The Shintaro Higashi Show - Adult White Belts

Episode Date: December 5, 2022

Adult white belts often are the butt of the joke in certain Judo and BJJ circles, but they form the foundation of the sports. How important are adult white belts for your Judo and BJJ gym? How important are they for the sports in general? In this episode, Shintaro and Peter discuss the importance of the adult white belts and the role they play in the grappling communities. Please support us on Patreon if you can: https://www.patreon.com/shintaro_higashi_show. Any amount helps!

Hello everyone, welcome back to the Shintaro Higashi show with Peter Yu. Today we're going to talk about adult white belts doing judo in the dojo. That's right. So this was one of the suggestions from our patrons, Phil. He said, why are adult white belts important to judo? Why are there a few of them in america so important and what to do if you're one of them in a dojo that is mostly for children which i see a lot i think the last question is uh very relevant to a lot of people in america yeah yes okay so why are they why are they important yeah oh it's the most important thing, right? So you need to really measure three metrics. And then the goals for three things for the dojo people is you want to increase the number of white belts, increase the number of black belts, and increase the number of judo teachers. Those are the three key factors to growth of judo in the community across the United States. Right.

You want more white belts, more black belts, more judo teachers. Okay. And if you just think of it that way, it makes sense. If your goal is to have more white belts in the room, right, you're going to massage your sales pipeline, you're going to do the right thing, call everybody, do all the things that I say to do but I don't do by myself, right? I sometimes neglect this. But, you know, when I see the dojo's numbers dwindle a little bit, right, because retention is tough, you know, in judo because of injury rates and especially if you're in a place like new york everyone's transitory

people move for their jobs all the time so you kind of always have to be feeding the machine yeah okay so it's all the responsibility of the instructor okay so that's the first goal that you want to right increase number of white belts and then once you have that you want to increase the number of black belts in the room yeah which means each one of those steps along the way has to be carefully thought of and executed properly to get to those people to the goal line right and once you have enough black belts you want to start pumping out teachers people who can teach the stuff right maybe they love it maybe they want to compete who knows whatever their goals are

yes yeah whatever right yeah but you want to be able to have them teach classes for you also just so you can spread their own ideas about judo. Not in this weird pyramid scheme way of like I taught this guy judo. He's going to teach it like me and he's going to come back to me. Not like that. Right. You know what I mean? But you want to teach them in a way where they design their own and have their own style.

And then they love it and they want to teach it. And then you can give them a platform. If they want to start their own school, you got to give them the blessing for that you know i mean just don't do it too close to me yeah yeah right compete so that's yeah so that's sort of the method so absolutely having good white belts in the room very very very important it's a foundation it kind of starts everything off everything is based on the white belts yeah yes so if you're looking around the dojo and there's not a lot of adult white belts in the room there's a couple of issues right number one there's a retention issue and then number one there's a lead gen issue right and sales issue

yeah so are their white belts actually signing up and coming in and what is their retention look like those are the two major things right. That's on responsibility of the teacher, the dojo owner. This is the issue and problem with teaching judo and being good at martial arts. You spend your whole life doing martial arts. You're amazing at it. You have no business experience

and now you open a business and you love doing judo, teaching judo. Majority of the time, you're doing something you've never done, which is sales or managing a business and you suck at it. And now you hate it. And then now, oh, I can't make money.

I got to keep my day job. You're working a nine-to-five and then going to the dojo. It's a vicious cycle, yeah. You're just miserable the whole time, right? So it's like why would anyone want to be in that environment? Yeah. Okay? Yeah, it's tough. It's want to be in that environment yeah okay yeah it's tough it's very very tough and i see the the issues with this you know yeah you kind of touched

on i mean it's a good segue to the next the second question why are there so few of few auto white belts in america i don't know how it is and well actually let's kind of do some comparative studies you you spent some time in japan actually i i trained in japan over the summer at a like a uh the province sponsored martial art gym actually i didn't see a lot of although white belts i don't think judo is like that right it's like a almost like collegiate wrestling here there are not that many adult wrestler beginner wrestlers in america because it you do it as a kid and they kind of like that in japan too yes yeah yeah and then but in contrast in america there's a few adult white belts for a different reason i think yeah i mean because it's a commercial business right it's a business the service provided.

I want to learn this, therefore I'm going to take lessons. You know what I mean? I want to learn gymnastics as an adult. I could sign up for gymnastic classes. I want to go to SoulCycle. I could sign up for those classes. I want to learn Judo. You sign up for Judo classes. It's a commercially driven, capitalistic thing. It's a service provided, therefore

who's running these businesses, who's running these schools, are they businessmen or are they people who are judo enthusiasts who have no business experience whatsoever? You know? So that's kind of – And they probably learned – yeah, go ahead. But it's kind of a CATS 22 situation. Like you have to be good at judo enough experience.

You have to put enough time into judo to become a judo teacher. But that means that time is not spent on learning the business side of things i mean you you someone like you like you went you even went to nba you got your nba to really learn the art of business um but yeah not uh not a lot of judo teachers well you think they can do it but they don't or it's more like oh they just can't do it they don't have enough time i think the issue is this most of the time you're nine to fiver you have your career yeah you're doing judo since you were a kid you do judo as an adult you've been doing judo for 20 years and you have a day job and you're like you know what

i love this thing i'm going to teach judo now i'm going to teach at the local club i'm going to start my own business and then they jump into into that. What's the likelihood that that person's capable of running a successful business? It's tough. You have to do the education. There's a lot of work behind it. And then when you think the actual day-to-day operation thing is going to be, it's not. It's making those phone calls, getting in and and follow ups and doing all this stuff and doing Google ads. And there's so many different factors that are completely unrelated to judo. You end up just actually not loving it. You know what I mean?

So that makes it really tough. Teaching judo is a very small part. Very, very small. But this is the thing. It doesn't have to be like that. If I was to think about really scaling my dojo, just fucking blowing it out of the water. Yeah. And I've thought of this many times.

And then when you're looking at any sort of franchising business, it's the lowest capable employee is sort of the main thing. Hiring great judo guys who know judo very, very well, who's charismatic, those people already have jobs. Those who are very, very high achievers successful look at you right there's no amount of money that i could pay you to teach at my club like not to make a margin for me and then have a good bottom line all right because for me to convince you with a dollar amount to do this it would have to exceed you know opportunity cost of your PhD and your future income and your wife will never allow it. There's a price tag

to someone who's as smart as you, as charismatic as you, who's as good as judo as you. I'll do it for you. I'll work for you. Nah, stop. It's like the lowest level skill set to be able to just think about every franchise business ever, right? Yeah.

Like McDonald's? Yeah, McDonald's. Anybody could do that job, right? Yeah. So how can you structure a dojo like this to scale? You know what I mean? You can't hire the best teachers, the best whatever it is. Okay.

So you can even have a green belt, literally teach judo. Okay. Right. No randori. Beginner comes in. You teach them some sales stuff. Right. These are the techniques that you do and no randori whatsoever.

It's a pipeline. Like very scalable. Yeah. Very scalable. So it can be done this way. Right. And every dojo should have a basics dedicated beginner class to pump white belts into and with no Rondori to sort of retain them in that system and keep them at least intrigued or interested for at least three to six months. They could develop and identify like this is what I do.

I'm a judo person. I have a yellow belt now. I'm very, very good at this. This is my thing. I love it. I'm interested in it. I know about the history, the techniques. Have I ever done Rondori?

No. That's a good thing because that guy is not going to get injured. Retention is going to be high. And then you have a critical mass where the community feeds on itself. Oh, I love going to see Johnny or Jessica is really cute in the gym. I'm going to go to the dojo and hang out with those guys. And there's 15 of them and we all get dinner together. And you develop sort of a white belt community.

Right, right. It's very difficult to do that if you're one white belt and then, you know, four black belts. Yeah. And then the black belts are kind of like doing the hierarchy thing, senpai, kohai thing.

And it's like American culture doesn't really cater to that. Yeah. In Japan, everything is hierarchical with the senpai, kohai mentality. So that, you know, even in social settings it's fine yeah so say if i was speaking to an average commoner somebody in japan yeah if they're

older than me i have to speak formally yeah yeah it's normal right oh what how old are you i'm 37 years old oh i'm 38 i'm a senpai you have to talk formally to me and i get to talk to you in informal manner this is the right agreement socially so when you're in the dojo and you start and then you're beneath somebody in terms of rank it's normal to have this sort of right and that culture bled into the american society and it's totally rejected totally weird yeah coming in as a beginner to learn something you're bound to the people who are above you right oh you know and that stuff doesn't really fare well right you know what i mean but if you have a 15 white belts who are equals and you kind of mitigate that hierarchical thing that just kind of bled from old judo now you have a community of people who are all learners

and little by little they're gonna like it no one's gonna get hurt and they're gonna it's gonna grow on itself right so there are two aspects it's like the people in the dojo already who are in the dojo already should yes especially in america shouldn't try to subscribe to this japanese culture that's very culture specific pick and choose pick and choose and it helps you know me who know both countries very well yeah right but if you've never been to japan and you assume this is what happens in japan and you're running a traditional martial arts school it doesn't look or fare very well either yeah right it's like in japan we do this it's like you you're not like japan you never even been to japan what are you talking about you know what i mean it's just weird right so and you need that critical mass

yeah like a kind of a cohort that kind of that grows up together yes so the tip to the guy who reached out to us right and yes i believe it is the responsibility of the dojo owner and the teacher yeah to feed this machine if you want to learn judo and you go in there you don't see a lot of people peers you have to go reach out to your friends hey man come do judo with me bro yeah you went to high school you have high school friends yeah you went to college your friends from college you have colleagues and co-workers and people you have happy hour with right instead of like having drinks after work and get loaded it's like bro come to judo with me today bro all right come to judo with me i used to do that with ballet yo come do ballet with me right how many times was it yo just do about come come with me

and i went i went right and were there not a lot of hot chicks there? Yeah. Right? That's right. I had a lot of fun. I brought like 10 dudes. I brought like 10 dudes to do basic ballet. Like, whoa, whoa, whoa, come, come, come. I got these hot friends. Right?

I did that. Right? So it's like now, all of a sudden, you know, they don't have a problem with leads. Everyone wants to do ballet. Right. Juno has that problem where it's not as popular it's very niche yeah what's let's go over your sales pitch again you've talked we talked about this again but what like say phil like the uh patron who asked this question the

a guy like phil what what's his sales pitch? Because you are in a different position because you're running a dojo so your sales pitch might be different. But how about for an average adult white belt? How do you sell it to your friends? Pitching it to their friends? Dude, you're getting fat. Come work out with me, bro. Right? Oh, I don't like

the gym. I hate the gym. It's like, dude, come do judo with me. It's fun. You learn how to slam people. There's not a lot of people there.'s just like me and you we'll just bullshit we'll like take each other down we'll choke each other show you some stuff yeah you know i don't know that much yet right but there's guys who know yeah and they're in the room and they're kind of cool you know and yo dude it's like a private lesson it's amazing right right and then you could frame like the not a lot of white belts, not a lot of students on the mat thing. Mostly kids do it.

You could frame that in a different way when you're talking about it as well. Don't make excuses like, oh, there's not too many people because this and that. Sell it as a positive. Right. Dude, you get to work out with me, right? One-to-one. There's not a small class sizes. That's fine.

That's good. That's a different pitch. You know? It's a boutique shop now it's a yeah and you get these guys all the time it's like oh the you know judo's not that popular or whatever it is and oh it's like what's wrong with judo then right right here's a pitch i noticed that there's not a lot of adult white belts in here why is that yeah it's because adults are brittle kids do it because they're tough, they're limber,

their joints are like rubber. You get an average out-of-shape adult, they're going to tear the ACL. That's why you don't see a lot in here. It takes a very special person to be here. And actually, it's very good for you because small class sizes. Yes, you are very special.

Get your friends to come. We'll all work out. It'll be a party. You know, I've never actually talked you know try to sell it that way i kind of given up like i'm just like okay i'll i'll i do say that i do say that hey if you come i'll work out with you you know we'll have fun but i never expect anything like if they do show up it's like wow you actually showed up you're my best friend yeah it's so it's so funny because it's like i'm like oh yeah get your friends to come and when whoever it is that's a high belt bring their friends i'm like all right you deal with them you teach your friend right so they get stuck with a beginner or a co- yeah so that's so that's what okay so um turn turn some things

that can be negative as positive like okay if there are a lot of not as many adults because there's more like a you know more boutique and you're it's more tailored to you and one that yeah and you know let me explain some of the stuff like i've taken so many fitness classes right right market research i've done like yeah jazzercise music boxing taibo thing zumba like you name it i've done it just to learn yeah why are these fitness programs so successful yeah how are there equinox classes of 47 people in it hour after hour after hour after hour after hour? Yeah.

How many people are in these classes getting pumped out through the day? How many people walked in here to take a class today? Right? Right. 670 people took a class today in this gym? What the hell is going on here? Yeah. Yeah.

I had 30 people last night for judo. It's like, you know, it sounds a lot if's going on here yeah yeah i had 30 people last night for judo it's like you know it sounds a lot if you're doing judo you got 30 people in the room but like that's not shouldn't be the gold standard you should what's the issue right what's the biggest issue that i see when people teaching it and you know i do it myself but i'm an exception i'm an exception to the rule right Right? And then I see my people sort of doing it too. Yeah. And they are not the exception to the rule. And it's human nature to do this kind of a thing where you get in front of a class and you start doing the dissertation.

Right? You're just talking and then show them how much you know. And I'm guilty of this all the time. And you're running a class like it's a seminar. Every class that you go in is flavor of the day. It's a seminar. Let me teach you what I think is the best and just kind of like show you this whole system,

and the majority of it is useless to most people. Right. Right? And that's the issue. That's a big problem, you know, because there's no movement and there's no continuity, okay? When you go into a business, you should expect what the service is going to be.

And the service has to be the same and consistent every time. You go to Starbucks, you know exactly what they're going to say. Oh, hey, what's going on? Good morning. What can I get for you today? Right? Oh, would you like something to eat with that shit? You know?

Oh, you just want a fucking coffee? Great. Okay, whatever. It's your coffee. Same exact coffee every single time. You go there two or three times. Hey, Shantaro, they know my name. Medium black coffee or grande black coffee?

Yeah. Going to eat something today? No, bitch. Okay, great. Here's your coffee. Have a great day, right? Yeah. It's the same every time.

It's consistent. It's expected every single time. You know, that's such a great point because, I i mean there's a reason why i i mean i thought it makes me sad to say but that's why i started going to the bjj school because with the judo school i have no idea what i'm gonna get yeah i don't know what i'm gonna get that day because yeah there's not that many people so sometimes i get good training sometimes i don't get good training and then you know well if I go to a good school, it's like, can I guarantee that I'll get good training?

And it's a little bit more systemized because there's more people in it and more money in it. So people are like, all right, how do we scale this thing? Okay, do this. Warm up, 10 minutes. Teach two techniques, two stand-up, two ground. And then you're going to roll five rounds of three-minute roll or whatever it is. Right. One hour goes by, hour goes by clean tight every single time what technique are we

gonna learn today this week it's kimura next week is triangle at least it's follows a pattern yeah you know what i mean yeah and then i always say like if you're gonna teach you have to minimize the teaching time uh-huh three minutes at best and i don't follow this rule myself because I am an exception to the exception. You're such an exceptional guy. Yeah, because I am a genius. I should be heard. Yeah. And not all judo teachers are like that.

You know, you have a different – This is the thing. Can I hire somebody like me to work for – at a dojo, my dojo, with close to minimum wage? No. No, of course not. Yeah. You just can't. And if they're capable of drawing and keeping and having and sustaining a 300-person following in the dojo, they're going to do their own thing. Why would they need you?

Right? So there's a little bit of a discrepancy there. Right. You know what I mean? But anyway, we're kind of digressing. The idea is like a white belt student who's in the dojo who wants to learn judo. Yeah. Got to bring their friends in, right?

Hey, come work out with me. Hey, do this with me. Hey, train with me. And every now and then, you'll find that one person who's sort of a connector, who's connected in the community. Yeah. And they'll bring a bunch of people, right? 10% of the people are like that. And then those are the people that you want.

And you have to keep them by providing consistency at the consistent service. And they cannot do Rondori because Rondori is the worst thing for a beginner because they learn it. They try it. It doesn't work. They get slammed. They get hurt. Done. Right. It sucks. learn it, they try it, it doesn't work, they get slammed, they get hurt, done.

I hate it. It sucks. When do you let them do Randori? I break all my rules that I'm talking about right now. I don't follow most of it. But I'm an exception. Like I said, I'm an exception. Right.

You have a better eye. You have a better eye on these things anyway. A little bit, yeah. And I think you can get away with it. There's some people who can get away with it. You know, like, there's some people who can get away with it. If you can speak and you're actually interesting.

Yeah. Right? And you can do a five minute, seven minute, your instruction can bleed. Yeah. And then people can go off and do their own thing.

And then you can bring it in and then make it interesting for everybody by seeking out the common denominator. Right? In mistakes. Right. For instance. Right? Everybody go and train here. and then make it interesting for everybody by seeking out the common denominator, right? In mistakes, for instance, right? Everybody go and train here.

Go ahead, do this thing that I did. I just, you know, talk for 10 minutes, but do your best. I'm scoping the entire room and I see like one consistent thing that everyone is doing wrong. Not everybody, like 40% of the people, mostly beginners. Okay, beginners, you got to work on this.. Beginners. You got to work on this. Intermediates.

You got to work on that. And then I'll show something completely different to build on it that the black belts get benefit from. Yeah. Right. Yeah. That's a masterful thing that you could do. And you're differentiated instruction.

You're talking most of the time, you keep it, everyone's attention. That is a master teacher. You can't scale with a master teacher because there's not a lot of them. I'll go down to say 99% of teachers who are teaching martial arts aren't like that. They think they're like that.

And maybe they had a teacher like that, but majority of the time, they are not like that. So it has to be more systemized. Yeah, because you can keep a school running and have enough people if you're doing it this way. Because you're interesting. Why would anyone quit? Yeah, because you can keep a school running and have enough people if you're doing it this way. Because you're interesting. Why would anyone quit? Yeah, yeah.

Everybody's getting something at least. You know what I mean? So in order to build in the beginner phase, you can get there. That's the thing, right? If you're new to the business, if you're new to teaching, it's going to take a long time to get there you know and if you look at any model of teaching like pedagogically like if you look at like doe system or new teacher system or a teacher entering into that world of education in the beginning you write lesson plans yeah it's systemized this is the hook this is students will be able to and you have goals they call it swabat students will be able to, right? Oh, wow. The hook is this. Yeah.

Hey, guys. Have you ever had this thing, and then, you know, you're whatever, blah, blah, blah? Yeah. Isn't it cool? Yeah. This is what it's about.

All right. So that's what we're going to do today now that everyone's interested, okay? How was your day, buddy? Good. Okay. Johnny, take it away. Read chapter one, blah, blah, blah, right?

And then you have this thing. What's next? All right. What are my goals? Students will be able to. How are we going to achieve those goals? We're going to give you worksheets all right everyone spent five minutes doing the worksheet oh we didn't really oh you know you guys didn't get number three let's do a powerpoint presentation on what you know this is what we'll do today right

right and then you approach it again and you do another worksheet everyone gets it and then and then you do like a exit interview yeah what did you learn today you know shadi tremaine you know with his hand got messed up with the crucible or whatever right and now it's like you could monitor and then it builds to the next day everybody expects it right it's a systemized thing there's a curriculum wow right that's how it is in the beginning but you you teach for eight years, you teach for 12 years, you walk in there. Bro, I've taught this 19 million times. Yeah.

So, you know. Yeah. Right. So, you're in that. And you can just make it up. You can wing it. Yeah. You know?

You're in that phase now, but not everyone's like that. No, it's phasic, right? And then if you look at like a teaching career, like regular school teacher. Yeah. Right? The first couple of years, the teachers have a hard time managing the class, most people, because it's not charismatic enough.

Yeah. They don't know how to identify which kids are trouble kids or how to keep their kids' attention. They don't know. It sucks. They usually get put in the worst schools too. Horrible, right? Terrible. Then they start getting the hang of it and they get better and better and better right and that's sort of the

second phase which is like where i'm at now yeah and then the third phase is you've done it for so long you don't give a shit anymore and you wing it and nail it in every single time is your dad in that phase maybe i don't know but like it's like one of those things right it's like yeah you want to Is your dad in that phase? Maybe. I don't know. But it's like one of those things, right? It's like you want to spend teaching years 10 to 20. That's what it is.

20 plus years, you've already set in your ways. Oh, we have to use smart boards now and do this and think about common core and higher order thinking. Those teachers are like, shut up. I've been doing this for 20 years i'll do what i want yeah and they're like okay you know fine you have the tenure they have tenure there's no tenure in martial arts right yeah so you want to teach in a way where it's years 10 to 20 as like if you're teaching school like a school teacher years 10 to 20 20. Yeah. Those are your prime years and you want to teach in that way, right? But that way doesn't scale.

Right, right. And it takes 10 years to get there. So in that time period, the first 10 years, it has to be systemized, right? And it has to be done in a way where you can scale,

okay? And then little by little, you could get here. Most people just kind of jump into year 20. And then after a couple of years, they're already in year 30. They're like, God, I'm just going to mail it in. What do you know about anything? You know, you're only doing jujitsu and I'm a judo teacher.

I'm a judo master. They just don't know any better. So that's sort of my opinion with the adult white belt, how to keep them. Yeah. How to keep them, how to teach them. And you got to learn, you know, lead gen, how many people are hitting your website up, how many people are converting, all this stuff. Nice. A lot goes into it.

A lot does go into it and there's an art to it. You know what I mean? And then, I mean, there's a reason why if you do this part-time as a hobby after you're nine to five it's just you can't do it it's tough it's tough you can do it you know but you need good systems in place that's what business is about right having good systems yeah you know coming from the guy that doesn't do any of this stuff well you're in that 10 to 20 year you've done you've been doing this for a while. So the system is built into you. A little bit.

Yeah, when you start out, especially if you want to do it as a side thing from your 9 to 5 regular day job, you have to operationalize everything so that you can kind of go through the motion without thinking too much so that it's more scalable but yeah and you know i look at the dojo a little bit differently too you know uh yeah this is gonna

sound selfish but dojo is for me i mean i go in there it's meets my social needs right i get it's a platform for me to share my knowledge you, and the ultimate goal isn't like numbers based. Yeah. Even though there needs to be a certain amount coming in. Yeah. To, you know, have some profit that I live on. Right. There needs to be a baseline number where it's like, okay, this is where it needed to

be to have, you know, sustain or pay the expense or whatever it is. Yes. Right. But I don't think in terms of like, oh i need 400 students 300 students right that's not really my you know approach to it you know and i treat it accordingly so when people look like hey you're not really doing some of the stuff that you're preaching it's like well you just came to me you just told me your goal is to really have 100 students you just told me your goal is to quit your day job and do this full time this is what you have to do for yeah that to happen you can't just do what i'm doing because my goals are completely different right i just want to teach the people i want to teach okay

and that's a very select few people yeah even the white belts come in majority of time i don't want to teach them because they have not proven to me that they're really interested in learning and they have no full trust in me yet they don't know who teach them because they have not proven to me that they're really interested in learning. They have no full trust in me yet. They don't know who I am. I'm just a dude with a red and white belt who's Asian to them majority of the time. It doesn't matter who stands in front of them. I want to teach the guy that are seeking me out.

Hey, I'm here to learn from you, and I respect you, and I've been around, and I know what's out there, and I want to learn from you those are the only guys that i want to teach you that those are the only people i give a shit about really you know so you can get there those are sort of my personal motivators and drivers right and then when you're in years 10 to 20 you could do that because you can't do that in the beginning i can't stress that enough and if you're on the reverse side of that in a dojo where there's not a lot of white belts get your friends to come with you yeah give the sales pitch sales pitch yeah not even that man it's like hey man you know come work out with me dude that's right cool yeah so that's uh our uh mostly shintaro spiel about adult white belts. Very integral. Any parting words? Nope.

That's it. Thank you guys for listening to me ramble as usual. You see the shirt that I'm wearing right now? You know what? Greg hasn't put the videos up. Yeah. You can go to my website, ShintaroHigashi.com. There's a couple of cool t-shirts to sell yeah related i i'm looking at them right now very cool very slick modern minimalist design

yeah you can wear that to a club and they'll let you in yeah nightclub all right thanks for listening guys and i'll we'll see you guys in the next episode