Latest / Gym Business Coach Podcast / Why Complexity is Destroying You Business Pt. 2

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Why Complexity is Destroying You Business Pt. 2 · Gym Business Coach Podcast

• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: All right, welcome back to another episode of the gym business code podcast.
• 0:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm your host today.
• 0:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: We're in the angst and joined with Zach Lumbio.
• 0:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yo, yo.
• 0:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: Hello, welcome back.
• 0:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: We still behind the scenes.
• 0:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: We should do.
• 0:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, behind the scenes.
• 0:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: You have no idea the conversations that happened before we start rolling.
• 0:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's a good time here.
• 0:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: We have a lot of fun doing this.
• 0:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: We have editors.
• 0:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 0:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, your job, Brian.
• 0:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: Good job.
• 0:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks, Brian.
• 0:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you joined us on our last episode, we talked about the how complexity could be hurting your ability to scale from a client facing side.
• 0:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: For today's episode, we're going to dive into more of the operational staff structure.
• 0:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: And a little bit of like the inner workings of why complexity could be hurting your ability to scale and why simplicity might be the ticket you're looking for.
• 0:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: Where is that?
• 0:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: What do you want to take this one to start?
• 0:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: I think the hero hustle is a good place to start.
• 0:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: If you if your business cannot run without you, we talk about this all the time, but if it can't run without you because you're the only person that can do the things,
• 1:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: then that's a pretty clear indication that your business is like two complex.
• 1:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: When you simplify things down to like, here's what we do, here's how we do it.
• 1:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's very systematic.
• 1:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: Or it's, I should say it's easier to sister.
• 1:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's nice.
• 1:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, I would.
• 1:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: Right.
• 1:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
• 1:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: because if you're a one-man show and it's like you just jump in and you do all of the things like, hey, I run a sales consultation and here's, you know, when somebody comes in and I'm having the conversation with them, you know, I change how I do the consultation
• 2:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: says what Ed ad they came in on or the hooker or whatever and then if they say this then I ask I go this direction with the consultation or if I they say this then I go this direction with the well you can't teach somebody that process sure yeah that's based on it's pretty much the person it's in the seat yes exactly it's very dependent on you having that conversation so all the time in somebody's business
• 2:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: that's the process.
• 2:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I'm using the consultation as example, I just based off what they say here's how I respond.
• 2:40
  [SPEAKER_01]: We'll try teaching some a staff member to sell the way that you do that if that's the way you do it.
• 2:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: Now take that same kind of concept and apply it to how you run a training session.
• 2:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: There you go.
• 2:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: If I run a training session and the client comes in and they'd go to do their squat and I see this, then I have these seven different things that I might switch to depending on the day, right?
• 3:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: If they say this or I see this, then I go this direction with here's how I adjust.
• 3:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: How can you teach a coach to mimic that and to be you?
• 3:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
• 3:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: You can't.
• 3:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: So...
• 3:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: We have a great gym in the Dyer and Circle.
• 3:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: And years, it's been a couple of years now.
• 3:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: And when they got in, I was doing a, since my private pro call with them, they're talking about their programming.
• 3:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I was asking them, you know, like, okay, well, how do you design the program or the clients?
• 3:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it was like, well, it depends on the client and what their goals are and all that.
• 3:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know what that makes perfect sense, but like what's your methodology?
• 4:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, it depends on like when they were in last.
• 4:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then it depends on how many sessions they did last week versus the week before.
• 4:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so, and then I'm like, well, help me find some sort of common theme here.
• 4:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: If they, you know, come in is like,
• 4:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: Or, you know, would you do dumbbell, like barbell stuff in the first block and then dumbbell stuff in the second row?
• 4:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: I just depends on the this and that and like all these things and end the owner's mind.
• 4:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: Man, it's like, they know the system.
• 4:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's it's clear.
• 4:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's like, well, here's why I do it this way based off of what the client, you know, does.
• 4:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sure.
• 4:45
  [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, but how can you then have a staff member take that over or how can you have a coach know what to do with a client the way that you would do it if there's no repeatable system to this.
• 5:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: you can't.
• 5:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: The answer is that you can't.
• 5:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're stuck in that seat and the only way that you can grow the business is you're the one delivering the training or you take somebody and you you find the unicorn that thinks the way that you think and and they spend
• 5:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: a year mentoring with you and observing you and and it's the perfect person and they devote all this time to being with you before you could ever even be like, hey, okay, you're going to go train Miss Johnson.
• 5:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 5:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: So, and then they leave.
• 5:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, and so it's just not a recipe built for scale.
• 5:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
• 5:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: So you look at it, a franchise, a franchise has their book of SOPs and they end the give you that and you go and you follow the book.
• 6:03
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's when you get you get your buying systems that have already been tried and true and and created.
• 6:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: So that you can just go implement them and they're doing that with dozens, hundreds, thousands of locations, different owners, different qualifications, different staff that are being brought into that system.
• 6:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: And it allows you to scale.
• 6:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 6:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think a lot of franchises a lot when we talk about systems and especially in this, you know, environment.
• 6:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: If we were to relate this to a different industry, you know, Starbucks, right?
• 6:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, it's they don't customize the drink.
• 6:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: They don't ask the customer.
• 6:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: How do you want your, you know, when they order something off the menu, it's not how do you want this, you know, how what parts of each ingredient do you want today type of thing and it's not customized to that scale right it's this is how we make it this is what you ordered this is how you're going to receive it and you can walk into any one of those around the world and get the same drink the same way because you ordered what you know right off their menu and that's that scalability right that's how they've been able to scale and get to those locations.
• 7:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um, if it was the modern pop coffee shop, you know, that was doing custom drinks, how you ordered it that's the same level of friction when it comes to scalability.
• 7:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: How do you teach everybody all of those things and yeah, but but even right down to the like the price on the menu.
• 7:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: Hey, you're going to, you know, you're going to order this cup of coffee.
• 7:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, today, I think, based off, like, I think I could sell it to you for $4.99, but then this next person comes in and I'm like, hey, it's $4.99.
• 7:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: Like, that's a lot for a couple of coffee, like, $2.50 to $5.50.
• 7:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know, like, yeah, and we did have no idea what your margins are on a couple of coffee.
• 7:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: Can we see that?
• 7:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, we've seen it with plenty of gyms, they have gone to our coaching programs where,
• 8:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: maybe they're operating out of a place of kind of desperation or scarcity, right, to where they'll do anything to create.
• 8:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: Are you a first responder?
• 8:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: Are you a veteran?
• 8:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: Are you a veteran?
• 8:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, the cup of coffee is your microphone.
• 8:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're a microphone.
• 8:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're a microphone.
• 8:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're going to send other people in like maybe in like six months.
• 8:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: You promised me that you, you have a big network.
• 8:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're a very important person.
• 8:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: You know people in the neighborhood.
• 8:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: So I'm going to go ahead and give you a discount
• 8:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: give you your coffee for free and hopes that you'll send other people.
• 8:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: We're making a joke out of it, but we have so many conversations and this is a reality in the business and so you just can't run a successful business.
• 8:50
  [SPEAKER_01]: like that.
• 8:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think we're kind of progressing a little bit here, but like I was like going back to the first part of the thing, I'm like, where do you see go with this?
• 8:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: But there's like way off the wall, but it's like it's just so it's just so true.
• 9:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: So back to the simplicity scales and complexity fails.
• 9:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sure.
• 9:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: Is the message, but for your staff,
• 9:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: is the point of this episode.
• 9:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: And you know, on the last episode, we talked about even service offerings, you know, to mean if you've got a team of trainers and sometime, you know, this session, they have to do large group.
• 9:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: Next session they're doing small group, or semi-private either way, one of the other doesn't matter for the context of the conversation, or youthsport performance, and
• 9:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, what is the likelihood that you're going to find an attract quality coaches that can actually take that on and do any one of them really well, let alone all of them.
• 9:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 9:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well.
• 9:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
• 9:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then how do you develop the skills hard and soft to be a great coach for a 10 year old.
• 9:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: then have adult conversations with a 40 year old and then be empathetic and understanding of a 75 year old that all have different limitations or different places in life, you know, even down to just being relatable at each level.
• 10:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: Like those things are
• 10:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: not thought about.
• 10:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: I don't think in our industry when you're setting up your business.
• 10:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're like, yeah, I want to do youth training.
• 10:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's super exciting for me.
• 10:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: But you know what, that's not going to pay the bills.
• 10:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: So like we have to do adult too.
• 10:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: will just the complexity of that.
• 10:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm not saying you can't do it.
• 10:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm just saying that like they're totally different business models from how you market to how you hire to how you package it or price it with the membership options and like all those things.
• 10:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: they're just different businesses very much so i mean even even your price point i think is a level of complexity that can you know if you've got a low price point volume play okay well how's that impact the staff when you've got 400 members to try and pay the bills versus a jam that has you know equal revenue doing it with a hundred 150 yeah you know like we see that a lot and and in this industry it's funny we we almost hold client count
• 11:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: As well, that's the KPI or the metric that most Jim owners are constantly focused on, and they assume that revenue is a by-product of client count when it absolutely can be the inverse, right?
• 11:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you have a price point that serves the business, you know the margins are where you need to be in order to have profit and put money and carry cash loan all those things.
• 11:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: you don't need a thousand people to make that revenue.
• 11:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: You can do it with a higher price point and fewer people.
• 11:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then obviously one of the things that we do all time is help Jim's transition away from some of those volume type services, a large group specifically.
• 12:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: And they're shocked at how e, quote, unquote, easier the businesses to manage and operate because they're not dealing with 500 people's card cancellations and, you know, accountability when they're not showing up.
• 12:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, trade chasing them down and tracking them down.
• 12:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: All of the things
• 12:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's so much easier on the other side to manage and I use easy because, you know, because at the end of the day, it's in my opinion, it's a little bit more streamlined.
• 12:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, from your staff is perspective like it's hard to connect and build relationships with.
• 12:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: you know, 200 people that I'm training, if I'm doing large group and throughout the week, I'm seeing 200 different people, bodies, things like that, like, you know, and your coaches know that if I see the same 50 clients a week, and they have different, you know, contraindications and things have to be aware of things I have to modify and adjust for them, like,
• 13:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: I know all of that, and I know that client really, really well.
• 13:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: I can deliver a great experience for that person.
• 13:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: You get beyond like 50 clients per coach.
• 13:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: Now all of a sudden, I start forgetting things.
• 13:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, oh, yeah, you do have that knee injury.
• 13:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: I just asked you to jump on a box.
• 13:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: Like, I didn't remember.
• 13:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: And you, you know, you look just like the other 10 Sarah's that are here.
• 13:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: And like, it was the, the Dumbar numbers.
• 13:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: What, 150 personal relationships?
• 13:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Any human.
• 13:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: typically manage right so I mean if you think of because our coaches have lives outside of here those are personal relationships that they're managing as well right so how how many clients are they responsible for on top of their personal life on top of have that part of that job is knowing those those situations and those issues that clients have and being able to speak to them program or modify for them and if you you do get that number too high
• 14:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't remember who it was, but the gym owner, themselves was doing something like 80, 100 different clients a week.
• 14:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: And it's as one individual, you know, what is our typical, I know you probably know it off hand.
• 14:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, what is our coaches typically about 50 clients?
• 14:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: 50 is the kind of the max, right?
• 14:28
  [SPEAKER_01]: So when you get, and that's the simple equation, right?
• 14:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: Like, hey, I'm get to 50 clients per coach beyond that.
• 14:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: of looking at it over simplified way of looking at it, but that's a, that is in, in itself, it's a system for scalability.
• 14:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.
• 14:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: Right.
• 14:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: We're, we're not taxing that one individual to go, hey, sorry, you're going to have to be busier.
• 14:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: You're going to have to manage all these things, which will have a negative impact on the client experience because nobody's capable of doing it.
• 15:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 15:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: Right.
• 15:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: So the system is, we got to bring in another person, another body to manage
• 15:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, but I mean, so the simplicity piece of it when we're talking about like your team and execution, you're from a staffing standpoint or from a team standpoint, it's like if each person in your business knows.
• 15:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: what your business is, what the mission is, who you serve, who the clients are, they know their role and they have the capacity to deliver on it, then that gives you freedom as a owner because it eliminates a lot of the confusion
• 15:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: like this isn't getting done type of thing.
• 15:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: If you're running from a place of hustle and scrambling or put out fires and all of those things, then your staff is going to act to the exact same way.
• 16:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: And you, everybody, like Jim owner probably have a special talent, I think,
• 16:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: putting out fires and almost keeping up.
• 16:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: But everybody has that threshold where it's like, oh, I forgot that, I had to put out this fire and I forgot to call Miss Johnson, right?
• 16:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so things start to get missed.
• 16:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: Well, that is also gonna trickle down, hill to your staff.
• 16:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: and they're going to be busy putting out fires and hustling and then the high for got to do that.
• 16:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: Um, and a lot of times we have things in our business that are not simplified or automated or or structured, the way that they should be.
• 16:54
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then you know when things aren't getting done and it starts creating these issues, it's like,
• 17:00
  [SPEAKER_01]: Is that because I told the staff like that because the staff sucks and I told them 50 times and they just keep don't where am I saying they don't they're not executing on it or is it like a system problem so give you an example of this When I when I first started here every client that was a semi-private client had a folder yep and the filing cabinet out there
• 17:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: So you look at the schedule, you see who's coming in, you pull out each client's folder, and inside the folder you have a client card.
• 17:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: And the client card has like the workouts they've done and all of that.
• 17:36
  [SPEAKER_01]: So what you're supposed to do is you're supposed to initial it and circle what work out they did today, that way if they come in training with somebody else, pull that out, look what they do.
• 17:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, here's where they're at, with things.
• 17:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: Which is great and theory,
• 17:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: But what happens if you're slammed at the end of a training session?
• 17:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: Not every, you don't have enough time to fill out the card and start on time with the next group.
• 18:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: And then it doesn't get documented, then another that client comes back later in the week, trains with another coach, it didn't get documented what that client did.
• 18:18
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so now the coach is like, oh, I'm going to do this workout with you.
• 18:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: This is the next one on the list, um, and now the clients like, well, I already did that workout and the coach is now scrambling to figure out what work out they're supposed to do.
• 18:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: They're behind schedule, like,
• 18:33
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's this trickle down.
• 18:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's a snowball.
• 18:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's a great way to the problem.
• 18:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: It just gets bigger and bigger, yeah.
• 18:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
• 18:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so you can go, okay, well, fill out the card, right?
• 18:44
  [SPEAKER_01]: Fill out the card, like that's the easy solution.
• 18:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: Why isn't the card getting filled out?
• 18:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's a question.
• 18:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: Is there a better way where we don't need the card anymore?
• 18:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: Simple, like thing to look at.
• 19:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: This is how I did it, when I was training and I had 30 clients or 40 clients or 50 clients.
• 19:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so that's what the staff is doing.
• 19:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: But now that we have 200 clients and we have four coaches, like maybe this isn't the most simplistic and streamlined system that we can operate with.
• 19:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: And so it's like, well, what's the simplest thing
• 19:34
  [SPEAKER_01]: automatic.
• 19:38
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's just a nice to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be able to be
• 20:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and for those not aware, the Eisenhower matrix breaks down, is it urgent, not urgent, is it important, not important, and then you can throw those basically into quadrants.
• 20:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's how you start to prioritize what tasks need to be done by me today.
• 20:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: What can be delegated, what can be eliminated if it's not important and not urgent, probably just not be happening.
• 20:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then the third quadrant you can probably systemize, right?
• 20:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's urgent, but not urgent.
• 20:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: Excuse me, it's important but not urgent.
• 20:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: and you can automate, you can automate, automate, systemize exactly.
• 20:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: So, man, we've broken down previous episode, we talked about how complexity is a linchpin in growth from a client facing side, right?
• 20:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: We know that making doing business with you easy is an important when it comes to clients.
• 20:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: But for today's episode, you know, think about it through the lens of your team, your staff, the operation itself.
• 21:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: really pull back to curtain and look at those systems that you have in place see where you have opportunity to optimize.
• 21:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you need help with this, this is something that we Zack and I coach clients on every single week.
• 21:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: In our springboard program, there's a link in the show notes for that.
• 21:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: But before we let you go, we do have our growth summit coming up in June.
• 21:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: I know we were on a team call yesterday so we're we're getting to the next point where our ticket prices are going to go up again, if you want to lock in your tickets had to fit pro growth summit dot com grab your tickets there the price you see on that on that page is going to be the cheapest that you're going to be able to get tickets for They will go up from there as we closer and start to film more seats Lock that in anything else you want to add for today
• 21:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: Rock and roll, keep it simple.
• 21:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: Keep it to be scales.
• 21:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: Keep it simple.
• 21:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: They're the old kiss method, right?
• 21:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 21:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: All right, guys, that's all we have for this episode.
• 21:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: Keep changing lives.
• 21:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: We'll see you in the next show.