M02.11 Niche Worksheet Discovery

On Sunday night we had our monthly meeting of CareerThinking participants in Tokyo. Many have found their niche, while some are still searching to find where they want to impact the world with Alexander's Discoveries. Kyoko-san, who posted a guest blog recently, is one of our members still searching for her niche. From doing the worksheets, she came up with three areas of that qualified for her further consideration: 1. Past skills: Kyoko has been a mountain climber for 20+ years; 2. Passion: She attended an upmarket meeting of individuals seeking to create a family, and was inspired by the depth and honesty of the attendees… 3. Current skills: Her experience as an NGO customer service representative supporting Member enquiries. So we all sat with those and came up with a plan: A Mountaineering Club. She could offer all kinds of courses, holidays, meet-ups etc: with a catch call around the theme of finding new friends to climb with ease (pun unintended). Of course, Alexander's Discoveries in application to climbing and communicating sit at the heart of the business, and help to make it unique. It will take work to develop the USP (Unique Sales Proposition) but it is an idea worth researching… It may be an idea for you too. Peter Grunwald's EyeBody business most closely resembles this model. His approach is to gather 40 people together over 10 days and offer an intense educational experience, which incidentally offers an opportunity to catch up with old friends, meet new ones and generates a sense of belonging to a growing EyeBody community. Peter is gradually introducing a back end – which his model needs – in the form of residentials exclusively for people who have attended residentials. Making it a certificate course would probably double the interest, but Peter is not ready to unleash large numbers of EyeBody practitioners just yet. Every time we met, I always ask: when will you train teachers Peter? I asked again most recently in Tokyo, just two weeks ago, standing on the platform of the bullet train with Yuzuru Katagiri, as Peter headed off to Kyoto for another workshop. His answer: not yet. My attitude is a little more reckless. I am not talking about BodyChance graduates – who must pass through what I believe is one of the most gruelling and challenging Teacher Education courses in the world. It certainly fits the "1,600" rule – most graduates do longer than that, but a few do it quicker. However, quality of teaching process, not number of training hours, is the final arbitrator of graduation at BodyChance. No, now I am talking more about the "three month certificate course" class of education programs. It is possible you can offer these to your niche. Why not? Looking around at what is already been taught in the world, I believe it is difficult to harm anyone with Alexander's Discoveries, no matter how wretched the interpretation becomes. I can only see positive possibilities if just 10% of Alexander's ideas survive in translation. Call me an opportunist (people do) but at the end of the day, who is harmed? I only see people supported. When considering your niche, you may need to get outside the model you imagine you need. Your relationship could take many different forms. One piece of advice I have heard often is to look at other industries – those wholly different from Alexander Technique education – and explore what they are doing. I would love to read your suggestions of business models you think could be adapted for niche building by Alexander Technique teachers. Any ideas? PS A reminder to Pro Members that we have our next Skype call for your questions this week June 20th Tokyo time at 7am.