EP177: "2025 Goals For Sports PTs"

[00:00:05] Are you a motivated healthcare or fitness professional? Are you looking to work with more athletes, become a sports specialist, or even get a job in a sports setting so you can finally enjoy the career that you've always dreamed of? If so, you're in the right place. My name is Chris Garcia, physical therapist, business owner, entrepreneur, and residency training sports specialist. I've been fortunate to work in professional sports and travel around the world working with elite athletes throughout my career, and I've learned a lot of lessons along the way.

[00:00:30] I created this podcast to share my experiences and give you everything you need to know to help you become a sports expert. Welcome to the SportsPT Academy.

[00:00:44] It is 2025 and you're thinking about what are you going to do this year professionally or even worse? You're not thinking, and I'm finally bringing it to your attention.

[00:00:53] This is what you need to do to set your goals as a sports PT for 2025. Before I go on to the episode, hello, welcome all new listeners and welcome back to those who have heard my content in the past.

[00:01:05] Today, we are really going to talk about all goal setting of what it means for you in 2025, but let's get down to what's happening personally first.

[00:01:14] My kids had a fantastic Christmas, good holiday season. For those of you who don't know, I am a Scrooge for the holidays. I don't enjoy the holidays. I think gathering family and those type of things are important, but I just don't get excited about giving gifts for no purpose, and it's just not my thing.

[00:01:37] So my wife is a big Christmas person, so my kids had a great time. Fun fact, we don't really buy anything over $50, maybe one $100 item, but we did a lot of little things.

[00:01:51] My son, Zach, wanted a Rubik's Cube, so I'm really excited for that. My son, Jacob, wanted anything to do with a basketball or a soccer ball.

[00:01:59] My daughter got a gymnastics bar, so now I have an indoor gymnastics bar in my house. So she is practicing everything from muscle-ups to L-hold pull-ups, which is crazy.

[00:02:17] And she's doing some, I don't know, just a bunch of gymnastics things that I don't think of myself doing over the next couple years.

[00:02:24] I don't want to hurt myself, but kids are great. Holiday is fantastic. It is a new year.

[00:02:30] So about two months ago, I started thinking about what my 2025 goals were, and I've always been chipping away at them over the last four quarters.

[00:02:38] And I want to share with you what I'm doing and what I help the physical therapists that I mentor.

[00:02:46] Like, what am I thinking about? What am I executing? What's the next big thing?

[00:02:50] And what can you do professionally and where are you going to suffer the most as a sports PT?

[00:02:57] And I'll give you the breakdown of what I'm doing.

[00:03:00] But more importantly, to help you figure out what it is that you're missing, what it is you can focus on.

[00:03:06] Because for a lot of you, if you're in a PT school, you're a new grad, or you've been out for a while,

[00:03:12] you've been going through this kind of same whirlwind of a process.

[00:03:16] You get super excited. You get super motivated. You take some courses.

[00:03:20] And you don't have the athletic or sports patients to practice on.

[00:03:26] And so you take all these courses to give you a boost of confidence, but all your clientele doesn't really match that.

[00:03:32] Or you're trying, you implement with athletes, and it's not really piecing together like you want.

[00:03:37] And so you get this rabbit hole of you're super excited about your job, your professional career.

[00:03:43] Maybe your patients aren't good, or it's not working right.

[00:03:45] So you kind of go in this downward spiral.

[00:03:48] You're not happy about your job.

[00:03:50] You don't love your coworkers.

[00:03:51] You don't love your patient type.

[00:03:54] And you start thinking about, is this a career for me?

[00:03:57] Do I really want it?

[00:03:58] Do I change jobs?

[00:04:00] You can go through this whole thing.

[00:04:01] I get it.

[00:04:01] I hear it from you literally every day.

[00:04:03] People who Instagram me, DM me, I hear it from third-year students who are like, I don't want that.

[00:04:09] How do I avoid that?

[00:04:10] I went to, I presented, gosh, two months ago at my alumni at San Diego State.

[00:04:17] And I spoke to an undergraduate class who were pre-health or pre-DPT.

[00:04:24] And there was people asking me these types of questions then.

[00:04:27] Why?

[00:04:28] Because they're more aware.

[00:04:29] So one of the best things you can do to get out is not just kind of react to things.

[00:04:33] I'm going to help you plan some things out.

[00:04:34] So the way it all starts, every time you're going to set your goals and what you want to do,

[00:04:39] I want you to figure out what are your personal vacations?

[00:04:43] What are the things that you're going to want to do this year?

[00:04:45] And I do this with my own team, especially.

[00:04:48] So what are the big things you want to get this year?

[00:04:51] So is it like you want to go on a cruise?

[00:04:53] Do you want to go to Disney World?

[00:04:55] Do you want to go on a European backpack trip?

[00:04:57] What is it that you want to do this year, right?

[00:05:00] So figure that out.

[00:05:01] You're like, hey, I know that my spouse and I have been saving for a while.

[00:05:04] These are the two vacations we want to go on this year.

[00:05:06] You want to do, I don't know, Vegas, whatever it is you want to do.

[00:05:09] Let's start with that first.

[00:05:11] Before you start chipping away at all your professional development, let's put your happiness first,

[00:05:16] right?

[00:05:16] Let's figure out, all right, what do you want to do?

[00:05:18] All right.

[00:05:18] And then you got to figure out, okay, that's your personal side.

[00:05:21] Let me figure out my vacation because that creates happiness, right?

[00:05:24] Most people, they do the opposite.

[00:05:26] They don't have any plans and they get spoon fed like Con Ed all over the place, Instagram,

[00:05:32] YouTube, whatever it is, or some mailers.

[00:05:33] And you're like, oh, that looks like a juicy piece of something, you know, like you take

[00:05:37] that class and you're like, oh my gosh, that's great.

[00:05:38] But the problem becomes is that there's really no growth.

[00:05:41] You just take these like piecemeal things because they were just hitting you and you're like,

[00:05:44] well, that sounds great.

[00:05:46] And there's really no progress made.

[00:05:48] And then you spend all your money on your Con Ed.

[00:05:50] You have no money for fun or anything like that.

[00:05:52] And you go on this downward spiral.

[00:05:53] So that's why I say you got to take your personal things and figure out what you want to

[00:05:56] do to keep you happy.

[00:05:59] Because professional career is not everything, right?

[00:06:02] And I think that you have to have this balance of, you know, what it is that you personally

[00:06:05] want out of your professional career, but also like of your just your personal life.

[00:06:10] Like what is ultimately that you're working for?

[00:06:13] And that takes a couple of deep thoughts, a couple of good sessions of mental clarity.

[00:06:18] Maybe go to a coffee shop, get a pencil, get a paper and start writing those things down.

[00:06:22] Like what are the two or three places that you would love to go this year?

[00:06:24] Or if not, the following year?

[00:06:25] And think about, okay, well, how much money do I need to be able to save for that?

[00:06:29] Where does this fit inside like my PTO or available hours?

[00:06:34] And that sets the tone for what you want to do for the year.

[00:06:37] All right.

[00:06:38] That creates happiness and long-term longevity in your path.

[00:06:42] Now on the personal side, on the professional side, we got to figure out, all right,

[00:06:47] what are you really good at as a sports PT?

[00:06:51] Like write that down.

[00:06:52] On one side, you're really strong.

[00:06:54] On the other side, you're really weak.

[00:06:55] What are you really good at?

[00:06:56] On one side of the column, you might say, well, gosh, I'm really good at manual therapy

[00:07:00] and exercise prescription and patient communication.

[00:07:04] Okay, that's great.

[00:07:05] What are you really lacking with the people that you see or the people you want to see?

[00:07:09] What are you really lacking?

[00:07:11] And I don't want to hear exercise prescription.

[00:07:14] I don't want to hear like the normal traditional things.

[00:07:16] What are you not good at?

[00:07:17] Say it, put it down.

[00:07:18] Like what is it that you're not good at?

[00:07:21] So you have this list of strengths and weaknesses.

[00:07:24] All right.

[00:07:24] Well, that's fantastic.

[00:07:25] So what do you do now?

[00:07:26] What I would have you do is if you're already 80, 90% good with manual therapy and all those

[00:07:31] things, why attack those things?

[00:07:34] You know, I think one of the things you can do is attack your weaknesses.

[00:07:37] Then that puts you in a position of like, wow, gosh, I am not good at ACLs.

[00:07:42] I'm not good at labral tears.

[00:07:43] I'm not good at blank, right?

[00:07:46] One of the things you can do is separate it by regions.

[00:07:50] Maybe you're like really bad at the neck, really bad at the ankle.

[00:07:53] And those are really tactical things that you want to get better at.

[00:07:55] Fine.

[00:07:56] Take those courses.

[00:07:57] But what are you missing in your overall approach?

[00:07:59] Is it like your understanding of strength and conditioning to be able to program for somebody?

[00:08:03] Is it that you want to manage more sports rehab and you need a little bit higher level

[00:08:09] rehabilitation principles?

[00:08:10] Or you want to work on more acute injury management.

[00:08:13] So you take a course to help you with that.

[00:08:15] There's a lot of ways to look at this.

[00:08:16] But the reality is if you don't plan for this, what will happen is you'll just get hit by

[00:08:23] media telling you should take this course and this course.

[00:08:25] In reality, you just keep taking the things that you're really good at.

[00:08:28] You just keep enhancing your strengths.

[00:08:30] And you've taken five shoulder courses, two knee courses.

[00:08:33] And the reality is you're not really getting better.

[00:08:35] You're just fine tuning.

[00:08:36] You're making small gains.

[00:08:38] So if you're trying to make a huge jump, you got to attack your biggest weaknesses and hit

[00:08:42] those hard so you can develop that confidence.

[00:08:44] Now that starts with planning.

[00:08:46] Most people don't even have any thought about this.

[00:08:48] Well, I never even thought about what my con ed is.

[00:08:49] I remember reaching out to somebody about a course of mine and they said, well, gosh,

[00:08:56] that's a fantastic course.

[00:08:58] I'll let you know when I start thinking about my CEU budget or something to that effect.

[00:09:05] And I was like, are you kidding me?

[00:09:07] Like the fact that you don't plan tells me where you are professionally.

[00:09:13] You just wait for things to come.

[00:09:15] You don't think and plan, which means you probably don't do that with your patients.

[00:09:19] You don't have a lot of planning.

[00:09:21] You don't have a lot of foresight.

[00:09:22] You just wait for things to come.

[00:09:23] And so you're a passive physical therapist.

[00:09:25] You really aren't looking to grow.

[00:09:28] You should be knowing what your next two to three CEUs are because you should be salivating

[00:09:33] at them and excited about it because you're like, I finally want to work with golfers and

[00:09:37] I finally saved enough money to work on TPI.

[00:09:40] And this was like the thing I wanted to do.

[00:09:42] You should be salivating that.

[00:09:43] If you have no forecast over your CEUs and your professional development, that means that

[00:09:47] you don't take your professional development seriously.

[00:09:50] There's not enough effort.

[00:09:51] And I think that's how 80 to 90% of sports PTs live out there.

[00:09:55] Now, the difference between them and you is you want to make a difference.

[00:09:59] You want to be able to take your standards, your development to another level.

[00:10:04] Well, it's not going to happen if you're just taking a passive approach and you're just getting

[00:10:07] hit by things that really only enhance you one or 2%.

[00:10:10] And the difference is how do we get you to the next one?

[00:10:13] Now, maybe for some of you, it's like, oh, I've always thought about a residency.

[00:10:16] I've always thought.

[00:10:16] That's fantastic.

[00:10:17] Start mapping that out now.

[00:10:19] And if you don't have that, you get in this wheel of, well, January came.

[00:10:23] You really think about it, you're like, oh, I'll just think about it later.

[00:10:25] That's fine.

[00:10:26] And then your PT license is about to expire.

[00:10:30] And then you're like, well, I don't have time.

[00:10:32] I don't want to fly.

[00:10:33] It takes cost money to travel and I have to do lodging.

[00:10:35] I'll just take whatever is my local area.

[00:10:37] And then you just take a crappy course just to fulfill your actual CEUs.

[00:10:42] So there's really no growth.

[00:10:43] And that's why you're stuck where you are.

[00:10:45] And because you haven't thought one or two years in advance, that's why you're not happy.

[00:10:51] That's why you go in this, you know, PT burnout.

[00:10:54] I don't love my facility.

[00:10:56] I don't love my patients.

[00:10:57] When the reality is you are a reflection of your habits.

[00:11:02] You are a reflection of your habits.

[00:11:04] If you're overweight, it's because you're not exercising or putting the fork down.

[00:11:07] If you're not professionally developing or making the money that you want, it's because

[00:11:11] you're not putting the effort.

[00:11:12] You're just expecting that time will figure that out or that you deserve it.

[00:11:17] And the reality is if you're not pushing towards that, you're not earning that.

[00:11:22] So how you look, how you feel, how your development is, is a reflection of your daily, weekly, monthly

[00:11:29] habits.

[00:11:30] So if you don't have a plan for 2025, welcome to 2024 repeat.

[00:11:36] Repeat.

[00:11:36] It's the same thing.

[00:11:38] One of my favorite sayings of all time, I met a business owner who had been treating

[00:11:45] for 20 years.

[00:11:46] And, you know, I met him in a course and, you know, we went through a couple of things.

[00:11:50] He's like, gosh, Chris, I feel after going through these things and hearing how you practice,

[00:11:54] hear how you do these things, I feel like I have 20 years experience.

[00:12:00] Don't get me wrong.

[00:12:00] He's like, but I just feel like I've have one year experience 20 times over.

[00:12:06] I've been living the same year over and over just waiting for a course to come at me, not

[00:12:10] really progressing, not really pushing towards getting more athletes on my schedule, just

[00:12:14] hoping that they would come on, taking more sports courses, but have the same schedule

[00:12:17] with the same unmotivated people being surrounded by the same unmotivated staff who just do a bare

[00:12:23] minimum, take the bare minimum CEUs, don't really progress, don't really think, don't want

[00:12:27] to work their lunches, don't want to work their evenings, don't want to work their, you

[00:12:30] know, weekends.

[00:12:32] And if you're stuck around that, it's because your habits reflect that.

[00:12:36] And it all starts with, I mean, like, I don't care whether when you're listening to this,

[00:12:41] I'm recording this in January of 2025.

[00:12:44] If you're listening to this months down the line, just do it now.

[00:12:50] Pretend it's the beginning of your year.

[00:12:52] So if you're doing this two, three, six months in, start with your goals and your weaknesses,

[00:12:57] what is going to make the biggest impact on the people you want to see.

[00:13:00] So if you say, hey, my weaknesses is back pain, and you want to take a McKenzie course,

[00:13:05] repeated movement course, that's fantastic.

[00:13:07] Where is that going to help you professionally?

[00:13:09] How many athletes or patients do you currently see right now?

[00:13:13] And how is that going to impact your development?

[00:13:15] If you see 20% back pain patients, I don't know if a back pain course is really going to

[00:13:20] do that for you.

[00:13:21] Now, if you're seeing shoulders day and night, you 100% need to do that.

[00:13:25] So which course gives you the most bang for your buck professionally?

[00:13:29] How is it going to get more patients in your schedule?

[00:13:31] So on this whole chart, at the top of this is more athletes on my schedule, a full schedule,

[00:13:38] or get motivated people on my schedule.

[00:13:40] All right.

[00:13:40] So as you take your strength and weaknesses and you decide on what goals you want to set,

[00:13:44] the ultimate pinnacle is how do I get more active people on there?

[00:13:47] That's a question you have to answer.

[00:13:49] That's not me.

[00:13:50] That is 100% you.

[00:13:51] How do you get more of these?

[00:13:52] Figure out which course or which thing you need to do.

[00:13:55] What workshops do you need to take?

[00:13:56] What mentorship group do you have to do?

[00:13:59] What residency do you have to do?

[00:14:00] In either case, you're looking at what is going to make the biggest impact in my career.

[00:14:05] I can't answer that for you.

[00:14:06] You have to figure that out.

[00:14:07] What I do is I have a running list, a note that I have on my phone and my computer.

[00:14:13] It's a running list of things that I hear throughout the year.

[00:14:16] I'm like, okay, I think that would help me, but I don't lock that in.

[00:14:19] Throughout the whole year, I'm collecting data on, I think this is what's going to help

[00:14:22] me personally and professionally.

[00:14:23] This is going to help my family.

[00:14:24] This is going to help my getting on more vacations.

[00:14:27] This is what I'm going to help in my business.

[00:14:28] This is what I'm going to help with my mentoring groups and helping PTs.

[00:14:31] And I just put those together.

[00:14:32] And at the end of the quarter three, usually around October, November, I start putting

[00:14:36] those into like puzzle pieces and saying, okay, this is what's going to make the greatest

[00:14:40] impact.

[00:14:41] If I want to be able to help sports PTs all over the world, these are the things I need

[00:14:46] to get really good at to help these individuals.

[00:14:48] I want them working on their own goal setting so they can set their own path, check in on

[00:14:52] them every single month, every single quarter.

[00:14:54] This is really going to impact them versus the old me was like, well, let me teach them

[00:14:58] a couple of rehab exercises.

[00:14:59] That's not going to really get them onto the next train.

[00:15:01] The next level is you being identified what your gaps are and what's going to take you

[00:15:06] to the next level.

[00:15:07] So it starts with your goal setting.

[00:15:08] You have to start here.

[00:15:09] So you can't help somebody.

[00:15:11] Let's say for instance, they're trying to lose weight.

[00:15:12] You can't help them without understanding what a destination is.

[00:15:16] So if you don't have a destination for somebody trying to lose weight, well, how many pounds

[00:15:18] do I want?

[00:15:18] I don't know.

[00:15:19] I just want to lose a couple of pounds.

[00:15:20] No, no, no, no.

[00:15:21] Let's start with 10.

[00:15:22] Let's go 10 in the next 10 weeks, one pound per week.

[00:15:24] Reasonable?

[00:15:25] Yes.

[00:15:25] Now you have something to go off of.

[00:15:26] But when you're a sports PT and you just don't have any actual goals, then what are

[00:15:31] you working towards?

[00:15:32] That's why you don't feel good about your profession.

[00:15:34] That's why you don't feel good about your job because it just, it takes over.

[00:15:37] You really aren't thinking about it.

[00:15:39] So then life hits you.

[00:15:41] You know, you have somebody, you know, sick in your family.

[00:15:43] Somebody breaks up with you.

[00:15:44] You have a car that's not working and just life just hits you.

[00:15:47] And so if you have a destination, you're more willing and excited to take it to that next

[00:15:50] level.

[00:15:51] And that could be your residency.

[00:15:52] That could be, you know, your next five CEUs.

[00:15:55] That could be your vacation.

[00:15:56] And all I'm trying to do here is get you in that right path to have what I call a North

[00:15:59] star.

[00:16:00] Somebody to look up to and be like, gosh, that's it.

[00:16:02] That's my cruise.

[00:16:03] That's my Disney world.

[00:16:04] That's my thing that I'm doing this year.

[00:16:05] That's my residency.

[00:16:06] You stay focused on that.

[00:16:07] And everything that happens to you in your business, in your PT clinic is irrelevant

[00:16:13] because you're constantly focusing on that North star.

[00:16:15] So as you do this, don't have the laxical approach where you have no direction.

[00:16:20] You get in this washing machine of emotions and you don't love what you do and you let life

[00:16:26] just kind of tackle you.

[00:16:28] So if you're looking for that fresh start, you know, put on a piece of paper at the top

[00:16:32] of it is what is going to change your professional career and your happiness in your development

[00:16:35] the most this year.

[00:16:37] Figure out your strengths and weaknesses, then start to look for those resources.

[00:16:40] Most people just look for the resources.

[00:16:41] Don't even think about the goal.

[00:16:42] So start with that first and that gives you that direction.

[00:16:46] That's what I'm doing right now.

[00:16:47] And I've done it to my entire team.

[00:16:49] I have something called annual planning where my entire team gets together, tells me what

[00:16:55] their goals are and how it relates to everything that we're doing inside the business.

[00:16:59] I do it with my wife and we forecasted all of our vacations for the next year down to like

[00:17:03] December 31st of 2025.

[00:17:05] It gets the forecast.

[00:17:07] It creates our North stars to be able to have that positive mindset no matter what happens.

[00:17:10] And there's going to be adjustments made in that.

[00:17:12] I totally respect that.

[00:17:13] But at least you have a target, a direction to go to versus you're sitting in the same

[00:17:17] spot and you just get in this whirlwind.

[00:17:20] And for most sports VTs, that's where they are.

[00:17:22] And that's always going to, they're going to be stuck.

[00:17:24] So if you're looking to make a change and make a significant impact on your professional

[00:17:28] development, this is where it starts.

[00:17:30] Start today.

[00:17:31] Send me an email.

[00:17:33] Dr. Chris at drchrisgarcia.com.

[00:17:35] Send it to me.

[00:17:36] Impress me.

[00:17:37] Show me.

[00:17:38] I would love to see what you come up with.

[00:17:41] For those of you who don't have goals, who don't know a direction, don't even know what

[00:17:46] the next step is for themselves.

[00:17:47] I would highly recommend you take my SportsPT Kickstarter.

[00:17:50] It's an eight week online mentorship course.

[00:17:52] Well, I'll give you that direction to be able to point in the right direction of how

[00:17:56] to structure being a SportsPT, everything from being in a cash pay setting and out of network

[00:18:01] setting or an in network setting where you're trying to get more athletes and you're willing

[00:18:04] to get those types of patients.

[00:18:05] But you can't if you're working in a traditional insurance based model where you just see the

[00:18:10] same unmotivated people for a fixed amount of visits and you just, you're in a factory

[00:18:14] line.

[00:18:15] So if you're looking for something different, my SportsPT Kickstarter course will put you

[00:18:19] in the right direction to help create your goals, to get you more athletes, more motivated

[00:18:23] people and keep you highly focused and away from that stupid thing they call PT burnout.

[00:18:29] So if that's for you, I'd love to see you in the course.

[00:18:32] If not, I will see you on my next episode.

[00:18:34] Take care.

[00:18:35] Thanks for tuning in to the SportsPT Academy podcast.

[00:18:38] It means the absolute world to me.

[00:18:40] If you enjoy my content, subscribe to the podcast so you know exactly when new episodes come

[00:18:44] out.

[00:18:44] Next, help me help others by giving me a five-star review on Apple Podcasts.

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