E31 | Becoming An Intrapreneur

On Episode 31 of the P.T. Entrepreneur Podcast I talk about how to become a Intrapreneur. Yes, an intrapreneur or an entrepreneur within another company.

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Episode Transcription:

Hey guys, Doc Danny here with The PT Entrepreneur Podcast and today, instead of talking about being an entrepreneur, we're going to talk about how you can become an intrapreneur. And I know that it's confusing, and those are kind of hard to say. And this is the PT Entrepreneur Podcast. But intrapreneurship is very viable for tons of people that work for other companies.

So. Let's talk about what an entrepreneur is first, and then we'll get into some options of what you might be able to look at within your practice, to where you can start setting up your own little thing within that company. So, an intrapreneur is somebody that develops a kind of niche within another company, right?

So, this could be. Let's take the example of some strength and conditioning work. So let's say you work for a physical therapy practice, and you decide, you know, I like working for them. I love doing some strength conditioning stuff. Well, maybe I can do some strength conditioning work in conjunction with this company under the

banner of whatever company that is, and it is another kind of portion of the company and another potential revenue stream for that company. But you are in charge of it, right? So that's an intrapreneur would be somebody that does something like that. So who should do this? Because I got a question, and this is all based on an issue that was emailed to me.

And it was basically to the extent that this person didn't want to start their practice. They kind of had a young family and felt like they, it just, the timing wasn't right. And you know, they felt like it was too risky, but they were interested in trying to do still something different than just the day to day patient work.

And the idea of an entrepreneur was something that I sent back so. Entrepreneurship is my mind is a very viable option in particular. Not all physical therapists are. Once you own a business, not all physical therapists want to take on the risk of starting a business. Most physical therapists are very risk-averse.

The population as a whole is, is kind of like beneficial, friendly people. They like to see it. Change and be, you know, be able to help people achieve goals and, but, the w we're not high-risk risky people, right? As, as a whole, if you see, if you're going to a PT conference, it's pretty apparent that we're all pretty much just kind of friendly people, right?

And relatively risk-averse. So an intrapreneur is somebody that's able to then set up their kind of little sub-niche within their practice, that they're working for. And be able to increase the amount of revenue that they are going to be able to generate and also salary that they can ask for in return.

So this is where it gets kind of interesting. And in particular, being able to. Do something that you enjoy but get paid more for. It is a beautiful little combination. Right? So let me give you a couple of examples of how you may be able to go about kind of setting this up and, and also maintaining your current position.

Raise. Maybe you like your benefits, and you like your job a whole lot. You love your boss, you like who you work for, and perhaps you don't want to go and do your own thing. That's fine. But you could still. Create more revenue for yourself in the process by helping the company, and it's a win-win. So one example of this would be programming.

So programming is something that I see a decent amount in terms of. PTs is being able to do this and generating some, some revenue from, and already seen this at other practices around the country. A couple of the PTs that I work within that I coach already do programming for four people, and they have their methods, but you could do something very similar in a.

A practice that you work for. So programming is, you know, writing up a workout plan that somebody should follow for that month or, you know, ongoing however long that the agreement would be with you and the person you're programming for. But many people do not have any idea of what to do to stay healthy.

And when they come in to see us. In most cases, they are in pain. They're having to avoid many things because they're, aggravated the, their shoulder hurts, their back hurts or whatever. They're unable to do physical activities and are limited. Now. Once that they're pain-free and they're moving better, they're healthier, whatever the goal is that you get them to, at that point.

They're sort of in this weird gray area, so they're kind of, they're there. They're probably a bit too advanced for physical therapy at this point, apparently ready for discharge. Still, they're not quite to where they would need to be for maybe, let's say, small group class or perhaps even a personal trainer, unless they were good at kind of the gray area between PTN and personal training.

And we're able to be very conservative early on and then continue that process going forward. But as a physical therapist with a background in training conditioning, my entire practice is. Leveraged off of this gray area, this area where people tend to kind of drop off and have a lot of re aggravations that occur because they try to get back to activities they have been avoiding, but maybe aren't a hundred percent back to whatever level they need to be at four.

Competing in CrossFit or running or tennis or whatever it is. And, and we, we spend a lot of time with people building their capacity back up. And it, in many cases, looks very much like training, much more like training than physical therapy, which there in many ways the same things. They're just progressions and regressions of each other.

So if you're working at a clinic, and let's say you have a group of people that you've worked with and they've already expressed interest. And maybe ask you, Hey, what kind of things should I be doing at the gym? And this is a really, really common for people to get this question. Hey, what types of things should I be doing at the gym?

Well, you can give them some general guidelines. You know, maybe you can direct them towards a simple program or something like that. Or you can take this as an opportunity to see the potential for an option for a cash-based service that is recurring revenue. And there's a couple of ways to do it. You can do, you can do 100% individualized custom program.

So that means you sit down, and you know what that person wants to do, what their athletic goals are, what their limitations are, and you develop a plan for that month. Let's say it's just due for four weeks of what they should be doing at the gym. Now you can charge people for this and a decent amount of money at that.

You know, there's, the, the people that I work within our practice, it's anywhere between 120 upwards of $250 a month for individualized programming. Now, this also has to do with some. Potential online kind of coaching, responding to questions about things. It depends who you're working with, but, it's, it's, it's something that you can manage a decent amount of people at once if you're doing this kind of individualized approach.

A couple of groups that do this well that is not physical therapists, but, has made a pretty. Good business for themselves. This is a group like OPEX out in Arizona and a group here in Atlanta called training think tank, and they're a group of brilliant coaches that do online programming, digital programming, and a, I see this as a potential.

The area that physical therapists, especially ones that are very kind of strength conditioning bias, could fit into really well and become an entrepreneur within your own company. So let's say you work for a practice that likes, and you know, you want to continue to work there. Well, you could approach your clinic owner and say, Hey, I've gotten a lot of people that have asked me about What they should do in the gym. And I think there's an opportunity for us to create a, whatever the name of your practice is, workout plan that we can then, you know, house on our website and they can, they can go there and see what their workout should be for the day, and we can charge them for it. And it can be individualized.

Let's say you want to do custom programming just one-on-one. Then great. That's one way to do. It's a higher cost. That may be somebody that's more athletic or somebody only, you know, has more goals of high-level training. Then you could also potentially have a lower level, more simplified training program.

That's more about just. General kind of health and fitness, and it has a lot of mobility work in it. Just some essential strength work and getting some conditioning in there. And this could be something that you could do regularly, and it'd be a subscription. So this could be a shallow price point compared to the individual training.

Anywhere between, I don't know, a ten and a maybe 30 or $40 a month, and this is something that's a sneaky effective. All you have to do is look at the business model of MobilityWOD, the group that I teach for. It's the Netflix model, right? It's $10 a month for, you know, for MobilityWOD, to, for you to have access to that.

It's such a small amount. You probably don't even. Realize it, that it's on your credit card. Right. And it's perhaps more of a hassle to go through to cancel it than it is what it's worth for the ten bucks a month. So people will stay there forever, just like Netflix and, it's incredible, right? I mean, there's excellent content, aren't you?

Utilize it. It is helpful. But, It doesn't sound like much, right? So ten bucks a month doesn't sound like a whole lot, but if you take that $10 a month times 10,000 people, which the internet is hugely scalable, you know, that's $100,000 a month in revenue that you're generating $100,000.

That's not a made-up number. That's a legit number. And I know it's, it's, there are more than 10,000 people that are members of MobilityWOD pro. So to put that in perspective, that. The website is doing well. And if you can take lessons from a group like that, that's much, much more well known than both you and I are.

And you can start to reverse engineer that and say, Hey, how could I potentially do something similar to this? That I could then have people that I work with be a part of. Then all of a sudden, now you have this opportunity to, you know, create another revenue stream within the business, and you know, this is something that like, let's say 20 bucks a month.

And you get 500 people on it. Now all of a sudden you're generating $10,000 a month in revenue from a program that multiple people can follow at once, and you can set up regularly and then you can say, Hey, I would like to take point on this, but I want X percent of whatever we make. We'll go over under the banner of.

This is your company. I like working here. I think it's the way I can add value to you guys. I can get better outcomes for the people that we work with, and I can generate more revenue for myself by taking this side project on that. Hey, I like to do anyway. I want to program stuff. I'm into this stuff.

I geek out on the training condition. So that's one example of something you could do. The other thing you could do is you could look at, Hey, how can I. Potentially add another revenue stream by doing some strength-based kind of niche work. So let's say you take small groups and you start to do small group training programs or little group training, you know, in-person groups.

Let's say it's a triathlon group. So maybe there's this local triathlon group that's, you know, big in your area and you, you like triathlons, you train triathlon. So you work with all these people anyway, and you decide, Hey, I want to develop a small group. And I want to do weekly kind of in-person training and potentially have a program involved with it as well.

So you mean you manage this group, you lead this group, you set up their training. You train them on, whether it be strength days or you know, you lead some conditioning stuff or whatever it is, but you get the group together. You drive it, and you charge per person to be associated with this group in this training plan leading up to whatever the event is.

Or this could be a run if you're a runner. And you know, there's a marathon coming up, and you want to start a marathon group with the company that you teach for. Now all of a sudden, X PT clinic can have this training group led by you. This is an additional cost service that you can charge, and you keep a percentage of the revenue from that.

Not only that, the cool part about this is you. Set yourself apart as the subject matter expert for this specific niche. It's a perfect way for you to see more of the people that you like, you know, work with more of those people and, and, and be able to be a part of that community that you're training with, to begin with.

Such groups like runners, triathletes, youth athletes are excellent. You know you may enjoy working with youth athletes, and maybe you are a strength coach. Are you a strength coach at a high school or college or whatever it might be, and you have experience working with groups of athletes. Now all of a sudden, you can say who I played college soccer.

I want to work with this youth college or these youth soccer players and help them avoid it. You know, ACL surgeries, but also get them more durable and, you know, more flexible, more conditioned. I, you can set all this stuff up within these small group settings, and now all of a sudden, you have this kind of niche group that you're training as a cash service under the banner of a company that you already worked for.

So it's a way that you can become an entrepreneur by doing small groups. So all those groups would work well, including something maybe even like golfers where you know you have some sort of golf training, conditioning work. And man, those guys need a lot of help. Cause I see a lot of those guys and they're just.

They're just old, tight men in most cases that don't move very well and, together, you know, you could train them as a group and be efficient with your time. Not only that small group is impressive because let's take, for example, our, our practice. So we charge about a two, a $200 for a visit, so $200 for a visit.

Or if I can get. Eight people together, you know, and I'll say they're paying 40 bucks each for the small group session. Now all of a sudden, I'm making $240 an hour. I'm sorry, $320 an hour instead of 200 and that's 100% cash that you don't have to have this conversation of, Oh, well, physical therapy, this and that.

No, it's not. It's straining to condition. I just happened to be a physical therapist, right. So. The last thing I think is also a viable option is nutrition consulting, right? So a customized nutrition consulting can be an area that many of us are interested in. You know, we're very interested in nutrition.

It helps our outcomes. You know, if people eat like shit, they're not going to heal as fast. If people eat well and they're hydrated, and they're maybe taking the right supplementation, they treat a lot better, they feel a lot better. I sleep better. They look better, which is what most people care about more than anything.

And you can do all this if you have the skillset, the interest, and the knowledge. In nutrition consulting, under the umbrella of the company that you already worked for. So you could say, Hey, you know, whoever your boss is, I'm interested in nutrition. I get a lot of patients that ask me about diet based questions and especially when they're at the end of their treatment plan.

And I just don't have the time in their visits to be able to, talk to them about what they should be eating or, look at how many—carbohydrates, proteins, fats they might need or whatever it is based on their goals. I would love to see if we can set up some sort of matching cash visit option where they could come in, and we could see them for something that's not necessarily physical therapy that they see value in.

And I would like to take the point on setting that up and establish this program. And. I would like to get X percent of whatever money we generate from doing this. And I think that's if somebody came to me as a business owner and said that, I would be exceptional, I'd be impressed, number one, that they thought that through.

But also. I would love the fact that they wanted to add to our company, but also understood that their value was more than somebody that just wants to be fed patients all day. That there's not as much, there's not as much value for that person because they're easily replaceable compared to somebody that is bringing in business, creating revenue, and adding.

To the company. So they're making the pie bigger for everybody, not just asking for a piece of the cake. And that's very rare for employees to have that sort of mindset going forward. And especially if it's a company that you like working with that's creative and is willing to let you do some things on your own, man, that could be an enjoyable opportunity for you to stay with that company.

Have some security in terms of, you know, benefits and all the other things we think of as security with working for a company, but also be able to. Do what you enjoy in some capacity, and potentially increase your revenue. So last thing with that nutrition side of things would be likely even supplemented sales.

So you may have supplements that you could carry it wholesale price, resale, then resell at a retail price, and make a profit on that. And then again, that's just more revenue for this kind of side intrapreneur option or venture that you take on. But overall, adding a lot of value to. That practice. So if you're listening to this and you're thinking to yourself, man, I just don't want to be an entrepreneur.

It sounds risky. This guy is crazy. He opened a practice in a CrossFit gym with no windows after having a second kid and left a stable job, and plenty of people thought that was crazy. And if you're listening to this and you think that is crazy, that's fine. It's not for everybody. And the risk is maybe we're just too dumb to realize that there's a lot of risks associated with it, but you can still do a lot of things that you would enjoy it.

And that's what this comes down to, right? It's, it's, it's not about money. It's not about notoriety or anything like that. It's about, do you enjoy what you do every single day? And if you don't, you need to figure out something else to do because. When you're 75 years old, sitting in a rocking chair, talking about, Oh, I wish I would've done this and that.

It's too fucking late. By that point, you're not going to be able to tell anybody what you wish you would have done, and this done and not be, feel a ton of regret for not having tried so. If you're sitting here thinking, you know, okay, well, well, how can I potentially enjoy what I do more and create more, you know, revenue where I can then leverage that into more financial freedom for me, my family?

Well, maybe you need to look at how can I become an entrepreneur within this company? And if that's a company that has no interest whatsoever in you being able to come and entrepreneur within. Then that's fine. You run with it on your own. It's going to be more work. You know, you're going to have to build up the kind of a viable number of people to make it work on your own, but you're going to be able to, in many ways, be much, more successful longterm.

If you can establish that, that that, that new business yourself, but if you don't want to leave, I get it. Intrapreneurship is excellent as long as you're in a company that values your creativity. If you're not, he might want to look for a different company. So guys, as always, thank you so much for listening.

I appreciate the question. This was a question that. You know, got my mind running a little bit and I thought, Hey, this could be a perfect option for a lot of people, and I hope you liked this one. I believe that this is valuable for, for many of you, if you're not interested in taking that step to become your own, your boss, which sometimes can be a good thing and a bad thing, but a gas.

Thanks so much for listening. Any questions you got? Shoot them my way. I love to hear them. It's Danny had athlete's potential.com and if you like what you hear. Please head over to iTunes, leave me a review, and a little five-star ranking would be excellent. Hopefully, it's not one, but five stars would be great.

Do you want more cash, PT, biz help? If so, get a copy of my book, Fuck Insurance. It's your playbook—so successful performance, PT practice, and never having to deal with insurance again. You can get a free copy at Finsurancebook.com. Inside this book, you'll learn the direct techniques that we've used to become one of the fastest 100% cash PT practices in the country.

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