Theresa and I searched high and low to higher the best and brightest to join Shay Realtors Inc. Nicole Montemuro, who is our most recent hire as our Operations Manager, was employed by Pacific Sotheby's, while our Listing Manager, Lindsey Fech, was formerly with Barry Estates of Rancho Santa Fe. Both are great companies.
 |
| Battle of the Socks |
Our most recent employee to join Shay Realtors is Kelly Haynes, who graduated from California Western School of Law only a few weeks ago. I bragged to Theresa I was doing an amazing job as "hiring manager." That was until last week as our team of about a dozen employees crowded around our "Dog Bone" table at our Rancho Penasquitos Community Hub®.
That is when I realized I made a big mistake in hiring every one of them. They first broke rule #1 by celebrating my birthday and the #2 rule they all violated was gifts. Bag after bag containing brightly colored socks.
They were all sending me a very clear message, "your archaic black and brown socks gotta go!" I thought I was pretty "hipster" but I guess my GQ magazine subscription must have run out. No one told me black and brown socks, went the way of the pet rock?
 |
| Battle of the Socks |
I had no idea that colorful socks are "in." Some of the socks were multi colored with funny logos including mugs of beer, dollar bills, stripes and even one which had Homer Simpson on it. I got what my staff was telling me. It was time for a "sock intervention."
For as long as I can remember my sock drawer at home has always had a consistency of muted colors. Mostly black, a few dark brown and only a handful of lighter brown socks. All twenty-four years as a cop I always wore black socks under leather black boots. It took a few minutes to wrap my mind around the idea of modernizing my sock collection.
Sometimes as a leader, you need to follow. The very next day I was sitting at the Athlete Store in UTC working on this story as I waited for Theresa. As you can see, I had my bright blue socks with Homer Simpson on them.
 |
| Stephanie - Athleta at UTC Employee |
What the heck. Who says an old dog can't learn new tricks. That is when I met Stephanie or "Steph" as her friends call her.
Steph walked past me as I sat by the dressing room with her arms full of clothes. Her million dollar smile was followed by, "hey, those are great looking socks!"
I had to laugh as I realized she saw Homer smiling away on the bright blue background. Once again our employees demonstrated how truly amazing they are. I rescinded their termination notices as it renewed my keen sense as a darn good hiring manager and, well, I guess I will get used to my change of socks.
We hope you had a great Memorial Day Holiday weekend. Be sure to thank a Veteran for all they have done to keep us safe and preserve our freedoms. We are so lucky to have them!
Ray Shay
Copyrighted by Shay Realtors Inc. All Rights Reserved.
