How can 1 person make a huge impact?

My name is Phil Dozois, Owner and Operator of the Parisi Speed School at Breakthru Fitness, located in Pasadena, CA.  I wanted to take a minute and tell the Parisi Network about my current Program Director, Armina Asefvaziri, and the amazing impact she has had on our Speed School since she took over as Program Director last fall.  If you attended last year’s Summit you might have had the pleasure of meeting her.  She not only attended the conference, she showed up a few days early to do the 3 Day Training (she is not a trainer by the way) as her way of getting a deeper understanding of what Parisi is and what we offer.

At that time, we had hit an all time low in our Parisi revenue.  Classes were light, sales were slow and things just flat lined for us for about a year. Our Speed School lives inside our health club and is only 3,500 SF of space…but we’ve never let that stop us from hitting some bigger numbers, getting in the $20K and even $25K per month in years past.

However, once we took all of our adult revenue (lets be fair here and compare apples to apples) we dropped down to $14k and then little by little, below 10K.  We learned to be OK with the results, as in, I guess this is the best we can do.  But that was 10 months ago…

Armina is one of those amazing people that you instantly like… she is warm, friendly and knows the magic of connecting (one of Breakthru Fitness’ core values) with everyone she meets.  She first came to work with us as a front desk staff and through the years, has worked her way up from there… lead front desk, to evening sales, to lead sales and now adding Parisi Program Director to her never ending quest to add more value as an employee to Breakthru.

Fast forward to last month…we hit $22K!  NO ADULTS in the revenue number, which I think is very important to mention.  Nothing but clean, Parisi revenue.  How did she do it?  Here are the 5 keys to success.

1.) She took the job of Program Director as a PERSONAL CHALLENGE and set a goal for herself to beat each of the previous year’s sales and revenue number.  She knew her goal every month.    

2.) She took personal RESPONSIBILITY for the job.  She knew she had a great service to sell because she had a great team, with Ray McDonough leading the team of coaches.  But ultimately, she understood it was on her to succeed.

3.) She CONNECTS with people by returning their calls right away.  It didn’t matter if she was “clocked in” or not, she called people back right away (even if she was home), something she believes is very important to reaching great sales numbers.

4.) She creates RELATIONSHIPS FIRST with people on the phone by SERVING THEIR NEEDS not listing our features.  Instead of trying to sell, she offers to serve.  “What do you need?” “What are you looking for?”  Only after a long time of listening…does she respond with, “Here is what I think might work for you.” It’s because she comes across so genuinely that people respond in such a positive way.

5.) She is CONSISTENT in her work ethic.  She is consistent at her job.  Showing up on time, knowing her numbers, spending her time doing what impacts the business as a whole, and most importantly, connecting and building relationships with people.   And she always (and I mean this) has a very positive attitude.  Even working through challenging situations, she listens, understands, thinks of a solution and always stays positive.

Armina didn’t know I was going to write about her; I wanted to surprise her and give her the recognition she deserves… not every business has that special person, who comes along and impacts the business in a very big, very positive way.

It wouldn’t surprise me if she was running the entire club someday in the near future.   I just want to say thank you for bringing us back out of the hole and creating an amazing Parisi Speed School experience here in Pasadena!  Thank you Armina.