Brian Smith is my right hand man. He’s an INCREDIBLE and super savvy business owner.
I’ve had the opportunity to be Brian’s coach since late 2015 and I’ve watched as he grew his businesses, sold one of his studios, and has created financial AND time freedom for himself.
Just ask him about some of the trips he has planned this year!
Brian has been so amazing… that I had to ask him if he wanted to be on MY team at Fit Pro Essentials! He is now my right hand man and helps me support our incredible coaching clients in Fit Pro Accelerator.
Since he is a highly effective leader and manager, I asked him if he would share some valuable insight from his perspective on how to create and manage an team.
So without further ado, here’s Brian!
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Staff, trainers, employees, coaches, and my personal favorite….TEAM!
There can be many ways to describe the people that work for you and help you serve your members.
Whether you have a small team or large, it is important to remember that cultivating a rock solid team is an integral part of building and maintaining an incredibly successful fitness business.
Now, sometimes it’s easy to spot the difference between a weak leader and a strong one.
Take alignment. While weak leaders blame their teams when they can’t get it, strong leaders know it’s their responsibility to create it.
Much like you hopefully cultivate an amazing culture and energy for your members, you have to CREATE and BUILD the like for your team! And when you have a team that’s on the same page with your vision and have a solid understanding of what’s expected of them…. it is an amazing feeling!
Ultimately, there are 3 big components to sync up your team for success so that everyone is on the same page and nothing falls through the cracks.
1. Contact:
You cannot keep your team aligned unless you have frequent contact with them. They are going to do the best with what you give them.
If you don’t spend time with them, it is inevitable that they’re going to make decisions you’re uncomfortable with.
Team meetings are a great way to do this. Are you doing weekly meetings? Bi-weekly? Monthly?
The less frequent, the longer and more intensive they need to be so everyone can be on the same page. (Alicia recommends a minimum of once per month)
2. Communication:
Just having “contact” with your team is not enough. You have to communicate.
Your team members cannot read your mind…no matter how much we try to train them to!
They need to know what you expect. They need to understand the vision, values, mission, and desired outcomes. You need to verbalize your expectations. Over and over again.
This is where you NEED to leverage the systems you have in place in your business. Having a system for every component of your business and having it written down will help give clarity to expectations for your team.
In addition, if you don’t like the direction your team is going, you need to speak up—before you get into a high stakes situation where dialog is happening in real time. Or worse, it’s too late.
Get everyone on board by having them contribute at EVERY meeting:
- Have them present on a topic (nothing too intensive- just something where they can contribute and share their ideas)
- Have each person discuss wins and struggles they have/are having with members…who you need to reach out to for a high five or maybe a written note, and those that may need more support/accountability?
- Challenge them to come up with new and creative ways that your business can over-deliver to your clients and prospects
3. Connection:
Communication is not even enough. For true alignment to take place, your team has to be 100% on board with your vision and values.
For your team to be 100% committed to your success and the success of the team, you have to be 100% committed to them.
That means investing in them (both time and money), taking the time to get to know them individually and what their personal goals are, and going above and beyond for your team like you do your clients.
When you have a team full of people who are on board with helping you build your business, you’ll be amazed at how wonderful that feels and how smoothly things run.
I like to think of this as I am CREATING my own personal replacement… potentially someone who could run or buy my business should I choose to sell (which I JUST did with one of my locations this past January!)
Try to think of a few ways that you can over-deliver to your team members.
This could be sending them a card in the mail letting them know how much your appreciate them, taking them individually out for breakfast or lunch, remembering what they like and getting them something that means something to them on their birthday, etc.
My New Favorite Team Exercise
In advance of the meeting, we asked each team member to come with a written answer to three questions:
- What should be our top priority in 2017, or the next Quarter?
- What is the biggest challenge we are facing as a company and with our members?
- What is one new opportunity or idea you think would add value to our program or to help us grow?
Once we got to the meeting, we had people write their answers on large Post-It notes.
Then, one by one, we had each team member stick their note on one of walls where we met, walk to the front of the room, and share their answers with the group.
It’s easy to get paralyzed as a fitness business owner in thinking that it all rests upon YOUR shoulders, but if you can build a rockstar team, the weight on your shoulders feels lighter and lighter each and every day.
Your team benefits, your members benefit and, ultimately, you and your business (and sanity) benefit 🙂
Alicia again…
I hope that you found a few gold nuggets in here!
The team exercise ideas could be a game-changer for your business.
Have any great tips for creating and managing your team? Share them in a comment below!
