In spite of a global pandemic, Mr Guanlao has acquired the master Anytime Fitness franchise licence across all of Asia including Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Taiwan, Vietnam, Hong Kong, and Macau. Based in Sydney, he is the COO of Anytime Fitness Asia and co-founder of Inspire Brands Asia, the company which acquired it.

A former regional GC at Robert Walters, Mr Guanlao told Lawyers Weekly that the transition from corporate lawyer to entrepreneur was not what people may think it is like.

“I remain a qualified lawyer today and am coming up to 14 years [post-admission],” he said.

“The intention was to satisfy an entrepreneurial desire to start my own business that was aligned with my passion, which was health and fitness.” 

Mr Guanlao said that his passion, coupled with the sales skills developed pre-law school in business development days with IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and Compaq allowed him to translate those skills into a business-to-consumer (B2C) format. 

However, rather than selling IT solutions, he was selling gym memberships for a club that he loved.

“I would finish my law work at 6.30pm and drive from the CBD to the gym and get involved. It felt like a [six-month] MBA!” he joked.

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Mr Guanlao soon realised that he had a knack for small business ownership success. 

“We were turning over about $1.1 million with an EBITDA of around 45 per cent, and I quickly purchased my second club while still practising law as an in-house corporate lawyer,” he said.

“I was on a good salary as a lawyer, but this was crazy, it was producing five times that amount. I was hungry.” 

Using legal experience to channel entrepreneurship 

As he continued to grow his gym portfolio, Mr Guanlao reiterated that being a lawyer has assisted immensely with his business dealings throughout his journey. 

Mr Guanlao said he was able to deal with the majority of legal matters encountered including drafting employment contracts, negotiating commercial agreements (including leases and franchise agreements). 

“In terms of contentious work I had a good understanding of risk management and was very comfortable in this area of business,” he said.

Mr Guanlao said the skill was developed during his time in the commercial disputes team at MinterEllison and Thomson Geer.

“As a commercial disputes lawyer, I had a front-row seat to where things went wrong in business and specifically the time and cost involved to escalate the matter to formal legal proceedings,” he said. 

“So when I am negotiating or in my business dealings, I have the opportunity to apply both my front-end negotiating skills, be it by way of contract negotiation, but also to understand the associated risks with the matter based on my experience in commercial disputes.

“So it was not a transition from being an in-house lawyer into being a fitness entrepreneur.”

Although Mr Guanlao has left full-time practice, he is still actively involved in legal work, running a specialist firm called Sydney Property Conveyancing, and starting his own boutique law firm Teneo Legal, both of which are still in operation today.

Keeping up with health during COVID-19  

As the pandemic continues to hit in Australia, working remotely has made it difficult for many law firms to maintain employee health and productivity.

As a gym owner and a passionate wellness advocate, Mr Guanlao said he is a firm believer in overall health and wellness, not just for body composition results, but more so to develop and maintain strong mental health for lawyers.

As a former lawyer, Mr Guanlao said that having strong physical and mental health ensures that “you are in top form even when you are working 14 to [16-hour] days.”

“That is a combination of staying fit, and proactively working on your nutrition,” he said.

Mr Guanlao said that he understands being a lawyer is a high-pressure job which is more the reason to take care of yourself.

“It is about diet, it is about exercise, it is about rest,” he said.

“But irrespective of whether you’re a lawyer or not, or in a high-pressure job, it is important to maintain a certain level of fitness.

“This could be 30 or 60 minutes a day of exercise, whether it is an Anytime Fitness gym or elsewhere, it is important that time is taken to take care of yourself.”