This is always the busiest and hardest part of the season for me. As many of you know, we run several businesses, so I often find I’m more effective working from home. I haven’t always been able to do that, but today, I’ve got a great staff who can handle things during the day while I’m at home. 

Today I decided I was going to go into the office to work though. We have a large office where my business partner, gym manager, event manager, rec director and teams director share. Sometimes Justin also works in the office. It’s usually a fun, busy environment with phones ringing off the hook, customers popping in to book a party or a lesson, and lots of laughs. 

So, you’ll understand why I was surprised when I came into the office after lunch and it was silent. Other than the phone ringing and a couple private lessons out on the floor, the only sound was staff typing away. So, I messaged my gym manager across the office.

“Is everyone OK today? It’s so quiet…..” 

She messages back, “Yep. Everyone just has a ton of stuff to get done, so I think they’re all really focused right now.” 

That’s when it hit me. It’s THAT time of the year. 

We’re in the middle of one season, which is certainly the busiest anyway – and the prep for the 2022-2023 season is well underway as well. Here’s what we’re working on right now: 

  1. Ally (our all star director) did some research last week. She polled coaches to find out if there were competitions we’d like to go to and did some research. This is always tough because they are all still working on contracts for the events for next season. Then, we went through the packet in All Star 101 on budgeting and started working on our budget. 
  2. We scheduled our choreographer and our stunt camp, we reviewed music pricing, and we began working on uniforms. (Side note: We’re working with Next Gen sponsors for all three of those!!) 
  3. After we did the budget, Ally got to work on edits for the packet. We have a Canva template of our packet and I make adjustments throughout the year, so just a few things needed to be added (modifications to how we’ll do tryouts, pricing and a few things we intend to change for next season). 
  4. Once Ally is done looking at it, the packet passes through our gym manager for review. Melanie (the gym manager) makes sure she knows everything in the packet and briefs me on anything that needs my attention. Later this week, I’ll give it a final edit, make it look fancy using one of our great NG templates, and get it scheduled to release on our website.

For most gyms, that’s it! For my gym, we’ll then move on next week to our competitive tumbling and competitive dance packets. Then, we’ll get started planning for tryouts. We’ll do all of this while also getting our teams ready to travel to Memphis later this month, another competition in March, and two end-of-season events in April (one for prep and one for elite teams). We’ll end our season with our banquet/lock in combo. 

The busiest, craziest time of the year for my gym is right now through May. I’m sure it’s the same for you too. As you see above, I’ve got a pretty great staff who can take a lot of that off my plate. It wasn’t always that way though. In our early years, I didn’t have the help I have today. I would have killed for someone to sell me a template for a budget and a packet. 

So, if you’re feeling a little crazy right now, I understand why. Make sure you’re being effective with your time and setting deadlines for yourself. If you need a little extra motivation about how to focus on TODAY and take things one at a time, watch Riana’s live video from yesterday. Good luck friends! We’re going to make it through this chaos soon!