I am up early this morning with something very valuable, a flash of inspiration.
I look forward to moments like this. the flash of inspiration contains within it complete clarity about something that’s been on my mind.
Usually, it’s a problem I want to solve, or a new direction I want to go, or something that I keep putting off that I really need to attend to.
Sound familiar?
It happens to all of us, especially in the fitness business.
Usually, our flash of inspiration in the fitness business has to do with working on our business, instead of working in our business.
We get caught up in working in our business. We started our business to train people and we love it. It feels good. It’s rewarding.
Our clients tell us how much they adore us and how significant we are in their lives. The feedback is addictive and we want more.
We rationalize our feelings with thoughts like the members pay the bills and they are the most important part of my business. At the extreme, the owner stops everything, including missing, or being late for, important meetings because a member had a concern. The owner has placed the highest priority on handling each and every member concern over everything else.
Meanwhile, there is a nagging thought in the back of our minds that came from a flash of inspiration. We really should be working on our business in order to move it forward. We do need to spend some time with this months’ financial statements. We need to update or create a simple marketing tactic for the holidays, rather than suddenly looking back in a few weeks realizing that the holidays got by us again without a specific strategy.
Working on the business is once again taking a back seat to the owner’s working in the business. The nagging thought in the back of our minds that we need to figure out how to change this, once and for all, or we will continue along this path is still there. It demands action, or it will not leave your mind, keep you awake at night, worrying about next month’s bills.
Sadly this scenario repeats over and over until the owner makes a decision to operate differently.
Changing this cycle is not hard when you look back on it from the future. But it’s extremely difficult when looking ahead, for the reason that you are creating a new habit. And creating a new habit is one of the hardest things, and yet the most rewarding, that you can do.
Think about this for a second. Creating a new habit in your member’s lives is what makes them successful. The same applies to the business owner. So how do you get started?
1. Get clear that the member is not the most important thing in your business, YOU are the most important. With rare exceptions, a member should not be able to interrupt your schedule with a concern. There are many ways to handle this, it’s just a matter of creating a system. We had to learn how and we coach our clients on this all the time.
2. Create times in your schedule for working on your business. The key is 20 minutes or less every day for the next 30 days. Write these times in your schedule and stick to them.
3. Keep your sessions at 20 minutes or less until you have been consistent for 30+ days. Research has shown humans can focus on anything for a short period of time, 20 minutes or less. Longer than 20 minutes and we have a very difficult time getting motivated and staying on task.
4. Expect many challenges especially the first few days. You making changes and challenges are part of the process. Dogged determination, discipline, and a support system will be of tremendous help to you.
Most importantly, don’t give in or give up.
