The “Big Dog” in Your Dojo
Every single business runs on the same four pillars: Finance, Marketing, Operations, and Human Resources.
Whether you own a global corporation or a one-person dojo, those four areas of business are always there.
in the martial arts business world, two of those pillars tend to hog ALL the attention ; Operations and Marketing. We’ll deal with marketing later but today, let’s take a close up look at Operations.
Operations: The Big Dog
It’s true — operations is an attention hog. It tends to get most of the love in any business. And honestly, that’s fair. Most owners are stressed out, trying to fix everything at once, and often don’t know where else to look. Operations is what keeps the whole place running. It’s the heartbeat of the dojo — the reason students show up, classes happen, and families stick around.
But to really understand operations, we can’t just hyper-focus on it. We need to break it down, look at its moving parts, and learn how to manage each one intentionally within the business.
We’ll begin by breaking it down into four categories : Administrative Operations, Instructional Operations, Operational Flow, and Standard Operating Procedures.
#1 Administrative Operations
This is the behind-the-scenes machine that most people never see, but if it breaks, everyone knows it.
It includes:
Registration and tuition
Membership tracking
Retail and inventory
Instructor scheduling
Communication systems (email lists, texts, updates — all the * Fun * stuff)
If this area of your operations isn’t solid, your entire business will struggle. You can be the best instructor on the planet, but if the admin side is chaos, nobody’s going to feel like your center runs smoothly.
#2 Instructional Operations
Now, let’s look at the mat side — the part everyone does see. It covers:
Your curriculum (what, and how, you teach)
Instructor training
Class structure and flow
Exam process and belt advancement
#3 Operational Flow: The People Mover
Now let’s talk about something most school owners don’t think about until there’s a problem; operational flow.
Operational flow is exactly what it sounds like: how people move through your program. It’s the people mover of your business.
Every person who walks through your door fits into one of two categories:
The support family (the parent or guardian bringing the student)
The student
Each one needs a smooth, thought-out experience from start to finish.
The Support Family Flow
Parents have expectations the minute they walk in. The question is….are YOU meeting them?
Ask yourself:
Do they know where to go and where to sit?
Is the waiting area clean, comfortable, and inviting?
Can they find Wi-Fi?
How’s the temperature?
And yes… how does it smell? (If you know, you know. Martial arts schools have….ummm, smells.)
These details might seem small, but they shape how parents feel about your business. Ultimately, parents are the one’s who decided whether to support your center, or not…so their comfort and opinion is paramount.
The Student Flow
Now let’s talk about the people who actually train.
From the moment a student’s hand touches the front door, there should be a clear, consistent process for them to follow.
In our school, we call it “Door to Floor.”
Every student knows exactly what to do when they arrive. They know where to bow, how to get their attendance card, where their shoes come off, when to clean their feet, where to stand, how to start class etc. They NEVER have to guess.
Our Operational flow is taught in our introductory corse and It never changes.
Why? Consistency creates confidence. It eliminates chaos. It keeps the student focused on what matters - training. People DO NOT like surprises.
They want to know what to expect, and when they become familiar with a process, it makes them like they have some control over the situation and that translates into confidence.
#4 Standard Operating Procedures.
The dreaded SOP. Standard Operating Procedures. The phrase sounds soooo….. corporate. But, don’t be fooled - even a one person operation needs a solid set of SOPs. Creating them is not as difficult as many people think. It’s as easy as saying, “How do I want to handle this?” And, then - writing it down. The best news is that once they are crafted, you don’t ever have to do it again. Having written procedures often falls under the Human Resources banner but we have to understand our procedures first in order to document them. So, you can think of them as being “born” in operations but living in Human Resources. Because they are SO important, we will certainly do a deeper dive of SOPs in the future.
The Bottom Line?
The Operational Element of a martial art center deserves attention. A LOT of attention. BUT….operations alone don’t move a business forward. The other pillars, Finance, Marketing, and HR, are just as important. Keep an eye out for a future article detailing those as well.
