ironic, venue to discuss “nouvelle technologies” in an industry historically slow to accept change. Like the city itself, our industry has been steeped in its history, and many glory days of the past. Navigating innovation and tradition has never been easy. Yet the conference seemed to break those barriers: conversations were collaborative, if opinionated, on every matter.
I loved that conference.
Take Your Time
I remember going for a long walk after the conference. All around were signs of the times when history and future had collided in Paris. Old roads leading to high-speed trains. Ancient bakeries next to renovated buildings. New shops in the shadow of old cathedrals. It was very much a living metaphor of our own industry, even today, where conferences juxtapose “high tech, high touch” workshops and endless contributors argue about how we’ve always done business and how we might do it in an age of algorithms.
How many times have you heard, “Artificial intelligence won’t replace agents; but agents using artificial intelligence will replace agents who don’t use artificial intelligence,” this year?
Of course, I’m old enough to remember when they said the same thing about fax machines, computers, the internet itself, digital cameras, social media, video, and just about everything else that was newer than a skeleton key. It recalls to mind this sculpture by Arman on that last trip: Everybody’s Time reminds us that life is full of varied experiences, even in the same public square.
So I’ve never worried about whether or not A.I. is going to replace anyone, to be honest. Nor do I pay attention to anyone who thinks they know where it’s really going, either. I’ve watched endless “savior” solutions try to “fix” our industry for decades. There’s nothing today that hasn’t been tried before: from novel comp plans to new gadgets to private equity. It turns out there’s always l’heure pour tous — an hour for everyone — to be successful in this business their own way, in a marketplace both enormously scalable and locally unique.
It’s also why so many brokers did so well this year, though the press would have you believe it was only disasters everywhere.
Try, Learn, Decide
My walk around Paris visualized an important point about the future: You don’t have to accept every suggestion.
In fact, trying, then learning, and deciding what to do next is the most important part of dealing with emerging possibilities. Maybe a certain brokerage model will take over the business, but I remember when YHD, Foxtons, and Owners.com were a thing, too. (Last year, the number of people trying to sell their home on their own fell to the lowest number in more than 41 years of data.)
Not unlike the Tour Montparnasse, the lonely (and singular) skyscraper on the Parisian skyline which mars the near-perfect view from Montmartre. The 59-story office tower makes an apt metaphor. Built in 1973, it “jumped ahead” with the latest building materials, construction methods, and zoning rules. Immediately upon completion, public backlash to its stark, dark silhouette was so strong that Paris now relegates skyscrapers to La Defense, a suburb outside the main city.
People tried, learned, and decided that some things were simply worth keeping.
Like the view.
Today, many companies are taking a second look at lots of “predictions” about the industry’s future and asking, are we so sure? Studies show an obvious recent drop-off in general AI use at major firms in two years — fascinating for a phenomenon barely three years old. Mergers and acquisitions in the housing industry are mopping up years of debt overreach by companies with “smarter mousetraps” that never turned a profit. Miracle-cures must confront the reality of not living up to the hype, such as how poorly private listing networks perform for actual consumers, or attempts to replace our institutions with organizations who barely attracted 10,000 members amongst 1.5 million in over two years.
Yeah: Sometimes you gotta try, and learn, and decide whether to pay attention to all that noise, or just go out and get another listing (or two).
Disney in Paris
And yet, change happens in the strangest places.
I never visited Disney in Paris, but it has always struck me as an optimistic effort to explore the future of entertainment in the city that hosts some of the most ancient artwork. Disney attracted 15.5 million visitors this year, while 8.4 million browsed the Louvre and 6.6 million climbed the Eiffel Tower. Could it be that it’s still possible to love what’s best in your past, while spending time with the coolest things in the future? I think so, and apparently I’m not alone, because the Mouse didn’t only innovate on entertainment, but fashion, in the world’s most stylish cities.
Move, the Mouse
In an industry that’s all about moving, few do it better than ours. And not just for clients.
We’re always moving from one idea to the next, one strategy to another, and one innovation after another. We’re good at it, even if we’re not entirely sure what the future will bring. We’re brave enough to try, old enough to have seen a lot, and willing enough to accept the consequences. We’ll navigate any maze, not like a mouse trying to get out, but one who’s excited for the journey itself.
We change, not for what it will bring us, but what it helps make of us!
December in Paris, those years ago, was fun. But December in any year is just as wonderful, anywhere. Just take a walk - back through the year - and see how your plans, choices, and efforts paid off. Then remind yourself, looking forward:
I don’t need to be ready for everything, because I’m ready for anything!
I’ll achieve as much next year as any year before, because when it comes my success:
C’est la vie!
—M
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Thanks for another great read, Matthew. I’m coming away excited to keep trying and learning while deciding every day to tune out a lot of the noise and focus on who I can help.
Love this Matthew! "I don’t need to be ready for everything, because I’m ready for anything!" It's going on a post-it note on my whiteboard along with other quotes that have inspired me this year. Thank you! Wishing you a wonderful holiday season!