I received the following email from one of the readers of this blog who opened an affiliate last September. It’s on the topic of coaching large group classes and I thought you all might like to see it and my response. Learning how to navigate large groups is one of the “good” problems to have!
Nicki,
In one of your blogs you talked about the excitement of a 15 person class, and we agree, but I was wondering about the trainer to client ratio and how you handle that. My partner and I would probably do okay with a class that size, but I’m worried about our other trainers blowing a fuse if 15 people showed up.
We were having between 15 and 20 people show up for our five o’clock class so we quickly added a 5:30. That evened out our 5 and 5:30 classes to about 5 to 7 attendees each, but now our 6 o’clock class is hit and miss with sometimes 1, 2 or none showing.
I hesitate to drop our 6 o’clock class. If it’s not on the schedule, I worry that busy professionals getting off at 5 and 5:30 might just pass us by if we don’t offer a 6 o’clock class.
I’ve also created a 2 trainer scenario now 5 nights a week. Where 1 trainer used to be able to do the 5 and the 6, I’m now paying a second to come in and do the 5:30.
Any suggestions you have would be greatly appreciated.
15 people is about the largest class size that I like to see with just 1 coach on. Let’s not kid ourselves, to successfully manage a 15 person class takes a coach with a lot of presence and the ability to command a large group. It’s not a comfortable thing for everybody, so pay attention to your coaches and what their strengths are regarding this.
We always have 2 coaches on for our 10 person On Ramp classes, but the students in those classes are raw beginners and we can see some pretty ugly movement in the beginning.
Our ongoing classes we typically cap at 15. Well, not capping in the sense that we are turning people away, because we aren’t, but when we are consistently seeing class sizes of 13,14,15, at a particular hour it tells us it’s time to open another class.
When training larger groups it is very helpful to have some structure to the sessions that the clients are familiar with. This is helpful for the trainers as well!
For example, all of our classes start like this:
Folks arrive, get changed, and typically hang around and chat for a bit. At 5:15, or whatever the start time is, the trainer gathers up the group and announces the warmup. This is usually some sort of monostructural element (run, row, jump rope, etc). When folks come back in, all of them know to do our DROM (dynamic range of movement) and shoulder mobility sequence (shoulder dislocates/glide kips/ohs with pvc).
After folks are good and warmed up we have a strength and skill element for that day that gets explained and reviewed by the trainer first. This could be DL plus working on handstands, or standing press plus working on rope climbs or forward rolls, etc.
When the strength/skill component is wrapped up (usually with about 15 minutes remaining of class) there is a WOD typically in either the 5-7min or 8-12 min range…rarely over 15 minutes. If you go to Dutch Lowy’s training seminar…which I HIGHLY recommend…you will see why our programming lives here primarily.
After the WOD we wrap it all up with some static stretching. Again, folks are well trained on this…they learned it in our On Ramp or in private training so they know exactly what to do…and they stretch and bullshit with one another, etc. It works quite well.
Regarding dropping class times that have low attendance:
If it is a time that is reasonable for most professionals and you feel it SHOULD be a busy hour (early morning/late evening time slots) then do this: Make that time your next beginner workshop/class. Announce it to all of your folks that you are starting a beginner class at 6pm that will run MWF for 4 weeks. Tell them to tell all of the people they know who are thinking about training…tell them this is the PERFECT place for them to get started.
Since you are paying a trainer to do the 5:30 class, use this time to get the word out about your fabulous 6pm beginner class! I know it’s tough in the beginning to justify paying a trainer if it’s a class you could be coaching, but think of it as valuable time for your to be spending on growing your business!
Awesome post. Love the class structure and ideas. Keep up the good posts. Thanks!