Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Achiko SaGa. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alright, Achiko thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Being a business owner can be really hard sometimes. It’s rewarding, but most business owners we’ve spoken sometimes think about what it would have been like to have had a regular job instead. Have you ever wondered that yourself? Maybe you can talk to us about a time when you felt this way?

Last option in the drop down menu was “taking the risk”, which I think goes along with the being happy as a business owner. I had, so called regular job before, and while many people find it appealing, for me it was very stagnant and non challenging. Business owners take a huge risk, especially in dancing world. People tend to think that it is not a real job, that it is just a side gig. Well a regular job can become a side gig very quickly too if you are not good at it. The advantage here is that when you are a business owner you have a huge potential over regular job, the growth. Most regular jobs give you a salary increase of 2% annually and 2 or maybe 3 weeks vacation a year. But in my particular situation, if I plan thing accordingly, sometimes by taking a vacation I can get paid because I am giving a workshop at the venue I am going to or performing there.. It all comes down to how much you invest in yourself and your business. I practice very often in order to learn new moves and improve myself as a dancer. I work very hard to generate clients for my classes and once they are in I pay attention to them and treat them with respect. I know they come for lessons but I also know they come from work, home, life, stress etc… That is why I try to create friendly environment in the studio during the lessons, which is the key element of having a success in this line of business. Maybe it was a risk at the beginning but I would do it again if I had a chance because I always believed in myself that I could do it and I was always ready to improve myself to show my students that their instructor is also improving by giving them even more motivation to improve further.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Before coming to USA I was competing in ballroom dancing and I am grateful for that experience. But when I came here I was exposed to social dancing, which is mainly Salsa, Bachata and Kizomba. Those dances are called social because everyone can relate to them and everyone can do it. It does not make them easy, but everyone has a chance to be good at it. I was amazed how well these dances were structured and started to get into them almost immediately. Throughout the years I have managed to absorb technique and develop my own teaching methodology. Any person who follows my method will start dancing in just several months and feel confident about that too. My approach is not just physical, it is a mental state as well. Social dancing is a projection of social behavior on the dance floor. Therefore the lead always has to have a leader’s mentality and follower always follows. Keyword here is always. I soon discovered how positively it affected the learning outcome for my students.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Back in 2016 when I was a consultant in environmental field I had to rethink my career because of lack of funding in this field. I tried many interviews but job offers I was getting were very unappealing. That was the moment where I decided to pivot my career to teaching. I considered my options, found the venue and started organizing my classes. At first it was hard and Covid pandemic did not help either, but soon after it became gradual success. Currently classes are more attended and there are more bookings for private events. Therefore the pivot really worked for me. I have less stress and more pleasure and validation out of work that I am doing.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

What helps to build the reputation in this market is to be congruent. For all these years I have been dedicating my time to become a better version of me by practicing my moves as well as improving on my teaching skills. As a result people see and appreciate your work. This, I think is the way to build your reputation.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.sagadancers.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/achikosaga
• Facebook: Facebook.com/achikosaga
• Youtube: YouTube.com/achikoz

Image Credits
I have the right for the pictures