People don’t quit their jobs, they quit their leaders. Maybe you have heard or read that before, but I feel that there is a lot of truth to that statement. People quit jobs for many reasons, but the gym owners that I know who keep employees the longest are usually the ones who treat their employees the best. They pay well, yes, but they also follow these five keys.
1. You are the boss, they are the employee. Great leaders hire people smarter than them, for sure. But they also never let the tail wag the dog. They earn respect by being able and willing to do all of the jobs in the gym, but expecting each employee to do it better than them.
2. Hire slowly, fire quickly. When bringing a new person on board, interview them more than once. Allow other team members to meet and interview each candidate. (Email jason@jasonlinse.com with “interview” in the subject line and I will send you back my top 10 interview questions). And don’t hesitate to cut bait faster than it took to hire. I see too many gyms keep an employee around too long when they were underperforming and/or had a negative or bad attitude. Gyms are places where people come to get away and be supported. You need people on your team who are positive and enjoy helping change lives. Get rid of folks who don’t fit into that category. Now.
3. Reward success, and punish failure. Pay does not have to be fair, and it should be based on production. If somebody wants more money, they better be a producer and able to demonstrate that. If you have two salespeople on your team, and one of them consistently sells five more memberships per month than the other, who should get paid more?
4. Friendly, but not friends. It is completely fine to be friends with as many of your members as possible. And your employees should be encouraged to build friendships and relationships with the members also. But between the boss and the employee, a close friendship is typically not a good thing. This one can be a sensitive topic because sometimes, people will hire friends whom they have met in the industry. My advice is to try to avoid this. And if you do, be sure to communicate that friendship doesn’t change goals, benchmarks and expectations.
5. Communicate daily. Speaking of communication, the gyms that have the most success are the ones that don’t let periods of time go by without meeting with individual employees. Make a daily production meeting with each salesperson something you simply do. Every day. This meeting doesn’t need to take longer than a few minutes. The goal of the meeting is to see how yesterday went and how today and tomorrow are shaping up. Making a meeting like this a priority will force salespeople to understand how important every single day at their job really is.
These are the five keys to leading a team of life changers, whether you have a big box gym, or a 2,500-square-foot training gym. Whether you have one employee or a dozen. And to tie it all together, let me finish by saying that I want you to treat all employees the same. This means that you show no favorites, even if you have made the decision to hire a friend or two.
But you will “coach” them differently based on their individual personalities. Some people will need expectations more defined, some will respond better than others to challenges, some will need you to show appreciation for their efforts, and some will want you to listen to their ideas more than others. To find out your employees’ (and your) personalities, email me at jason@jasonlinse.com and I will send you a promo code for up to 25 folks on your team to take a free personality assessment.
Keep changing lives.
Jason Linse is president and founder of The Business of Fitness, a consulting company. He also owns a personality assessment company called People Plus+ Fitness. He can be reached at jason@jasonlinse.com or at 612-310-1319. Visit www.jasonlinse.com.
