As fitness professionals, we support our current clients to renew their goals. We encourage potential new clients to get started on theirs. This is should queue us to look at our own goals.

Think of creating them in three categories: Business Acumen, Your Craft, and Self-Development. It’s no different than helping clients to develop their physical bodies in fitness facilities and their minds through motivational coaching.

Here’s a couple of tips on how to take this approach to develop your success:

• 1) Block off your calendar and schedule time to develop your business, craft and yourself. As fitness professionals, we can get busy working with clients, raising families, and taking care of life’s needs. So, it is important to ‘write ourselves’ into our calendars. We can do this by making ourselves a client on our roster. We can schedule ourselves just like we schedule our clients.
• 2) Budget some finances for each of these three categories. The New Year is a great time of year to assess your budget for development because chances are, you’ve finished your previous year’s taxes or have an idea of upcoming projections.

Let’s take a quick look at each category and things to consider for each one:

• 1) For business development: what’s your current level of skill and comfort creating client targets, finance goals, and marketing and sales strategies? Do you have the need to develop any of these areas? If so, research business workshops and conferences, take business classes through community centers and colleges. Attend networking meetings, participate in business growth webinars, or partner with others who can bring this to your fitness business.
• 2) For your craft: when will your current certifications need to be renewed? If you need Continuing Education Units (CEUs), think about which ones you can leverage by advancing the knowledge of your craft. You can also think of adding a specialization. When a specialization is added through your current certification body, it usually counts towards CEUs, so you’d be earning a double win! You’d add a specialization and earn CEUs at the same time. Think about an area that you’re drawn to or a type of population you’ve found yourself working with more than others.
• 3) For self-development: what kind of activities do you like to do when you aren’t working with clients? How much time do you spend on these? Focusing on this can give you fresh ideas and help to prevent burnout. This category can include a vacation, a personal retreat, a family getaway, a staycation, listening to motivational speakers and investing in self-improvement books and classes that support your personal goals.

By setting aside some time and financial resources to plan a course of action to develop these three important areas of success, you can be the ultimate role model to your clients. It can also help you stay centered while advancing your fitness profession.