The Certification Trap: What No Ergonomics Course Taught You About Actually Building a Business

Ergonomics is not a regulated health profession. You do not need a license to do office ergonomics assessments. And yet there are healthcare professionals all over the world sitting on the sidelines, waiting for a certification that, in most jurisdictions, the law doesn't actually require. That waiting is costing them time, clients, and income they could already be generating.

In this episode, we have an honest conversation about the gap that nobody in the ergonomics training world wants to talk about. Most ergonomics courses teach half of the problem. They teach assessments. They don't teach business. And when a healthcare professional finishes a course, gets competent and confident in their assessment skills, and then realizes they have no idea how to find a single client, they're left with a credential and a blank calendar.

Listen to this episode to find out these 2 things that true at the same time right now and almost nobody is connecting them: back, neck, and joint pain is the most expensive chronic health condition in North America at over $300 billion a year, and new business formation is at record highs. The demand is real. The practitioners are out there. The gap is visibility, not skill. This episode is about closing that gap.

What you'll take away:

•       The honest truth about ergonomics regulation and why waiting for a license is often waiting for something that doesn't exist

•       Why competence and confidence matter deeply, and why a bad certification is worse than no certification

•       The catch-22 that most ergonomics courses create: they teach you to assess but not to find anyone to assess

•       The $300B context: why the market for ergonomics services has never been bigger or more ready

•       Why the real barrier right now is visibility, not skill, and what to do about it

•       Why a chatbot can't solve the business problem, and what actually can

If you trained in ergonomics and you're not yet consistently getting clients, this episode will tell you why. And more importantly, what to do next.

If you're a healthcare professional and this episode got your wheels turning about office ergonomics - good. I've got free resources to help you take the next step at ergonomicshelp.com/resources. 

Transcript

Darcie J's video recording 0:00

Well, hey there. Welcome to the Business of Ergonomics Podcast. Today, we're diving into the world of ergonomic certifications. This is near and dear to my heart, and I'm gonna be breaking down what you need to know about the ergonomics industry, what you need to succeed, and, you know, my thoughts about if certifications are actually required to get started.

0:21

Welcome to the Business of Ergonomics podcast. I'm your host, Darcy Jeremy. I'm a board certified professional ergonomist with over 15 years of experience delivering ergonomics programs to employers of all different types. In this podcast, I share what other healthcare professionals are already doing and being with ergonomics assessments, and how to land those clients that you dream of. Without further ado, let's jump into this episode right now

Darcie J's video recording 0:55

This is a conversation that I am so eager to start because it is so near and dear to my heart I wanna have a conversation that I think a lot of people in our field need to hear, but for whatever reasons they don't hear. Maybe it's too late. Maybe there's another issue that we're gonna peel away the layers of the onion of in today's episode. But really there's a gap here. There's a gap I need to address with you, and it's about learning how to do ergonomics and building a business doing ergonomics. Just because you learn how to do an office ergonomics assessment or an industrial ergonomics assessment means that you know how to run a business and solve all the clients' problems that you meet. And you already know the more problems that you can solve, the more value that you can bring business, the more money that you'll make as a consultant. Most people interested in ergonomics are interested in providing that value to make more money, but there is a problem that exists here. Learning how to do an office ergonomics assessment or an industrial ergonomics assessment will not give you the skills to do this as a business. And any certification course that you see out there, and you know there's, there's a bunch of them out there, they're not giving you that information in the fine print, and that is an issue that I have. If you don't know much about me, I have been in the ergonomics industry for 20 years now. I've worked in a variety of roles from working with workers' compensation boards, working with the largest ergonomics consulting firm in the world at the time, with the most board-certified professional ergonomists, working on reports from everywhere, consulting everywhere with Fortune 500 companies, Fortune 100 companies. I've worked in a variety of industries, in a variety of settings. If this is the first time that we are meeting, then I have a bone to pick. Not with you, but with the ergonomics industry. And the fact of the matter that there has been so much confusion about what it takes to get started in ergonomics and how to succeed, that it's kind of like just a crazy moment that exists. On one hand, you have perfectly qualified people that have decades of experience in the ergonomics industry, and on the other hand you have Joe Blow's just off the street just getting started with ergonomics. Today I am tabling a conversation that absolutely needs to be happening about the ergonomics industry this is a conversation that I think a lot of people need to hear, but it's just not happening And there's a gap. There's a gap between learning how to do office ergonomics assessments or industrial ergonomics assessments and building a business that allows you to do that And it's not your fault that you haven't heard about this gap before if this is the first time that you're learning, or maybe you already found out that this gap exists And it's a gap that the training world, by and large, is not helping people close Now I'm gonna be honest here. What I'm gonna be talking about today is probably going to step on some people's toes Not because I enjoy that by any means. But because I think the people I work with and the people I care about in this profession honestly deserve to know what's going on. So let's get into that. A little bit about me. I have been in the ergonomics industry for going on 20 years now. Ergonomics is a great profession to be in, whether you are doing this as a side hustle, part-time, full-time, whether you're looking to pivot your career. And the fact that you're watching this episode, you're with me on this podcast, means that you found some value in ergonomics, and maybe you're a bit disillusioned about what it takes to succeed because there's so much confusion in the marketplace. And I get that. And as an ergonomist who has been in this world for 20 years, I humbly apologize because it is confusing So as a background, I have consulted to Fortune 500, Fortune 100 companies. I've worked with workers' compensation boards, implementing participatory ergonomics frameworks. I've done some disability management. I've worked as the program manager of a huge organization's ergonomics program, and then I finally started to consult with my own company, which brings me to what I'm doing now, and I help healthcare professionals get into ergonomics assessments in the office, and I teach you how to scale your ergonomics business with plug-and-play and done-for-you resources so it doesn't take any more of your time. If you're a healthcare professional that sees this industry as a growth industry, then my friend, you've hit the nail on the head because there is so much opportunity. On the side, I want you to do like a really quick Google search right now. I want you to Google ergonomics consultants and your city. Do it right now. Do it in the background while you're listening to this episode, because there's so much value to know that there is not a lot of people who are doing this in your city. And what I want you to do is think back to other types of Companies in your city, whether it's like an occupational therapist, a physical therapist, massage therapist, or chiropractor, there's such an upside to learning at least office ergonomics assessments. Because when you compare it to other industries, other professions where they're almost on every street corner, There's hardly anyone who is practicing ergonomics in the world of consulting, which is a blue ocean for you, okay? Especially when you think about all the people who are required to go into those clinics because they are actively injured by something happening in their personal life or in their work life. So it's not a matter of if an injury's gonna happen, it's a matter of when. And where do those people go once they get injured? They go back to work. Who's helping them improve the overall fit of their offices? There's not a lot of resources. So that's why it's a blue ocean to get into ergonomics, okay? So that may have piqued your interest, and you decide to take a private label course, because most of the time when you are starting in office ergonomics assessments for instance, it's a lot simpler to take a private label course. Me personally, do I have specific office ergonomics assessment certification? Nope. Absolutely not. You don't need certification to get started. And for many years until I received my certification through the BCPE, I didn't have anything. I had my degree in kinesiology, and that was fine. Did anyone ask me if I was a certified ergonomist before I actually had that after my name? No. Did I not get a job because of that? Nope. Was I trained? Yep. Was I competent? Yep. So if you are interested in ergonomics assessments, how can you get started? Well, you can either go through a mentorship type of program like I did. I was hired on, I was interning for a couple years. That's where I got trained, not to mention everything I received specializing in ergonomics in my undergrad and my graduate degree. So that was really helpful. But if you don't have that opportunity, what can you do? Number one, you could read a lot of books. You can research the internet. Number two, you can take a private label course. What is a private label course? It's some sort of company's process of their version of office ergonomics assessments. Not every private label course is equal, and if you are a consumer, you truly have to do your due diligence. You gotta look at what the whole purpose of that office ergonomics course is, who designed it, because that's gonna set you up for success or failure down the line. I have seen so many certified ergonomics courses out there that, in my humble opinion, does nothing but screw you up in terms of taking your money, and does it actually provide a framework for you to get success? Not at all. Now, don't get me wrong, there's a lot of quality courses out there, but do your dul- diligence to see who developed that course, what the scope of their practice is, what that course is going to get you. How many courses do you need to take to become competent and confident as an office ergonomic assessor? So that's really something as I think of as a step one to getting a good idea of what it takes to be successful, getting the right training so that you can be competent and confident, okay? That's number one. Not every training course is gonna be the same. Hey, fun fact, did you know that have a course too. If you haven't already got the course, get the ergonomics blueprint. It's gonna teach you how to do office ergonomics assessment from a board-certified professional ergonomist who's been in the industry for 20 years. So You're gonna get all the processes that you need to do an office ergonomics assessment, no matter where you're starting from. So if you've never done one before, you're gonna get the goods, or if you've been doing this before, you're gonna get a really thorough background to how to actually crush this from someone who's done literally thousands of office ergonomics assessments. Not only that, you're gonna get the support that you need to get out there and do it. What does that mean? I'm glad you asked. If you are doing an assessment and you come up with a really strange scenario, reach out to me on the Discord. You'll get some quick feedback about what works and what doesn't work in that particular situation Not only that, you're gonna get a good idea of the types of equipment to recommend. You're not just gonna get a process. you're actually gonna learn what to recommend, right? If it's a keyboard or a keyboard tray or a mouse. You're gonna find out what you should be recommending, 'cause there are design specifications that you need to know about And y'all, I gotta talk to you about something that's really important about the ergonomics training industry You might think that taking an office ergonomics course is going to allow you to get paying clients, make a lot of money, because you can make a lot of money doing office ergonomics assessments. All you really need is your noggin, your brain, and a tape measure. That's all you need. You don't need to have really fancy equipment. You just gotta go out there and provide value. You might be asking yourself how much can you actually be making with this? I'm glad you asked. You can make anywhere between 300 to $1,000 for one one-on-one office ergonomic assessment. Of course, that includes an assessment and report. So you might be looking at that with eyes wide open thinking, "Yes, this is what I need, a side hustle, part-time. I wanna work for myself. I'm not gonna be burned out in my regular profession. I'm gonna make my hours. I'm gonna make more money so I can spend it on where I need it to be spent." That is all yours with office ergonomics But here's the thing, if you take most office ergonomics courses out there, you're only ever getting half of the problem They teach the assessment. They teach you how to evaluate a workstation, how to identify risk factors, and if you're lucky, how to do a root cause analysis on how to make a recommendation. This is the most important half, obviously. The clinical competency is the foundation to anyone going out there and trying to sell this as a service. And I'm not dismissing this for a second. It's so important. But here's the catch-22. You finish the course. You're trained. You're competent. You're confident because you are trained, right? You know how to solve problems. And Then you sit down at your desk and you're, like, scratching your head, and you're like, "Wait a minute. How do I actually get people to come into my ergonomics service business?" But it's not your fault. Okay? Let's get on the same page. It's not your fault. You went to school, you learned a healthcare profession, and you were narrowed in and focused on that particular profession. Maybe you took a course in marketing or how to design a website or something like that, but that was probably years and years ago, and whatever you learned in marketing or website design is not even relevant anymore the way that our world is going, right? So what is marketing in the first place? It makes the sale easier. And if you wanna look at that opportunity of doing office ergonomics assessments, and you're thinking of all the demand that's out there, you're gonna have to learn how to market and sell your services. That's no if, ands, or buts. You gotta learn how to do it, especially if you wanna get the glory and the freedom with being self-employed and building a schedule that works for you, whatever that means I've been in this industry for some time. I've been talking to healthcare professionals for years about how to develop and get the second half of that equation. I've received questions like, "How do you get clients? How do you reach out to HR managers? Who do you reach out to in a company in the first place? How do you get in front of the safety director who could bring you in for literally 100 assessments? Think about how that could change your life. It totally can. How do you price your services in the first place? How do you write a proposal? How do you handle a client who asks why they should pay for an assessment when they already bought new chairs? All of this is really important And yet, all of that is what determines whether your ergonomics practice actually exists or whether it's just a certification you paid for and never used. It's collecting electronic dust on your computer. But the point of this conversation is not about what I can bring to the table. It's about what the industry in general thinks is appropriate. And the fact of the matter is, it's the marketing and the sales that brings customers in, and this is never talked about in many, if not 99% of all office ergonomics courses how to do that, with the exception of what I bring to the table. I've talked to so many healthcare professionals who are genuinely excellent at assessments. Their clinical reasoning is sound. Their recommendations are good, and they're based on the root cause of the situation But they're not getting the traction in their businesses. They're not getting the marketing in their businesses. It's because no one taught them how to do it So whether you're building a side hustle, adding ergonomics to an existing practice, or going all in with your own consulting business, it literally doesn't matter. The pattern is the same, and if you're not building marketing in to what you're doing, maybe even before, it actually matters. Without a client pipeline, the skills simply don't get used, and, like, that is the biggest thing that needs to be addressed in our industry And this is the catch-22, without the skills being used, you don't get better at it. You don't build the confidence through experience, and eventually the whole thing just stalls, it fizzles out. It's gonna be on that conversation point where, "Oh, yeah, I know how to do office ergonomics assessments." Well, do you do them?" no, I don't" The ergonomics training industry has created a quiet epidemic of well-trained, invisible practitioners. They're competent people who can't be found. And the market, which genuinely needs them as we address it's not a matter of if an injury happens, it's a matter of when, and people are already going to clinics trying to get some pain reduction. And this is the thing that just crushes my heart because people genuinely need them, they're trying to get help by people who are the most visible. And those people who are the most visible doing office ergonomics assessments, they're not always the people who are actually the most skilled So two things are true at the same time right now, and almost no one is connecting them. Back, neck, and joint pain are the most expensive chronic health condition in North America, with over $300 billion a year, more than cancer, more than diabetes, and the number two reason people miss work. You can look up the stats of musculoskeletal disorders. It's going on about 50% of all work-related injuries are a musculoskeletal disorder, and that is directly resultant of someone's ergonomics setup. and at exactly the same time as this pandemic of ergonomic-related injuries, new businesses formation is also at record highs. The demand is real. the practitioners are clearly out there. It's really easy to see this. You just have to go on LinkedIn, and you can see people with some acronyms, being trained in office ergonomics assessments being out there. They're out there, but are they busy? That's the thing. The gap is visibility. It's not skill. And learning how to market yourself as an ergonomics practitioner is the difference that makes the difference And that's the real problem, right? It's not that qualified ergonomists don't exist. They do It's not that companies don't need ergonomics right now, especially in the recession that we're in. The gap is that people who need the service can't find the people that provide it, 100%. And the training world is only solving the competency side, if that, not the visibility side So not only did we address the musculoskeletal concerns that I personally have as an observer to injury trends in the world, not only that, I have noted the regulatory environment. You might be asking yourself, what exactly does that mean? Well, we're talking about like OSHA and more government agencies that are tightening and people are a little bit more interested in musculoskeletal issues. governments are requiring ergonomics assessments in specific sectors. And it doesn't take a scientist to figure what that is. We're talking about various states around the United States that have this, and we're looking at, Europe even more so, right? More unions are negotiating ergonomics provisions into collective agreements because they know that they need it to protect their workers from injuries that could change their lives. More HR leaders post-pandemic are genuinely asking, "How do we take care of people who are no longer sitting in our building? Where can we see them?" So the demand for qualified ergonomics consultants has genuinely never been higher. And most of the qualified practitioners I know are either underemployed in their practice or stuck in a salaried position doing exactly the same work at a fraction of their earning potential because no one ever taught them how to get into the business. I want to say this as directly as I can. The barrier right now for most trained ergonomics professionals is not skill. It's visibility. It is knowing how to reach the people who need what you do, and having something to say when you reach them, providing value, providing context. And then having the systems in place to turn an initial conversation into a client relationship. That's all marketing is. It's making the sale easier by providing value and building the relationship. It's not rocket science, yet if you're not consistently doing this as an ergonomics practitioner, you're literally leaving opportunity and money on the table The really neat thing about this is that marketing is fun. It's a learnable skill set. Obviously, no one wakes up being a absolute guru at marketing. It's not mysterious either It's not innate to some people and then to others. It can be learned, it can be built, it can be systemized by doing consistent actions to get you closer to where you wanna be The issue, in my humble opinion, is that no one is teaching ergonomists to do this alongside assessment training, and that is a huge opportunity. Even if you pick one simple marketing action for, like, a month to do that, you are literally light years ahead of so many other ergonomics professionals, especially if you wanna do this as a self-employed person, like a side hustle, part-time. I'm so passionate about this because I was once in your shoes. I had all of the experience in the world doing ergonomics assessments in industry and office. So I thought when I broke away from corporate that this was gonna be so easy. Companies need my help. So how hard could it be just to get one paying client? Well, it turns out it is really hard because they don't teach you how to do this stuff in school, and it brings out a lot of personal insecurities about going out there and talking to strangers and really questioning whether you have the right answers to get out in front of them And when we're going out there looking for a contract, looking to build a relationship with a company, that rejection fear can be so loud for so many of us But it's then you realize it's less about a once in the dark shot to start a relationship with a company. It's more about providing value to that company in a marketable way, reaching out to that company in a marketable way, instead of demanding for a sale when you've never really done that before in your life. Because maybe you've only been an in-house ergonomist or you have only worked as an OT and or a PT. There is a way to go about building a relationship. But the fact of the matter is, because as office ergonomics practitioners, that's really what we're talking about today, when you take a course, they don't teach you how to do that. And I think that is a fundamental issue with the ergonomics industry There's that idea of the ergonomics professional who's highly skilled, has all the certifications, but is invisible and is not actually serving their market, even though we know that people are injured The company that needs ergonomics help, they simply don't know that they can find a qualified practitioner. They just think that ergonomics isn't available or isn't relevant to them Somebody with half the skill and twice the visibility can get there first. and that's not bad for the profession, it's bad for the clients. It's bad for the practitioners who did the work to get genuinely competent and then couldn't get in front of anyone So this brings the conversation to something a little bit different I wanna talk about something that comes up when I talk to practitioners and things that I have witnessed from practitioners over the years, especially the recent years. They know they need to do the business side. They know they need to market themselves. They know they need to find paying clients, obviously. But as a shortcut, like magical pill next step, they use chatbots to help them write content, draft proposals, and come up with marketing ideas. And I'm not saying that's wrong I'm not anti-AI. I use it myself. It has real uses, especially when we talk about the Pareto Principle, it helps us leverage and scale so much of what we're doing. However, it cannot replace your voice and it cannot replace a sound technical process and relying on chatbots for, like, every next step in your business isn't the solution either, because sometimes you just need someone who has gone through an ergonomics issue, And this is why I'm so passionate about this stuff. Literally, it's the certification trap. Just because you are certified doing office ergonomics assessments, the question is, who certified you? Does that mean you're gonna get clients that someone just sees, "Oh, she's certified. Here, take my money." That's generally not how business works. You have to provide value to get clients so that you can do the skill that you learnt. But there's the thing, they don't teach you the marketing process in so many ergonomics courses out there, and that's why I'm so passionate about this. I've seen so many qualified ergonomists just quit and get a corporate job. They go back to their nine-to-five. However, it doesn't have to be that way at all. In my program, Accelerate, I give you all of the tools so that you can succeed to build a business and life that you love. this program is built on time-saving resources that you can access with the touch of a button, a community that absolutely can help you get to where you need to be, done-for-you resources. Everything that a professional ergonomist needs to start building their marketing system and spend less time on the $15-an-hour tasks. What do I think about $15-an-hour tasks? What does that mean? What's that anyway? A $15-an-hour task is legitimately something that would cost you $15 an hour to do. So think of it like Canva, graphic design, things like that. As a CEO, you gotta think of things that will move your business forward, especially if you are looking at making $75 an hour, something like that. You gotta be looking at the $75-an-hour tasks, not the $15-an-hour tasks. Learning how to market your business and taking the steps to build those relationships with corporate, is that a $75-an-hour task? Absolutely. Making a Canva graphic, is that a $75-an-hour task that will move your business forward? Absolutely not. At the core, this is what Accelerate the Business of Ergonomics does for you and your business. So I'm gonna leave a link below this video for you to get started, see what it's all about. Because this gives you the tools to move your business forward. However, the fact of this matter still relates that b- just because you took an ergonomics course doesn't mean that you're gonna get money doing this in-demand service. You gotta market to get paying clients, and that has been the downfall of the ergonomics industry for decades. This is what holds competent people back from where they are right now to building a business and life that they love, and that's why I'm so passionate about this. There's so much upswing to learning how to market yourself as an ergonomics professional, and if you want to hear more about it, then subscribe because I'm gonna give you the goods.