How to Start a Stress Management Training Business

Part 1 - How to start a Stress Management Training business - Background

Stress management training can increase a business’ profitability by giving employees the tools they need to manage difficult emotions or particularly taxing situations. Hiring a counselor who can impart the wisdom employees need to keep their cool and maintain their quality can be a huge boost to their bottom line and it can even increase employee loyalty.

Our guide is in 3 parts:

• Part 1 - How to start a Stress Management Training business - Background
• Part 2 - Our planner tool to see if this idea is the right fit for you
• Part 3 - Action plan to get started

What are the costs involved in opening a stress management training business?

Overhead costs may be somewhat low to start, especially if you already have the advanced education. You don’t necessarily need an official office space, or formal equipment. Most of your clients should be able to provide the audio/visual devices you need to illustrate your points.

What are the ongoing expenses for a stress management training business?

Ongoing expenses can be minimal, especially if you do the majority of your training as one-on-one or in intimate settings. Depending on the nature of the business, you may have the following expenses:

• Computer

• Presentation software

• Handouts/booklets for employees

• Ongoing stress-management education for you and employees

• Employee salaries

• Refreshments (tea, coffee, etc.)

• Website maintenance

Who is the target market?

Small, tight-knit companies typically won’t need these services. Stress management training is normally reserved for large companies with a variety of departments who may or may not all get along.

How does a stress management training business make money?

Owners make money by charging a set fee for their services to clients. This fee should cover all materials and time spent to provide training.

How much can you charge customers?

Stress management counselors can charge a lot for their services, and major corporations will not necessarily cringe at the fees — especially if they think they’re getting more worker productivity in return. It’s not unreasonable for established companies to charge up to $2,000 a day to counsel a group of around 20 people.

How much profit can a stress management training business make?

There are plenty of ways that a training business can keep their overhead down to increase their profit. Potentially, you’re looking at 80 to 90% pure profit, depending on the resources you use. If you work five days a week at $2,000 a day, then you can conceivably make around $8,000 a week.

How can you make your business more profitable?

Counselors who understand employee behavior can branch out into time-management counseling as well (which will follow a similar format as stress management training.) There are also positive psychology workshops you can offer to increase worker outlook on their jobs and their lives.

Day-to-Day and Growth

What happens during a typical day at a stress management training business?

Owners may need to complete the following tasks on any given day.

• Market to clients who need your services

• Conduct training seminars to employees

• Prepare contracts for clients

• Hire employees to assist with conducting seminars

• Prepare reports about employee stress levels

• Prepare employee hand-outs or instructional booklets about stress management

• Provide detailed recommendations to clients to ensure successes

What are some skills and experiences that will help you build a successful stress management training business?

Those giving the training need to inspire while providing concrete advice about stress. An owner needs to be detail-oriented to understand the needs of each business, and they’ll also need a certain amount of intuition when handling large groups of employees who likely just want to go back to their regularly scheduled working day.

An owner will also need to have some type of sales skills in order to succeed, as new clients may be initially hesitant to compromise their budget on this type of non-essential service.

What is the growth potential for a stress management training business?

Growth will be dependent upon the need for these services in any given area. However, companies that increase their client base may be able to expand to other parts of the state or even country. As a stress management training company grows, owners will need to hire a team while continuing to ensure quality in the seminars and lessons the company provides.

What are some insider tips for jump starting a stress management training business?

Your business will be dependent on how well you can help other businesses, but this can be difficult to do. It’s not easy to change the mindset of employees after just one day (even if it’s an incredibly good seminar).

Thankfully, the numbers are on your side. More than half of employees suffer from moderate to severe stress, and 66% of employees have a difficult time concentrating when they feel stressed. The total impact on productivity costs hundreds of thousand and potentially millions of dollars to companies who need alert and clearheaded employees to do their jobs.

How and when to build a team

It may be difficult to find employees who can do this type of job well, as it’s a very specialized set of skills. While it may seem as easy as just reading from a PowerPoint presentation, counselors must do far more than that. They will need to adapt to a variety of office settings.

For example, a tech company will have very different stressors than a retail company. Owners of a stress management training company may want to start off alone, and then add employees as the client base grows. This also gives an owner the chance to further narrow down exactly what they need from an employee for success.

Part 2 - Is a Stress Management Training business the right fit for you?

Part 3 - Action plan to launch your Stress Management Training business in 90 days