Today went much better than I thought it would. Except for the admin password issue. But I was on the phone with the on-sites before I was out of my pj's this morning to get updates on what rent had been collected, and I had emails out to the attorney with updates by 9am. About noon while I was sitting in the CEO luncheon I attended today (more later), I was so curious as to why I wasn't being bombarded with requests for more information, I actually emailed to see how things were going. There were no further requests. I was shocked. And escrow closed with no further mishaps. Except for the admin password that was written on a post-it note. In my planner. At home. While we were trying to clear our company's things off of the on-sites computers and reset the admin passwords for the new company.

So tomorrow I'll be up early and down on properties to finish up resetting passwords and the like.

Phone calls to WaMu and an owner's insurance company went so well this morning, that I called the Dr's office to follow up on the referral that I had yet to receive. I've been so frustrated with the fact that it is like pulling eye teeth to get in to see the dr. for the problem I am having with my foot. It took me two weeks and about 10 phone calls to see the dr initially. Then I got a referral to a podiatrist. Or so I thought. I've been waiting for a week for the letter that I was supposed to get last week. I called Monday to follow up and left a message. Did not get a phone call back. (Big surprise.) So I called again today and was told that the referral request was just put in on Monday and was still in for approval with the insurance company. I saw the doctor on May 23rd! I unleashed on the person on the phone. It is absolutely ridiculous that I cannot get a phone call back and have to babysit the doctor's office just to see someone. I had already sent a scathing email to our company's insurance rep last night at 11:00 pm (and got a response back moments later!!). The lady on the phone promised to send messages to three people and personally follow up on them tomorrow. I then called our insurance rep. He promised to call the doctor's office and give them hell too. I got a phone message from the doctor's office just after.

I got a call late this afternoon - referral approved, with a name and phone number to make an appointment. Squeaky wheel gets the grease? Honestly, I prefer to just be nice about things, but I will not be walked over. Yes, it was not exceedingly urgent, but that doesn't mean that it isn't still important!

Anyway.

More on the CEO Luncheon: Rob Slee, author of Midas Managers, presented on the new conceptual and aggregation business models and intellectual capital's role in both of those. The traditional business model? So 1990's. The conceptual business model has owners defining their process steps, identifying the steps that are their intellectual capital, and then outsourcing the rest. The aggregation business model has owners managing, not owning, the entire process chain. Most businesses? Traditional business model. Unfortunately, you have to go through conceptual to get to aggregation, and as I learned, you've got about 2 years to make the transition if you're already behind.

The challenge for us as a service company is applying what sounds on the surface like advice solely for manufacturing-type industries. Our intellectual capital as a property management company is most apparently our ways of doing business (how centralized we are, how accounting is handled, etc.). However, in thinking, another part that falls under our intellectual capital is our relationships with our owners. This is something that allows us to be as successful as we are, cannot be outsourced and, considering how much we really rely on word of mouth for referrals, is desperately important to the vitality of our company.

Mom, sis and I meet in a couple of weeks for a weekend-long strategy session. Between this and the Grow or Die seminar, we will have quite a lot of fodder for thought.

I've been through escrow closings before, but nothing like this. Three properties closing tomorrow, and they just started asking me for stuff at the end of last week. Did I mention that one of the on-sites had managed to screw up just about everything she had done in the last month. It's one of those things that causes me to have homicidal thoughts. Especially when all of this mayhem is discovered while I am trying to ready the final rent roll for the title company. I suppose that I shouldn't complain too much now - I started out with 4 people emailing me and asking for the exact same items. At least I was able to narrow down my contact list to just one. This would happen to me during rent collection, too.

After tomorrow, my stress level will drop tremendously and that twitch in my right eyelid should subside somewhat.

I spoke too soon last week. I've spent most of this week without a tenant/accounting database. Or at least without one of three - the most important one, of course. It finally came back from tech support today, nearly 1/4 of its original size. So far as I can tell, everything is still there. I have to wonder exactly what it was that they compressed for it to shrink that much. (Maybe the program puts in a bunch of junk? Who knows.) At least it's working again for now.

This weekend, provided it doesn't rain, Gary and I are hoping to head out to the Anza-Borrego Desert to check out the wildflowers. I've been wanting to get out and go hiking, but it seems like I've had something going on all of the recent sunny, warm days. (Darn work.)

I did finally upload quite a few pictures from last fall to last weekend. They're up on my flickr account. Which reminds me that I need to hunt for my extra battery and memory card before tomorrow.

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