The availability of quality child care businesses helps the economy grow because these days, both parents (and single parents) need to work to make ends meet. Chicago native, Julie Bartkus, realized the importance of this years ago and has focused her passion on helping business owners in the childcare industry.
Julie started her involvement with the childcare industry early on during her college years, when she worked in daycares. Over time, as she worked in the corporate world, she got involved with studying staff issues.
“I love teaching adults and helping them get reconnected with their passion and with what drives them in the workplace. So often the experts say that we’re actively disengaged. I wanted to figure out what makes people get re-engaged. How do we get that excitement that we felt when we first came in to the job?” says Julie.
As she was specializing in staffing issues and helping to grow businesses, she was continually pulled towards the childcare industry and that is where her passion currently lies. As a business success coach, she helps childcare business owners through her business, Motivate Teachers.
Business owners often start a business because of a passion they have. In this instance, they have a passion for children and for helping them grow into wonderful, healthy adults. The problem is that running a business is not always a part of that passion. There are issues around recruiting staff, training staff, retaining staff, student enrollment, parents, marketing and everything else that’s involved with running a business like this.
Julie determined that when a childcare owner said she needed higher enrollment, the root cause of this issue was usually needing a more motivated staff. They needed to have a staff that would be actively promoting the program through their daily work behavior, and also actively singing your praises out in the community.
According to Julie, “Having a successful child care business is dependent upon having a positive and productive team in place to support your vision and your ability to generate greater profits. It’s one of the four pillars that I share with child care owners and directors to help them create a successful business.”
Julie believes that in a tough economy, there can be a lot of choices for parents. It’s important to position your business so that parents choose your childcare to enroll their children in. She believes that another critical piece to success is the vision the owner has for the business and empowering team members to actively engage in that vision.
Her programs teach owners and childcare directors to manage, motivate and retain great staff and how to be the child care program of choice in their community. This will, in turn, translate into happy children and happy parents who will spread the word in the community about a great place for motivating and inspiring our future – the children.
So often, a business owner’s passion dwindles as the realities of running the business set in. Julie’s programs help to re-kindle those passions to their original strength. As Julie states, “We help them increase enrollment, attract and retain high quality staff and parents. And to really get the word of mouth out there, spreading far, fast and furious. So that your parents are happy and they’re telling their friends. And so that even the strangers in the community are talking about ‘that excellent childcare program.’”
What sets Julie’s program apart is how she takes a holistic approach to assessing the business and its needs, as opposed to focusing on just one piece of it, such as marketing or staff. She then provides concrete action steps that owners and directors can take to get to the next level in their business and often in their personal lives, as well. She also stresses how important it is to have a vision which helps to motivate and guide the actions that are taken.
Julie wants childcare business owners to know that having a business coach can help ease your frustration and propel your success in creating your dreamy child care business. There is support available to you and you don’t have to spend days, weeks or years trying to reinvent the wheel, figuring it all out by yourself to create the child care business that you desire. Seeking out a coach or a positive, support system with resources is critical to moving forward and having a successful business.
To learn more about Julie Bartkus, visit: MotivateTeachers.com.