Most of us are standing inside the same snow globe. Everything feels normal because we are inside it. Then someone gives it one hard shake. AI. Retirements. New expectations. New business models. Suddenly the world looks different.
What Got You Here Won’t Get You There is a book theme that highlights our profession’s blind spot. We obsess over the technical aspects of valuing real estate and don’t talk about leadership.
Think about the conversations happening inside appraisal firms today. “How do we convince experienced appraisers AI is an advantage instead of a threat?” “What happens when thirty years of judgment retires on Friday?”
Chief Appraisers conversations. “How do I help the bank close more loans without lowering appraisal standards or increasing risk?” “How do I modernize our review process with AI while keeping regulators, credit and my team confident in the results?”
Those are leadership problems wearing appraisal clothes.
Our industry over-indexed on technical skills. We need to lean in on leadership, entrepreneurship, hiring, negotiation, technology, communication, culture and change management.
Where firm owners learn how to build organizations instead of just cranking out reports. Where Chief Appraisers become architects of great teams, not just guardians of compliance.
Here’s the strange part.
Leadership often gets learned by accident. Hiring becomes trial and error. Succession gets pushed to another year. Culture becomes whatever happens when nobody is intentionally shaping it. technology gets adopted only after someone else proves it works.
Markets change. Technology changes. Regulations change. The leaders that keep learning will build organizations that outlast the people who built them.
Maybe the profession doesn’t need yet another USPAP seminar.
Maybe it needs someone willing to shake the snow globe.