Genesis Co-Founder Skip Phillips Returns

Two months after resigning from the organization that he co-founded and ran for more than 20 years, Skip Phillips has rejoined Genesis.

“I’m excited about the direction that this industry can be headed, and I want to be a part of that — not where it was headed, but where it can be headed,” he said

Additionally, the president and CEO of Genesis’ parent association, The Pool & Hot Tub Alliance, has assumed direct supervision of the group. Sabeena Hickman expects to maintain this role at least through 2020, as the Genesis program gains its footing after recent upheaval.

“It’s such an important program that we offer, and … we’re committed to those 1,800 people who’ve gone through the program,” she said. “So I’m going to be very actively engaged in Genesis.”

Jim Mock, interim head of PHTA’s non-profit foundation and de factor leader for Genesis, has decided to retire upon the end of his contract in December.

Phillips’ return comes after months of dissatisfaction with the direction the group was taking after merging into PHTA. This sentiment was held by others and, over the past few weeks, it culminated in turmoil among current and former Genesis members and staff. Just before Phillips’ resignation in September, Genesis’ director and deputy director of education left to form a new organization. In the aftermath, some key volunteers and instructors left Genesis to align with the new organization, Watershape University. In October, Genesis Co-founder Brian Van Bower intensified his role, which had been winding down, and encouraged Genesis members to stay the course as the organization found its way as a PHTA entity.

In the meantime, some other instructors and long-time members of Genesis tried to maintain loyalties and alliances with their friends and colleagues in both organizations. But as tensions accumulated, some found it more difficult, causing more Genesis instructors to leave. The most recent high-profile resignation came from Paolo Benedetti, a long-time instructor and Genesis participant since shortly after its formation in 1998. He tendered his resignation shortly after the International Pool | Spa | Patio Expo in early November.

Seeking to repair the situation, Hickman, who joined the organization in September, joined the PHTA Chairman of the Board Chris Curcio to meet with Phillips near his home.

“Through discussions, we realized how aligned we were in terms of what we wanted to accomplish,” Hickman said. “Once we discovered that, it became very clear that Skip re-engaging with Genesis was the right thing to do.”

Phillips shared his ideas for repairing Genesis and improving building/design education across PHTA. After being asked to rejoin, Phillips negotiated and eventually agreed. Like Van Bower, he will keep the same title, ambassador. However, he will be more involved in developing and maintaining the curriculum and recruiting instructors for Genesis, and helping reshape the builder/designer curriculum offered by PHTA.

“We’re obviously extremely excited to have Skip back,” Hickman said. “There will be some rebuilding. We have lost some key [Genesis instructors], but Brian and Skip said they’ve been through this before.”

Expected educational changes

Phillips agreed to return after PHTA’s board signed on to certain things, he said.

“I wasn’t willing to do it without knowing for sure that I had the support of the board,” he said. “I’m not going to waste my time…”

He added: “I was always focused on what I call the 1,800. That’s the number of people who are in our educational funnel right now, and they deserve to have that continue in a principled leadership way.”

One the most significant changes Phillips hopes to shepherd involves theCertified Building Professional designation that had been offered by the Association of Pool & Spa Professionals. Phillips takes issue with certain aspects of the current program: Pool/spa builders must have worked five years to qualify, some individuals have been grandfathered in, and some certificate holders have had their continuing education requirements waved and were allowed to renew, he said.

Additionally, some of the principles and practices espoused in the APSP Builders Manual, which supplies much of the content for the CBP exam, does not line up with those of Genesis.

In the future, they will explore the removal of the five-year requirement, eliminate grandfathering, and require continuing education units (CEUs) for any Certified Building Professional looking to renew their designation. Additionally, he hopes to see those CEUs supplied by Genesis courses. Through this plan, the CBP would also gain the seal of the International Association for Continuing Education and Training (IACET), which Genesis achieved a few years ago.

Phillips also plans to create a path for CBP holders to exchange their certification for a certain number of elective credit hours in Genesis, if they wish to earn one of the Genesis certifications or designations.

Hickman said that, in addressing builder/designer education, PHTA will make it a priority to rework the CBP content, and the Builders Manual in particular, to line up with Genesis.

“That’s something we’re going to focus on pretty shortly right out of the gate,” she said.

The group also will decide how to position legacy CBP instruction with that of Genesis. “We’re going to evaluate CBP as maybe the first rung in the career ladder, and then they can move up to some of the offerings with Genesis,” Hickman said.

Mending fences

The group also plans to avoid territorialism in relation to WU. Hickman and Phillips said that Genesis will welcome instructors who meet its criteria, including those who also teach for WU.

“We don’t want it to be an ‘either/or’,” Hickman said. “We want it to be an ‘and.’ We want to find ways to work together and just continue to educate and professionalize builders in the industry.”

Phillips said it’s personal for him: “I don’t want to have any conflict with the very people who are a product of the very system that they helped create. I won’t stand for that.”

Hickman added that Genesis instructors own the content of their courses, resolving questions that had circulated surrounding who held intellectual property rights to the content after Genesis’ parent association, the National Swimming Pool Foundation, merged with APSP to form the PHTA.

“I’ve [communicated to Genesis instructors] ‘You own your IP, you can teach wherever you want,’” Hickman explained. “And we’re confident with that, because these are phenomenal instructors.”

Hickman attributed Genesis’ recent problems with the logistics of managing a merger of this size. “PHTA was so focused on all the paperwork and everything that goes into the unification, which was a tremendous undertaking, that the openness and transparency wasn’t what it should have been, I think,” she said. “… We weren’t servicing those stakeholders probably as they were accustomed to, because we were distracted with the unification.”

But organizers reported record attendance at the Genesis courses that took place at November’s PSP Expo, and the group has high expectations for its scheduled education at the Northeast Spa and Pool Association’s convention in January.

“We’ve got work ahead of us, but we’ve got a great team assembled,” she said.