Hiring, Vetting, and Training In Home Music Teachers:  10 Ways to End Churn and Build a Staff that Stays

Empowering your staff of in home music teachers to succeed and provide a high quality of service is the goal of the best music school owners and the key to growth.  But creating this type of team to execute your music education vision is a supreme-challenge that requires more than a strong interview process and a good first-month of teaching in students’ houses. 

A truly effective leader never stops working on their hiring, vetting, and training process for their staff.  To make matters more complicated, it’s also a process that must adapt to various levels of professionals simultaneously without upsetting protective egos.

And yes, catering to the egos of your staff is a thing you must do when you own a music school that other industries do not understand.  I will not continue the gaslighting.  It’s actually essential and a positive.

Ultimately, the staff of a music school is what makes or breaks the program, the retention rates, and the revenue.  It then makes sense that maintaining the most effective staff is vital to your operation – and in our opinion – the secret to growth and success.

Read more on this topic in our guide to leadership coaching for business growth.

In our guide to building an effective in-home teaching staff, we outline how turnover affects your program and why the music lessons industry is different.  We also share the best practices for hiring, training, and vetting music teachers that make the greatest impact, so you can stop the enrollment churn and start growing!

The true cost of music teacher turnover for your in-home program

In many industries, the exit of a key professional could cause a client to exit as well.  But what if every member of your team was that key professional and would lead to some type of revenue loss if they left?

This is the challenge that music school owners face, because the teacher is the most vital part of the teaching relationship with any given student.  They hold the power of retention in their hands, and you really feel it when they leave.

When a music school owner understands this and really feels that impact, catering to their team becomes a necessary part of the job, just as much as providing quality customer service to clients.  This should not feel like pandering to your group to encourage work, though.  Instead, if you own a music school, I want you to try-on a different perspective: 

The in-home music teacher who works on your staff is ALSO your client…just as a student and their family are.  As a music school program, you are actually serving two sides of the lessons-equation and two clients.

By adopting this perspective, you realize providing ways for your staff of music teachers to be as successful as possible at what they do and make their job easy is essential. 

You can start to see how you provide teachers a service too.  Just as the teacher helps their students, the music teachers on staff are helped and fostered by the music program.

Why are in-home music teachers a different kind of hire?

An on-location provider – like a traveling music teacher – must make part of the service investment in the entire product the student is receiving through the added labor of driving to the family’s home.  And on the service end, they are the ones actually implementing the work through giving the lesson too.

The obvious questions are, “what are you doing for mobile teachers as a music school that they can’t do for themselves?” 

And as a music school owner, “can I trust this person I don’t see regularly to do a great job with the lessons they are teaching that represents my program well?”

There is trepidation on both sides, and there is a symbiosis that must occur to make this type of business relationship work…the in-home teacher working for a company that facilitates their lessons.

On the school’s end, you will be seeking the best quality musician along with a person who can follow guidelines of basic professionalism when going to the home of a client.  Sounds easy enough so far.

Here is the curve-ball:  this person must also enjoy, or at least not mind, driving…a lot.  And they must be responsible enough to manage the driving part and routes, schedule changes, and reporting the completion of lessons accurately on all ends. Oh yes – and they will be the first line of communication with all their students too for updates.

Now we see the dilemma.  This is a lot for a music teacher to manage when their primary craft is teaching a student to play an instrument.  How aligned do you think the average creative personality is with all the rules and logistics associated with this job?

Not too many.  But that is not the fault of the music teachers – it’s the fault of the organizations scheduling them. 

The teacher management mistakes in home music lessons programs make

You see, in home music lessons programs are not generally set up to work in the teacher’s favor as a priority.  They work towards offering the most service, and this repetitive logistical stress wears down great music teachers who could give in home lessons and thrive if the factors were set up better.

On the music school end, I feel you!  It’s hard to wait list family after family for in home lessons and have teachers who need work simultaneously.  You are connecting dots. 

The issue is that we fail as leaders on creating the hiring, vetting, and training support needed throughout the process to really keep these in home music lessons all together for the teacher.  Too often we are looking only at the musical and teaching resume, not the professional factors that make in home lessons successful, and that’s where you can start changing things around for your school. 

What are the ideal in-home music teacher personality traits that predict success?

The ideal teacher for in-home music lessons is the individual who is an expert with their instrument and wants to give lessons, but be extremely independent as well.  They are responsible enough to manage a fixed schedule that requires periodic adjustments, as well as routine communications from their clients.

My teaching story – the ideal in-home piano teacher

I was a text-book candidate for teaching in-home piano lessons once upon a time – before I knew my own talents and abilities in business development and management. I was just 21 years old and living in Atlanta. 

This is where my journey began and how I got my start in teaching over 20 years ago. This one job was an experience that changed my career.

I always think back to what drew me to that in-home teaching position years ago and what factors in my life were present that made it so perfect an opportunity.  Because it was at the time – a perfect opportunity for me that I immensely enjoyed. Many of my peers did not say the same, though, and had a different experience.

At 21 when I was hired, I was starting my senior year of music school at Georgia State University and finishing my degree. My in-home teaching position was my part-time job. 

The fact that I could go TO students to for the lessons instead of needing a home fit for visitors was a revelation, because in 2006, I was not living in an environment that would allow for students to come to me. Going to them seemed like a turn of good fortune.

I also was highly qualified to be a piano teacher, but I had no teaching experience.  I was majoring in music, so I had taken weekly lessons for most of my life at that point, but had not given one.  The fact that I would be able to “practice teaching” away from the direct oversight of a manager made me feel more free to explore the role.

As a bonus, I wouldn’t be chained to one location all day, and my college-brain loved that.  After 30-60 minutes, I would be off and away to the next lesson, and that constant change matched my energy at the time.

Some of my friends who worked for the same company did not embrace this role the same way, and they were the ones who complained.  Many told me they felt swindled by an organization that only schedules the lessons and runs the books, but not much more. The word “middle-man” was also thrown around a bit – referring to the in home program.

As you can see, this is a vastly different perspective between myself and my friends doing the same job!  Music school owners MUST be attuned to this sentiment out the gate and monitor for these negative belief systems from an incoming teacher. This position will be a poor fit for all without that early detection.

How can you tell if a candidate is the wrong fit for in-home teaching?

When I moved into the ownership and management side of running an in-home program, I had experienced the teacher-side for so long that it deeply influenced how I worked with my team.

For instance, my go-to system for finding the teachers who would not enjoy in home teaching was listening for statements like “I don’t want to be in the car to a lesson longer than I am teaching” and “that breaks down to (x) per minute, which isn’t worth my time” on their interviews.  

These teachers were obviously not the right match for teaching on-location, because they already did not see the value in this way of giving lessons. The driving experience already felt painful before they even tried it, and they are proving they cannot see where the ROI comes in for them.

If you listen for these cues, this group can be easy to spot.

The larger issue music schools have to fight is when this sentiment builds over time with their staff, due to lack of support, or work, from the organization housing the lessons.  The teachers are strong and started that way, but your program is turning them off month by month from the arrangement.

Going back to “the teacher is your 2^nd client”, this makes sense.  As an organization, you must keep feeding your staff and serving them to earn their trust in overseeing a studio they could very-well build for themselves.

Failure to serve your team will lead to massive resentment, and honestly, I have to side with the teacher on this. What are you doing in the engagement to help them after the lessons start and for all the months after?

A good business cannot put all the responsibilities for running the in-home lessons on their staff without contributing and providing continuous benefit as well. Therefore, in home music schools must provide a service to this group too and seek out teachers who are looking for what they have to offer. 

The ideal teacher is the individual who allows you to serve them while working with you to provide the highest quality service to your mutual client – the student.

How do we make this level of service and symbiosis possible? 

We show you our process with our 10 essential best practices for building your in home music instruction staff – and keeping them.

10 Best Practices for Building an In-Home Teacher Team that Lasts

Keep the idea of “the teacher is your client” in mind as you consider the strategies here.

Practice I: Hire for musical proficiency PLUS trainability

Musical proficiency points on candidates’ resumes are super easy to spot when you have been running a music school for any amount of time.  And if not, I can give you a shortcut:  do you see a credible degree in music listed? 

If yes, that candidate is a “go” for their primary instrument.  If they have more than one degree, they are even more qualified to teach that instrument, and probably more.  Simple.

All the other points you will need to determine, are much more important than the music degree, though. The challenge is that these details are nuanced and harder to find, but necessary if a long-term teaching engagement will be created that goes on for years.

A music degree and a background check are screening points.  You don’t get through the gate when you don’t have these.  So what do you look for otherwise?

Through your hiring process, build in subtle internal checks for trainability that you note and use to make a decision on moving forward. 

For example, adding onboarding steps during the interview process that require the completion of a set of autonomous tasks to turn in by a certain date.  Those who cannot complete this type of systematic task per instruction is likely ruling themselves out for you.

Practice II:  Reward internal referrals – especially from teachers you trust

Any referrals are a compliment to your program and music school, so never fail to reward those that lead to a new student sign-up.  There is always a sub-set of the “best and brightest” teachers within any school, though, and they should be a big focus to you and your staffing efforts.

The teachers you trust and who do a great job with lessons are the teachers you would clone if it were at all possible.  You know who they are as a leader. Though we do not have cloning technology yet, the next best thing is asking them for referrals of other musicians they know.

Excellence tends to surround itself with excellence, and musicians run in flocks from different schools and ensembles.  Finding like-minded musicians and conveying your trust to a staff member who is doing a great job on your team is a win-win, so make sure to explore this opportunity with strategy.

You will hit a home-run with staff development by handsomely rewarding these high performing teachers with bonuses for any referrals and additional staff members they connect you to.  Showing your appreciation will build more trust with your best team members, and bringing on others they know will only strengthen your community.

Practice III:  Integrate vetting into hiring – build stages that reveal true colors

When I was running at music school, my hiring processes merged together with the interview processes and beyond.  I would have around 3-4 “drop off points” where a teacher-candidate may not move forward to the next step in the onboarding process.

This vetting was merged into the actual job training, so it worked efficiently as a system for getting a teacher ready while still evaluating how they operate on my end.

Staging out hiring and onboarding as steps was a concept I developed over time and through actual pain-points I was resolving.  I had been duped one too many times by over-eager music teachers who told me everything I wanted to hear, passed the interviews and training with flying colors, then turned out to be total disappointments a month later.

I hope to save you that pain by suggesting a better alternative. 

The draw-back with my hiring and vetting plan is that I have trained SO MANY music teachers in my day who never taught a lesson with a student in my school.  But this is a fine sacrifice. 

I would much rather take the hit on my time and a couple virtual hours wasted than to send a teacher out to a family’s home who is not representing our brand well.  Or worse, who does a great job for 4 lessons, then takes another position – leaving the family high and dry.

Practice IV:  Let candidates exit. Why failure to follow instructions is a red flag

Elaborating a little further on Practice III and any red flags a candidate is giving you – you must take these warning signs seriously when you see them in the hiring process if you are a music school owner.

Musicians applying for your job are truly incredible people and artists.  Whether they can teach a single lesson, or not, it is very easy to get blinded by the excellence this individual demonstrates on the guitar, or on the piano.  Don’t let this admiration curb your best professional judgement.

The truth is that a great player is not the same thing as a great music teacher.  Instruction requires total dedication to the student, rather than to their own craft. 

In fact, most top-level performers only teach in limited settings, like masterclasses, clinics, or in academia.  The average champion-performer does not have long-term, ongoing elementary students they are developing over years. They are more focused on touring, collaborations, and being in front of an audience.

Performing and teaching are different jobs. They are separate concentrations in music school for a reason, my friends.

The key to the best hiring decisions is learning to allow these candidates who will not be a good fit for you to filter themselves out. You do this by relying on the cues they are giving you, not their skill, as the measure.

Example – if an amazing pianist applies for your position and gets through the initial processes, but delays with the pre-requisite paperwork needed for the next interview, or does not send back their signed agreement by the deadline, don’t push or stress.  Just watch.

Those who are not the right fit for your in home music lessons program will stop the process on their own, or will give you good reason not to move forward. 

Let them, and PLAN for it!  Never chase a teacher. This is the secret part of your hiring process that gives you the best insights for developing your team.

Practice V: Train teachers on pedagogy, professionalism, and where the two intersect

Pedagogical training is the musical development side of mentoring a teacher and building a successful staff. It’s the “teaching teachers how to teach” part of the training process, and it centers around teaching musical concepts effectively for us.

The teaching side of staff onboarding was where I would get out the Faber Piano Adventures method and teach incoming instructors how to use the two / four books together, and what to look for with technique, theory, and performance milestones.

Then, the professionalism side of training for teachers was a separate meeting that covered first lesson calls, how to talk about cancellations with parents, how to submit lesson records verifying a session was complete, etc. 

The most important part of the training process was where pedagogy and professionalism intersect, rather than each area on its own.  The way we teach music must be done with best practices that merge something as simple as the way we greet a student with the musical impact that greeting could have.

An example in home teachers can relate to: when you are on the road and getting to a student’s home for a lesson, delays can happen when en route. If you enter a family’s home looking disheveled, running late, and your student is calm and collected – ready to start their session – we are already starting with an energy mismatch, and we need to rebalance ASAP. 

Without a repair to the overall energy after starting off late, the student experiences the ripple effect from this time frustration and is unable to perform their best work in the lesson. Now their impacted experience further adds to the accumulating frustration.

See how the professional side and environment management impacts this student?  This is a real situation that happens in almost every mobile teacher’s lessons at some point too.  The rush and lateness is a by-product of traveling to students in heavy traffic. 

The best music schools understand these pain points and train their teachers to manage this very stressful situation gracefully, so it doesn’t interfere with their students’ learning.

Practice VI: Make training dynamic, not one-size-fits-all

At the start of this piece, I mentioned dancing around egos and managing these within your staff of in home music teachers, and this is where we explain more. 

First, more on the ego concept…

Any musical artist – myself included – has some portion of themselves that is still sensitive and fragile.  It’s the quality that allows us to pick up on the emotional nuances in music and bring out subtle differences in frequencies that create an impact for our audiences.  We need this sensitivity as musicians.

However, the “fragile being within” is not at ease when in public – especially on stage.  So as artists, we bury that sensitive person under a highly-rehearsed character of confidence to execute the artistry.  Without that, we would not be able to subject ourselves to the performance-level judgement of others repeatedly.

This is true for both introverts and extroverts, and not every performing artist even realizes this about themselves.

How does this confident artist persona factor into teaching?  Music school owners are managing an entire team that has worked very hard to receive esteem for their individual levels of proficiency on stage and in performance, as well as in their work with students.      

The worst thing you can do when hiring and vetting these individuals is to give them a one-size-fits-all training plan that fails to recognize their specific skill level.

You must contour the level of education needed to the level of the teacher.  Failure to do so is an affront to their uniqueness in the music space and individual accomplishments they have earned.  The lack of consideration hurts egos.

Instead, a training process that actually honors how much a teacher already knows, or what they are missing as an individual, then works on those areas will build trust.  This thoughtfulness signals to your staff member you recognize what they do well and where you can be a unique asset to them. 

Practice VII: Start with a trial run before you book a full studio for a new teacher

This one should be an obvious play, but is not a tactic every music school owner, or manager, can afford to implement without intentional pre-planning.  When you have a qualified teacher fully open to receive students on your staff, your instinct can be to load them up and get them as much work as possible.

Incoming teachers even tell us they want full studios when we are hiring them!  What is going wrong when we give them 20 students in the first two-weeks then?

Even if a teacher has given in home lessons before, they probably have not done it exactly like your program.  Logistical differences, drive time expectations, average student ages, and the areas where students live can all affect how overwhelmed – or pleased – a teacher is with the schedule you created for them.

Too often, we found teachers would be overwhelmed from even 10 students when they wanted 20, because they were basing this estimate on how much they wanted to earn.  They were not considering the level of driving, or mental, effort that goes into building a 20 student schedule. 

First-lesson weeks with new students especially demand a lot of prep and attention-investment from a teacher, as everything is new.  By not carefully spreading out start dates in a way that preserves your teacher’s mental-health, you could end up with a staff-member who burns out in three weeks and needs you to stop scheduling them immediately.

The process I found to be effective was to set a minimum baseline of 10 students for new teachers across three afternoons, or weekend days. 

Then, spread out these new student additions, so there are no more than three new families starting in the same week.

10 students per week will feel full to an in home teacher, but should not take more than a part-time commitment.  Plus, we allowed teachers to pause scheduling after that baseline was reached, allowing them space to settle in with their first group.

Once implemented, most teachers only wanted the 10 students that got them to our minimum… at all.  Only a portion wanted a true full-time schedule once they saw how the work went in motion, and this strategic stop point helped our teaching team succeed. 

Some teachers actually wanted less than 10 students, and that gave us an additional filter-point to stop the onboarding process.  On our school’s end, we know it is also not worth our time to start a teacher who only wants 3-5 students, so we could easily rule these individuals out too.

Practice VIII:  Treat training as a journey, not a checklist

I have some bad news for music school owners who want to set-and-forget their music teaching staffs…

That is impossible.  A staff of music teachers – even very independent ones who are great at their jobs – cannot be turned loose without guidance and be expected to perform well over a long period of time.  They need support and leadership, even from afar.

Training for your teachers is not a checklist of completed quizzes and sessions you give them before they start, or even over the year. 

Instead, it is a journey and access to constant support for the real student situations they are facing at this moment. 

Becoming a great music teacher requires accumulating experiences and learning from them.  As a music school, you are providing this platform for instruction, so you should also be providing the solutions for real pain points that come up.

As an example – developing strong cancellation communication and boundaries for some teachers is a challenge.  It’s a struggle that is a bit personality-based, but broad enough that over 50% of teachers have had some struggle and evolution with their process. 

To effectively train your staff, being available to help teachers in the moment when they are faced with a tough make up, or cancellation situation will make the greatest impact – both in the moment and for your teacher’s future.

Those teachable moments can only happen when a constant training process is part of the support-experience for your teachers…not just a routine check point everyone is required to complete.

Practice IX: Build a training-enabled environment with ongoing mentorship

Much like Practice VIII, our 9^th best practice is to build an environment of ongoing mentorship for your team.  This means the culture of your in-home program invites its teachers to lean on the company and managers for consistent support, as well as making it easy to reach an administrative point of contact with ease.

Just extending the opportunity to reach out any time is not enough to create an environment of support, though.  It also takes proactive work on the part of the owner and administrators to invite teachers in to the process.  This is the part that takes effort.

As an owner, the best way to signal to your in home music instruction staff that you are a source of help is to treat every communication from your teachers as very important to you and an opportunity to connect.

Example: if a teacher needs help submitting their invoice for completed lessons to the office so they get paid, I answer their question as quickly as possible.  They move up to the front of the line.  I give them a clear explanation, help for the future, and invite them to reach out if I can be of assistance with the next one. I welcome any other questions and reinforce this door is always open.

This approach makes everyone feel more comfortable. We are working together to provide a service, and my job as an admin is to help the teacher succeed. We cover for them when they f-up, we take on the tough conversations. We make our role valuable to them as well.

What I do not do is say when a teacher reaches out is, “refer to your teacher handbook”, or “we went over this in your training.” 

I’ll teach them as many times as I need to for them to genuinely understand the ins and outs of what they need to do, unless the error / question by the teacher is from a place of disrespect. 

Make yourself open to help your staff and prioritize your teachers’ questions.  You will find a lot of issues are resolved easily when your staff does not have to make all the decisions, or remember all the policies the first time. Instead, you teach all of this along the way.

Key Takeaway: in the relationship between school and teacher, ongoing administrative and pedagogical support becomes the service you give to your teachers.  Having on-demand help to relieve typical business stresses is the aspect of working through an in-home program that makes this arrangement worthwhile for a freelance music instructor.

Practice X: Know when to cut the cord – for your teacher and your families

Vetting your team members does not stop once they are fully on your staff, and the same goes for students and families who are fully enrolled.  Working together is an ongoing collaboration that requires consistent and repeated investment from both parties.

If your staff member is unable to keep up with the responsibilities of your in home lessons opportunity and fulfill the level of service expected in practice, it’s time to cut the cord.

The individuals who are not a good fit for your program will set a bad standard within your current student base, as well as with other teachers.

In Conclusion – Your In Home Teachers are Your Music School’s Growth Engine

We hope this article has not only given you ideas for sharpening your hiring, vetting, and training processes for in home teachers – we hope you have a deeper understanding of how valuable this group is within your organization.

Truly, your teachers will make or break your in-home lessons.  They can send you into spirals of enrollment churn, or by contrast, enable your program to grow to over 800 active students per week.

When we, as music school owners, stop treating our teaching staff like replaceable employees and contractors – and start seeing them as another part of our clientele to manage – things change in our schools. Community is created, and true learning happens for your students due to continuity of instruction.

The results I experienced from adopting this mentality for my program is what allowed me to serve our school’s staff of 85 amazing individuals – and hundreds more teachers over 16 years – who saw the value in working with my program, instead of feeling we were their only option to teach.

You don’t have to be a perfect leader to show your teaching team you care.  You just have to be open and ready to help in every way you can with making their job a little bit easier.  And with this shift, you will be on your way to reaching for the stars with your program!

Are you developing your music school staff, or a similar industry? If so, we know your pain first hand and would love to share strategies for growing your enrollment, while also maintaining balance.

Don’t go it alone! Are you ready to start a leadership training program for yourself, an employee, or your team?  Book a free discovery call with us through our contact form, and receive a customized action-plan and next-steps.