What The Fitness Industry is Missing When We Train New Trainers with Jodi Barrett

In this insightful interview, Jodi Barrett shares her expertise on the gaps in trainer education, emphasizing the importance of teaching skills, soft skills, and energy awareness in the fitness industry. Discover practical tips for developing human connection, effective communication, and continuous growth as a trainer.

Connect with Jodi:

@kbstronger 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello and welcome back to the Fitness Education Online podcast. My name is Dr. Erinitchke and I am your host. I have with me today my friend and colleague Jodi and we are here to break down the topic of what the fitness industry is missing when we train trainers. So, Jodi, welcome to this podcast. Thank you for taking the time to chat with me today and share your wealth of experience. And before we dive into the topic, I'd love it if you would just talk a little bit about what your background is, who you are, and why this topic is important to you.

SPEAKER_01 0:31

First of all, thank you, Erin, for having me here today. It's such a pleasure. My name is Jodi Barrett, and I've been in certifying trainer since 2007. Yeah, so and but I went very niche. I went into the kettlebell industry. So my my certification program is Libs with kettlebell training. I did a deep dive into that. I fell in love with the kettlebell and I thought, well, I feel like there's definitely an area where people can, even um trainers can add to their toolbox because sometimes kettlebell is something that they're not quite exposed to the foundations of it. So that's where I went. I love it. I love it.

SPEAKER_00 1:15

So from your perspective, and when we think about certifications, they often focus a lot on things like exercise technique, guidelines, reps, sets, you know, those types of things. So what do you feel from your perspective? And having now been training trainers for a hot minute, like you said, what are some of the biggest gaps that you see currently in newer professionals or maybe as you are starting to train new trainers?

SPEAKER_01 1:40

Absolutely. So what I've seen over the years is necessarily the foundations, we all want the skill, right? We want to know how to. So I'll always just for reference, pull in kettlebell training. We always want the skill of the swing. So we want our person who's taking the certification to first learn that skill. The second step that I think often gets left out is the teaching part. Like there's so much to learn in the piece where you have to learn the skill as an individual yourself. But I think that a piece that's sometimes left out is the how to teach to your clients that skill. It's the whole teaching part versus the foundations of the exercise.

SPEAKER_00 2:23

Yeah, that's such a great point because really at the heart of it, I think we're educators. And we are experts in our field, but it it means something different when you're working with a client and you are trying to teach them. They're not interested in your science jargon. They're not interested in those things. They're interested in the relevancy of what it is you are trying to teach them. So, as you talk a little bit about that teaching skill, what are some ways that you mentor your new trainers and really get them to understand the value of what it means to teach someone a skill?

SPEAKER_01 3:00

Yeah. I'll give you a little bit of background. So at a very young age, I began the journey of an educator teacher. Honestly, I can go back when I was 14. I started at a swimming pool where I taught swimming lessons. So I've grown up teaching, probably I would say, well, just about my entire life. And when I got certified to certified trainers, I did that for a period of time just the trainers until one day I was like, for me to fully immerse myself in what I was doing, I took on the role of also starting to teach classes because I thought as an educator, I can become better at teaching my trainers if I'm in the thick of it. So then I could figure out, you know, the faults, the fixes, what's really being seen out there, you know, amongst the clients. And so that was kind of the a little bit of background of where I went to, you know, you have to, you have to have the experience so that you can properly educate your trainers, right?

SPEAKER_00 4:01

Absolutely. I think as a longtime educator myself, you have to be immersed in that process. And like you said, finding the faults and the fixes. I like how you said that. And I want to talk a little bit about the faults and the fixes. So tell us, like back in your early days, the the the first starting out version of you and learning to teach, what were some of the faults that you kind of came across or or experienced? And then how did you fix those? So specifically to kettlebell, what a fault would be. Sure. Yeah. Just when, like if you if you imagine when you were trying to teach clients skills, what were some things that you felt were like stumbling blocks or or things that sort of threw you off track that you're like, oh, that didn't really come out or that didn't land the way I wanted it to.

SPEAKER_01 4:50

Yeah. So some of the things that I found right away were, and actually the beauty of it, I did one of my nieces, she just started doing um teaching Pilates and we had this conversation over the Easter weekend, and she's like, Well, when I mess up. And so, like, that is a real thing. And I always like I go back to my, and I mean, for me, it was like, you're still human at the end of the day when you're riding people. So I'm like, you give yourself some grace. I said, there's a couple of things that most often people don't notice because they're in their own head about things. So I said, you can do a couple of things in that scenario. You can just carry on. I said, but for me, it's always I normally generally call myself out. And I'm like, yep, that that that was. And I think when you do show that, then you become relatable to the people that you're guiding, right? Nobody wants to hang around in a room who with somebody who is so perfect that you feel like you cannot even function around them, right? So, you know, I think that was one of the things I learned quickly was I was just human, right? And, you know, that's something always just, you know, have that conversation with my my trainers is like you are just human. Doesn't mean that gives you the right to always not be prepared, like, you know, have those things, your skills, everything in order. But, you know, it does give you a relatable piece for your clients to go, okay, she's not like perfect. Perfect is hard, right? So I think that was one of the things that I learned, you know, back in the day was like, you know, I I always had a couple of rules when my clients, when are one of my trainers? I'm like, you know, the professionalism when you walk to the door. I've trained a lot of trainers who, well, generally when you spend a lot of time with your clients, sometimes there's clients that you become friends with. Sure. Right. Because you're in that space at all the time. You're I always say you're tearing down walls when you're training. And sometimes that's an emotional thing opposed to, you know, even building muscle. There's that piece. And one of the things I've always been pretty um clear on is I'm like, you be you are that trainer in that moment. And when you step out of that, then you go and have your coffee and have a discussion about whatever you want to. But just being that professional piece when you're there, that was something I'd I would say I learned off the hop too, because I first started in an area that was a pretty small community. And it was like you needed to understand some key elements when you're doing the when you're first starting.

SPEAKER_00 7:23

Yeah, I appreciate that you said the relatability piece of like not being perfect. And I think sometimes we as those professionals put so much pressure on ourselves to be the expert, to do it all right, to get it all right, to make sure it's it fits in this box and it unfolds the way that we want it to unfold. But you said something really beautiful there about giving yourself grace, but not leaning so heavily into like the fact that you're human and that gives you an excuse not to show up professionally. So I think that's a really important piece of the job itself is yes, understanding exercise technique and the physiology and nervous system and all of those things. But because you mentioned the professionalism part, I want to dive into a little bit about the value of the human skills, like those soft skills. How do you incorporate teaching the value of those when they're not guidelines, you know, that we can lean on? Like we can look at ACSM and we know these guidelines, but what does it mean to enter this profession, not just scientifically prepared, but like communicatively prepared and professionally prepared? How do you teach your trainers that?

SPEAKER_01 8:34

That's a great question. And that sits in my brain and like, can you teach this to some extent? Right. I think with practice, with showing up, I think they're I think their skills you groom as you go, those soft skills. Like, for example, you may not, when you have a client walk into the room, you may not day one recognize that they're carrying heavy energy, that their capacity isn't like I mean, I taught enough classes that I could see a client walk in, I could tell how they walked that something heavy was going on. Now, that's not a like, I mean, maybe you're blessed with that as a skill, as a human, maybe because of life, life experiences, but no, you're not all of your trainers are gonna have that day one. So it is a conversation of like the same thing, like you learn the skill, you teach them foundations. They got to practice it. I say to my trainers, when they get certified, they have the access to the training platform. I'm like, you won't get better at your skill unless you're training it. That's a fact. The same thing is you're not gonna get better at teaching, at watching the energy unless you practice it, which means being uncomfortable and having those days that you maybe think that you weren't the best trainer you could be, but you're building, right? And just having a support system for them to know that, you know, you're always a message away. I always say this thing. I'm like, if someone asks you a question, you are better to say, I actually don't know the answer and come to me. I always say, come to me. And I'm brutally honest too. And I say, if I don't know it, I'm gonna tell you I don't know it, I'm gonna go somewhere else. You know, so you kind of have this tier system, but it's again, it's that human piece where you kind of go, we all searching for knowledge, we're all building our skills. So practice.

SPEAKER_00 10:21

Yeah, absolutely. And I appreciate that you mentioned the notion of being uncomfortable because growth, growth is, right? If it was comfortable, you wouldn't be growing, you wouldn't be advancing, you wouldn't be upskilling. So growth is uncomfortable. And I think practicing those human skills is is difficult because we're in a profession where it's people facing, it's a service profession, and no two clients are alike. And like you said, part of it is becoming attuned to the energy in the room and like noticing things that your clients are carrying and not just being technically proficient at your job or competent, but being able to read the room, so to speak, and understand the person who's in front of you. And I do feel like that is a gap when individuals are going through and trying to learn how to be prepared for the field and how to be successful in the field. There's so much of it that hinges on those people's skills.

SPEAKER_01 11:20

Yes. And it's, you know, and again, it's showing up, doing the work. I had one client say to me, I remember way back when when I started teaching, I said to her, I said, Well, pack your shoulder. And she said to me, Well, Jody, I know how to pack a suitcase, but I don't have a clue what you're saying when you buy a package. What are you talking about? Just like that. So I always, you know, we have our trainer's weekend where we get together and I'm like, share your cues, share, because I said you have, when you get into a room and you have 20 people that are following you, not all you. I'm like, to be the person that that teaches that front line of people, like you're honing so many skills, right? Because now you're like 20 individuals are out there. We're trying to teach them the same skill. Some learn by seeing, some learn by hearing, some learn by doing, some learn by like, you know, you have to. And that's the that's the that's the part. I think there's that missing piece where you have to teach. You have to teach someone to be able to go into that space and go, you know, even this the same thing of sometimes maybe you don't have the ability to have, you know, three different classes. Maybe you are putting people all into one class. Now you have a beginner's, you have an intermediate, and I have advanced. But I'm like, the beauty of that, and people always get stressed out. I'm like, when they have to do that, I'm like, the beauty of it is you are going to get so skilled. Yes. Because you have right. So it's again that uncomfortable piece.

SPEAKER_00 12:52

Yeah, absolutely. And you're speaking to something really important, which is learning styles. Yes. And it doesn't matter if it's in a classroom setting, like a traditional, you know, I'm teaching you an anatomy lesson. It transcends that. Like when we teach, we have to be cognizant of the learning styles of auditory, kinesthetic, visual, and enter into a group class or group training or even one-on-one, and being able to say the same thing in multiple ways, but demonstrate it, it's like that tell show do method of you tell them what it is, you show them what it is, and then have them do it. And in that formula, you're capturing all of the learning styles that and all the different learning languages that your clients or group X members or whatever naturally possess. And so it's it's important to become a master at, like you mentioned, cueing, because we have to cue in do different ways. It can't just be verbal. No, it has to be like, I'm showing them the movement and I'm keeping this feeling in mind, like you should feel it here, or something like that. And I think that's something that I see new trainers stumble with a little bit because they're not real confident with, well, like you said, like tack your shoulder or you know, something like that, that doesn't resonate necessarily with the person in front of you. So, yes, you enter that room and you've got beginner, intermediate, advanced. You have to learn to communicate at the same time to all of those styles and all of those levels.

SPEAKER_01 14:20

Yeah, I think your trainer ultimately becomes a master of communication above all.

SPEAKER_00 14:26

Absolutely. The successful ones do for sure. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. You mentioned earlier about being able to know the energy, like being able to be attuned to how your client is showing up, that energetic load. I think you you sort of phrased it that way. So, how do you prepare your new trainers, the ones you're working with and mentoring, to read that energy? What are some things that you notice clients show up with when their energy is just a little bit low, dipped? And then how would trainers effectively respond to that?

SPEAKER_01 15:01

Yeah. So with my trainers, because you have to like again, it it's kind of a journey because you're learning, you're learning your own skills first, the foundations of that, and then the teaching of it, and then the energy piece, they have to be aware of themselves, right? Like I can't teach you how to be aware of someone else's energy if you're not even aware of your own.

SPEAKER_00 15:21

Such a beautiful point. Like, I just want to listeners rewind and listen to that part again because it starts with self-awareness. Yes. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 15:29

So once you figure that piece out, and with the trainers, it's it's the these conversations, right? Maybe it's a they fly into like because I do a lot of um like Zoom like certifications now. So I'm not even in their room, right? But knowing that I can still, you know, maybe they flew into it, they're late, they're kind of scrambled. And it's just like, I often will say, Okay, we're actually just we're gonna sit for five breath. We're gonna ground first. So then you start kind of teaching them to be self-aware. Sure. And then you have the conversation about, you know, the client that walks into the room, you know, and like when you practice it, when you practice it yourself, it's easier to, you know, look at it outwardly. I always we have a checklist that I go through like four with my trainers about capacity. Okay. Yeah. It's and I think it's something that we've also been unaware of as trainers. Like we think about, I'm gonna build this program, I'm gonna put it up at the front of the room, I'm gonna execute it and it's dumb. But when you start to be aware of the energy, right? Like I used to have one thing where I was like, I had this really fun game that I used to do with my clients, and I taught my trainers in it. And it was always a fun exercise that the clients did, and they always ended up laughing. But you know, I live in a place where it's winter. Oh my God, six months out of the year. And I tell you, there are days where you'll be start a class, you'd start a class, you'd be, you know, quarterway in, halfway in. People are just like, they're not there. They're not there.

SPEAKER_00 17:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 17:08

Understanding energy, right? Is so important. Because I would then I would, or I'd tell my trainers, because we'd have this conversation, and I'm like, insert something that is so fun, maybe even ridiculous, but you're shift you're working on shifting energy, is all you're doing, right? Like yeah. So it's uh I love that. It's it's practicing, but it's self-aware first and then how to navigate. Well, and uh, you think about it, you always say you when you walk into a room, when you start to become aware, but here's the thing, you have to start leaner learning how to be present as a person because if you're all in your head all the time when you walk in a room, you're not gonna even notice. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_00 17:52

Yeah, you're speaking so much. I feel like our philosophies align really well. I love that you will encourage them grounding first. And that's something that I've done with clients and students. Like I've been a long time instructor in higher education as well as a professional in the field. And sometimes you just know like something is not like Mercury is in retro, like something is affecting the cosmos here, and it is thus affecting the energy in the room. And I think by doing a grounding exercise, like I'll notice that with clients, they'll come in and they're just in their head, right? Okay, we need to get out of sympathetic and we need to get into parasympathetic. And whether that's like I have them do an ear massage, a couple deep breaths, like let's talk about intention, let's talk about let's unload whatever the load is that you carried in, then you can pick it up on your way out. But let's let's write it down, let's jot it down, let's breathe it out, let's yell it at it, whatever we have to do, to just get to a place where you're centered. And I think that's a really good skill to have new trainers practice on themselves because you're right. If if you are not present, you are not aware. And until you step into that moment with presence, that's when that awareness will sort of start to unfold. So doing that grounding exercise, I think is really important. One of the things I want to ask you, because you do work in training new professionals and mentoring them, it it's it goes beyond just giving them a certificate, right? There's a difference between giving someone a certificate or then earning a certificate and then actually teaching someone how to coach and how to teach. And I'm wondering what are the qualities, characteristics, or abilities that separate technically competent coaches and trainers from like the really great coaches, the ones that are really successful in all dimensions of their practice.

SPEAKER_01 19:39

I would just say it would think highly that it's the human element.

SPEAKER_00 19:43

I love it. Yeah, I would agree 100%. Yeah, it's like the connectivity that you can have with another person. And one of the things that I think is difficult is teaching people like that rapport is the foundation of everything you do. You can know the science backwards, forwards, inside, and out. You can know the Krebs cycle. And I promise you, your client doesn't care. They don't care about it. They don't care about energy substrates, they don't care about what's being burned at rest versus during hot. They don't care. I assure you, they do not care. You you might have the one-off occasion that's like a science nerd that's like, I want to know. But by and large, generally speaking, they care about how you make them feel and they care about how they feel in your presence and within the space that you've created for them. So foundation really is that rapport. So I couldn't agree more that what separates someone from just being, we'll call it technically competent and maybe proficient, and those that really do achieve success, which is more than just client results, it's career longevity, it's reducing burnout, it's a commitment to the field, it's advocacy in the field, is that human element, that ability to not just recognize that you are human and that you are imperfect. You can be both a masterpiece and a work in progress at the same time. And I think that's a really important message that it sounds like you do in just your mentoring piece. Like you're hitting home on a piece that's so intangible. Like our guidelines are tangible, right? Like we can see those, we can touch those, we can update those, we can apply those. But the human element is something that's a little more ethereal. It's a it's a little bit different in a way to weave it in.

SPEAKER_01 21:25

Yeah, I think it's the energy exchange. Yeah. Ultimately, I believe it comes down to the energy exchange, right? Like what you know, you stand in front of your client and you they they stand in front of their brute class, there, there's an exchange there. And right, and you learn that, you figure out that's where you start to shift, you know. You're like, oh, there's something going on in here. There's an ick, there's in the ick in this room, and we need to take away, you know. So then you figure out what we need to do. I used to do a knee tab drill where they they, you know, it was. One of the ones that would just like they would laugh. I'd always like, please do not bang your heads together when you do this. There's a couple coconuts hitting each other. Oh gee. It was always the thing that kind of made everybody, you know, as adults, we still the root of everyone is a child within, right? And just finding that and pull that out is sometimes the biggest element. I always tell my trainers to remember that you're standing in training maybe 35 to 40 to 50 year olds, but I said inside each one of them is still a child, right? Yes.

SPEAKER_00 22:35

I think that's a really beautiful way to bookend this conversation because one of the messages that I think you're saying is to one, one, remember that. Like remember that it doesn't matter the biological or chronological age of your participants, like somewhere inside is someone that has whimsy and that's a child. But to also remember that you, as the professional, to continue to upskill and separate yourself from being somebody who is technically competent to someone from someone who is great at what they do energetically, typically, all of those things is to continue to remember that you yourself have whimsy and you're a child inside and to be curious like a child. Be curious about the energy in the room that you're facing, be curious about your own energy and your own presence and the things that you maybe need to offload before you walk into a session. So really getting in touch with that inner whimsy is what I call it. I I think about my kids and they're very whimsical.

SPEAKER_01 23:34

And I love the word curious. Like if you're if you can be curious about your day, about your life, yourself as a trainer, you know, and that will come with you. And that'll be the energy when you step, you know. People, people will people will come towards that.

SPEAKER_00 23:51

Yeah, absolutely. It's it's like mouths to flames. Like it's there's a very, there's the attractiveness to really positive, beautiful, fun, whimsical energy, right? Like it's it's influential and you're like, I want to, I want to go there because that seems fun. And it also seems like something that aligns with the energy that I have. So as we bookend our time, I'm wondering if you could give new trainers two solid pieces of advice, things that you wish you would have known at age 14 when you started out teaching people and and you know, swimming lessons. What were what would those two pieces of advice be?

SPEAKER_01 24:31

Well, since we talked about you brought the word to to to the forefront, curious. Like I think that's a great word. Because when you're curious, lots of things open up, right? Curious means you're gonna you want to learn, you look at life differently, more in a positive way than a negative way. So that's gonna pull that energy differently. Another thing I would recommend is do the reps. Ah, yeah. Like the and when I say reps, I don't mean always necessarily the reps of a kettlebell swing to get better, but I am saying that, you know, you have to, you have to hone your skill, right? If you can't, I always say if you can't do it, probably don't teach it unless you can articulate it really, really well. Uh, you know, there's things around that too. If you have an injury yourself or you're impeded, you know, possibly you can't. But I'm like, if you're you just play within the lines that work for you, right? So I kind of give it. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 25:29

That's perfect. So that's perfect. Like be curious, right? And do the reps. I think that's beautifully stated. And I'm looking forward to having you on the second part where we do talk about kettlebell and like your niche training. But I want to leave reader or listeners, readers. If you're reading show notes, then you're a reader. But leave all listeners with how they can contact you and what's the best way to get in touch with you and follow your work.

SPEAKER_01 25:54

Absolutely. So kbstronger.com website. I am on all socials that exist in the world. I think. Yes. And again, I think probably what I would say is be curious. Ask the question. You never know, you know, if you're curious about adding to your toolbox, because it's in it's important to have these skills that can help and not only the the foundations of it, the teaching of it.

SPEAKER_00 26:18

Absolutely. Well, Jody, it was a pleasure having you here. I love your energy. I love that you focus on that human element as being a component of success. And I dare say, like what will make your success is being very attuned and reading the energy and being present in the work that you do with clients because it's less about doing the technical reps and more about how you connect with others. So thank you for sharing your time, your energy, your expertise, your wealth of knowledge. And I look forward to next time when we talk a little bit more about the kettlebell piece.

SPEAKER_01 26:50

Thank you so much for having me. It was great being here.