1. Be imperfect – stay fit and value your training, but don’t feel under pressure to be perfect and compare yourself to people on Instagram.
2. Be a leader – share your knowledge, and teach as well as train. Share articles and journals you have come across and take time to explain things to clients. They’ll love you for it.
3. Toughen up – make sure you challenge your clients. A healthy dose of tough love will pay off in the long run.
4. Be yourself – this sounds obvious, but you’re not a fitness robot. You don’t have to get personal, but it’ll help build good rapport with clients if you can share honest opinions and have a joke with them.
5. Admit if you mess up – maybe you were a bit quite or distant to your client in your session. Own up to your mistake, and tell your client, just make sure you don’t make this a habit. My clients could always tell when I was stressed and tired.
6. Say “I don’t know” – you’re not expected to know everything and it’s okay to not know something. Just let your client know that you’ll find out for them as soon as possible. I still use this to this day whilst teaching when learners ask me a question during a lecture.
7. Don’t be afraid to say no – you need time off or you’ll burn out. I see this a lot especially to newly qualified PT”s. Value your time and make sure you only say yes to things you really want to do or can do.
8. Get rid of a client – You can only do so much. If a client relationship isn’t working, you have too many or they keep cancelling, refer them to someone else. I always remember course tutor Damion doing this when we worked together at a gym in Norwich. Sometimes your training just doesn’t work with that particular client.
9. Remember stuff – maybe your client’s has a big event coming up. Keeping track of that kind of thing helps build better relationships and understanding. To this days some of my clients have become very good friends.
10. Always have good breath – Nothing worse than your client smelling your onion breath from your lunch or dinner whilst spotting them on the lat pulldown. Keep a pack of chewing gum in your bag.
