You may have already heard this word, but if you haven’t, I predict that this word will become the 2020 buzz word.
Have you pivoted?
How did you pivot?
What was your pivoting strategy?
Well, what does all of this mean?
Pivoting is a word often used to describe when you have had to adapt quickly in response to a demand or crisis. It is about understanding that you have to completely change your ‘normal’ strategies and processes. Now, I think you know where this is going: the Coronavirus pivot.
I am not going to discuss the crisis (which I am sure you can get from an infinite number of sources), but what I do want to share is; what can you do now? And how can you pivot?
As a group fitness instructor, I have always relied on a building called a gym. The gym was where I would show up for work, at an allocated time slot that was available for the members of the gym to attend a class. I didn’t have much choice other than what I taught in the class (as I am a freestyle instructor), I could negotiate a little bit about what I was paid, and I might be able to get a time slot that worked for me.
Maybe I could influence promoting my class, if I worked the social media platforms effectively enough to encourage members of the public to purchase a gym membership.I didn’t have to worry about rent, utilities or getting members in the door. I just needed to show up, deliver a great class, and take care of the class like I owned it until it was either changed or red flagged (see a previous blog about this) and/or dropped off the schedule.
So here we are in a health crisis that has affected everything from health, to jobs, to the ability to manage our lives with home schooling children and working from home.
This very last point is the one I want to focus on and is crucial to pivoting successfully: The question is, do you need a gym to teach? Do you need to have a group of people physically in front of you to fulfill a desire to get people moving and feeling great? Do you need the four walls of a gym to be able to deliver your specific skill set?
The answer to these questions can only be determined by you and how you feel about teaching group fitness. For me, teaching is like breathing. I can’t stop. If I stop, I lose my purpose and just because I can’t do it in front of a live audience in the same space, that doesn’t mean that I need to stop teaching. In fact, it has opened opportunities that would simply have been ignored or too challenging to do, prior to this crisis.
Building an online community has not been easy for me. But now I have a regular group of people joining me every day (either live or on replay after the live class is over). A bigger class than I would have ever attracted in a gym, people that otherwise would not have ever had the resources, time or inclination to come to one of my classes in the past. This certainly is a braver new world for me. So, this can either be an opportunity; or a disaster that you are waiting to end.
0 Comments