When I decided to restart my teaching business I chose to base it upon my idealized vision of what a classical guitar business should be.
Unlike music schools, I do not have a lot of overheads to cover. This allowed me to offer much greater value. My students only pay for 1 hour, but in reality they are given 1.5 hours. The extra half an hour acts as a buffer.
This gives my students’ the luxury to be late. This also gives them ample time to ‘pick’ my brain after classes or for me to help them with miscellaneous problems.
This makes poor business sense. I foresee a time when I will have reconsider this added service. But I would like to retain this feature for as long as possible.
When I studied under Ernest, I remember an incidence where I was delayed by the train service. The North-East train had been held-up due to technical difficulties. As a result, I could only attend 10 minutes worth of lesson with Ernest. My lessons with Ernest were typically 30 minutes.
I also decided to provide a 30-minute buffer after watching Alex teach. It’s common for Alex to get carried away overrun his timeslot. This causes a problem for the subsequent student.
The solution was to provide 30-minutes of ‘buffer time’ completely free-of-charge.
Most of the professional classical guitar teachers I have met are wonderful people and are incredibly nice. But to music schools, the teaching of the classical guitar is merely a business. Music schools have a lot of overheads to cover. This forces them to adopt an ‘assembly-line’ approach to teaching.
I work for myself. I have fewer overheads to cover. This allows me to treat my students as human beings, not as another item in an assembly line.
Oddly, my experience working at Ogilvy would also influence the way I do business. At Ogilvy, clients are treated with the utmost respect and care. I wanted to do the same for my students.
I took great care in respecting the confidentiality of my students. Young inexperienced punks take no issue with name-dropping in order to win new business. I take great care in maintaining the privacy of all my students.
This is impressive when you consider the fact that some of my former students are also my competitors. I could bad-mouth them. But that’s something I would never do.
Trust is important. Without it, clients would not trust me to enter their homes and teach them. I would never divulge the identity of a client to win new business. The only instance I would find this acceptable is if the student chose to make the information known.
Some of my clients are influential and important people. As a result, I also take great care in safeguarding their personal details. I never travel with any of my clients personal details on my person with the exception of their mobile number.
But discretion isn’t the only attribute I copied from Ogilvy. Honesty and integrity are other hallmarks that I built my business around.
My pricing is transparent and fair. I do not charge expatriates a different rate from locals. I do not practice discriminatory pricing. This is because I price my services competitively. On average my per-hour, in-house rates are 10-40% cheaper than music schools.
I am so honest with my dealings, that in the rare event I am unable to fully execute my services (usually due to a child’s temperament), I charge my client with a to-the-minute bill. I once considered a to-the-second billing structure, but my disdain for coins deterred me from doing so.
For in-home services, like Alex, I typically overrun. I never charge extra in these instances.
My teaching style is an eclectic mix of Ernest, Alex, Zuklifee and several other world-class guitarists I have the opportunity to examine during master classes and private encounters. I was particularly impressed by Toru and Naoka Yamashita during my first classical guitar expedition to Japan.
Sessions with me are relaxed but extremely intense. I provide more musical direction than most other teachers. I strive to achieve a careful balance of technical supervision and good musicianship. It is like a master class at times and like a rehearsal with a conductor at other times.
I attribute the latter quirk to the time I spent as an assistant-conductor at Ngee Ann Polytechnic Strings. Students who spend time under my tutelage have little problem making the transition into a larger group setting. This is because they are already accustomed to music direction and instruction.
Because I use widely established classical guitar technique in my teachings, my students also have little trouble adapting to the instruction of another teacher. This is important because this experience will aid the student should he/she attend a master class or enroll in a conservatory.
I notice that the same is not true for younger and inexperienced private teachers. I was horrified to learn that another private teacher taught classical guitar using tablature. To make matters worse, the teacher had never sat for an exam before nor had he formerly studied the instrument under anyone in his entire life.
He demonstrated extremely poor technique and I was dismayed that would-be classical guitarists may have already been tainted by such an unqualified teacher.
At the moment I am extremely satisfied with the structure of my teaching business. This sentiment seems to be echoed by my students. Many have been with me since I restarted my teaching business. Take-up rate is also extremely high. At any point of time, I am booked at 70-80% of capacity.
I’m not certain how this chapter in my life will end, but I do know that as long as I strive to maintain high levels of service standards, it’ll be a happy tale for both myself and my students.
