For agents who want to grow in a changing market, the most valuable thing one can do is to spend time with others who are relentless in their pursuit of achievement and growth. These types of individuals are growth-oriented and see economic turbulence as opportunity.

As the Jim Rohn saying goes, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with, including yourself.” The good news is that it’s possible to make that positive change quickly by being hyperaware.

The first step in making change is to take extreme ownership of your life and actively develop your productivity environment.

While many look to the external environment, of which you have no control, and blame the government, economy, or even their company (victim mindset), they should really be looking inward at themselves to see what drives them and look to improve daily (personal accountability). This personal accountability can be tough, but it leads to long-term improvement and progress. Those who don’t take accountability, tend to jump from thing to thing, never sticking with it long enough to see real results. That’s a problem because all great achievements in life come from compounding returns.

I see this commonly in real estate sales, observing agents who hop from company to company or lead generation lever to lead generation lever, blaming everyone else for why they are unable to make positive change. These agents are often unaware that they haven’t stepped up, participated, attended, or put the effort in themselves. They haven’t yet done the inner work. That’s ok, we are all a work-in-progress, but it does boil down to a daily choice:

Do I stay the same and be comfortable, or do I push myself into being uncomfortable and keep improving?

On the other hand, high performers achieve in practically any external environment, even a negative or unproductive one. So the brand of the company doesn’t matter as much for these natural achievers who do the inner work, except for the fact that these top performers prefer to spend their time with other positive, growth-minded performers, that push them to be competitive and grow even more than they may have alone. Top performers generally become friends with other top performers naturally for this reason. These performers show up, participate, and come open and willing to learn and grow. They constantly seek being uncomfortable because they view it as a necessity to grow.

If you’re not achieving at the level you’d like to, ask yourself some of these questions below:

• Am I spending time with other top performers or achievers?

• Am I taking accountability for my daily decisions?

• Am I reinvesting in myself and my business?

• Does the level of my activities match my goals?

• Are my goals the same as they were at the beginning of the year? If not, what’s different?

Finally, one last exercise to leave you with. In The Tribe of Millionaires book, an exercise that is suggested is to write down the income level, health, and quality of relationships of the people you spend the most time with. Then add up those metrics, and take the average. Chances are that you are the average of the people you spend the most time with.

The premise is simple: if you want to grow to a higher level, it’s time to change who you spend time with.

To connect with the author, email jon@movewithmomentum.com