Men of The Gym with Nick and Phil
Men of The Gym with Nick and Phil
On this episode of Financially Naked: Stories from The Financial Gym, our host is Shannon McLay, CEO and Founder of The Gym. She is joined by Nick O’Neil, Level 2 Trainer, and Phil Nelson, Level 2 Trainer, to discuss working at The Gym.
Podcast Notes
Phil found out about The Gym, while he was Googling something on finance, and he saw a link to Shannon on the Today Show. He liked that The Gym was all about the client and the experience. When he got an interview, it was exactly what he expected. Shannon makes sure the vibe of The Gym is people first.
Prior to The Gym, Phil had a career in music. After his mom passed away, he worked at a non-profit, because he wanted to give back and do something meaningful. However, in non-profits, at the executive level, you find that it is all about numbers and different agendas and not about people.
Phil wanted people and the human experience first, which is why he joined the team at The Gym.
Nick heard about The Gym from a friend, Georgina, who is a Level 3 Trainer. He had been in sales, business management, and the tech startup world before now. He was laid off and decided to apply.
Nick was concerned that The Gym was about helping wealthy people get wealthier. As soon as he sat down with a trainer, in a client meeting, during his apprenticeship, all of that concern melted away. It all boils down to empathy and helping your client.
When hiring trainers, Shannon looks for compassion, empathy, a desire to help people, and an interest in personal finance. At one point, it was an all-woman team. When Nick and Phil were hired, there was only one trainer that was a man, Jesse.
Shannon wasn’t avoiding hiring men, but many men she had interviewed in the past were interested in becoming financial advisors and selling stocks and bonds and managing portfolios, which is not what she was looking for.
Nick feels totally comfortable going to either the men or women who work at The Gym to talk about (appropriate) emotional subjects.
Since Nick and Phil’s group were hired in, T5, The Gym has received more employment interest from men.
After the T5 group was hired, the women from that group immediately started attracting more clients than the men. The men at The Gym are empathetic, good at listening, problem solvers, and are not here to tell people what to do, but they cannot assume that clients know that. Nick feels like if a new client feels more comfortable with a woman, the mission is still accomplished, because the client is being served.
At first there was such a big workload disparity between the men and women that they changed the warmup call process to ask if a client had a preference of a male or female trainer. If the client didn’t have a preference, they would get a male trainer.
Shannon has interviewed hundreds of people to get the team where it is now, and she has a very high standard for trainers.
Nick and Phil have both had clients who cried during their meetings.
For Phil it is about listening to the client and helping them find a solution. If a client has any level of emotion, either crying or yelling, he wants to help them figure it out. The key is no judgement. He wants clients to feel free to cry and really speak their mind.
For Nick, he understands that money is an emotional thing. It doesn’t matter your situation, it can manifest itself in a number of ways, because some people haven’t faced their financial situations in a long time. He has to be different things for different people.
For Phil, his favorite part of working for The Gym is working with the clients and helping them reach their goals and also working with his coworkers. Phil is vegetarian, and his least favorite part of working at The Gym is if he comes to the office later, the vegetarian options for lunch are gone.
For Nick, it is the community aspect, including the staff and clients. Nick attended a few of the Money Tribe meetups recently and they were great experiences. Seeing the wins that clients are able to get in such a short amount of time is extremely rewarding. His least favorite part is that sometimes it can be tough if he has a client in a tenuous situation, because Nick feels for them.
Clients might start sad, but they won’t end sad. Trainers show them the paths and options and then it is up to them. More often than not, there are happy endings.
For Shannon, her favorite part of the job is there is not just one type of client. All of her client meetings look and feel different.
Resources Mentioned
Money Tribes: financialgym.com/national-money-tribes
Financial Gym Team: financialgym.com/team