Episode 39 - Creating Systems to Support Your Business, Life, and Health

Most of us think we need better systems to be more efficient, but what if efficiency isn’t actually the point?

In this episode of Three Questions, I unpack what systems really are, why so many of them quietly fail us, and how starting with clearer goals can completely change the way you approach your business, your health, and your daily life. From morning routines to movement programming to business operations, I explore how backwards design, flexibility, and ongoing assessment create systems that actually support humans, not just productivity.

In This Episode You’ll Hear:

• Why efficiency alone can lead to burnout instead of clarity

• How backwards design creates systems that adapt as life changes

• Why flexible systems outperform rigid rules in both business and movement

Whether you’re a movement teacher, business owner, clinician, or someone trying to feel less overwhelmed by life, this episode will help you rethink systems as tools for autonomy, not constraints.

Links & Resources For This Episode:
Episode 2: Sensory Preferences and How They Dictate Who We Are!
Episode 23: Your Business, Your Rules: 3 Questions To Get It Right
Find a Neuro Studio Teacher Near You
Connect with me on Instagram
Connect with me on Threads

Transcript

Meghann Koppele Duffy: Welcome to Three Questions where critical thinking is king and my opinions and research are only here to support your learning and deeper understanding. Hey, I'm your host Meghann, and I'm so honored you clicked on Three Questions today so we can talk about creating better systems. So what is a system?

I mean, what does that even mean? You'll hear like systems thinking or we need to. Develop a better system to make this work better. And I feel like it's such kind of a catchall word, but what I don't think we realize is we use different systems every day. So think about it, when you get up in the morning, you probably do the same little routine.

You get up, you go to the bathroom, you get dressed, or you make your coffee, shower, walk the dog, whatever those things you do. So you have created a system to help your day flow better. And let's be honest, does anybody like when their system gets disrupted? No. So what I wanna really talk about today is when we're creating these different systems for life, for work or for whatever, what is your goal?

What's your goal? And I think it's funny because a lot of people create systems because they wanna make things more efficient. So they think being efficient is the goal. But think about it, when we're efficient and we get things done, don't we end up doing one more thing, creating some inefficiency. So what is the actual goal of your system?

So for me, my morning routine or system that I created, I do. Because I feel better throughout the day. Now let's keep this even simple. I find when I go downstairs in my pajamas and have my coffee, I always have a slower, less productive start to my day when I wake up, go to the bathroom, brush my teeth, shower, or just dry, shampoo the hair, throw in a little mascara and blush, get dressed, and then go downstairs.

I always have a more productive day. Okay, now we can argue that waking up, going to the bathroom, having coffee, coming upstairs, getting dressed, that is also efficient. However, it doesn't set my day up for me to really kill it. So what if when we're creating systems, we move past efficiency? Right? Now, don't get me wrong, efficiency is important.

So I don't wanna like throw the baby out with the bath water, but what if we set clearer goals? My goals for the day is I always want to be present and to be less reactive. I find when I get all my chores and quotes or the things I have to do done before I start my work day, I am in a different mindset and I am trying not to lose my patience for things that doesn't matter in life.

So for me, the goal of my personal system at home is to help me be the best version of Meghann and when we set a clear goal, we can then work backwards. Now, I did a podcast on teaching, just the kind of dip our toes in there. But the education model that I've adapted for movement professionals is using backwards design.

So always starting with a goal in mind, right? So a lot of people will like give these exercises and I'm like, well, why are you doing that? Uh, and they look at me, they're like, well. That's a full body exercise. I'm like, be more specific. What is your goal with that exercise? Why did you give that cue? And I find when we can be goal oriented like that, I'll say, alright, well I picked that exercise first because I need her to differentiate her hip and get more proximal hip control before we work on the foot.

And I feel like that just sets you up to respond better rather than why'd you do the hip exercise before the foot? Because we could argue, well, maybe if we did some distal sensory exercises at the foot, we might get a better response at the hip. I feel like there's no right or wrong answer provided we understand what our goal is.

So if I'm gonna start with a hip exercise, I'm gonna say, well, what is my goal? So if my client's goal is I wanna be able to move my left foot again. All right. If I just start by moving the foot, I'm not gonna reach that goal. So I've gotta go back and be like, all right, let's see what happens when they move.

Try to move their foot. Oh shoot. When they try to move their foot, they also move their upper body. Ah, let's see if we can fill sensory gaps. Get them to stabilize there and work back down. Okay, so I started at the goal, did a foot exercise, and then saw what happened. So how can we apply this to our life?

Well, try things. People figure out your goal. Maybe your goal is, I want to be able to eat at home and save money. Well, you're gonna have to create a daily system that allows you to do that. If I want to do that, I've got to wake up 15 minutes earlier to make my breakfast. Okay? If I don't know what my ultimate goal is, I'm not gonna be able to set up a system that really works for me.

So right now, I want everybody to take a step back and think about a system that you've created. Okay? Whether it's at work, maybe you've created different ways that people get things done. Well, what's the goal of people get? Do you want people just to get shit done? I mean, I don't, I don't want my employees just to get shit done.

I want them to get shit done at the level I deem acceptable, which is kind of a high level. Okay? So in order to get it done at a higher level, I'm gonna need a different system than just getting it done. Maybe it's picking up your kids or the goal. Yeah. We obviously need to pick the kids up, but you wanna pick up the kids so that you can make dinner.

Are you gonna pick up the, what is the ultimate goal? I wanna pick up the kids and be in a good mood. I wanna pick up the kids and be able to make dinner. Well, maybe we can do Instacart so I don't have time to go to the food store, but I wanna make a home cooked meal. Well, you can create a system that while you're in the pickup line, I feel like parents are always queuing for something, right?

They're always waiting to pick up or drop off. You do your Instacart order so that when you get home, all the food is there so you can cook and Well, that's 15, $20 more expensive. Yes, but you reached your goal. Or you can pick up your kids. Run, run around like a monkey with his head chopped off. Or I think the sayings a chicken with a head chopped off.

Somebody's head is chopped off and they're running, okay, get the food. You're now annoyed with the kids. 'cause now they're asking for this. We're running late. You are now cooking when you're starving, which is like the worst time to cook and nobody is happy. So I know that's a lot to ask, but take a system, whether it's work or personal.

And maybe make a clearer defined goal and work your way backwards. And the beautiful thing I love about backwards design, it's not like, oh, this is the goal. It allows for adaptation. So I'm never saying, if this is our goal, this is how we have to teach it. Mm-hmm. We're saying this is the goal. And then we always assess what do they know?

What happens when I move that joint? What happens when I move this joint? What happens when I do Instacart? One of my clients, like, I hate Instacart. They pick out crappy vegetables. I was like, fair. So write it in the note. Pick out good vegetables and you'll get a better tip. Or you pick up your vegetables another day, right?

With my clients when I'm, if I need a specific goal, I need to assess what they're actually doing, and then I am going to dictate my teaching method, my sensory inputs, and what I'm gonna do based off the assessments. We don't guess. When you're using backwards design, we assess everything and then what's so great is after we, everything we do assesses what we do next.

So rather than creating this system. What if we create a system that is ever changing? Which leads me to question two. How flexible are your current systems? I'm gonna talk from a business perspective. Okay. So there's different ways to do things. So you might have standing operating procedures, or you want this specific protocol.

These are due on this day. That's that day. Great. But how flexible is your current system? The best advice I got from another one of my clients, they give great advice is he always said, do what is due first, not what you wanna do. What is the priority? So if we have a monthly email that needs to go out, and I'm saying, I need you to do this right now, well, I need to create a system of my employee to say, Hey, wait, Meg, you're asking me to do this, but the monthly email is due tomorrow.

So that I can adjust the system and say, you know what? I need you to do this. I will take care of the monthly email. It allows for flexibility, right? Or vice versa. When we create a system, this is why I like using backwards design. We, if we create a system, everything sounds good on paper until you do it right?

Everything sounds good on paper, but there's humans we're dealing with. So every step of the process can be changed because every step of the systems I create is not a step, it's an assessment. Okay? So we do, let's just talk about our monthly email. At the neuro studio We do a monthly email and then a weekly email to remind people what's coming up, right?

So if we do all the emails in the beginning of the month, that is great in theory. But we need flexibility when we send out the monthly email based off feedback so that monthly email is assessing. So I might change things based off that monthly email if I have a rigid formula and say, Nope, I'm not changing anything based off this.

Clients are gonna be unhappy, they're gonna cancel their subscriptions. I'm gonna be annoyed, and then shit rolls downhill. I'll be yelling at Lou and Mariska and they don't wanna hear my voice. Okay. So, I know people like systems for efficiency and stuff like that, but how flexible is your current system?

Is it even working for you? Do you like it? Most people that I talk to when I look and break down their businesses, they have these rigid rules that don't matter, and they're stuck almost in a situation they created. And I'm like, yeah, but you can change that price structure. You can change that class structure.

Um, well, my clients won't like it. Well, how do you know people don't care? As long as the product's good. When you're teaching a good class, when you're giving people results, they will be flexible. And if they're not, well find clients that are more flexible. There's this thing called life. Okay. We had a mentorship meeting the other week.

Mariska had a terrible stomach flu and she was leading it and I was like, why don't we just postpone because this is an important meeting. Mariska had this brilliant lecture planned and I was like, I want them to get a hundred percent of you and you don't feel good. Take a break. Okay? So allow him for flexibility really lets you off the hook and anybody you're dealing with, none of us are perfect.

Shit happens in life. If you allow for flexibility and ownership and just being good communicators, everything falls in place. Which leads me to my last question that is going to take up the rest of the time of this podcast. What if you created a new system and looked at it as an opportunity rather than a burden?

A lot of times when I make suggestions to teachers, especially Pilates teachers, Pilates teachers are like living and dying off a business model that sucked from the get go. I will die on that hill. They don't know their numbers. They're discounting their session significantly, and when we actually look at their p and l sheet, which is profits and loss, they are making no money yet they're fully booked.

They're working all the time. It looks very successful from the outside, and they're always getting money in because people are paying them, so they don't recognize how bad their p and l sheet is. They're almost like hiding from it, and that is nothing to be ashamed of. I am not a financial expert, nor am I great at it.

I just know if a system or a business model is working or not. But when I make suggestions to change, I can see their face. They're thinking this is gonna be so much work, understanding my numbers, creating a new system, creating a new structure, creating a new price structure. Emailing people, they're looking at me like it's a lot of work.

Yeah. But what if we looked at us as an opportunity? What if we looked at, it's an opportunity to create a business that you're proud of, that makes you money, that takes care of your family. Make sure you can afford healthcare. So many movement professionals can't afford healthcare. That is amazing. And let me give you the honest truth.

I change things all the time. I was doing intensives with people in person. Three days I stopped doing it. You know why? People were paying for me to sprinkle fairy dust on them. That's not how it works. When you're recovering from a stroke, a brain injury, or dealing with MS. Parkinson's, it's chronic. So we have to create lifestyle changes.

This is not stuff that will change overnight, and if anybody is selling you a short term solution, they are a snake oil salesman. Now, there are things that can help, right? I use red light theory vibration, the neuro 22. I use a lot of different products with my clients. But there is no shortcut to success.

And so I felt those intensives were setting them up to fail. They were overriding their nervous system, but they would do so much. They were like, oh, this is great, but it wasn't pushing the needle. And for me, I don't want you to get fast results that burn out. I want you to get long-term results. I want it to be a chapter of your story, not the whole book.

So I stopped doing them. Then what I would do is I would do. A Zoom intake. And then we would do a movement session. 'cause I found when we, I did 90 minute intros, we would like talk for 30 minutes to get all the background and then it's hard to like switch gears into movement after you're doing like a 30 minute chat and asking a lot of questions.

Okay. That worked amazing for people. Right now what I do now is I meet with people for an hour. Why do I do that? Is I ask them an intake. What is one question you needed to be to answer at the end of the session? I have a full intake form that is not just health history, it's to really get to know them, their injuries.

So I know in that hour I need to answer that question and really figure out what this client needs. Does this client need movement? Do we have to do some lifestyle changes? Do we have to talk about nutrition? What is the gap for them? So this way I'm not working on. Step eight when we need to do step one.

I literally just got off a call with a client and we were doing a new exercise and she kind of was resisting. I was like, what's going on? Is this not make sense? She's like, I am just very overwhelmed by everything right now. I go, gotcha. Let's do something else, and we completely switched gears. I was taking more time to explain it to her because I was looking to create a system for her.

'cause that's what she asked. I want to know what to do, when to do it. And I was explaining how this fit into the system, but it was overwhelming and confusing her and, and I had to say, say I could look at this and get mad, or I can use it as an opportunity and say, you know what, let's talk about cognitive load.

I feel like your cognitive load is too high. Let's decrease that before we take on any more movement. And the session completely switched gears. How did I do that? By assessing everything I say. Is it landing? Is it coming across? So I'm over here creating this system for her when in actuality she needed this system.

Okay. The hard part is usually clients want to know what to do, when to do it, and how many times, and that's not how the brain and body works. I'm very clear with that. So just right there, in the past five years, I have changed my in intake intakes with clients multiple times. I do coaching calls with teachers all the time.

Okay. I have an online system where they're like, Hey, I wanna book a session with you. I send them a link immediately. They pay immediately, they. Look so I don't have to deal with the back and forth. Can you meet on Tuesday? You see what my availability is? Okay. Now I used to not like that when I was starting out because well, what if that person can only do that?

Well, I can move some things around. Now my schedule is very rigid because I am doing a lot of different things. So if you want to make a coaching call, you kind of have to work around my schedule at this point. That's what I'm doing right now, and I might change that in the future. Okay. So be very open to changing things.

Our mentorship that we do for the Neuro Studio, we change it every year. This year we're doing a lot more in-person stuff because we've been doing Zoom for a while, and I was noticing that while the teachers were understanding the work and doing good work, they weren't able to do it on their body. They needed my hands on.

They need to feel the work in their body. So we had a pivot. Mariska and I had a pivot when COVID happened. We had a very solid business. She would teach a course a month. I would, we would travel once a month, fill the courses. It was great. Our business was doing amazing and growing every year. And then COVD happened.

Luckily we had a course book in booked in New Jersey in April, and I said, what if we try Zoom? We'll offer people the opportunity to do it. And see how it goes. I demoed everything on my husband and it went amazing, and I loved it. And we pivoted our business immediately, all onto Zoom. So if I looked at that as a burden, switching all to Zoom sessions, which I did a first, I'm being honest, I cried.

The first Zoom session I had to do with a client who had complete hemiparesis, single-sided weakness, recovered from a stroke, but I had no choice. It was either do that. Or the business implode him. I make no money. So I had to, but I looked at it as an opportunity and that opportunity has gotten to me.

Right now. I am such a better teacher because I had to be, oh my God. I think I would take, I used to take things so for granted. 'cause I could get people to do, I could put my hands on them. Right. So I know it's easy to say and I don't wanna point out all the ways I created opportunities. I, I apologize if I made that about me.

I want you to see yourself in me. So with your business, what part of your business don't you like? Make it an opportunity. Create a new system, blow it up. I have an episode on, on business especially. Um. Kind of brick and mortar Pilates or um, fitness studios, but guys don't do what everybody else is doing.

Just because they're doing it doesn't mean it's successful. Doesn't mean they're burnt out. Everybody is lying to you. So all the smoke mirrors you see on Instagram, you had a lot of people are burnt out and having trouble making ends meet. I am only sharing that with you because that's how it was when I had my first Pilate studio.

I was booked and blessed, as they say. 24 years old had a studio in Hoboken and I was cash poor, okay? Wasn't making enough money to support myself. So I know what it's like to bust your ass and love a business and it not fulfill your needs. I also know that the other way possible because I've now built two businesses that feed all my needs and have, I haven't had to sacrifice any of my morals or what I want out of client sessions to get there.

So don't let systems scare you. Let systems be an opportunity rather than a burden. Have fun creating a system, but don't think it is written in stone. Allow, allow nuance. Allow different shifts. And now if you're thinking, well, I run a big business with. 20,000 employees. Um, well, you should know this better than me.

You've gotta be flexible with things. You've gotta adjust, you've gotta be in the mix with your employees, right? That's how you have success. So going back to question, when we are creating a system, whether it's an organizational system, whether it's operating procedures for your business, whether it's.

How do I get someone to walk again, that's the system too. First, identify the goal and don't be so vague. So if I say I want my client to walk again, okay, well hold on a sec. That's a long term goal. What are some short term goals? Okay, well we need foot tip connection. We need upper and lower coordination.

I need the visual vestibular and proprioception to work as a team. I need the spine to mobilize. I need hip differentiation, but I need the hip and the spine to move together. I need all these little pieces. I need pelvic listing. I need push off on the foot. I need shoulder mobility. I mean, the, the list could go on.

I, I, I could keep going. I'm not, 'cause I'm boring you. I get it. So, okay. In order to work, walk, I need all those things. Well, how do we know what your client needs? What are we gonna just guess? Well, everybody needs hip mobility. All right, well look at your client. Ask them to walk, ask them to do a hip mobility exercise.

Go smaller. So if I want to improve hip mobility, we always love to kind of get the hip moving first. It's the second most mobile joint in the body. So we, we really, from a. Um, biomechanical perspective. Yes. Do I want my clients to move their foot and ankle better? Yeah. But the hip is a much more mobile joint and most people are not moving their hip joint efficiently at all.

They're moving their lower back. When they're moving their hip. They're hyperextending their knees when they think they're moving their hip and they're hyperextending their ankle when they think they're moving their hip. So I love to just kind of start with the hip and see what goes on. And I mean like, oh my God, when I do hip exercises, my client keeps moving their head around and looking.

That could indicate their eyes can't ga stabilize or they're searching for sensory input. Well, so the goal's gotta shift. We've gotta get that spine to stabilize so that we can differentiate the spine from the hip. If the spine is mobilizing, when we're trying to isolate the hip, the spine, the hip is not isolating.

So my goal was. Proximal hip mobility and control. I did the hip exercise and then, huh? Yeah, I identified a different problem. So we've gotta solve that goal first. So we shift the goal. The goal is now get their eyes to stabilize, get their spine stabilized. Then what happens? Holy shit. Look, they're moving their hip better.

Awesome. Let's reinforce it. So now we know that this client's upper body, visual, and vestibular system are affecting their hip. So if I keep doing hip exercises or foot to hip exercises, we ain't gonna reach the end goal of walking better. So see how I've created a system in my hip, what we do at the neuro studios, hip foot to hip spine integration with upper body visual vestibular, but I never put a hierarchy.

I pick an exercise. And based off that I assess you might not like that, you might like, I want to know which exercise to do in a row. Well, you obviously do not work with humans. Um, it would be lovely to give a list of exercises and do them in this order and your life will change. It's called my friend Shante.

When clients ask me how many reps, I say three sets of a million. I don't know. What I do know is you need to do a lot less reps. When you do it with good sensory feed, uh, sensory input and good sensory integration, when you really have an accurate movement and can repeat it with precision, oh my God, three reps can be way more powerful than 25.

So a movement system, I am shifting as I go. So you're trying to teach a kid how to tie their shoes. Come on. Come on Bobby. We gotta go. We gotta go. Tie your shoes, tie your shoes, loop swoop pull. Then they kid won't sit down. Every time he's trying to tie his shoe, he's looking all over the place. Well, first of all, maybe sitting down on the ground isn't great for him.

Sometimes kids, when they sit on the ground, it's too much. The si joints, the lower back and the hip are too close together. It can create a lot of discomfort and instability where they, they. They just, they, they're not comfortable in their own skin. Maybe have them sit in a chair. Maybe before you leave the house, you say, Hey, Bobby, let's do these.

Look at your thumb. Bring it to your nose. Get Bobby's eyes to gaze stabilize so that when he's got his shoe on, he can gaze stabilize, and look at the laces. Or maybe Bobby hates those shoes. Maybe those shoes are bothering his feet, maybe the pants are bothering him. And if this conversation is interesting, I think it was one of the first episodes I did on sensory, take a look at it.

People act the way they do for a reason. I know it can be frustrating to other people, but people do everything they do for a reason. You don't have to agree with that reason, but there is a reason. So you're trying to create a system, get the kid out the door with this, but there's shoot. We identified a goal, a goal before the goal.

We've gotta achieve that goal first. Flexibility in the systems. And if you're doing this at a business level, there is always a problem. We forgot. This is why our, one of our level three teachers in admin, Lou she, well email me. Well, what about this? What about this? What about this? And I'll be like, Lou, and I'm like, God, I love Lou.

Because for me, she knows I'm doing 20 million things. So she's a real systems oriented thinker, so she's like, Meg, you missed this. You missed this, you missed that, you missed that. And I'm like, awesome. So I know somebody's got my back. Okay, so everybody who's doing too many things have someone who's always got your back and can check for things you miss.

And based off that, we change the system. Hey, we thought we could use the payment plan this way, but we can't because then after it's done, it cancels and they lose their access. Oh, we've gotta do it different. So I'm gonna leave you with this thought. Rules and systems were made to be broken. Do not break them for no reason.

Break them for a reason that helps you achieve your goals. If you are under, if you're interested in more learning, more about backwards design and how to implement it into what you do, reach out. Trust me, I love talking about it. It's kind of what my dissertation is focused on and what I find it helps someone like me who needs to be outside the box but needs a box.

It creates a framework for flexibility, critical thinking, and enjoyment in the process rather than kind of. Uh, reaching goals. A lot of us are looking for more autonomy in what we do and how we feel. Creating a system, breaking a system, and recreating it, is not only an opportunity, it's a way to build better autonomy.

So hopefully after today's podcast, you are less scared about systems, you are more excited about making changes, and you will reach out. To myself or anybody else that can help bounce ideas off, because I find once you get started, there's always going to be a roadblock or an opportunity to make it better.

Thanks guys, and I'll see you next time.