A New Picture for the Photo Gallery In Your Head

A few weeks ago, I talked about how the pictures in our head can help or hinder us. Specifically, what does a “business person” look like in your head? Is it motivating you or pushing you away?
 

I want to give you an example of a “business person” that might be better than the picture in your head.

Brenda Teal is a massage therapist and the owner of The Teal Center. The Teal Center has 2 locations in Arlington VA – one in a hospital, one in a residential high-rise – and about two dozen practitioners (four of whom are acupuncturists). The practice is well-respected in the massage community and in the client community.

Brenda readily admits that she didn’t plan her way to where she is now. She simply responded to what was right in front of her.

She started as a massage therapist and a single parent working out of her home in Washington DC. She just wanted to have enough work to support herself and her kids. Her focus was pain relief, primarily through neuromuscular therapy. If she hadn’t gotten a “cease and desist” order from the city for practicing physical therapy without a license (she wasn’t but that’s what the city called it before we had MT licensure) she might still be there.

That visit by the police meant she had to move into the nearby Virginia suburbs. Though she found a space, she wasn’t entirely satisfied with it. A client who was involved in corporate real estate encouraged her to take on a space in a residential high-rise. It was 4 times bigger than what she had (or needed) but the opportunity was too good to pass up. She added massage therapists as she was able and has grown her practice to where it is today.

When she was starting out, she began attending a small business support group, where she was strongly encouraged to operate her business in a more traditional way. They told her she “wasn’t creating enough profit”. She found their worldview and their values simply “didn’t suit me”; she left the group and followed her own values.

What values have guided her? “To create a business based on the same values as my practice. Service to massage therapists and to my clients. Respect. Collaboration.”

In fact, The Teal Center has a specific list of values that governs their operations as a business:

·       Service

·       Compassion

·       Collaboration

·       Professionalism

·       Personal responsibility

Brenda says these values aren’t just something you hold in your heart; it governs the kind of behavior she expects to see in the practice.

While The Teal Center is supporting her (so she doesn’t have to do massage to be able to pay herself!) it just makes enough money to support the practice. “I earn a living for me but I don’t have a huge income.” She said her salary is less than 10% of The Teal Center’s gross when standard business wisdom is that it should be 20%.

Brenda says her “main goal is not profitability but sustainability.” Yet she’s managed to be profitable and sustainable while still being able to look at her center, look at her values, look at the satisfaction of the people who work for her and be pleased with what she’s done.

Many of her therapists have been with her for years, in no small part because Brenda is dedicated to “helping massage therapists earn a livable wage. I pay therapists as much as possible.” Because she started as a massage therapist, that dedication is deep in her bones.

Traditional business advice is that a business in the service sector (such as massage) should have no more than 55% of their expenses going to pay their employees. The Teal Center is right at 55%.

Brenda makes a distinction between a “business person” and an “entrepreneur”. Business people pay their own taxes, rent, and overhead. They pay attention to details. They can imagine their future and forecast what it will take to get there. They have a certain ability to (and may actually take pleasure in) analyzing their business. They are consistent and dependable.

Entrepreneurs, according to Brenda, are driven by “a vision to create something bigger than what they can create on their own”. While business people may be able to operate on their own, entrepreneurs work in partnership, as part of a larger community. (Though, yes, they still need to do all the things a business person does.)

While she is clearly a business person, she defines herself as an entrepreneur. When she thinks back on her business development, she cites a list of people who have been part of her journey.

Actually, she says “I was the engine for my business. Now my business is working for me. I’m now an executive. I make decisions and guide the practice.”

Even as an executive, she keeps coming back to service as her primary motivator. “I can [run The Teal Center] as a service to other massage therapists who don’t want to do this.” By “this” she means the management of a practice – laundry, scheduling, processing payments, renting space, marketing, etc. In fact, she says “service done well is the most effective marketing.”

Brenda is a great example of holding the highest values in your heart – service, compassion, professionalism, etc. -- while still be able to function as a business owner – pay the rent, set the rates, analyze your numbers, etc. She is the picture I want you all to have in your head (well, it doesn’t have to be her specifically but you get the idea) – someone who combines the heart of a healer and a head for business and doesn’t lose herself in the process.