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The Salon Attitude: What type of Culture does your Salon have?
By SDC {MOSIMAGE}
It would be nearly impossible to find to salons in the country that are run exactly a light, that have the same sales, the same perspective on business. Even to salons that are owned by the same person could be markedly different.
If two mutually owned salons can be so different, what factors contribute to this aligns the situation that result in drastic differences in attitude, be performance, desire, teamwork and potential success?
Sociologists tell us that in every small group there exists a culture of habitual way of living/being or working together as a total salon group.
Cultures may vary in that some may have opted for democratic rule, while others chose or were forced to choose a dictatorship.
Maintenance versus growth oriented cultures-
You may be wondering why the culture of the salon is so important. Through research, we have found that the success of a salon can to be dependent on the culture of the salon.
If the salon is maintenance oriented, with a culture based on negative thinking and poor attitude, success is unlikely.
If, or the other hand, the culture is a growth oriented one, in which the culture expects more than just average performance from its members, maintains a high level of customer services and one in which each person views him/herself as a member of a team -- it is one that fosters success.
Sociologists have found that a culture is not created by members of the staff. The study's lead us to the idea that the current culture in any salon is the direct or indirect result of management. Management creates the culture, and then manages the culture, rather than manages the people working with in the framework of the given culture. What are the ramifications of this notion in layman's terms? We believe that salon management can build and maintain a positive, creative, growth oriented, customer obsessed salon in environment through sound management skills and follow through. It also means, however, that poor management can take a potentially strong staff and drag them down to the bottom rung of the success ladder, and in fact, can topple the ladder completely.
There is an obvious need to expand this notion of culture for greater understanding. We begin by pulling the word culture itself apart. A “cult” is a group of people who share a strong devotion to a common belief. Therefore, a salon culture is made up of the sum total of the group’s philosophy, values and norms. When the majority of the people in the culture live by the group's values, peer pressure is created to cause others in the culture to conform to those values or be alienated.
One of the most unique aspects of a culture is that, in any situation, a culture of some tight can not NOT exist. It is never a matter of whether a culture exists, but what type of culture it is, positive, negative or what ever adjective can best describe it.
In terms of our business, the quality of the culture, the philosophy and values involved, defines the meaning of work to the members of the culture. It defines what is appropriate and inappropriate, acceptable and unacceptable for all members involved in the culture. When the values of the culture of focus on growth, creativity and customer satisfaction, peer pressure causes staff members to conform to a way of thinking or leave the culture. The opposite is also true. If the cultural values stressed low commitment, lack of motivation and little concern for the customer, the staff responds and accepts this attitude when peer pressure becomes more important than personal ideology.
The need to conform-
How can it be, that a positive, creative, growth oriented person can be convinced to either change their value system or leave rather than try and change the system it self or simply work under their own set of values?
Studies show that, in most people, the need to belong to a group is stronger than they need to achieve. Therefore, in order to be accepted into a group, the average high achiever will sacrifice or at least alter in his or her personal value system in order to become one of the group.
Consequently, potential high performers, but they need to achieve on hold if achieving isn't appropriate according to the values of the culture.
The Negative Culture-
Let’s define the value system supported by a negative culture. Work is the usually seen as drudgery or punishment. The staff often has the attitude that the only reason they work at all is that they have to pay their bills. Work becomes a “necessary evil” and the members of this type of culture fine little or no enjoyment from their jobs. In fact, they use a variety of tactics to avoid the work altogether. In a culture of this type, new ideas are almost unheard of. Anyone who unfortunately has a new idea or suggestion is booed out of the room and possibly even chastised by the group for rocking the boat. Status quo is tenaciously upheld such that it is!
The Positive Culture-
The positive culture, by contrast, is one in which the members of the culture feel like the work is an expression of themselves. Work becomes an opportunity or a vehicle for each person to expand their vision, experienced new people and new situations. They are able to grow both personally and professionally because of their work environment, not in spite of it. The favorable side effect of such a work culture is an increased income, bringing staff members into the next level in their standard of living.
Chances are good that the average salons don't support cultures that are totally positive or totally negative. In reality, it is often the case that, somewhere in the bowels of a negative culture, there are lurks one or two positive people. Because the culture has adopted a negative value system, the positive people fall prey to peer pressure that forces them to conform to the chosen value system. They take on the value system of the group and stop striving for achievement. The opposite situation must also be true, if people in negativity are placed in positive culture, peer pressure, should cause them to either choose to conform to the positive value system or leave the culture. The culture it solved actually has a built in cleansing system. Not to conform to the peer pressure means to be alienated or washed out of the group.
The Manager's role-
We mentioned earlier that we believe management holds the key to the type of value system. A given culture adopts. Negativity breeds more negativity and management that displays verbally or nonverbally a feeling of indifference or apathy is one that undermines any hope for growth and success in a salon. People in management tend to hire others who are like them, who won't buck the system, who think like they do. If a few people more positive slip in, they are quickly forced to conform through peer pressure, as we mentioned earlier. Thus, we have a manager or who perpetuate a negative culture. Change will not come about until the manager changes or is removed from the position.
Owners may go to seminar after seminar, bring back notebooks and tapes full of held for information for the manager to utilize. How many times have you heard a manager say “well, I'll try it but I don't think it will work in our salon, we’re different”. And managers who say that are absolutely correct, it won't work, because they will be the reason any new idea won't be instituted successfully.
Positive cultures are managed by people who understand and enjoy the subtle workings of managing people and the culture they inhabit. These successful managers utilize teamwork, hard work and fairness in their ethics and basic standards of practice. They would never ask a staff member to do something they themselves would not do. Oftentimes, they'd lead by example as well as through a management program earmarked by skills of negotiation, discipline, reinforcement, rewards, and feedback.
Top 20 cultures, versus average 80 cultures-
We feel it is interesting to note that the culture or value system in the top 20 salon is vastly different than that in an average TD salon. The top 20 salons tend to embrace a higher purpose, a positive value system and a few excellent in performance a necessity. The staff of a top 20 salon, not only enjoys working in a culture that supports growth, creativity and fulfillment and they demand that type of culture for themselves and their fellow workers.
In the average 80 salon staff is made up largely of stylists who are merely doing their jobs. They see it as a duty that must be performed in order to survive. The staff members tend to work as individuals rather than a teen, and few creative or innovative ideas find their way into conversation, let alone come to fruition in a setting such as this.
It may be difficult to swallow, but if you buy into the eight East/20 rule, the majority of today's salons fall into the negative or low culture situation we have been outlining. These salons are characterized by low morale, apathy and indifference. The employees are self obsessed and cynical. They rarely show concern for anything that happens outside their own circle of space surrounding their situation.
When you wish upon a Star-
Salon owners across the country are faced with the dilemma of the falling star. You know, the stylists we mean, the ones with the star potential, that is fresh, it excited, motivated stylists were out to make a fortune in doing good hair. They are eager to stay late for clients. Double book if they have to, even bear the brunt of scornful looks from the veteran stylists who have long outgrown this stage. All of a sudden, the hard work stops. Everything that the star you hired did to get to this point ends. What has happened to cause is shooting star to fizzle out and fall from? Peer pressure may have finally taken its toll on those idealistic newcomers. They may have been forced by a negative culture to fit in and to quit making everyone else look bad.
The challenge of management is to call as a cultural shift from the current culture to a more positive, desirable one. A culture that supports positivity, growth, creativity and teamwork is the rich soil in which to plant the seeds of success. Soil that is nourished by good, management will produce a strong and healthy crop of hair stylists devoted to the culture and its value system.
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