HOW TO KEEP YOUR MARTIAL ARTS STAFF MOTIVATED

Do you struggle to keep your team, employees and instructors excited and motivated about work? Jennifer Waters, the sales and systems sensei, shares 3 helpful tips to deal with this issue. “I remember looking at our own methods before we turned into a booming seven-figure martial arts school” says Waters, “and realizing that there are ways to incentivize my team without promising large bonuses.” Building that team is not rocket science, but if you put a few components together, you’re bound to have a happier team.

The first method to get the team incentivized is, have a 90-day window anytime you bring on a new instructor. This window must have a few very clear objectives that you need to achieve with that employee. In those ninety days, what is it that you want that new instructor to do, to learn, and to be like? They need to have focus points that you will be taking them through on a daily basis and a weekly basis that they are trying to reach, and break that down into 3 periods within that ninety day window, i.e., periods of 30 days. At the end of every one of these 30 day periods, you sit down and have an honest conversation together, where you can give them a feedback, whether positive or negative, and likewise, the new employee get to be honest with you about whether or not they want to keep doing the job on the agreed terms. By having this open and honest conversation about how you feel about them as an employee and how they feel about that job every month during the first ninety days, you will get way better results and employees that are motivated far longer, and it also starts this cadence of communication which helps it to go a lot smoother in the future when you need to communicate to this team member.

The next thing to do after implementing this 90-day window is to have some type of ranking. You need to have some type of differentiation levels for your instructors. The reason why Waters instituted this method in her flagship school is that there is a huge amount of open space between someone titled an assistant instructor and someone titled an instructor. For example, an assistant instructor who is sixteen years old and an assistant instructor who is twenty-five years old could be totally different in terms of their responsibilities and such. So having different levels of assistant instructor is very helpful and additionally, having certain specifications that they need to achieve to get to that level is even more convenient. The same applies to instructors: there is a big difference between an instructor who has been teaching large volumes of students for years, versus an instructor who has been teaching a small volume of students for years. Because of this difference, you need to have different levels of instructors because they are going to have very different experience levels, depending upon if they are able to work with kids, teenagers, or adults. All of these variations are very important so having those different levels is necessary.

The third method is to have evaluations of employees’ success in every 6 months, instead of every year. Then tie those six month increments into where they are on achieving those levels of employment, i.e., how are they moved up as an assistant instructor for example. Just because they are showing up to work does not mean that they are eligible to be promoted to the next level, the same way that showing up to class does not mean you can automatically earn a new belt rank. It is going to depend upon whether or not that employee is actually putting in the work to level up. Of course, it is essential the employees know the criteria or the minimum requirements to move up to that next level, just as it is with a student earning the next belt rank.

A bonus tip to motivate the team is to host a minimum of a monthly training which includes leadership development, martial arts, and also something that will show them your vision for the future.

Putting all three of these methods together and the bonus tip as well, you are going to see a much more harmonious outcome with your team. Tying in all of these elements will help you keep a motivated and extremely engaged team working for you and helping to change the lives of your students.

For more information, check out the video.