Creating an advisory board can help massage therapists gain valuable insights, support, and honest feedback for their business. By surrounding yourself with trusted peers, mentors, and professionals from both inside and outside the industry, you can make better decisions, overcome challenges, and stay motivated. An advisory board doesn’t have to meet regularly or even know they’re on it—it’s about identifying who you can turn to for guidance. Building this support system helps combat isolation, provides fresh perspectives, and ultimately contributes to long-term business success.
Key Takeaways
- Surround yourself with people who will give you constructive advice, even when it’s not what you want to hear.
- It doesn’t have to be an official group; trusted colleagues, mentors, friends, and professionals from different industries can all offer valuable perspectives.
- Having a support system helps you navigate challenges, stay motivated, and gain confidence in your decisions.
- Whether it’s pricing changes, business strategies, or client challenges, getting input from trusted sources can lead to better outcomes.
- Small business development centers, mentorship programs, and professional networks can also provide structured guidance and resources.
Create an Advisory Board for Greater Practice Success
Who do you trust to tell you the truth even when it’s not necessarily what you want to hear? These people should be on your advisory board.
When I wonder if I’m over-committing my time, I talk to my husband, Jeff.
When I’m thinking about a new business offering for massage therapists, I talk to Ginny.
When I’ve got a question about deductions or bookkeeping, I talk to Margo.
When I’m feeling insecure professionally, I talk to Kitty.
When I need to talk to someone to help me get the big picture or to reflect on our industry, I talk to Rhonda.
When I’m anxious about raising my rates, I talk to Kitty and Jeff.
These are some of the people who will give me good advice. They will also tell me things I don’t always want to hear—especially when it’s true. I trust them, even when I might not agree with them. They are my advisory board.
Being a business owner is, for many of us, a new identity and responsibility. Many of us don’t have a deep education in business. We can be overwhelmed or stymied by common business decisions.
Even when we do have experience or education, we may struggle to get a healthy perspective on a business problem when we’re in the middle of it. We may be laid low by imposter syndrome. And, like being a massage therapist, we’re often on our own, isolated.
We can do something about the isolation. We can build our own support system.
Create an Advisory Board
Take a moment and think about this: Who do you listen to? Who gives you good feedback or advice, especially about business challenges? Who do you trust to tell you the truth even when it’s not necessarily what you want to hear?
The odds are some of them are other massage therapists. After all, who understands our business better than other people in our business? Former instructors or classmates. Co-workers. Massage therapists you get to know through professional organizations, activities, or classes. Practitioners you’ve connected with through social media.
Some of them will come from outside our industry. Partners and spouses are common sounding boards. If you’ve got a good relationship with an accountant or tax advisor, that’s invaluable.
You might have some wise friends who are great advisors. Some of those wise friends might have business expertise from other industries. Sometimes I even toss ideas back and forth with my hairdresser, Nekko, because she enjoys talking about the ins and outs of a service-sector business.
An advisory board doesn’t have to actually meet as a group. They don’t even need to know that they’re “on” your board. Having an informal board is more about identifying who you can talk to when you need to. However, sometimes it is a benefit to have a live group of people who do meet face to face to support each other.
Right after graduating from massage school in the early ‘90s, Netta Chiorello organized a supervisory group. A supervisory group is a formally organized group, led by an experienced practitioner, that meets regularly to discuss challenges and experiences as massage therapists.
“It was invaluable,” said Chiorello. “We could bring anything to the group. We could talk about difficult clients. We could talk about raising our rates. We could talk about business practices. We talked about ethics a lot. It was great.”
Chiorello recently retired from hands-on work and she finds herself now missing that connection, even though she hasn’t been involved in the supervisory group in many years. In recent years, she banded together with other massage therapists to change outdated laws in her town. The group now meets regularly to share news, experiences, and challenges. It helps her answer the “how will I stay connected now?” question.
She’s also a member of her local Chamber of Commerce. “I meet new people through the Chamber. I meet coaches, other business owners, and women who do different things.”
Lauren Piro, on the other hand, had what she calls her business bestie. They worked near each other and were starting their businesses at the same time.
“It was a really good fit to be able to bounce ideas off of each other about what direction we wanted to take our practices and talk about things happening with clients,” said Piro. “We could have very easily had a competitive relationship but we were very clear from the beginning that this was about supporting each other so we could both thrive. So our clients, in turn, could thrive.”
That relationship lasted eight years until her bestie moved home to Australia.
Piro is now a health coach and her current business bestie isn’t even on the same side of the country. Even though they’re in different places in their businesses it’s “still really helpful because we’re both navigating a lot of change.
To have that consistency and someone who’s watching your growth and being able to reflect that back to you is so helpful. You see each other in your valleys and your peaks. Seeing someone on a peak when you’re in a valley can be encouraging because you can get there too.” They’ve been besties for two and a half years now and connect most weeks.
Piro’s also been proactive about creating other support groups for herself. She’s reached out to people she knows she has a solid connection with and trusts. “I really am very cautious about who I receive advice from,” she said.
Piro pointed to a common problem for business owners: unsolicited advice, especially from people with very little experience being business owners or being self-employed. “Some of their ideas are just so far-fetched sometimes,” Piro said with a laugh.
Try New Ideas
Your advisory board can be a productive place to try out new ideas. I was recently talking to another business educator about what to name a new course. She knows the course material, she understands massage therapists, but she was struggling with a good course title. We threw words back and forth to each other, narrowing down the words and phrases that both captured the benefit of the course material and would catch the interest of massage therapists.
An advisory board can run the range from very informal (friends who kick ideas and experiences around) to the formal (regularly scheduled supervision groups). You can also receive business support from organizations that exist specifically for that purpose. Many states have small business development centers that have business advisors available for small- and medium-sized business. The Small Business Administration has links to multiple organizations that provide business mentoring and support.
Cities and counties sometimes offer these services as well. Even colleges and universities may have services.
Of course, when you have a professional relationship with an accountant or lawyer, they are superb sources of specific kinds of business advice and support.
The bottom line is that you don’t have to go it alone and most of us probably shouldn’t go it alone. Aren’t two heads (usually) better than one? Take a moment to think about all the times and situations where you could have used a listening ear, some solid feedback, or practical advice about managing the business side of your life.
None of us have all the answers. Who and where can you look for support? There are times you absolutely want to go to a professional—but there are likely also people in your life who would be happy to lend you their ears, their hearts, and their wisdom.
Maybe you’re already benefitting from their support.
So, who’s on your advisory board?
About the Author
Kelly Bowers is the owner of the Healing Arts Business Academy. She is the author of four books: “The Affordable Massage Handbook,” “The Accidental Business Owner,” “Can I Deduct That,” and “Between Doormat and Diva.” She is a regular presenter at national conferences, an instructor in professional training programs, and an NCBTMB Approved CE Provider. She lives in Durham, North Car
