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“When I ride alone, my wheel is always in front.” – Greg Glassman   I don’t remember when he said it, but the video stands out clearly. Because I love bikes, and so does Greg.   In the few times I visited the Scotts Valley home of CrossFit HQ, Greg always arrived by bike. He talks about riding bikes as a kid in his early videos, and CrossFit now has its own official bike for sale on the main site. But bikes aren’t the point: comparison is.   The value of group exercise in a gym is the same as the value of a peloton: you can be pulled by the pack, or you can measure yourself against the leaders.   The Games shows us who the leaders are in fitness. Who are the leaders in the fitness business?   I’ll introduce you to a few I know in a moment. But first, here’s why we don’t know who the leaders REALLY are: No one is keeping score–there’s no centralized ledger of which gyms are actually profitable. Many are keeping the wrong data–it’s easy to assume a box with 400 athletes is profitable. That’s a red herring. There’s no formal definition of success. At TwoBrain, we use “perfect day” because the term encompasses more than money, but this is specific to the gym owner by definition. To put this back into bike terms: we don’t know the course, we don’t know how fast anyone is going, and we haven’t defined a finish line. So who is winning?   Who should we be drafting?   I’ve been tracking data on affiliates since 2013. The Gym Checkup on the TwoBrain site, and our surveys, and thousands of month-end tracking sheets give me the start of a database. Others (like our partners, Incite Tax and ZenPlanner) have a broader but more general data set.   Here are two to follow: Ken Andrukow – ...

After conquering Crete, Theseus and the young warriors of Athens journeyed home on a boat with 30 oars. Upon arrival, the boat was lifted up as a display of their triumph for hundreds of years. Obviously, a wooden boat eventually rots. Over the years, each board was taken out and replaced as necessary, until eventually none of the original boards remained. But the boat was still on display. Plutarch asked, “Is it still Theseus’ boat?” How does your business survive change? As you move to higher-value roles, you’ll have to replace yourself in each area of your business. First, you’ll stop mopping; then you might cut back on coaching, or posting pictures from your workouts. Members will eventually notice. I remember one of my favorite members, Kath, asking me, “Why do you run and hide in your office all day instead of standing on the floor and chatting with people like you used to?” The answer, of course, was that my business wasn’t growing while I was standing around for 12 hours talking to people. But I couldn’t share that with a client, because they wouldn’t understand it (from her perspective, everything was great; from mine, I was dead-broke, exhausted and barely containing my constant anger. I was ready to fold the business.) People notice when you replace the planks. Does that mean you should let the boat rot to preserve its authenticity? Of course not. Here’s another (more recent) example of the Theseus’ Boat exercise: A young Canadian boy inherits his grandfather’s axe. He’s inspired to become a lumberjack like his grandfather, so he starts chopping down a tree. Halfway through the tree, the handle of the axe breaks. So the boy replaces the handle and continues to chop. The axe head soon becomes dull. So the boy sharpens the head, and notices there’s not much edge left. So he buys a new head and finishes cutting down the ...

By Jeff Burlingame, Two-Brain Business Mentor  When you’re looking to recruit employees for your gym, it’s hard to know which ones will be your best employees and which ones will just be good. That’s why I’ve broken potential employees down into 3 categories: good, better, and best. A good potential employee may be someone who is a member and has been involved in your community for awhile. They’re open to going through something like the Advanced Theory Course that we include with our incubator to train coaches so that you don’t have to. The problem with the good category of potential employees is that they don’t have a lot of time and likely have another job. They’re committed, but not as much as you’d like, and they often miss meetings due to their other commitments. They may be able to cover some hours for you but they’re not going to go above and beyond to get involved in your community. They may be new to town and have their L1 and may have other experience and certifications but if they can’t commit to more hours, they’ll become a liability later down the line. Ideally, you want to hire slowly and fire fast so don’t rush to hire someone in this category if you don’t have to. Better potential employees may be members who get involved through ATC (Advanced Theory Course) or other training with you and now can commit to 5-10 hours per week. These people are consistent, they never complain, and they show up to most of your events and get involved in your community. They likely come to most, but not all, of your employee meetings once a month. Interns and those fresh out of school fall into this category so long term they’re looking for what the next step is for them and that may be elsewhere. The best category of potential employees are young, hungry, consistent, ...