NO. 2 LARGE COMPANY
12-TIME WINNER
Private agents/brokers firm based in Dallas, with 23 local offices and 1,113 D-FW workers.
To encourage callers to leave a phone message for Jim Fite, president and CEO of Century 21 Judge Fite Company, Fite’s voicemail recording says he’ll make personal donations to two charities for every one message that’s left on his machine. To date, the promise has helped the Dallas-based real estate brokerage give $4 million-plus to Easterseals Lonestar, and hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Judge Fite Charitable Foundation, which supports people with emergency needs.
The voicemail message represents one way Fite’s company — founded in 1937 by his father, the late Judge B. Fite — supports its multidimensional mission of serving the community, developing people, having fun and achieving profits. The firm also lived up to its mission in the past year by rewarding its top agents with a trip to the WinStar World Casino and Resort in Thackerville, Oklahoma. Plus, it started a six-week motivational initiative for agents called Fite Club, and conducted a four-week training program dubbed Ninja Selling for the third straight year.
In addition, Fite said, the company achieved yet another of its 99% customer-satisfaction scores, as documented by a third-party survey of closed transactions. “I’ll put that up against any real estate company in the country,” Fite said. “It’s just unheard of.”
Century 21 Judge Fite agents seemed to agree the company’s efforts are succeeding. “The training and coaching are above the rest in the industry,” one told us. Said a second, “It’s truly a big family where anyone and everyone is willing to help and uplift each other.” Summarized another: “I have never worked for a company with this much support and community.”
“Community” might be epitomized by that voicemail message about contributions to worthy causes, which Fite said makes a big splash with his callers. “Some people say, ‘I think I’ll call you back 100 times,’” he recalled, chuckling. “I say, ‘OK. Go ahead, do it!’”