The Program: For Entrepreneurs

Leadership Fitness is an integrated model of leadership development derived from over 20 years of personal leadership experience and over a decade spent professionally coaching and training leaders in a wide variety of organizations. The model centers around four crucial components of leadership success that create long-term impact for leaders and their organizations: Clarity, Confidence, Effectiveness and Vitality. We encourage you to read the book “The Fit Leader’s Companion: A Down-to-Earth Guide for Sustainable Leadership Success” by founder David Chinsky.

The Fit Leader’s Program™ provides aspiring leaders with a unique leadership development experience. Combining tool-based workshops, professional coaching and leadership assessment, the Program introduces thirty-two different tools and processes, each focused on the development of Fit Leaders. Sixteen of these tools are taught in Year 1 of the Program, and the other 16 are taught in Year 2 of the Program. Participants enroll in Year 1 of the Program, and then decide at the end of the first year if they would like to complete Year 2.

Participating leaders attend full-day workshops, one every 90 days, during which they learn new tools in each of the four components of our model.

In addition to the skill-building workshops, each participating leader receives executive coaching between workshops, and benefits from the administration of several leadership assessments.

The Fit Leader’s Program™ is offered in two highly interactive formats: city-based, open-enrollment programs and onsite Programs. Participants enrolling in an open-enrollment program attend all of their quarterly workshops with a cohort of leaders from other organizations. Participants enrolled in an onsite Program attend quarterly workshops with colleagues from their own organization.

The Program leverages four critical elements of the learning process: training, coaching (support), assessment and follow up. While other programs tend to focus on only one or two of these components of learning, the Fit Leader’s Program™ comprises full-day workshops, professional coaching between workshops, multiple leadership assessments and access to a customer-only website providing 24/7 access to a comprehensive set of follow-up resources.

During the Program, we teach leaders how to move from confusion to clarity, from fear to confidence, from frustration to effectiveness and from overwhelm to vitality.

We’ve designed our program as a long-term relationship with our clients so that we “keep skin in the game”. Rather than cramming our content into a two- or three-day program, we spread the learning over the course of a one- or two-year period, and then provide ongoing support along the way to create accountability and sustainability around what we teach in our quarterly workshops.

The coaching component of the Program enables our customers to work through whatever barriers or resistance they encounter on their way to implementing changes they commit to taking during our workshops.

Another key differentiation point of our program is the inclusion of Vitality in our model of Leadership Fitness. We have had participating leaders in our program tell us that while they have participated in numerous leadership development programs during their careers, ours is the first that treats them as a whole person.

Our program provides ongoing support to customers through our professional coaching, our Fit Leader’s Companion™ and our customer-only website that provides 24/7 access to a number of learning tools that reinforce the application of what we teach in our workshops.

The Program has been ‘road tested’ and fine tuned in over a dozen year-long programs, and over 50 individual workshops.

Here are some of the reasons you might consider becoming a Certified Leadership Fitness Coach™.

• We offer a quality product and brand to add to your portfolio
• We offer a product with a track record with big name clients
• We offer an opportunity to develop Fit Leaders around the world
• We offer the opportunity to increase your own leadership fitness
• We provide you with excellent opportunities for generating income
• We provide you with the opportunity to engage with a committed community of people like you that are making a difference

We also want to tell you why we want you involved and what the Institute hopes to gain from your involvement:

• A way to expand the impact of our model
• The collaboration we know is necessary to achieve our target of training 10,000 Fit Leaders by 2020
• An opportunity for us to continue our own commitment to Leadership Fitness – which means more time developing great products and services
• Expanded opportunities for revenue
• Engagement in a committed community of like-minded people who are making a difference

At the end of our year-long program, participating leaders are more effective at:

• Setting a clear direction consistent with the strategic goals of their organization
• Prioritizing opportunities that compete for their attention
• Selling their ideas to colleagues and customers
• Creating a work environment in which high performers thrive
• Managing important change initiatives and transitions
• Increasing the creativity, innovation and adaptability of their teams
• Taming their self-sabotaging “inner voices” so self-doubt doesn’t get in the way of taking action
• Utilizing delegation as a means to accelerate the development of successor candidates
• Developing and delivering impactful presentations
• Choosing foods, exercises and other healthy habits to maintain peak performance
• Adjusting to the communication preferences and conflict management styles of others
• Balancing periods of high engagement with periods of rest and rejuvenation

Over the last three years, we have fine tuned the Fit Leader’s Program™ by delivering it to over 300 leaders in over a dozen separate programs. The program has been enthusiastically received by clients in a number of industry groups, including the following:

• Arizona Heart Institute
• Arizona Medical Board
• Automotive Credit Corporation
• Behr-Hella Thermocontrol, Inc.
• BorgWarner
• Cambridge Information Group
• Carhartt
• C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital
• DANTOM Systems
• Emergency Physicians Medical Group
• Helios Education Foundation
• Illinois Institute of Technology
• Innoventures
• Institute for Social Research
• Michigan Chamber
• Michigan Economic Development Corporation
• Perrigo
• ProQuest
• R.L. Polk & Co.
• Right Management
• Saint Joseph Mercy Oakland
• Spartan Stores
• Spectrum Health
• Thomson Reuters
• TRW Automotive
• University of Michigan Health System

Many customers have called the Program the best training they’ve ever received. Here are just some of the testimonials we’ve received from our customers.

If you’re thinking of applying, consider whether you agree with the following statements:

• I have a demonstrated passion for developing talent
• I have several years of experience facilitating or training – being “at the front of the room”
• I have an entrepreneurial zeal for expanding my reach, my portfolio and my revenue
• I have the capacity and willingness to sell and deliver the Fit Leader’s Program™
• I have experience and credibility working with organizational leaders
• I have a well-developed network of professional contacts
• I am comfortable marketing and selling learning programs
• I have a sense of humor
• I have my own “authentic voice”
• I have the financial ability to pay the annual license fee

The Certification Program will take approximately three months to complete. Everyone who applies will have a telephone interview with David Chinsky to ensure a mutual fit.

Upon selection, Certification candidates will complete an Independent Contractor Services Agreement, pay their year-one license fee ($5,000) and schedule their training sessions.

All candidates will shadow a live Leadership Fitness workshop, and successfully complete a facilitator evaluation process.

The Certification Program will focus on both how to effectively deliver the Program, and on how to market and sell the Program to individuals and organizations. Candidates will learn how to facilitate all Program workshops and how to build a pipeline of prospects.

The Certification Program costs US$5,000 and includes the first-year license fee.

To maintain Certification, Certified Leadership Fitness Coaches will be required to pay an annual licensing fee of US$2,500, beginning on the anniversary date of their certification, as well as enroll at least 20 leaders in the previous year.

I want you to be an active promoter and deliverer of this workshop, and we know that for this to happen the program must make sense not just philosophically but also financially.

Our pricing model is designed to make this an exciting financial opportunity for trainers, to encourage sales (the more you sell the more you’ll earn), to encourage your on-going commitment and engagement and to support the Fit Leader’s Program™ brand position as a quality, high-end training program. Detailed revenue and compensation information will be provided to all applicants.

Your success in this endeavor is partially technical – mastering the Program – and partially entrepreneurial. If you’re unwilling or unable to market and sell this Program, you may not get the success you’re looking for.

We might be able to generate work for you, but you shouldn’t count on it. We will continue to sell the Program ourselves and we may be able to provide opportunities for you to facilitate workshops based on the programs we sell.

But you should work on the assumption that we won’t provide work for you – and it’s up to you to make things happen by selling Programs to your network of professional contacts.

Please use the Application Form (92KB PDF) . We look forward to answering your questions and to determining whether we are a good fit for each other.