If you’re a member of the Dance Studio Owners Association Facebook group(and just quietly if you aren’t, you are missing out on a goldmine of 100% free resources and support), you’ll remember that we ask you 3 questions when you first apply to join the group.
I’ll be completely honest with you, I don’t even remember what the first 2 questions are. (I have an amazing team who pays attention to those for me.)
But I always, always personally read your the answers to the most important one, question #3: ‘What is the biggest challenge you are facing in your studio right now?”
I’m sure you can probably make an educated guess about some of the most frequent answers to this.
“Covid (duh, Clint).” “I need more students.” “I’m losing too many students.” “I need more hours in my day.”
But one of the more surprisingly common themes that pops up when I read your answers each day is this: Too much drama.
Now, this answer always raises an eyebrow for me because it immediately takes me back to my studio-owner days and brings flashbacks of the ‘drama’. The costume dramas, the friendship dramas, the teacher dramas, the relationship dramas…I almost need a Tylenol just thinking about it.
The problem is, that once this negative energy finds its way through your studio doors – whether with students, parents, or teachers – it can so easily take far too much of your time if you don’t have the tools and strategies in place to prevent, and squash it right away.
It can also have a huge impact on your mental health and your own relationships outside of the studio, which is why I am so happy that Kim McSwain has brought her WWKD(What Would Kim Do – The Dealing With Drama edition) gold to share with you in this week’s Guest Takeover of the Transform My Dance Studio Podcast.
Kim is here to empower you to Say Goodbye To Studio Drama in this value-packed episode, where she shares her powerful (and as always, brilliantly unfiltered) strategies for:
Setting rules and expectations with your students from a young age, so that they know without doubt the acceptable attitudes that they can bring into your studio
Dealing with healthy competition between your dancers and re-framing it to empower them
The importance of shutting down conflict consistently and immediately, and how you can do this effectively
Communicating with compassion when dealing with staff friction or external influences that may be affecting their performance
Kim also digs into the power of the language you may be using when managing drama or conflict in your studio, and how you can create permanent, positive change with your words alone.
I know you are going to have a lot of ‘aha’ moments in this week’s episode of the Transform My Dance Studio Podcast with guest host, Kim McSwain!
