I just have to get this off my chest: Our Salon Company recently terminated a relationship with a 31 year old separated mother. She had no transportation and was living with her parents. We had reservations about her at the time of her hiring because she was so behind the curve in the timeline of life. However, she had just completed her basic cosmetology training at a fairly prestigious beauty academy in Seattle. She brought a notebook with some pictures of her work, and she definitely had some talent; although in retrospect, there was no real pride or professionalism shown in the way she printed her pictures and threw her portfolio together. Her hair was dyed blue, and she made some off-the-wall comment about how it was meant to “challenge people,” which we didn’t really think or talk about until much later. She came to us at a time when we were actively discussing the need for diversity in the salon; and, if nothing else, she was most assuredly different than anything we were accustomed to. She seemed to be testing our tolerance a bit by making it a big deal that she had just converted to lesbianism (something neither Lynn nor I cared about in the least), but had soon re-converted as soon as a good looking sailor gave her a second glance. Within about two weeks of working with her, Lynn was routinely referring to her (behind her back) as “Little Miss Know It All.” I knew that this was a very bad sign, and I began telling Lynn that she had to do something to either fix the relationship between them, or terminate her employment. As time passed, more little things began to annoy us. Finding out that she had no idea how to operate a standard clothes washing machine gave us quite a bit of insight as to how she may have been catered to. Lynn was having a hard time teaching her, as nearly every attempt resulted in the infamous words “I know” escaping from her lemon-puckered lips. I once speculated in front of het that another employee might be having a difficult time with Capitalism because profit is so demonized by the media and within our public school system. She became very snooty with me and stated “I won’t go there with you; I’m not getting into politics. I held back, but I wanted to fire her on the spot for being so rude and thinking she had the right to control our topics of conversation. At the end of some days, when her mother would come to transport her home, it became evident during their interactions that Mom was not exactly the “Alpha Dog” in the family. She began to brag about how she “was the smartest one” in her beauty school class. Each day, her behavior worsened. She was communicating with Lynn less and less, likely because she was delinquent on several simple assignments. She stopped even acknowledging my presence when I made my after work salon visits. Many of our clients pointed out her inherent rudeness after her departure (information which would have saved us a good deal of money, had it been pointed out sooner). The final straw was when she hemmed and hawed in the presence of an important walk-in client about cutting his hair. After witnessing her resistant behavior, he said: “Well, it’s obvious that she doesn’t want to do it.” Lynn’s heart sunk when he walked out the door. Being accepted into our Associate program is a very special opportunity for new cosmetology school graduates. As a Redken Certified Colorist and Redken Artist, Lynn is among the most highly trained stylists anywhere. Lynn keeps very abreast of current industry trends by attending every advanced training opportunity available. Many of Lynn’s “days off” are spent in other salons or beauty supply distributors, facilitating product knowledge classes or advanced coloring technique seminars. The associate program literally gives the young stylist the equivalent of several years of experience in their first six months behind the chair. The normal trial and error period is basically eliminated, and predictable results are achieved much sooner. Simply put, it really jump-starts their career. Our failed Associate had no appreciation for the very generous paid training opportunity we provided her. Lynn became consumed with her, using nearly every waking moment to express frustration over the deteriorating situation. After approximately 4 ½ months of aggravation, and fearing her own failure as a trainer and mentor, Lynn realized that she had to give up and let her go. When we called her in “to review her performance,” she seemed to already know the outcome of our meeting and accepted it very willingly. At first, Lynn told her that our decision was purely financial. While there was a high degree of truth in that explanation (when one took into account that she would likely never build a faithful clientele due to her likeability factor), I felt it necessary to be a bit more honest with her and encourage her to internalize the situation a bit and learn from this experience. I clumsily told her that often in life, brains just don’t matter. I continued to explain that dumb people can make great decisions and smart people can make poor decisions; and that geniuses die poor while morons die wealthy every day. Well… she didn’t get it at all. She even made the comment on how my words applied so well to her husband; never even considering that I might be talking about her. I ended our meeting by giving her her final paycheck and a basic letter of recommendation which focused on her solid technical skills. I urged her to pursue a career in hairstyling, and she assured me that it was her true passion. Several weeks later, Lynn received a phone call from the Department of Health and Human Services. Approximately six months after investing a great deal of time and (somebody’s) money graduating from a very fine beauty academy, our “passionate” and “Smart” failed Associate applied for welfare benefits. Now it’s time for Harbor Hair Design to internalize. What has been learned from this episode? • The associate did not meet the #1 requirement to be allowed into our Associate Program (to be NICE). • We were much too impressed by the reputation of her beauty academy. Technical competence can be taught, being NICE cannot. • We knew from our management training that only 1 out of 3 Associates will be successful. Firing and hiring shouldn’t be viewed as such major events. • Firing will be much sooner in the process next time – as soon as we develop serious doubt about an Associate. • We need to ask some “whys” of future candidates (Why don’t you own a car? for instance). If the answers blame others, the candidate is very likely incapable of self-improvement.
Posted on: Wed, 31 Dec 2014 00:20:27 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015