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August is here and we are getting close to rolling into the last 10 episodes of the year before we hit the big #200! If you’re a regular follower, thanks for being here week after week. If you’re in and out, I invite you to be sure and hit that subscribe button in your podcast app so new episodes download automatically.
I’m Amy Chaplin, host of this podcast and your resident organized teacher friend who is here to share practical and sustainable rhythms for your teacher life.
Don’t forget there are show notes and transcripts available for every episode including this one at pianopantry.com/podcast.
Mark your calendar for the next round of the Organize Your Life with Notion workshop which will be held on 3 Thursdays in November — the 5th, 12, and 19th — two hours each day.
I’m excited to let you know that after 3 years of running this wonderful workshop series, my co-partner in this, Joy Morin and I have decided to launch an advanced version, so there will now be the Notion Basics workshop and then a Notion Advanced which will take a deep dive into Notion AI and advanced skills for using Databases to their fullest.
Join the waitlist at pianopantry.com/notion today so you get notified as soon as all the details are nailed down and registration opens.
This week is my one week off between summer lessons and next weeks digital organization retreat so today’s episode is a replay perfect for this time of year—episode #129 on a process for onboarding new students which originally aired in August of 2024 and is still totally relevant today!
Get ready to streamline your onboarding process!
Onboarding new students can be a lot more work than one might think. If you’ve been doing this for a while, you know what I mean.
To clarify, this process has two parts. The first part is communicating with and managing prospective student inquiries and first meetings, and the second part is kicking things into gear and locking the student into your studio setup once the “go” button is hit.
There are a lot of moving parts here – especially when the decision is made to start lessons – so today’s topic is on building a procedures checklist – something I also recommend for recital planning.
The point of a Policies and Procedures Manual and Checklist is to follow a step-by-step guide when you’re going through the same processes repeatedly. It’s a way of helping you not miss a step and can also create a more streamlined approach by placing items in the best executable order. This is even more critical if you have a team running your business as part of a multi-teacher studio.
Looking back at my studio documents, I created my registration procedures checklist in July 2011—just as I was first opening my studio doors—so I’ve been doing this for a long time. It has gone through many iterations and is thus a living, breathing document. Confession time, though – while writing this episode, I realized I’m guilty of not updating mine in recent years simply because my studio has only been taking on one student a year for several years now.
This onboarding document has been an absolute lifesaver in the past, though, when I was taking on multiple students a year and even throughout the year. I liked to print the checklist and write the student’s name at the top so I could work through each item without losing track.
I considered creating a free download for this. However, the more I thought about it (and after seeing my document that needs updating), I realized it’s not a cut-and-dry picture for anyone, as we all run our businesses with different tools and processes. What I will share though is items I’ve had on my own list over the years that I think are good broad examples of the types of items you may want to include.
You definitely want to have a checklist of items for onboarding students once the decision is made to start lessons. Whether or not you want to have a checklist for communicating with prospective students is up to you. I think that part of the process doesn’t have as many moving parts as setting students up, so I just do it out of experience, as it’s mostly email communication**.**
When I am ready to meet with a prospective student about an opening, I tell them I’d like to meet in person so we can get to know each other and make sure both of us feel like it’s the right fit. I also tell them I prefer to talk through things in person rather than just handing them a document.
For the record, I don’t like calling these meetings interviews because I’ve never really turned away a student. If you prefer for your process to feel like an application process, then do what works for you. After a general get-to-know-you time and a little fun at the piano with the student, I verbally go over what being in my studio looks like. Don’t use this as a time to read off your entire policies sheet – just hit the important big-picture highlights verbally.
As for WHEN to give the policies sheet, I usually send a digital version before setting up a meeting and again when sending details on final registration. Sometimes, I also print off a hard copy and send it home with them, but I’ve come to the conclusion that I would rather parents pay attention to what I’m doing with the student than sit and read through a policies document during our meeting.
Here’s where it might get difficult. My personal opinion is that no matter how confident you feel about taking on this student and no matter how excited you think they are to sign up, thank them for meeting with you and ask them to go home and talk things through. Tell them you will follow up in the next day or two. This gives YOU a chance to take a step back and ask yourself if you really want to work with that student. Even more importantly, it also creates space for THEM not to feel put on the spot if they actually don’t want to proceed.
The next day, I send an email saying how nice it was to meet them and that if they’re interested in proceeding, I am looking forward to welcoming them into my studio. Again, I include a digital copy of the studio policies and a link to my digital registration form. Be sure to request a date deadline within the week so you can get the ball rolling.
My digital form has a section for policy acceptance. They check a box that indicates they received the policies and agree to adhere to them. My form builder – Tally – has a digital signature block. When I used to use Google Forms, I just used a basic text box and said by typing their name they were acknowledging their understanding of and acceptance of the policies.
OK – so that covers a bit on the initial contact. Let’s move on to the part where you’re getting the student set up in your studio and talk about that more detailed procedures checklist.
Your checklist should have two parts. The first half is about Student Details and Communication, and the second half is about Student Materials and Files. I find keeping these sections separate helps segment mentally the types of items you’re working through.
So, on your document, create two headings. Let’s start with the student details and communication section. Here are some examples of items I’ve had on my checklist over the years that I think would be useful.
First—As I mentioned earlier, after your meeting, email parents final onboarding information and the formal online registration form. I would wait until the form is actually received and registration finalized before spending time doing all the other things just in case they would change their mind.
By the way – there’s one question that I strongly recommend including on your registration form. I don’t want to spend time here on it, but there is a link in the show notes to a blog post on the Piano Pantry website that covers that topic if you’re interested.
Two—Add their details to your Google or iCloud Contacts and add them to a Studio contact group. In Google, it’s called labels. This allows you to add all your Studio families to one email at once without having to manually add each name. All I do is start typing Studio 88, and it will auto-populate all the names on that list.
Three—Add student birthdays to your calendar. If you use student management software, that’s built-in. Since I don’t use that software anymore, I create a calendar in my Google Calendar just for birthdays and add student birthdays there. Set them as recurring so they show up every year.
Four—Add their name and address to the address labels document for birthday cards.
Five—If you do studio shirts, put the students’ t-shirt sizes on a spreadsheet so there’s a compiled list when it comes time to order for all new students.
Six— Connect with them on social media and invite them to like the studio’s Facebook page if they haven’t already.
Lastly—Schedule a series of onboarding emails. In my initial registration email, besides requesting the registration form be filled out, I let them know that they will be receiving small snippets of information about once a week for the first 4-6 weeks. I try to deliver information in small bits so it’s more easily digestible. The emails I include in my onboarding series are:
OK, so that’s the first part of your onboarding checklist—anything related to communication and student information.
The second half of your onboarding setup is all about the actual lesson process. Things like:
I’m telling you, having a checklist for this type of stuff is what can save our sanity. For the same reason that we recommend students pencil in fingerings for consistency, so they don’t have to use the mental energy to think about tricky spots over and over again – so we need to free our mind of things it doesn’t need to remember on its own.
It’s such a freeing process to take the time to sit down and hash out exactly what you need to do when onboarding a student so the next time you do it you don’t have to try and remember every little item.
A lot of the things I’ve talked about for you to have on your checklist have blog posts that cover that very topic. For example, I have a video on using Canva to create student photo boards, a podcast episode on utilizing 3-ring binders, a video tutorial on building a master lesson planning spreadsheet, several on organizing student files, how to use My Music Staff to feed student birthdays from the software into your personal Google Calendar, and so many more.
All of those supporting materials are linked inside the show notes at PianoPantry.com/podcast/episode129.
For more on how to streamline the process for onboarding new students, you might also want to check out a blog post I published this past winter on my process for Onboarding new students using Notion.
Joy Morin also published a blog post on her process as well. You get get links to both of those in the show notes at pianopantry.com/podcast.
Stay tuned for the next episode which is always one of my favorite episodes of the year – the teacher talk episode from my annual digital organization retreat. They are always so much fun.
Thanks to my Patreon friends for your dedicated support – I couldn’t do this without you. If you would also like to help support this creative work please join in at pianopantry.com/patreon. Every little bit helps! I just like buying me a cup of coffee!
Cheers to the start of the 2026 school year! See you on the other side! LOL
