What if fitness coaches were viewed the same as firefighters, warehouse workers, transport drivers, accountants and teachers?
And what if the trainers themselves considered coaching to be their profession for life?
That’s my dream.
I’d be thrilled if our industry could retain its best people for 30 years instead of hold them for two years before they decide they need to sell real estate or fight fires to support their families.
As more Two-Brain clients build strong, stable, profitable businesses, it’s become clear that employment at a gym can become a key part of staff members’ retirement strategies.
In 2024, a well-run gym can shelter trainers from risk as they build great careers that generate more income for everyone.
But the owner must create careers for staff members. They won’t just appear. You must hire the right staff members and give them opportunities to get started. You must show them how to help other people and be rewarded for it.
You must do more than encourage them: You must lay out the exact process and break down the math. This is best done in Career Roadmap meetings.
Career planning is not the same as performing a staff evaluation. Evaluations are important, too. They are a key part of staff development and ascension, but reviewing a trainer’s performance coaching a group workout is very different than sitting down and showing a trainer exactly how to build a long-term career.
Here are the essential elements of a Career Roadmap meeting:
1. Ask
Ask your coaches where they want to be in six months. How do they want to live? What will fulfill them long term? Learn what “successful career” means to each staff person.
2. Analyze
Determine how much each staff person needs to earn to reach those goals. Calculate a goal number. A number makes it real.
3. Plan
Work backward from that number. Use a spreadsheet (we have one for clients). Keep a running potential income total as you lay out opportunities to coach classes, complete programming or admin work, do personal training, run specialty programs, run semi-private or small-group sessions, create high-value platinum-level service packages, and so on.
4. Start
Determine the starting position. What will the coach need to learn to capitalize on this plan? Will they need a certification before starting a kids program, for example? Or would sales training be a better investment? Make a list and start crossing things off.
5. Measure
Measure progress. Perform regular reviews as part of Career Roadmap meetings and help coaches learn how to keep building value. Example: “Eight of our clients mentioned they’re doing a fun weightlifting competition in November. Why don’t you create and sell a high-touch, high-value, three-month prep program, including technique work, strength training, nutrition coaching and meet prep?”
6. Empower
Give the coach an opportunity to open his or her own business under your brand. After you’ve taught the coach how to be an “intrapreneur,” you can help them step out from under your protective umbrella if they want to.
Mentor Staff to Succeed
The best way to help your coaches build careers is to mentor them to success.
It’s much more common to abandon coaches and watch them flounder, then get frustrated when they leave to “get a real job.”
The process I laid out above is simple but effective. Staff members see numbers and understand the exact steps they must take to hit those numbers.
That alone is much better than saying “see if you can drum up some PT business.”
If you combine the spreadsheet work with a development plan, a starting point and regular check-ins, you’ll be able to guide a staff person to create a fulfilling career that benefits the gym and its clients, too.
We call this concept “intrapreneurialism,” and I’ll lay it out for you in even greater detail in the next post in this series so you can see how it creates wins all around.
To start, set up Career Roadmap meetings with your staff today. Ask them what they want, and then help them achieve it.
