The latter part of 2026 has been the busiest of the year and I will end the year with around 40% of annual turnover being attributed to the last quarter.
This has largely come about due to securing a number of training course bookings for individual clients – with HMRC making it mandatory for annual training for all staff this has focused many businesses on making sure that their teams and documentation are up to date before they enter 2027.
All of my open training courses for 2027 are available to be booked via the website here – courses for individual businesses are by agreement – just call and let’s talk!
Over the last few months I have been increasing my usage of AI with the creation of a Co-CEO agent (Ellis) who works with me on strategic aspects of the business and this has enabled me to very effectively target the best business and to streamline my daily tasks. In addition to a Co-CEO I am working on an AI Chief of Staff who will handle more of the operational aspects.
At the moment I still “sign off” all actions but it is reaching a point where much of my day to day admin, prospecting and operational output could be running automatically.
I am working with a fabulous team in the US who are ahead of the game in the AI arena and, not only am I learning a lot (and quickly) but have plans to bring this help and focus to UK clients in 2027.
Good use of AI is not about taking a suite of bolt on products from a CRM provider, paying another subscription and ending up with a set of generic tools that don’t get used. It is about identifying the key things that will make the biggest difference to your business, developing the workflows and tools to handle them and using day in day out in order to develop mastery. Once this has been achieved then it can be time to move onto the next one and so on.
I welcome the opportunity of talking with anyone who would like to explore the way forward here. It is undoubtedly a fact that unless you embrace AI and change in a positive way, you will be eaten by competitors who do.
The latter part of the year is the awards and conference season and, as well as being a judge for The Negotiator Awards and attending the awards night on 27th November, I am also a shortlisted finalist in The Professional Support category. A category where I have previously been a Bronze Award winner and was highly commended last year.
The day time conference has a great looking line up of speakers and content and Grant Leonard has, as he did last year, kindly arranged for me to say a few words and have my charity Christmas single video played in the magnificent Great Room venue.
November 4th saw the E A Masters and I am delighted to confirm that Integra has been recognised as Exceptional for the tenth consecutive year (that’s every year since the supplier ratings were instigated) and we won our fourth Bronze award in the small supplier category (we also won a Silver in 2025) – perhaps one year we can make that final push and secure Gold!
On November 20th I shall be attending the Voice of the Agent Conference in Oxford organised by We Are Unchained – a great looking line up of speakers and content is planned and Simon Leadbetter has kindly arranged for me to be able to introduce and show my charity Christmas single video.
Propertymark are also showing the charity single video at several of their Regional Conferences in December. The Propertymark Trust is one of the two charities who will benefit from donations received.
In October I made an overseas trip (the Isle of Wight) on behalf of a client to help them with a proposed acquisition they are making. The FD joined me and we turned it into a mini break which was highly enjoyable.
Finally I am, with the help of my Co-CEO agent Ellis, reviewing the relationships I have with clients, how work is handled and how they are charged, with a view to agreeing a more effective modus operandi in 2027. It will need to be a win-win scenario for everyone and I will be contacting my clients between now and the end of 2026 to discuss.
Michael S Day MBA FRICS
