Chasing Capacity

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I received a ton of feedback on part 1 of this post however some felt my take on the fitness industry was overly negative.  I disagree and counter that it was honest and direct.  My purpose it not to discourage folks from becoming trainers – we still need a ton of high-quality trainers in the world.  My hope was to spark some intelligent dialogue about what being a trainer actually means as it relates to my career transition.

In that vein one of my readers, Shawna, shared some feedback on her 10 years in the fitness field and I wanted to post her comment in its entirety as I think she offers some valuable insights.  I will be back with Part 3 soon discussing things I would have done differently during my transition if I was to do it over again. Enjoy!

Hi Andy,
Thanks for the great post! I have worked in the fitness industry for the past 10 years and can agree with what you are saying and thought that I could offer a few other thoughts. After completing a degree in Kinesiology and getting more fitness certifications than I’d care to admit, I’ve been able to navigate an exciting career path. My original plan was to become a sport psychologist until I discovered that my job prospects in Canada as a female were almost nil. I shifted my focus to personal training and “gasp” triathlon coaching, along with presenting and writing articles on various diet and exercise related topics. I’ve had some great jobs and horrible ones along the way and have learned a lot of things through experience that should be considered before making a career shift:

-Being a personal trainer has been glamorized by tv shows- making the job look like it’s easy and fun (this is true, just not ALL fun and games). Most people don’t realize how much time goes into program planning, especially when you first start out. It also SEEMS like you’d be able to work out all day but a) Your body can not handle the beating of working out with every client day in and day out. You will burn out or get injured, fast, and b) As a trainer, your priority should be making sure that your paying client is doing the movements properly, not worrying about how great your own biceps look.

-Your day isn’t just training for 8hrs long like most office jobs. You need to account for travel time between facilities (if like many trainers do, you need to work at several locations to get your hours), prep time, paperwork/ charting, and if you run your own business even more time is spent doing accounting, budgeting, marketing, program development, banking and many more “office” type tasks. This doesn’t include the time needed to stay on top of current info, trends, maintaining your certifications etc.

-Your hours are typically long days with- split shifts. For example, as the Head Coach of a Triathlon Club, I had to coach starting at 6am and finished coaching my last swim session 10:30pm, despite only “working” an 8 hour day. As a full time personal trainer, my schedule wasn’t much different, especially on days when I had to open the gym at 5am. Split shift can be good for doing personal errands in the middle of the day when most other people are working, but then not as a result, you aren’t home early in the morning or in the evening to spend time with family and friends. Often times as a new trainer, you also have to work weekends, because you need build your client base-which takes time.

-Certifications are expensive to get and to maintain. If you aren’t fortunate enough to have the cert. offered in your hometown, you have travel costs such as hotel, car rental, and flights on top of the certification costs. Some certifications may not be considered credible in your area, so you may need to comply with standardized certifications in order to be considered “qualified” to be a trainer. Some of the “credible” certifications aren’t even worth the paper they are printed on, and are taught in a weekend workshop format, instantly making you a personal trainer! Not to say that all weekend workshops are bad- I’ve been to some really great ones (like OPT Nutrition 201 etc) but you can’t quit your day job, take one weekend course and suddenly expect to be the next Robb Wolf.

-In order to be a good/credible personal trainer, you need to look the part and stay fit. It is almost impossible to get in a good workout at the gym you work at because staff and members keep asking you questions or wanting to chat. Consider where you plan to work out!

-The hourly rate for being a trainer is amazing but you can’t base your salary off that. Most clients drop off in the summer months, September (back to school time), and in December then January is usually so busy you can’t keep up with all the resolution-ers. It can be very tough to balance a budget with a constantly fluctuating income, so you’ll need to be good at budgeting your money. Another thing most trainers don’t know until they get in is that some gyms pay on a sliding scale. So for example you make half of what the client pays. They buy one training session for $100, you make $50. But sell a big package (50 sessions) so that their cost is lower, say $40/session, you only make $20 for that same hour. Be very clear on how you are going to get paid before you jump!

-There is lots of B.S. and favouritism in the fitness industry, just like anywhere else. In this industry it’s definitely who you know, not always what you know. I’ve been beat out for jobs by trainers with far less experience or qualifications because of who they know. After all, look at some of the fitness and diet experts on Oprah and look up their qualifications. The Veganist- Kelly Freston (on with Michael Pollan) was a model turned author. Her credibility? Her hubby was one of the exec’s to start Oprah’s TV network!

-For every Robb Wolf, James Fitzgerald etc, there are hundreds of quality trainers out there and thousands of trainers who were certified from online or weekend courses. Similar to being a CEO of a company, you only make money in this industry once you reach a certain level. Can you hack it?

So needless to say, after 10 years of adventures, working for various gyms, running my own business and ultimately maxing out my salary- I realized the only way to further increase my income was to own my own gym. I didn’t have the capital to move forward and ultimately decided it was time to get out. I thought the only way to help people become more healthy was to be a trainer, giving diet and exercise advice. Now, a few months out from finishing my RN program, I’m about to help people change their diet and exercise habits, only this time as a nurse. Being a trainer and a coach was a fantastic gig, and probably something I’ll continue to dabble in for fun for years to come. I do encourage people to really look at their options and figure out why they want to be a trainer, talk to credible professionals in their area and find out what it really takes before they dive in head first!

Cheers

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Alternative Title: So You Want to Be a Personal Trainer???

In the past year I have received no fewer than 50 emails (plus numerous texts, facebook messages etc.) from folks asking for career advice.  How did you transition to personal training? Do you think you made the right decision? How do I make a career out of my passion for fitness?

A number of folks I emailed or spoke to on the phone directly, but honestly I just don’t really have the time to talk with every single person (even though I wish I could).  I thought it would just be easier if I pulled together a blog post that is a summary of the all the emails I have written plus some additional thoughts.  The short answer is I really don’t know what the right answer is for YOU.  I think it depends on your risk tolerance, current job situation, family status, and actual desire to make it work.  I’m hopeful my experience can be of some value to folks that are considering a career change.  I don’t want to spend too much time on my background, but I think its helpful because for many where you are currently will have a huge impact on the transition.  Starting a career when you are 21 and broke is one thing while looking to change careers when you are 30 and established is something entirely different.

My Background

My original major in college was Exercise Science and I thought I might want to be a physical therapist, but like most folks I changed majors a few times and ended up with a double major in Management Information Systems and Decision Sciences (basically business statistics).  I was a salaried network administrator for the School of Engineering and Applied Science for my last 2 years of school as well.  Needless to say I developed a passion for technology.  The job market was pretty good with someone with my skill set when I graduated and  I had quite a few options.  I interned will Deloitte & Touche LLP in Cincinnati, Ohio my last summer of school and really liked it, but didn’t find the group I worked in technical enough for my liking at that time.  It was recommended that I check out a more technical group in Chicago – I did and liked it and so I started my career in professional services in Chicago.

I spent 4 years working in the Chicago office and then transferred to the Phoenix, Arizona office and worked there for 5 years.  I was lucky enough to have some really good bosses and mentors in both Chicago and Arizona that really helped me become successful due mostly due their fantastic coaching (and lots of long hours on my part).

Overall I would say I was very happy with my time with Deloitte.  I got the chance to travel a ton and spent a bunch of time in Spain and the Netherlands (though I also spent time in town with populations in triple digits that were very hard to get to).  My first few years I traveled way too much.  My busiest year I took 150 flights and my longest stretch on the road without returning home was 92 days.  As I moved up within the company I was able to manage my schedule to a much greater degree and my last few years my travel schedule was very manageable.  Additionally, I had a huge sphere of influence, 6 weeks paid vacation, great benefits, had amazing teams that worked for me, and got to help mold and develop young careers.  I got to work with companies that were as small as 5 people and as big as several in the Fortune 100.  I got to work in all kinds of industries and environments, but there was still a part of me that wasn’t sure this is where I wanted to spend my next 25 years.

I met Robb Wolf at a Crossfit certification in early 2006 and we interacted periodically online.  Due to a weird set of circumstances he and Scotty Hagnas ended up staying at my house in Arizona in 2008.  I really enjoyed the time I spent with them and this is where the idea of a career change probably started (Inception if you will).  After one of many discussions on training I remember Robb asking when I was going to open a gym and my response was basically that is a very hard way to make a living.  I spoke with Robb periodically after he stayed at my house and several times we discussed the idea of moving to Chico to work at his gym.  Ultimately I convinced him to take a leap of faith and offer me a job.  I wrestled with this decision for a long, long time, but ultimately decided it was worth the risk and that even if it was the wrong decision I needed to learn first-hand.

I saved up a bunch of money and in the fall of 2009 I resigned from Deloitte, packed up my stuff, and moved to Chico, CA to try my hand at personal training (please note that moving to a city where you don’t know anyone was a huge tactical error especially since part of my responsibility is to find many of my clients – I will discuss this more below).  My hope was that I would enjoy my day to day work more and have a chance to impact folks lives in a positive way.  Its sounds silly to say, but this has been one of the hardest things I have ever done and has impacted my life in ways I never would have anticipated.  The further I get removed from my previous career the more I realize what a profound impact it had on my life and my world view.

Rather than continuing with what may seem like the worlds longest story I thought I would list some bullet points to address things folks have asked me about related to my career change.  Please note that the examples I will list are specific to my experiences although I will try to add generalizations where possible.

• Compensation (Salary, Benefits etc.) – My first year as a trainer I made less than 10% of what I made the year before in my corporate job.  It definitely wasn’t enough to live on and honestly it was very tough to watch much of my hard earned savings slowly evaporate from my bank account.  This year I will probably make about 20% of my last year in my corporate job.  Enough to live on, but I’m certainly not living extravagantly or taking many expensive trips.  My corporate job included health insurance, short-term disability insurance, and a pretty good 401K plan.  My current job offers none of those and I must pay for them out of pocket.  The tricky part of equation is that I can’t really compare the salaries directly because my corporate salary had a ton of additional benefits on top it that add value to the overall compensation.  My current job also has a fairly variable income that I’m still learning to deal with – this is certainly something that many professionals have to deal with, but I haven’t been paid by the hour since I was 20 years old so I tend to freak out with a big chunk of my client base takes a week off here and there.
• Schedule – My corporate job often involved long-hours and there were periods where I worked at least 6 days a week (although the further I moved up the more control I had over this).  However I got 6 weeks paid vacation and had the ability to balance things out over the year so if I had a horrible month where I put in a ton of hours the next month I would probably be able to lighten the load a bit and catch-up on personal stuff that may have taken a back seat.  An average day for me in corporate America would be 10-12 hours of total work.  In my current job as a trainer I usually have about 35 hours a week doing actual coaching however since I am still building my practice most days begin with me being at the gym between 6 and 7 am while my final coaching session will end between 7:30-8:30 pm.  I have a few days that are very busy and a few that are more manageable, but I’m still basically working in the AM & PM with a break in between.  This can be hard to manage because there is a ton of inefficiency built in – I may have 4 client hours, but they may be spread over 7 hours.  I only get paid when I actually coach and there can be a fair amount of time lost when you are at the gym because I may have an hour break, but I may spend like 30 minutes of that hour just dealing with questions from clients.
• Authority / Responsibility – Over the years in my corporate job I developed quite a bit of responsibility and authority.  Sure I worked for a huge company, but related to projects that I managed I made most of the key decisions and lived with the outcomes.  I was paid by my employer and my clients to have an opinion about everything.  Since I am a first born Type A this suited me perfectly.  In my new role I am a personal trainer.  I am employed to coach group classes and do personal training.  Sure my managers and owners are willing (within reason) to listen to feedback on other business matters, but honestly I realize that isn’t my job anymore.  This can be tough for me b/c ask anyone that used to work for me – I have an opinion about everything. I also spent so long managing people that I have very strong opinions about the right and wrong way to do this that it can be hard to keep my mouth shut.  One of my former bosses warned me that working for a small business that I didn’t own would be extremely challenging because I would be so close to the action, but I wouldn’t be able to make changes the way I wanted if it was my company or my department.
• Flexibility – One of the promises of being a personal trainer is that you can develop your own schedule.  In theory this in true, but it can take a long time to build up enough of a client base to make this happen. Many of the trainers I am friends with still work some sort of double-shift even if they have fine tuned their schedule.  In my old job there were certainly standard hours that most of us kept, but I definitely had a bunch of flexibility about what time I started and ended work and could manage things around doctors appointments etc.  Now if I am sick or need a few hours off to go to the doctor I may have to cancel appointments that will directly impact my bottom line.  The trick is figuring out ways to make your new schedule fit with the rest of your life.  I’m obviously not planning many social engagements for a week night, but have developed a pretty good schedule of lunches with a small group of friends.
• Continuing Education – This is the biggest heartbreaker for me.  I honestly used to attend more fitness CED functions before I was a full time trainer.  Obviously my practical knowledge has increase dramatically, but I’m often farther behind in new emerging areas than I would prefer to me.  There are some facilities I that know of that have a ton of education time built in, but those are few and far between.  You have to work for a pretty large training facility for that to happen.  My employer does provide a CED subsidy for us which is excellent, but taking time off for education cuts into my income and honestly if I am only going to take off a limited amount of time a year most of it will be family related.
• Job Satisfaction – Overall my job satisfaction is probably a little higher than my previous job, but not near as high as I would have anticipated.  I realize now that there are my things that I miss doing from my old job – I miss being a formal (and informal) mentor to new employees,  I miss participating in the employee hiring and evaluation process, and I miss the very high degree of autonomy.  The flip side is that now I have contributed to some amazing life changes in many of clients (some of their stories bring tears to my eyes), but not everyone actually wants to change and that can be a heartbreaker for me.  Additionally your clients will never care as much about this stuff as you do and I probably get more jaded everyday.  I have also had to make some hard decisions regarding going to weddings or vacations with friends I haven’t seen in a long time.  In my old job these would have been a no brainer, but right now taking trips almost counts 2x against me because I lose out on the revenue I would have produced and I obviously would spend money on the trip.  I am also surprisingly much more tired from my new job than from my old one even though I theoretically work less total hours.  I’ve found it is very emotionally expensive to be “on” for 35 plus hours a week.  When clients come to the gym they generally don’t want a cranky, tired trainer – they want someone who is very positive and engaging for their hour of fitness.  I never would have anticipated how much emotional energy that would take.  In my old job I certainly spent a good deal of my time interacting directly with clients, but since I was typically working onsite at their location I had a fair amount of time to myself to catch up on other work or to decompress.  Most of my work hours now take a pretty heavy toll and honestly on most Saturday nights I find myself wanting to go to bed at 9 pm even though Sunday is the only day I get to sleep in.

Hopefully some of the thoughts above were helpful to those considering a career change.  If you are considering making a career change I would definitely spend some time shadowing current fitness professionals and then try to think critically about what things in your life will improve with the change and which things may become more challenging. In Part 2 of this post I will discuss some of the things I would do differently if I were to do it all over again.  I think some of those insights can help better prepare those who are looking to make the jump into the fitness field.  Please let me know if there is anything specific you would like me to address.