What is CrossFit’s vision?
If you have been following CrossFit since mid-2020, it's more than fair to question if CrossFit has a vision, and/or what should the vision be. I am marking that point in time because that is when the founder sold the company. Curiously, the new CEO has effectively disappeared. (In fairness, they do have a temporary CEO right now). To answer these questions, let’s first get on the same page about how we got to today.
It's very common for visionary founders to leave their creation, a “manager” to take over, and then the company flounders for a period of time (e.g. Apple). And in retrospect, you could argue that the company needed to go thru that Rubicon-type of journey. “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”. For CrossFit, I believe Greg Glassman (CrossFit’s founder), had become detrimental to the business. In many ways he had created a disruptive business model for the fitness industry — he turned fitness upside down and proved everybody wrong with their “bro-logic” and “big box” business models. But then he decided the CrossFit Games were a circus show, distracting from CrossFit’s core mission, and going all in on transforming the healthcare industry.
Why does this matter?
CrossFit’s model was disruptive because they innovated on product architecture and customer-centricity. They created a people-oriented movement. CrossFit adherent’s (aka community, an important distinction from customers) love the CrossFit Games, and they love the workout methodology, and they love the box community. At the same time, the staff for the Games (aka “Sport of CrossFit”) were learning how to grow the Games and make it a spectacle — how it presents on TV. I’ve talked to people who attended the Games and they referred to it as a “week-long fitness festival”. Also, CrossFit had an incredible media team that took a very different approach to personalizing the athletes (this is part of the product architecture). This was entirely different from how the big sports (MLB, NFL, NBA, and PGA) handle their athletes. CrossFit got inside the athlete’s head, their trials and tribulations, and how they made it to the elite level. People at your local box, could qualify for the Games and be “elite”. And then in 2018, the CEO decided to fire almost the entire media staff, and radically change the Games format. In my opinion, some of those changes were good, such as encouraging world-wide participation, and instituting “cuts”, just like many other sports that have a bracket style of competition to declare a winner. In CrossFit’s case, the winner was called “the fittest in the world”.
And here we are in 2022, just before the CrossFit Games…
Since, mid-2020 you could argue that people have been focused on “saving CrossFit” (tactics), and had almost no time to work on a vision. And in some regards, I would argue that is appropriate. During the pandemic all the “boxes” were shut down. This threatened to kill the one thing that made CrossFit disruptive. The assumptions about how the product was delivered were completely invalidated. And that invalidated the whole customer experience of CrossFit. Fortunately, Dave Castro persevered to conduct the CrossFit Games in 2020. (Side note: this is why the Navy Seals matter — it builds people that persevere against insurmountable odds)
In times of crisis, you could argue that is when it is most important to have a vision. When I worked for Continental Airlines after 9/11, the industry was in crisis and its vision was being challenged. But the chief marketing officer ended up being the most strategic — she created a customer-first strategy that radically shifted the companies’ focus, and propelled Continental to much greater heights.
In contrast, CrossFit lost its CEO and replaced him with a guy who ended up taking a mental health break, and who arguably has had no meaningful positive impact on the company. Now here we are, the world is coming out of pandemic lockdowns, the CEO has resigned and taken a Chairman of the Board position (effectively absent), a temp CEO has been appointed, and Dave Castro has returned in some elusive position which seems focused on rebuilding the product architecture (aka the boxes and the community).
So does CrossFit need a new vision, or does it need to get back to executing its vision, pre 2020? Glassman and Castro were big visible personalities. That matters — it's part of their culture. And culture can slowly change, but not overnight. Communities have to adapt. In the midst of a pandemic is not the time to change culture and community.
The CrossFit vision has to be a vision of “AND”
I’ve stated in a previous post that CrossFit has to focus on the affiliates (a main component of the product architecture), AND it has to figure out the CrossFit Games. The Games can and need to grow. There is an opportunity for the athletes to make real money, TV deals, big time shoe sponsors, etc. AND They have the opportunity to have a product like golf: the elite play it on TV, AND all of us normal people get to play the CrossFit game in our own way at our boxes, AND make ourselves much healthier in the process.
If you step back, and tune out all the negative press CrossFit has received from some corners of the community, I think they are executing the vision elucidated above. Is Dave Castro the “CEO in waiting”? I think so. He needs to go stabilize the community and core product first. He can easily help the Sport team put on the Games, without being the Director of the Games.
Do they need to execute multiple tactics in parallel? Yes! I would argue they have to get the Games figured out, meaning how big they want it to be, how to make the most money for the athletes, and how to maintain the “fitness festival” product feel.
P.S. For entrepreneurs, it's worth noting that CrossFit’s product architecture and customer centricity have created some resiliency. They are able to navigate thru their Rubicon moments.
