I used to think Org Charts were just a fancy way of telling people who is in charge. I never really saw the purpose of them in the gym. There’s only one owner, right? (Well…two owners in my case…plus Dustin and Justin…but that’s neither here nor there.) You’re the boss, so why do we need a chart to explain it? 

I was missing a really key component though. Not only do I think org charts are a key component to partnerships, but for single owners, they help the staff see the path to a career at your gym. If you’ve ever had a staff member say they’ll have to get a “real job” after college, I’m sure you felt as frustrated as I used to feel. I wanted to hire people full-time, because I really needed them at the gym, but my part-timers just didn’t see the gym as a viable full-time option. 

I later realized it’s because they actually had no idea what I did all day. 

It wasn’t until we developed a thorough organization chart that my staff started to see all the areas of the gym that were necessary to run the programs. Below are the tips to creating your perfect org chart for your gym: 

1. Format. It doesn’t really matter what format you use. If you like a pen and paper, that’s great. Canva has some great free templates, and here is one Next Gen provides as well. (Note: The template we provide is incredibly thorough, and at this stage of business you likely don’t need one that’s that in depth.) I searched for hours to find a platform that offered me to plug in names and create an appealing org chart that could link to position agreements. Canva was the best option I found. 
2. Vision. Many people make their org chart based on who they have in their gym right now. They fit the boxes to the people. If they have an all star director, they make sure there is a box so that person feels important. Instead, we need to make our org chart based on the vision for the business. This means you’re likely going to have your name in a lot of boxes, or perhaps you have vacancies altogether. I’d like to hire a full-time social media director. In the meantime, Melanie fills that role so her name is in the box. Her name is actually in a ton of boxes. This helps guide our hiring decisions. An org chart should be based off the positions in the gym that you’d hire if you had all the time and money in the world. Over time, you may realize you have part-time people who can fill those positions and/or you’re ready to hire and those positions make the most sense. When we tried to hire an all star director back in 2017 it’s because I “felt” like that was the right position for the gym. It wasn’t until I couldn’t find someone and took a deep look into our org chart that I realized I really didn’t need an all star director. At the time I only had 30 kids in the program. Instead, I had 400 kids who were recreational and I could really use a tumbling director. His position has evolved over time, and Patrick has been promoted to “recreational programming director”, but nonetheless, his name is in the boxes that make sense. We just didn’t realize we needed those positions until we took a hard look at the vision and future goals for the gym. 
3. If you have business partners, don’t stress about being even. The reality is that the number of boxes you’re in does not determine how hard you work or how many hours you’re putting in each week. One person may be in a ton of boxes because they have a ton of natural skill or really enjoy something, and as a result, they’re very focused and finish it quickly. Another person may really love a job, so they take their time and really work through every detail. Neither person is wrong. The person whose wrong is the one counting boxes to justify a paycheck, so avoid that. On the other hand, it’s necessary to start by talking about the tasks you really enjoy and excel at. The ones you don’t are the ones you need to either hire, or systemize and delegate. Now, there are a few you’re unlikely to get off your plate (finances for example), but you might be able to delegate positions below that (such as accounts receivable and bookkeeping) to make your anguish a bit more bearable.
4. Org charts need to be updated. Literally as I said this, I hopped into update a few things on mine. It’s not perfect and needs some work as we’ve decided we’d like to expand a few programs in our gym, and that will eventually require a full-time facility manager, full-time all star director and full-time marketing director. By updating our org chart based on our vision and who is in those current roles, I can also start putting a timeline to those positions and making reasonable decisions as to which positions should be hired next.

So, if you’re thinking an org chart is a waste of time, you’ll need to buck up and make one. Start building your vision and figuring out who can fill those spots. If they’re empty right now, that’s OK. You know you’ll need to make hires to make that vision a reality. If your name is in 99% of the boxes, you know you’ll need to start systemizing and delegating some easier roles.