This article about the best business books to boost your music teaching studio was written by Joanna Shiel. Joanna is one of the editorial assistants on the Vibrant Music Teaching team. She’s been running her piano teaching business for 15 years, and now runs a small studio remotely. In her spare time, she loves to learn languages, travel and hike in nature.
Nobody taught me the ins and outs of running a successful music-teaching business. And I rarely meet a teacher who has been trained in business, teaching and performance.
What about you? Are you as productive, entrepreneurial and efficient as you could be?
These three books have made the biggest difference in how I thought about my teaching business – and I hope they will inspire you to rethink how you’re running your business, too.
Book 1: ‘Getting Things Done’ by David Allen
Have you ever felt overwhelmed by a such a huge stack of tasks that:
- You don’t know where to possibly begin, and
- It’s hard to make progress on the things that really matter, and
- You have no idea what really matters in the first place?
If so, Getting Things Done is for you!
What’s it about?
Getting Things Done is a simple step-by-step system that gets your tasks out of your brain and stored somewhere you will revisit as frequently as needed to remind yourself what needs to be completed – and thus tops my list of the best books for your music teaching studio business.
This book follows a method of planning coined ‘The Natural Planning Model’ which is about using your brain to be a “thinking” machine rather than a “storing” machine.
You use your mind to:
- Figure out the next logical step in completing your task
- Solve problems creatively
- Dream about what’s possible
In his book, Allen sorts his to-do list into five general categories:
- ⌛ If it can be done in under 2 minutes, do it straight away.
- ⏭️ Tasks that have a single step go under the “next action” list to be reviewed daily (or on some other regular schedule to fit your context).
- 📃 The “project list” contains tasks with more than one step.
- 🗓️ Any tasks for the future go on a “tickler” file, to be revisited in the future (on a specific day, month or year).
- 🗑️ Tasks that you no longer need to do get binned.
Why read it?
This book is a productivity classic – and for good reason! Imagine how stress-free life could be without a head full of open tasks spinning round and round in your mind.
Not sure if you really need to be doing a particular thing? Run the task through this handy flowchart to see if it stays or goes.
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Getting Things Done will help free up your mind, get out of the day-to-day business grind and move into a place where you can start thinking about larger business ideas, goals and ambitions.
Favourite Quotes
“There is no reason to ever have the same thought twice unless you like having that thought.”
“Use your mind to think about things, rather than think of them. You want to be adding value as you think about projects and people, not simply reminding yourself they exist.”
“What do you do the last week before you leave on a big trip? You clean up, close up, clarify and renegotiate all your agreements with yourself and others. I just suggest that you do this weekly instead of yearly.”
Book 2: ‘The E-Myth Revisited’ by Michael Gerber
Are you getting everything you need out of your teaching business, or do you have ambitions to shape it into something different but aren’t sure where to start?
It can be really difficult to separate what we need to be doing and love doing in our business vs what we could delegate to someone else.
Michael Gerber’s The E-Myth Revisited will get you thinking about your business from several perspectives and help you understand the importance of creating systems and processes.
What’s it about?
The E-Myth Revisited will encourage you to think a little more objectively about how you run and work on your business as opposed to in it.
Like most teachers, you probably consider yourself a teacher first and foremost. But I wonder if you also consider yourself to be your marketing team, admin assistant, financial planner, creative team and accountant? (Can you think of any more?)
Do you want to be doing all of these tasks? Are you the best person for those jobs?
Why read it?
Firstly, this book will get you thinking about what you love and need to be doing so your business works for you rather than you for it.
Second, it’ll get you thinking about ways you can be more efficient by encouraging you to create systems and processes to save time.
Third, it’ll encourage you to think bigger about what you’re capable of to innovate your dream business over and over again as you grow.
Favourite Quotes
“If your business depends on you, you don’t own a business – you have a job.”
“With no clear picture of how you wish your life to be, how on earth are you going to live it? What is your Primary Aim? Where is the script to make your dreams come true? What is the first step to take and how do you measure your progress? How far have you gone and how close are you to getting to your goals?”
“…most businesses are operated according to what the owner wants as opposed to what the business needs.”
Book 3: ‘The Savvy Music Teacher’ by David Cutler
This one is more focussed specifically on running a music studio and working in music.
What’s it about?
In preparation for writing this book, David Cutler interviewed over 200 music teachers about how they ran their studios and important lessons they learnt along the way about running their businesses.
Each chapter of The Savvy Music Teacher gives you different streams of income you can offer as part of your studio business, along with steps for marketing, managing your time and workload and thinking about ways you can plan for your future financially.
Why read it?
This book will give you new ideas and perspectives about who and what you could teach from real-life teachers who are already successfully implementing these ideas in their studios.
If you’re somebody who wants to make a full-time living from music teaching, this book will give you blueprints of everything from deciding your studio’s core values to how to financially plan for retirement, and even to the different streams of income you can create for your studio.
Towards the back of the book, there are handy worksheets to help you jot down your ideas, forecast what these decisions could mean for you in the future and start making them a reality.
Favourite Quotes
“Beyond jobs, what life aptitudes should music instruction nurture? How can it help solve challenges that face students and their communities both today and tomorrow?”
“The best innovations amplify student impact, engagement, enjoyment and achievement. They increase retention and differentiate your studio while serving as effective marketing.”
“Twenty years from now, when current students reflect back on your time together, which benefits do you hope they cite above all others?”
What books have changed the way you think about your business?
Share your favourite business books in the comments below so we can create a “music teaching studio reading list”.
If you liked this article, you’ll love the resources on our “Music Studio Business” hub page.