Welcome back to another episode of the Female EmPOWERED Podcast! In today's guest episode, I'm thrilled to have Nora Reynolds, Chief Innovation Officer of Arrichion joining me.
Nora's journey began with her family's athletic background, leading to the establishment of hot yoga studios across several cities, including Raleigh, Charlotte, Durham, and Salt Lake City. However, her most recent venture, Strength Through Fitness University, has redefined fitness education.
Some of the major takeaways from the discussion include:
Thank you for tuning in to another episode of the Female EmPOWERED Podcast! Don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share the episode with fellow fitness enthusiasts. Until next time, keep empowering yourselves and others!
Interested in being a guest on a future Female Friday episode? Email me at Christa@pilatesinthegrove.com!
Welcome back to another episode of the Female EmPOWERED Podcast! In today's guest episode, I'm thrilled to have Nora Reynolds, Chief Innovation Officer of Arrichion joining me.
Nora's journey began with her family's athletic background, leading to the establishment of hot yoga studios across several cities, including Raleigh, Charlotte, Durham, and Salt Lake City. However, her most recent venture, Strength Through Fitness University, has redefined fitness education.
Some of the major takeaways from the discussion include:
Thank you for tuning in to another episode of the Female EmPOWERED Podcast! Don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share the episode with fellow fitness enthusiasts. Until next time, keep empowering yourselves and others!
Interested in being a guest on a future Female Friday episode? Email me at Christa@pilatesinthegrove.com!
Hey there, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of the female empowered podcast. I have again a guest episode I've really batched a bunch of guests episodes because I've come across a bunch of amazing people that I'm like, come on my podcast and help me talk about this topic. So today I have Nora Reynolds here with me, who is the she I love that she says as the chief innovation officer, because I think I said, I said at one point, like, what was I, at my Pilates in the grove? I can't remember. But there's something in that says, um, I think I'm gonna butcher the name is it? archaeon? No, Rick and Ricky, I knew I even pronounced it phonetically when I was in my head, your hot yoga. And tell us where that is. Because you don't live in the same place that you that the studios are, which is very interesting.
Nora Reynolds:So it's a family business. And we have studios in Raleigh, North Carolina, Charlotte, North Carolina, Durham, and also Salt Lake City, Utah. So that's an I'm actually ingrained for us. I'm kind of in the middle of the
Christa Gurka:you're in the middle of everything. Yeah. And then your most recent business venture is called strength through fitness University. And that's primarily what we're going to talk about today, because it's an amazing how would I like instruct fitness instructor program that incorporates everything, so we're gonna get into the nitty gritty of all of that, but the yoga studio came first. So why don't you give us give our audience a little, you know, a little background of who you are, how you got into this industry, and then how strength through fitness University came to be,
Nora Reynolds:okay, strength through focus.
Christa Gurka:So I started throwing sprinkle focus, that's fine.
Nora Reynolds:And so I, well, many years ago, our family is very athletic. So all of our, my husband's a coach, my kids were all athletes at the division one and even at the Olympic Training Center. And so we've been in the the fitness kind of area, the athletic theory for a long time. And when my daughter was, she would played soccer at Illinois, and she was in between semesters and decided she wanted to do us training in yoga. So she, she did a yoga teacher training, and then went back to Illinois and taught sorority girls in their sororities to make a little extra money when athletes couldn't make extra money. I shouldn't probably say back when. And then when she got out, she took a stint in Brazil, my sons were in wrestling, and we decided that we would open a hot yoga studio, hot yoga and circuit training in Raleigh. So we did that mess been over 15 years ago. Now. So and then we've expanded from there. So that's kind of where it came out of. And strength through through focus University actually comes out of more my my strengths, my background, which is in higher ed for 40 plus years, and a lot of work in distance learning when it was, you know, you had mail you'd get in the car and drive somewhere and teach you and evolved through, you know, two labs where you could do two way two online. And so that's kind of the kind of the intersection of our of our evolution. That's,
Christa Gurka:that's amazing. And so tell us a little bit about what your background is in higher education.
Nora Reynolds:Sure. I led a team at the University of North Carolina Greensboro for over 30 years on that was in distance education, summer session programming, kind of the creative kind of programming that was non credit and credit. And we had a really fantastic team of developers in the online space. And we had a dean that was really creative, different times and allowed us to do a lot of really interesting things in online that people weren't doing stuff. For example, back in 1997, I think it was, we created a micro economics course that was a game like online, and cool. We're a business school. So little things like that. And we and so my curiosity about learning, and how people learn and how they develop skills kind of comes from the work I did at university and the learning piece of what was going on there. And then watching athletes learn and how do they, how do people who are developing in skill areas, how do they what makes a high performer there and kind of the same process kind of comes together for both, which is interesting. It's
Christa Gurka:so interesting, maybe that game would have helped me like economics a little bit better. You know, I was we were talking pre To show my family and my husband's family are both in education. So I've learned over the years how much really goes into developing these sound educational systems? And how the instructors whomever is teaching, right, can really what skills and traits and technology can we use to make the learning optimize as much as possible. It's not just standing in front of a room and teaching curriculum. And so it's really fascinating to me, and from a physical side. So my background is in physical therapy, we do a ton of studies in how would I say it, I would say like, it's a motor learning and motor processing. And so from a way that we can learn and what you're talking about an athlete's, I was involved in a research study about athletic performance and biomechanical motor learning. And we've done all of these studies based on if you do a lot in a little period of time, right? If you're doing tremendous amount of work in a short period of time, or if you're doing a little bit of work over a long period of time, and how that, you know, the motor planning process and your system. So these kinds of things to me are, like, fascinating. And I really believe that in the world of boutique fitness, which we're all in and you the beauty of from what you are doing is you have both sides of it, like your front facing, so you know what is happening in the industry, and then you're helping serve a need, really. And we see a lot of instructors come out of programs, and you're kinda like, Um, okay, so that's great. You can do you know, a form stand really well, but can you teach the form Stan, and all of us have had teachers in our life, I don't care if they were coaches, or English professors, or something that we've really said, That person reached me in a way that's different. And at least for my Pilates instructors, that's what I want them to learn. Okay, so now let's talk about a little bit of strength through focus University and what what was the, like the forethought or the foresight of like, Why does our industry need this? And I do believe our industry does need this. So how was this like birth into creation.
Nora Reynolds:So anyone who has a fitness studio knows you need good teachers, as I've noted, and when we first started, we discovered very quickly, years ago that many people would come through with a certification but lack the skill to actually teach teaching in itself is a skill in addition to, to being able to perform, as you noted, so we just started creating our own teacher training programs for our yoga studio, first and foremost, because we needed teachers, and we wanted good teachers that could actually teach. So we started that I was in person. And we did a variety of formats, you know, weekends, whatever. And it at a point, about eight or nine years ago, it dawned on me that we could be more effective if we moved that program online. And I had this, you know, I had had a lot of experience in online learning from seeing really bad stuff there as well, that just didn't, you know, just a bunch of information out there to what could actually work. But I felt there was a really a way that we could create a framework that would actually get to the place, we wanted to go and actually be more effective than in person. And when I say that, it's because of this, if you have a group, classroom, you have, it doesn't matter. If you have 10 students, you have 25 students, whatever, it is virtually impossible. And it doesn't matter what you're trying to teach, it's impossible to touch each individual person all the time. And not every person can can actually demonstrate what they're learning frequently enough and get feedback, because it's impossible to do in an in person setting. But with the tools that have evolved in the online space in which there have been phenomenal growth over the last, you know, 2030 years, it has become really affordable and accessible to actually get the best of learning into an online framework if done right now. I've studied and I continue to look at programs in fitness certification fitness, I'm teacher trainings all the time every day practically I'm looking at someone else's stuff and several things came to light. So we built this program. Christa, we have refined it. We made some tweaks in it and I will be honest, my own children. were skeptical at first that we could do this online and do it Uh, well, I don't want to just trust me, I used to do this, you know, if it, if it works, it's all yours all your credits to you. If it fails, you can blame me. And we'll be done. I used to do that at the university a lot. I'm like, No, we're going to do this. So if it works, you get the credit. If it fails, just blame me. But we've refined a framework, which basically teaches, oh, sorry, oh, that's
Christa Gurka:why you're good. You're good.
Nora Reynolds:Teachers skilled, how do you develop skills because there's a big difference in having information and knowledge and having skill. And so I so think about it this way. If I don't know if you're familiar with Montessori method of preschools and elementary, but Montessori developed a system years ago, 100 years over 100 years ago, now, she was a physician, she was working with a special population, she developed a system that was both self correcting, and it's gone up against the test of time. And the instructors in her program are more of the guide the coach on the side than the sage on the stage, which is what we talk about at the university all whole lot, you know, the the lecture delivery, the whatever. So I've worked those all those kinds of elements into a framework that I think really works effectively. And we're really excited about how it works. And it deals with one of the biggest problems in curriculum, and this is doesn't matter where it doesn't matter if it's in fitness doesn't matter if it's in higher ed, elementary, whatever, there's a tendency, and it's not by because people are trying to do things, you know, from a easy way or a lazy way, there's a tendency to have too much, too much stuff. Yes. And not to look at where you want to go, but to say this is what I want to teach. And it doesn't matter what you want to teach. What really matters is what do you want your student to be able to do? At the end? And how will you get them there, and how will you know when they get there. And so that is the way to develop a curriculum or a framework that actually can get to the results of the competencies that you want to, to end up with for every student. And that's where we feel we've come with strength or focus. I think that and so as we did, we did the yoga, we've done a number of yoga certification programs. And then we, um, the same framework can work in other modalities, why? Because it's based on a set of principles. And, and the principles and basic foundational skill sets that you need to develop in order to get to the that place you want to be at. So that's kind of where we're at. And so we've refined it, we're building out will Pilates Mat, pilates reformer, Pilates barre, yoga, and it brings together what we what I know and what our group knows now to an audience in boutique fitness, where their skills, their strengths are in running a studio, teaching classes, all those things, and not necessarily in building curriculum. No,
Christa Gurka:you're 100%, right. A few things that you said that sparked my attention, one you said seven or eight years ago, which is pre COVID. i So you're doing this before everyone is going online there at least again, I can only speak from the Pilates world. But back then there were very few if any people that had digitized their program. And if they did, it was very expensive. And it was very expensive to enroll and participate in that. A lot of people started digitizing after COVID, just because that's what everyone was doing. Right. The other thing I will say the big pushback that people did, at least in the Pilates world was you can't teach that way. And I think that in any industry, I don't care what it is. If you don't adapt, you will be left behind at some point. So at every juncture, I don't care if it's the iPhone or something, there's always people that were like, that's not going to work. And so if we never innovate and adapt will be stuck in the same thing all the time. Right? And so my feeling is how great that now we can bring teacher training programs to you know, cities and towns and, and markets that maybe they don't have a teacher training program there. And then these people have to travel and I can tell you from Pilates, they're very expensive, right? And now that they have to travel and pay and all this stuff, so that's phenomenal. The other thing you said that is 100% true is People don't think of curriculum, they think of exactly what you said they think of, I need to teach all of this. And that's what's that's how I'm developing my program, not on the competencies. And I know for us, most people start a teacher training program, I will tell you, it's not for the revenue. So if any of you are out there listening, and you're like, I'm starting a teacher training program, because I'm going to make millions of dollars, I'm just here to tell you, it ain't happening, at least right away. Most of us start them because we need teachers. And so we start our own program so that we can train it's like on the job training, right? So, and we're just behind the eight ball 90% of the time. But what I tell my INR teacher training program, from the beginning, I've always said, this is a teacher training program, not a Pilates training program. It's a teacher training program. So while yes, we would love to see proficiency in the exercises, so you can feel it in your body. And you can understand what your students are going through our goal, what you are being graded or assessed on is your ability to teach the program. And I can speak certainly I did not have a good idea of developing curriculum. At the beginning, I was like, Well, this is what they tell us, we have to teach. And little by little, it's developed. But now I love the fact that you can bring this to people and we don't have to do all of it. And you you started with yoga, which was what your bread and butter is. And you're right. The foundational things are teaching competencies. Right? So what are some of the competencies that you try to develop in the training program, right, because whether you're teaching yoga, or Pilates or spin, there are a few things as teachers we all need to do. So what are some of those competencies that are included in your program?
Nora Reynolds:So so the first thing is, you have to think about where do you want someone to end up so you'd start from the very end. So just as you said, the dirty little secret in yoga, I will say is that we call them teacher training programs, but most of them don't teach people to teach. But so you start with, okay, I want them to be able to teach a group class or private session or whatever, that's the highest level skill, how am I going to get them there. So what we know is that there's a certain amount of information you have to have. And information is where most curriculums sit, they put all of their eggs in that basket, and they have, you know, so you'll see, we have 600 hours of video that you can watch forever. And we have a 200 page manual that you'll get, and you can use it for the rest of your life and all this. But the the issue is that we won't do it, and it's overwhelming. So you have to say, here's the here's the skill set I want. And so, Christa do just kind of give you a kind of overview how we do a program. First thing is we say, All right, you will, in competencies, you kind of have five, six competencies for a course, here's the competency, you will be able to, you know, will be able to demonstrate and know the information and the skill it takes to understand the exercises in Pilates, for example. So we break them individually. And we do very short, introductory instructional video very short. And then we ask the student that one in the teacher training program, you demonstrate to us now, we don't do self paced programs, because self paced with too much back on the learner and not enough accountability. So we have assignment dates, but so we have you. And there are certain things with getting in and out of that exercise that are pretty standard. You want to be able to get someone safely in and out of that quickly in and out of an exercise. So then you can deepen it, you can correct it you can do those things you need to do. And some of that needs to become automatic, you were talking about muscle memory and kinds of things that you look at when you guys do studies in the physical therapy world. Well, the same goes here. So take some of the load off by making them become a practice enough individually and demonstrate and get feedback from a coach on there. How do you get in and out so some of the teaching techniques there, we integrate the program together. So we're learning the skill, the exercise and isolation because if I said teach a class, it's way too much. So we build it. And we but we do it all every week. So you have a set of say seven exercises, you are going to demonstrate those you're going to learn the fundamental anatomy practical anatomy associated with it, it works this muscle or this whatever. Here's what we call 123 is but it could be the setup, whatever. Very, very structured, memorize that. We don't want you to have to think about that when you're trying to do Ah, and then they videoed themselves, they give feedback, then we and so there's an information layer there, but not a ton of information, everything. And everything has demonstration, and then feedback. The other thing now is you get person, you can get your own feedback, too. Just like with Montessori when the child puts the, the thing together, they see it doesn't work. Well, when you watch yourself in video, you just think, Oh, my goodness, I thought it was better than that. I thought I had that right. And I'm not my form is off. You don't have to be a Star Trek, also yogi, but you have to know the form correctly, and be able to demonstrate with correction. So so we do that. And then that little bit of information, and we start teaching, teaching skills, or teaching essential techniques, what I'll call them throughout the course. So we don't do it all at once. We don't just give you a PDF and say your voice should be this. So there's a way to use your boys, there's a way all these things when we integrate them and kind of parse them out. We also believe in so there's practice there than we believe in teaching right from the get go. So how do we start to get them in a teaching mode? Yes, teaching right from week one. So if I, if you, if we learned seven exercises in week one, then we work to cluster those in groups. So maybe you'll take three of them. Say it's mat Pilates, you're going to teach a series three, and you're going to think about how you deliver it, you're going to think about how you your voices. And you will teach that, say three different videos of teaching, you will get feedback to help you to help you grow and correct in that area. And then we do and so that starts to build out this the process that every expert goes through to become an expert. So I you know, I'm I've looked at all the theory, I read it, I'm kind of a weirdo that way. But Anders Ericsson, who died in the last few years was at Florida State, but he he looked at expert performance across the board, he looked at athletes, he looked at musicians, he looked at mathematicians, and he found this process called deliberate practice, which is how every expert evolves, has to be frequent has to be consistent has to be unbilled has to have a coach has to, you know, be a lot of practice. So we integrate that theory you don't We don't talk about the theory, particularly, that's integrated. And that's how you build out, then you can layer in some other things we do we show teach a student over across period of time, how do you create a safe and effective Pilates class for Pilates for students? What is the format of a class, you don't just jump on into the most the peak point of your exercises, you have to build up to it, you come down from it. And we start them thinking we play little, you know, fun things, we might say, if you're you know, give us a topic, I'm, you know, I'm in Pilates, and I'm going to be speaking to your audience, but in fitness generally. And someone's got, I'm working with runners. So how do I how do I craft a Class A program that fits runners from the Pilates perspective, and we have started to look at that and start to put together a script, essentially a class, because that shows them teaches them in real time, you know, it's more effective, because not just talking at them about that, you know, how you our class actually flows out. And they build that then you can toss in things like how would you market that class? How would you do things because everybody who's in the studios and sales of some sort or how they have to. And so that's kind of what we do. And we do that repeat that process every week. Yeah, by the time they get to the end, the competency as they teach that class they've developed, they teach it to an audience they've recruited might be you know, and they teach that at the end of the, the, the program, the teacher training, so not only have they built up to it, now they get a full class, they've gotten feedback, they've refined it, they've improved it, they see themselves, they take classes during the time we give, we tell them what classes to take on demand or whatever. Studio and then that comes out the other end and by the time you get to the end, every single student, every student, woman a classroom because I've had in classrooms, every student has a base level of competency, right? And then we bring them in. We also do in real time practice sessions. You can do them in zoom, we do them in zoom, but you could do them in studio, if you're set was all local, every week where you come in and you demonstrate you practice you kind of if you put it in the athletic perspective, you'd say you drilled a you drill what you've been learning, so and so those things all come together in a very integrated fashion. By the time you get to the end of your program. Bring them into the studio For more in depth, take them to the next level a little bit in like two, three days of input. But everybody comes in and you know where everybody's out. Right? So yes, we build out. And that's the kind of process that can be applied doesn't matter what the content is really, right?
Christa Gurka:It's great. No, I think that's so true, because a lot of teacher training programs, they teach you all the exercises, they teach you that and then your final is teaching but you haven't been assessed at teaching the whole time. And so unless someone is already a teacher of some sort of movement, the teaching part is the hardest part. They get confused on their cueing. I know that I love that you have one, two threes, we have action body part where it's like very specific, reach your arm forward like that. I'm like, That's it. Okay, once you become proficient, then you can layer on additional language, but it's really hard to do that at the beginning. You right? And so I love that it's very systematic. So when you were talking about, okay, I'm just gonna, I'll take yoga, because yoga, so you're teaching Downward Dog? Or maybe Chaturanga? Right. So you're, that's the exercise. So now they are sending in a they're recording themselves? Do it? Are they uploading this video into the portal? Yep. directly into LMS? Yeah. Okay. And then how are they? What is in what aspect? Are they getting feedback is that so they they, I am recording myself doing the Chaturanga. I upload my video into the LMS. And the LMS. By the way, for people if you don't know what that means it's learning management system. Now, what am I now what's the next step, somebody looks at it, and then sends me feedback. So what's the next step?
Nora Reynolds:So we are really big on having one coach, and we train coaches to do this, but one coach for a group. Because then they know that's very consistent. So in other words, we don't pride ourselves on saying we have 10 different coaches, and you're gonna get feedback from a lot of different people. Now, when you're learning, when you're first starting, and you're trying to get your basics down, you need one person to give you. So you, you upload your video into the learning management system, very simple. It's a very easy, intuitive white thing to do. And your coach who you've been working with, can click on your video, watch it, and then record a video back to you and say, Hey, Christa, I really love the way you did this, you really applied the feedback from last week. Here are a couple pointers, I want you to focus on going forward. And then they can also give you text written feedback right there at the same place. And you get that for every single assignment. Yep. So that they're you, not only you're developing community because, and a relationship, if you look at the best, the most effective learning over the years has been a one to one tutor, but who can afford to hire a one to one tutor to work them through. for weeks on end, it's impossible, because
Christa Gurka:those can't afford that next studios can't afford to do one to one training forever, because we need lots of Instagram. It's just it's not
Nora Reynolds:sustainable. Possible. No. So so this coach works with you and you again, you're developing community with your team or the people that you're in the class with, because of these once a week, practice sessions. So so you're getting that feedback. So everything is we do we typically have assignments, do three times a week, we break it up. I will true confessions, I when I first launched the yoga, I said, Okay, people like there is a lot of flexibility for folks. By the way, there's very little real time, you just have to meet the assignment deadlines. But I said, we'll have all the assignments due on the end of the week. And that'll give people lots of flexibility. And guess what happens? They wait just like everybody else, they wait till the very end, they can't get them out on or they get them all done. And it's a hurried mass. And so we now we scheduled them here. So you know from the beginning, the assignments are due every week on these days. And there's a purpose for why we do that that's even got a method to the madness. But it's so that you can get feedback for the before you do the next thing Correct. Which are all building so it's so that's how we kind of work it so
Christa Gurka:that's perfect. Yeah. And is the coach, one of your coaches the STF view or is that the studios coach,
Nora Reynolds:that would be the studio so this is this is my kind of vision for how this can help fitness. If I'm a studio as you have noticed, it doesn't matter what the modality I need to be able to train teachers and get the consistent quality product and and sometimes in If you've ever run a teacher training, which I know you have, and you're doing it is an overwhelming task, not only forget about just creating all the assets, so to speak, but then you have to practice delivering it. And then you are tying up your space time. And then you are and it's it's like, overwhelming. I compare it to like, say you do a training camp for an athlete, you know, like, you see like, boxers doing whatever. And you come in for, you know, 10 days, 30 days, whatever. That's overwhelming. It's can be exhausting. Exhausting. Yeah. So if if you can take that piece out and get better results, so what we do is we license the, the standard program to a studio, they pay a fee. And once they do that, we can white label it, or we can put their brand on it, we'll put their logo on it, we'll take their brand colors and put them insert them we put their face in, and we train a coach, we have a training program, both online and manual. And and working with our coach to train them on how do you give feedback. So we have them practice giving feedback by showing them example videos from
Christa Gurka:and teaching them how to be a teacher how to teach teachers,
Nora Reynolds:it's a yes, and we're taking they don't have to deliver content. That's all they're back on. Now, if I'm one of the big objections, people say, Well, I teach something very, I have a proprietary way of teaching and unique, I'm unique in the universe. No one teaches us this way. Frankly, I haven't found that even at university with PhDs who are very eminent scholars. But so, but we say look, if so Chaturanga. So you teach it a little bit slightly different than our instructional video, which is white labeled, the person doesn't have a rich piano, and there's just a plain shirt. And it's your logo, your coach's face your message, and you're doing the teaching. Week. If your objection is that, I would ask you to think about a step back and think about do you use textbooks? Do you? Um, do you use handouts that other from other groups, and most do. So think about the this course, as a textbook. And with your, all the worksheets have your logo on it, we just put your logo on, if you have a unique way of teaching one thing like Chaturanga, or down dog or you call it something slightly different. When they finish, you can say, at our studio, we do we we do this a little bit, but just like you would if you're teaching from a textbook, so think about it that way. And I will promise you that the student always remembers the coach, not the textbook. So think about that. I think about I've been out of my college days for many, many, many years, longer than you've been alive. And and here's what I can tell you, I remember the best teachers I had. Right? I have do not remember the textbooks or the books that we read. I remember the best teachers because they were actually the ones I remember the most were the toughest, and made me work the hardest and gave me feedback and made me practice and get better. And made you understand things in a way that stuck? Absolutely. Even when it was uncomfortable for me. Exactly. For sure. And and so I think that, so that's the position you have to take and then you don't have to create the it's very expensive as you you mentioned earlier, very expensive and time consuming. We can also I could do it myself. Okay. It would it takes most people probably a year if they can get a
Christa Gurka:domain. Listen, I'll tell you exactly, I'll tell you exactly, because we just did this. And I'm already Listen people, I have my own built out teacher training program. And I've already talked to Nora about being like, I think I could totally use this in my system because what we don't have is the curriculum that she developed. And so here's what I'm going to say to people. You're either going to spend time or money. Okay. And what I can tell you is it took Pilates in the grove and now I developed my curriculum five or seven, six or seven years ago, and I developed it very specifically from my physical therapy background. I do not I'm not a classically trained Pilates instructor. So it is contemporary. And it's it's took us two years to get the first thing correct. We had a we had to pay for a photographer. We had to pay for the manuals, we had to print the manuals, we had to put them in PDFs. Then everyone started going digital. So now we have we took us 18 months, and I didn't even do it. Thank God for Terry and Kelly that took 18 months to fully digitize our program, then get that edited, then get that uploaded. And it still requires us, Nora. And what you're saying is true. It still requires us to teach this and very long format. So when our students come in, to do our live in person, right, because not everyone has a reformer at home. So we do have a live component to it. It's all day, Saturday and Sunday, all day, nine to six. And so not only are the instructors are people teaching it exhausted, because now they're working seven days a week, right? Because they'd have their whole week, day week and then their weekend working weekend. The students are overwhelmed. That is a lot of exercises to go through. In one weekend, then we're like, okay, bye bye. Go practice. Right. And so I can tell you, and I can tell everyone listening you you say the same thing. I can create my own you can, you can? Like there is not one and when Pilates instructors like oh, it's proprietary. No, it's fucking not. It's the same book in exercise. It's not proprietary. Okay. Joseph, Pilates did not copyright a single thing. Okay. So the way and and the way that I would get around, so the perfect example that you said of like, well, I teach it a little different. I am not a classically trained instructor, nor are our instructors classically trained. However, I could say in the video. And what we do in our manuals all the time is say, classically, Joseph Pilates taught it this way. In our studio, we teach it this way. And here's why. Okay, and if you know anything about Pilates, you understand, too, that the traditional the Grots equipment is built a little bit differently the way the spring tension is loaded. And so it will feel different. So I want people to know, oh, this is, so if I see it in a studio taught this way, right. But I hear it this way, I'm gonna know where it came from. Another great example is in yoga. And correct me if I'm wrong, but in yoga, yoga uses bridging as an extension based prep. So we a lot of yoga, instructors will use bridging prior to like full wheel. Okay? In Pilates. We use bridging as like an articulation. So we don't want our people to go into this full extension. And so I will tell my clients, if you go to yoga class, they're going to cue you differently. And that's not wrong. It's just a different way to do it. So you can totally include that. In the teaching, if I'm giving. Yeah, if I'm giving feedback to you, Nora, I could say, I see you're pulling in your yoga practice. And I love that. Understand that in Pilates, we may want you to cue it this way.
Nora Reynolds:Yeah. And so, Christa, that is exactly right. And so when you would said You know, you learn how to get someone with your, the sequence that you put get someone into a an exercise, we don't introduce the cueing part once they're in until their comfort they've until several weeks in why it's too overwhelming. Thing. Yep. So what happens in most curriculum in this will be yoga, I'll use yoga lions, you know, sets a standard, right? And they say, cover this, cover this. And so what I see very, almost, almost to a tee is, this week, we're going to do anatomy next week, we're gonna do poses. Next week, we're going to talk about how to teach. And really, it's a process that kind of intersects, and you have to integrate it. So the other thing that's really helpful for using this kind of approach, one, you don't have to create the content to you don't have to pay for the learning management system, which costs 1000s of dollars every year. And that's all set up for you don't have to worry about the technology, you don't have to worry about how to how to do it, that's all done for you. Now you can do the thing you do best, and that's help a student get from here to here. Yeah, and that's what you are. And without the strain on you. Now, at every studio, think about the time the one person decides to leave your one key person that's instructs for you all the time. And they give you a two week notice because they're moving out of the area and they have whatever, and oh my god gotta hire another but we are not going to run a teacher training for you know, the next six months or 12 months. This program, you can scale up and down. You have one student, you can teach them, they can be put on right through it. You can do it. If you have, you know, 10 students or you know, you can do it three times a year, five times a year, one time a year, whatever suits you. The what it takes a place of what either creating your own, which you can do, I'm an expense and then the risks that you want. Get it right, but you'll take time to fix it after you do it. Um, bring someone in I know this is popular in Pilates and yoga, when very expensive, very expensive. And
Christa Gurka:the studio is not making, I'll tell you this, you're not making any money as a studio if you bring someone else in. And you can only do that if you have so many people doing it, which does not help the process of like, I need an instructor yesterday.
Nora Reynolds:Yep, yep, yeah. So those are the kinds of things that this allows you to do. And then like I said, it gives you the ability to do what you do best. And you because doesn't overwhelm you. This is this is something that's, you know, it kind of I hate to say it's like in the can, it's already done, it's in a box, but it is, but it's very thoughtfully put together in a way that gets to the end to the end result. Yeah, in your studio, and you are the focus. You are you are what your students will remember and, and like you said, you what you do with classical Pilates. Now, I will say that I know that in Pilates that the exam
Unknown:that is a certifying Yeah, and CPT exam is
Nora Reynolds:it is very important to a lot of folks. And so there's a couple ways, we're looking at what we do there. One is we do have a multiple choice questions every week that just to test knowledge. We do that early when we're introducing exercises or whatever. And so you can start to get that those kinds of things. So your, your students are practicing that. And then to be frank, I, I won't use Pilates, I'll use personal trainers, for example, I can go out to Amazon bio study guide, just like I could have in the essay to. And I can prop myself up for those tests. So if the concern is is your first concern, or most in the studio on the ground is can they teach. But then the next concern for some studios is can they pass these exams? And I would say that, again, like the LSAT, people prep for those things. But I will also say me, I'm a pretty quick study when it comes to like, being able to take in a bunch of information. And then I'm pretty good reader so I can kind of sort through multiple choice. And if you gave me enough time, I could probably prep and pass some of those tests not teach a ligament.
Christa Gurka:Yeah, but Well, I can tell you from the Pilates again, I can speak from Pilates. And I at one point was someone that was helping making exam questions for that exam, it's just a multiple choice exam. And what they're trying to do is just say that at least people that have qualified to sit for the exam have gone through an actual program, they didn't go to Amazon and get a weekend and some people teach weekend courses. So even with your program, the way that it qualifies is that so it would still be so technically Pilates in the Grove has a teacher training program, we use strength through focus University as our online LMS system, there's still an amount of hours that the student has to sit through there to watch the videos and everything. And that just counts as the hours. So for the NCPT exam, they just have to complete 450 hours. But now this is even more. It's just more they're more accountable for it right like you know that they've done the work so they can still sit for the exam. And the NCPT just started doing a just a matte exam, because before you couldn't sit for anything until you did all of this comprehensive work. On the back end. Legally, you don't need that. So no one's coming to arrest you like if I practice a license, I could go to jail. But no one's coming to arrest me if I don't have a certification. The only time I tell people that sometimes the certification is beneficial is. So for example, Pilates in the grove is a small two studio location in Miami. If someone moved to California, and wanted to teach and said, Oh, I got certified Pilates in the grove, that person may be like, Well, I don't know what that studio is. And so if they say and I've passed NCPT exam, they just know that my program was quality enough to allow this person to sit does it mean anything else? Yeah, no,
Nora Reynolds:absolutely. And I'm not opposed to that I actually, you know, believe in standards and all that and so I think that's a good thing. That that what I will say is and so I we what our job is to make sure that they're prepared to be able to do that except the first job the first job the first criteria is can they actually teach your job right? And you cannot measure that by hours and in education we always measure by hours see time. Do you have enough see time, but see, time doesn't tell me anything. And so that's why we establish right from the beginning, these are the competencies, you'll demonstrate 50 yoga poses, you will understand the basic anatomy practical anatomy, you'll have cueing, you'll know the how to advance that pose and how to modify that for someone who needs modification. You're going to practice teach this many hours. And you're going to get feedback on all of that. And ultimately, you're going to demonstrate that you can teach a class, and all of those things, and then we're going to bring you in, and that's where we're going to go to the next place, we're going to start doing, oh, if I have special populations, I have whatever what you can't do, you can't try to cram everything into the the bait the font, the foundation, you can't because it overwhelms everyone. The what it gives your studio owner is the opportunity to actually have flexibility in how often they offer it. Have it branded that looks like their program, it's a textbook, they can think about it that way, have incredible contact with students, that students that are students going through programs like ours, have more one to one contact with their coach than any in person program. Right? Yeah.
Christa Gurka:And it's a lot, it's exhausting. And so this type of program that you offer, is taking a lot of the work off the studio. So some people will be like, but it's expensive. But if it takes, if it took you 18, let's just I'm going to be very objective here, I charge let's say I charge $150 an hour for a private Pilates session, right. And now I it takes me 18 months, and five or six hours a month to record this video edit this video, I'm not that good at math. So I'm gonna have to pull my calculator up here. But so if I charge $150, right, and it takes me five hours a month, right? times 18 months, that's already over $13,000 that I'm dedicating to this versus not seeing a Pilates client. Right. So if you look at it from that, I mean, I guess if you don't have money, you have to spend your time, but a lot of us don't have the time, that's why we're not doing it. And so you can spend the money to pay, you know, strength or focus University, the licensing fee, and now be able to run your program 234 or five times a year, and your instructors are not going to be in your training, your teacher trainers are not going to be exhausted, providing the service.
Nora Reynolds:Absolutely. And you're going to come out with a student that you know better. Exactly. And so if you have 10 people in there, you're going to know by the time you get to the end which ones you want to hire, because you will have seen them in action. And, and so that kind of that, because if you you can go out and let me talk about yoga, you can go out and buy a curriculum, you can buy the manuals, you can buy someone's you know, PowerPoint slides, you can, you still have to teach it, you still have to, you know, evaluate them, mentor them, you all have that you have to do and, and so you can buy that and you can buy them, you know, I know in Pilates, you can buy one for you know, 10,000 you can buy him for 7000. In yoga, you can buy whatever you can buy this, you know, curriculum PDFs, and PowerPoints, and whatever. Now, here's the other thing. I also see a lot in yoga, where they take a very long period of time to train. In yoga, they have 200 hour certification, that's the fun, the basic one, and then they have an additional 300 on top of it for 500. So you can you can you know, you can do one or both. But I see this a lot. 200 is where most of the studios actually teach teacher training. There are some 300, but not as many. But everybody, practically a lot of people have the 200. Now, if I decide I'm going to teach that one weekend, a month for the net, it'll take then what happens? Here's what happens, that learning is lost, because you can't have that distance between the learning. And so or you can say if you do it eight weekends in a row, it just kills people. And then what happens when three people have this weekend? I can't make it next weekend. I can't make it next week and I can't make it I'm going to be out of town. And so then you get into that now yo got all the time all the time here. Oh, you're gonna be you know, someplace, you know, when you signed up. You can make some little things you can't sign on Zoom because you're on an airplane fine. We'll we'll do a makeup for you. But But you still be someplace where you know there's internet typically and you can do some of this. So I think that that's another factor. You've got to look at the consistency in the learning the frequency, the repetitiveness that it requires to learn a skill and teaching it is a skill, it's a separate skill from doing the practice. You're totally right. Yeah, so those things come together. And that gives you the flexibility, like I said, so is it expensive, I think that probably cost probably, it would not be an exaggeration to say, to build out an entire program digitized, doing all the videoing, like you said, hiring the videographers, hiring the editors, hiring the people, and the writers and all that, it would not be unrealistic to say you're gonna spend 30 $40,000 easily, easily on your time and your time. Yeah, you could also go out, and there are companies that will work with you to build your own program over three or four months, and they're very expensive as well. And they don't know your product, they'll help you map out your curriculum. But you've, the tendency could be, I'm not saying it is they may have this right. But I'm saying it might be to say, here's yoga lines is a list of standards, you need to have so many hours of anatomy, you need to have so many hours of this. And the tendency that I will have on many times is to try to do that the same way you would, you know, this topics list what I'd call a topics list, as opposed to looking at the competencies. So those are the kinds of things but you can certainly you can do all those things. But I Nora
Christa Gurka:was created Nora and her people, her team have created this for you. You don't have to reinvent the wheel. She's done the work. She's done the research and her background in and I really am passionate about this, that it's important to teach how to be a good teacher. I tell my teachers this all the time, it does not matter what you teach. It matters how you teach it. I can teach a Pilates class with the same nine exercises. And every time they people come out of the class, you're like, that was amazing. That was amazing. I'm like, we didn't do anything different. It's how you teach. And that's becoming a teacher. And so many of our programs don't teach people how to be teachers, they just teach the exercises, and then they wonder why their people aren't successful. Okay, it's like going to a course it's like why as a studio owner, I don't pay more for certifications, necessarily, because somebody can go sit in a workshop for five hours, get the certificate and come back and be no better. No better. Right? So it's how you implement what you're learning. Okay. And now you're right. Some do some people take longer than others. Of course, if somebody has gone through a yoga teacher training, and they're an amazing yoga instructor, will they probably go through Pilates teacher training very fast? Yes, because they've learned the skill of being a teacher. Right. And so your program, your, you know, software is what I think boutique fitness needs, especially even so if you're a smaller business owner, even generating like, you know, low to mid six figures right now, and you're thinking, Oh, I don't have the money, I'm going to tell you, I'm just going to entice you to think differently, you don't have the time. Okay, you don't have the time. So if you can pay upfront, now, I'm not telling anyone to go broke, I'm not telling you to go in the red. However, if you pay for this upfront, you've got a solid system in place. And you can generate revenue during a teacher training program without as much work. So you can't think of like the first time you run the program. Okay, maybe the first time you run the program, you're underwater a little bit, that's okay. But the second time, the third time, and then in perpetuity, now you're in the black, okay, and this and I'm sure as you start to like roll this out, you'll be like, Oh, we can improve on this. And we can improve on this certainly from feedback from your customers. And so where can there's a gazillion more questions that I could ask you, but I want to be respectful of your time. And I want to make sure that our listeners don't tune us out. But so I'm gonna ask you to share your information. Where can people find and I know you gave us so she was kind enough to give us a little resource, which we're going to link in the show notes that you can go grab some resource about strength through focus University and all of the programs they have. But where can they find more information from you or reach out to you if they want to set up a meeting with you and learn more? Yeah,
Nora Reynolds:so if you go to strength through focus.com, you will be able to get to a landing page where you can set up a call I'd love to talk to people about what they're working because everybody has a unique situation. And I will say that the our goal, I know what it's like to be in fitness. I understand the tight budgets. I understand coming back off COVID I understand all that. And our goal is not to break people I don't want people broken and so and we can talk about what what how fast you can recoup your licensing Be by just having several students and you will get your licensing fee back. But most importantly, can you be able to do what we've talked about? Can you get the right to the right teacher training it the times you need it, and without the heavy lift, because the heavy lift is a killer, that you're
Christa Gurka:absolutely right. And for those that are like, that's strength or focus.com, reach out to Nora. And if there's studio owners that are like, I don't, how could this work for me and you want to reach out to me, Christa at Pilates mcgruff.com or DM me over on Instagram, I'm at Christa Gurkha, I will tell you how you can make this work for you. Even if you already have a fledgling teacher training program. Okay, I can tell you, I'll help you strategize how this can work for you in the long run, and put you in touch with Nora too, because she's done a really amazing job of building out this program. And I thank you so much for coming on. You know, really I could talk to you for hours about this. I think it's really what the industry needs. And I think you're solving a really, really important problem in our entire and I'm not just talking about Pilates and yoga everywhere. Personal trainers, strength training, kettlebell gyms, spinning like everyone in our industry is going through the same thing. So this is a need. And I say like all businesses like great businesses find a problem and create the solution. And I think you're doing that so any last words for people nor I just
Nora Reynolds:just as exciting to work in the in this space. I love the fitness. It's very positive. I'm making change from people's lives. And I think it's super seriously important, especially now. So
Christa Gurka:I agree. I agree. Well, thanks so much for joining us. And until next time, ladies. Bye for now.
Nora Reynolds:Thanks