Your salon has been getting busier, and so, you decide it’s time to hire an additional person to reduce the load and, hopefully, generate more revenue.

After much planning and consideration, you find the ‘right’ person and offer them the job.

Things look promising initially, and you breathe a big sigh of relief…and then the problems surface.

As a business owner, chances are you’ve been in this position already, and if you haven’t, then I take my hat off to you for your amazing recruitment skills or sheer good luck.

The fact is, sometimes, no matter how much research you do and how many questions you ask, you’re going to hire a lemon.

But once done, what do you do about it?

Well, naturally, prevention is always better than cure, so although this advice may be a little late for this hire, better recruitment skills might help to avoid a recruitment disaster in the future. One mistake is painful but repeating that same mistake borders on sheer craziness.

But once you’ve hired, there are things that you can do to resolve a difficult situation.

Let’s start by looking at where your new recruit is failing, because there can be two different outcomes, depending on where the problem lies.

Lack of Technical Skills

If lack of skills is the problem, then the problem is actually your fault. A big part of your recruitment process should always be vigorous skills testing.

Yes, you have to pay the prospective employee for their time, but let me be brutally honest with you, this is a cheap investment compared to what it might possibly cost you in lost clients in the future.

It’s not enough for your new recruit to look good on paper – they must be able to follow through with the delivery of the high-quality treatments your clients expect from your salon.

But the good news is that skills can be taught or improved. It may be that your new employee did things differently at her last salon or that she learned a different technique at her college. Either way, if the only problem you have with your new employee is skills-based, then it may be well worth your while to persevere with them and to develop a training program to bring their skills levels up to your standards.

Yes, it will come at a price, but it’s not a lost cause entirely.

Bad Attitude

No matter how skilled or experienced your new employee is, if she has brought along a bad attitude with her, then you really do have a problem on your hands.

It’s pretty easy to conceal a poor attitude throughout the recruitment process. Most people know how to answer your questions with the words you want to hear, and most past employers don’t want to say bad things about their past employees when you check job references.

But here’s the thing.

You can change skill sets, but it’s almost impossible to change a bad attitude – it seems to come built-in.

These people have a heavy chip on their shoulder about something and they’re determined to make as many people as possible suffer because of it – and that includes you, their co-workers and their clients.

Believe me when I tell you that the longer your persevere with this type of employee, the more you and others will suffer.

Trying to be ‘fair and reasonable’ with these people or trying to ‘understand’ the reason why they are the way they are is akin to bashing your head against a brick wall.

You are not their mother, sister or psychiatrist and it’s not your job to ‘fix’ them and turn their lives around.

What your job as a business owner actually entails is to protect your clients, your other employee’s well-being and, of course, your business and livelihood.

Now what you do from here will depend on how they’ve been hired and from where you operate. You must make sure you are completely within the law before taking another step. Some countries or states allow you to put off a new recruit if they were hired for a trial period and it’s clearly stated in their contact. If that’s not the case, you may need to go through a process of warning letters and meetings to try and resolve the issue.

Either way, ALWAYS adhere completely to your legal requirements, but don’t persevere with bad employee behaviour.

It will cause you untold stress and possibly have a negative financial impact on your business  also.

When it comes to recruitment, I always recommend never to hire in haste, no matter how urgently you may need another employee. To do so may result in long-term issues that will affect every part of your business

I’ve got to say, I’m a big fan of making lists!

I have all kinds of lists in my life. Grocery lists, business lists, packing lists, to-do lists and the list goes on!

But seriously, making lists in your business can help you to grow in so many ways. Not only does writing something down generally ensure it doesn’t get forgotten, but it also helps to ensure that others do the things you want them to do, the way you want them to do it.

If you think making lists isn’t a sophisticated business tool, then think about those professions that wouldn’t think of not using a list to ensure a positive outcome.

• Astronauts use a checklist before lift-off. Every dial and every switch has to be in the right place at the right time and what better way to ensure this happens than to have a checklist?
• Pilots use a checklist before take-off just like the astronauts.
• Theatre staff use lists to prepare for surgeries so that everything that goes in comes out again.

Do you see what I’m getting at?

Lists make difficult jobs easier and ensure a much higher rate of success, so let’s look at how a few lists could help you in your business too.

Procedure List

You might also refer to these as treatment protocols, but regardless of what you call them, they are just a glorified list. Like a good menu, this list lays out what has to be included in your treatments.  One of the most important outcomes of using a procedure list is consistency.

Consistency in the delivery of your treatments equates to happy clients and this is because every time they return to your salon or spa, they’re going to get the exactly the same inclusions in their treatment as the time before – nothing more and nothing less.

Clients love consistency, even more than they love extras, and when they don’t receive it, they get cranky. So cranky, in fact, that they often leave and go elsewhere. And all because they never received the same treatment, delivered the same way, twice.

Many salons and spas make the big mistake of providing discretionary services. These discretionary services are the little extras that aren’t generally included but are sometimes provided on a whim. And while the client loves receiving these extra bits of pampering at the time, they don’t love it when they don’t get included next time they have the same service. As a matter of fact, they feel quite cheated and that can lead to all kinds of unwanted trouble.

So, to avoid this happening in your business, make a list that employees use when delivering services and make sure that everyone sticks by it. No more and no less at every visit will keep your clients happy and returning.

Delegation List

Delegation is any boss’s best friend. When done well, it can free up many valuable hours each week for more important activities. However, there is definitely a good way and a not-so-good way to delegate to employees.

The not-so-good way is to simply verbally tell your employee what you want them to do. This technique generally results in a disastrous outcome because not enough information is relayed in a written format

For delegation to be effective, employees have to understand clearly what they need to do to get the job done well. This involves, you guessed it, making a list.

By breaking a new job down into bite-sized pieces on a list, employees can generally tackle jobs that they may never have done previously and do it reasonably well. The devil is always in the detail, so make your list as detailed as necessary so that an employee knows exactly what to do to get the job done to your satisfaction.

Time Management List

This is one of my favourite lists. It’s my daily to-do list and when I use it, I get much more of the important stuff done each day instead of pottering about doing the easy jobs that could have waited. It’s human nature to put off doing the hard stuff first, but if you want to fit more of the important stuff into your day, start with a list.

The secret of an effective to-do list is prioritising the items on it so the important jobs get done first. Without this, human nature kicks in and you spend the time being busy but not being effective.

Recruitment List

If you’ve ever had to hire a team member, you know that it can be a bit stressful to say the least. If you stuff it up and hire the wrong person, it will definitely impact on your business and so you want to avoid that at all costs.

One way to ensure you hire the right person for the job is to have a recruitment list. This list needs to include all the must-have skills or qualities that the successful applicant must have as well as the desirable skills and qualities that would come as a bonus.

If you make and use a recruitment list, you’re much less likely to get swayed by other factors during the process which could result in employing someone you like instead of someone you need.

Cleaning List

I love cleaning lists for salons and spas. A good cleaning list ensures that all the less-than-fun jobs get shared out evenly.

As a previous salon owner, I know how frustrating it is when employees leave at the end of the day and the salon is left dirty or untidy. Particularly when it was left up to me to clean it.

It didn’t take me long to figure out I needed a list that would cover all the cleaning jobs that had to be done before everybody took off for the day.

If you don’t like the idea of having ‘Cleaning Lists’ try calling them ‘Accomplishments Charts’ – they’re really the same thing but with a more positive spin.

All these lists have worked wonders for my sanity over the years. I recommend you try making lists in your business. Not only will you get more of the important jobs done, but you’ll be much less stressed from worrying over the little things that often get forgotten.