AWE Awards nominees are recognized for their resilience, innovation, and leadership in their communities. Though we’ve had to postpone our 2020 AWE Awards celebration, we’ve taken this opportunity to talk to nominees and highlight how they’ve adapted their businesses to weather the pandemic. This month, we interviewed Janessa Marshall, entrepreneur and owner of Red Deer’s The Forum.
The Forum can be considered a physical fitness centre, but owner Janessa Marshall explains that it is so much more than that. Established in 2016, The Forum is dedicated to helping people find their best versions of themselves while prioritizing movement. Its mission revolves around community and lifelong education, with people coming together to share knowledge, passion, and play.
Janessa’s passion began as she started looking for ways to find more joy in life and pursue what is interesting, valuable, and exciting.
“I kept coming back to movement. The concept was: what if there was more possible with our bodies than we give ourselves credit for? The more I took training, the more I started to see that maybe there could be something else.”
Throughout this venture, Janessa sought to reach out to her community and ask, ‘What do you have to share?’ Creating synergies between vocational certifications and lived experience, The Forum allows for a collective of shared passions and social connection. When the pandemic hit, it became clear that this community could grow into something beyond in-person experiences.
“We asked ourselves, ‘What is the core of what we do and why do we do it?’ That's not confined to a space. When we converted online, we were committed to continue providing the foundational skills, the development, the routine, and the structure that people are seeking. We're just doing it online now. People meet with us one-on-one through video conferencing and other mediums. We chat about how people are doing, where we need help, where we need more support, and how we can show up more for each other. We also offer online group classes in an extensive schedule.”
That isn’t to say that the transition was easy. Converting to online distribution involved building a completely new website that could accommodate members logging in and accessing content that was normally provided in a live setting. Since then, the process has involved listening to community members and asking questions like: What’s working well? What could be better? What are you struggling with? Then, they can continue to tweak the system in order to accommodate those needs.
As for maintaining her own wellbeing, Janessa emphasizes the importance of connecting with other people and the simple necessity of being outside.
“Getting outside, being outdoors, is a must-do for me everyday. Usually when we go to work, we go grab coffee, we go do this or that, and we're outside for a cumulative two hours or more. In this situation, when you have to intentionally do it, it's hard! But we need it. And then, connection with people. Intentionally reaching out to people to connect and having that vital human interaction.”
The foundation of The Forum comes from supporting people in movement, which is why they’ve expanded their offerings to include free access to live classes online for everyone, everywhere. Additionally, they have free offerings for frontline healthcare professionals, including unlimited access to live classes and recordings of those classes.
“Frontline healthcare workers are showing up so much right now for us, that we wanted to be able to give back and say ‘We see you. We want to show up for you, too’. We wanted to make sure that when they wanted or needed that workout, when they needed that time for themselves, that it was available at whatever time of day.”
And finally, as our province begins its phased reopening, Janessa underlines that her current aim is concentrating on the now and how they can serve their community today. Further building out this online platform, The Forum can expand beyond a physical space while continuing to offer clients the flexibility they’ve been enjoying with an at-home offering.
At the end of the day, her ultimate goal is to remind people that they are worthy. When schedules are busy, when life brings so much uncertainty, and when others need our support, it is absolutely necessary to prioritize our own wellbeing.
“We are worth spending the time on ourselves. It's in times like these that we downgrade our own worth and say, ‘I'm just going to show up, I have so many people I have to support, I have to show up for them. I don't have time. I don't have energy.’ And those are the moments that we really need to show up for ourselves, so that we have the ability to be there for everyone else. Especially as women, we show up for our family, we show up for our friends, we show up for our business, for all of these things we show up, but we always put ourselves last. And if we can't get up, who's going to show up for everyone else?”
To learn more about what other AWE Awards nominees are doing to adapt to the new business environment click here.
