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Transcript

Leadership Film Study #008: The Real Reason Salon Meetings Aren’t Working · Salon Success Secrets — The podcast for salon owners who are done hustling harder and ready to break their revenue ceiling.

• 0:33
  SPEAKER_04: Welcome back to Salon Success Secrets and another episode in our leadership film study series where uh Lindsay and I take a piece of content circulating in the beauty industry and unpack not only what is being said, but what saloners might do with it.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_04: And today's clip is a good one because it starts with something Lindsay and I completely agree with.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_04: Stop correcting an entire team for the behavior of one person.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_04: You guys, if one person isn't folding the towels, talk to that person.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_04: If one person isn't completing the closing duties, talk to that person.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_04: Your entire team should not have to sit through a lecture intended for one individual.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but then the message takes a pretty significant turn.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_02: Your salon is having too many meetings.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_02: You don't need monthly meetings.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_02: Most meetings should be an email or a text.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_02: And that's where Jen and I would say, hold on.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_02: Because most salons don't have a meeting problem.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_02: They have a meeting purpose problem.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_02: So let's go ahead and play the clip.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: Too many meetings.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: You do not need to have monthly meetings.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: You do not need to have bi-monthly meetings.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: You do not need to, you don't, you're having too many meetings.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: It most of the meetings could be an email.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: Most of the meetings could be a text message.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say about 90% of the meetings could be a direct conversation to the person that you are having the meeting about.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: So you don't need to have a meeting about folding towels.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: You need to talk to the people who aren't folding towels.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: You don't need to have a meeting about how to clean up at the end of the day.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: You need to talk directly to the people who aren't cleaning up at the end of the day.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: You don't need to have a meeting.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: The worst type of ownership is blanket ownership where you blanket statement everything and you put everyone in the same group.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: Then you start treating the adults in the room like children.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: And those adults start to go, I don't need to deal with this.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna go work somewhere else.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna go open a suite.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna go work at the salon down the street.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: We spend our days helping salon owners untrain their brain from whatever they think they're supposed to be doing, whatever business strategy they think they've come up with, whatever they think they're supposed to do for their business.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: We unbrainwash and then we ask critical thinking questions.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: Do you need to have a meeting or do you need to have a direct conversation with an individual?
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: Are you avoiding the responsibility of leadership by calling a meeting?
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Or is this actually a meeting that's required?
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: Does everyone need to be talked to?
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I think sometimes I get hairdressers that have turned into business owners and they're like, I don't know how to confront.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: Well, guess what?
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: We'll teach you.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: I'll teach you how to confront.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: I love confrontation.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: I think the only way that business moves forward is through confrontation.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: And confrontation doesn't have to be bad, it can be very good.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: Your salon is having all right.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, so good.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_04: So, you know, I would say, Lindsay, the first part of this video is absolutely right, right?
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_04: It's like he said a team meeting should never be used to avoid a direct conversation.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_04: Like I think you made the um the analogy of someone's folding towels, you know, deal with that.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_04: For some somebody's not folding towels, a lot of owners like, thank God they're folding towels, but someone's not folding towels.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_04: Um, you know, have that current conversation direct with them.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_04: Or if they're, you know, not doing X, Y, and Z, have that conversation direct with people instead of making it an entire team event.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I I we obviously agree on that, you know, and I think what happens a lot of times when people do communicate in that way to their team is the ones who need to hear it, they don't hear it because they're like, oh, they're just telling everybody this, you know.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_02: And the ones who've actually been doing a great job at it, they're like, oh my gosh, I'm not doing it.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_02: Did I do something wrong?
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not doing this right, you know?
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_02: And so it never lands well when you use that blanket correction.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um I agree with him on that, and I know you do too, Jin.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_04: Um, I think where we have some opportunities or the clip makes the wrong leap is um it loses me where um they say stop using meetings for individual correction to you don't need regular meetings.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_04: Like those are two completely different ideas, you guys.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_04: You know, we've worked with salons for a very long time, and most salons are not meeting too often.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_04: Um, many aren't gathering their teams consistently enough.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_04: You know, though you know, think about the real question.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_04: It's not could this meeting have been an email?
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_04: It is, hey, are we using our time together to do something an email can never accomplish?
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_04: Um, we have somebody on our team, our director, salon director Joanna, she's been with us for 12 years, I think 13 years.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_04: And um she came as a referral from someone else that used to work here.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_04: And she said that the girl that um told her is like, yeah, Jen holds these meetings.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_04: And at the time when we first started, it was me and this other girl, but we still had meetings, right?
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: I love it.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_03: She says Jen holds these meetings, and like I think she's just talking to me because it's just me and her in the meetings.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_03: Meetings.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_03: I love it.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_03: But she said, but they're so inspirational.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_03: We we play these games, we both play it out.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_03: And Joanne said, you know, I knew I was like, man, I gotta check this place out because she actually is our director now.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_04: Um, so like even if it's just one and you other person, like you can still have a really incredible opportunity to host a meeting because what I was doing in that moment was driving the business forward.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_04: I was never talking about what we were not doing, what we needed, or what was not, you know, just not working.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_04: It was like, how can we drive business forward?
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_02: And I love that, Jen, because like I can't even, you know, fathom thinking that a meeting and an email or a text could distribute the same information, because an email, sure, it can distribute information, but it cannot develop your people, which is exactly what you were talking about, Jen, because a great salon meeting should actually accomplish helping a beauty pro become better at something, you know, like from seeing and serving guests at a higher level to practicing hospitality.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you can spend it reading someone's body type, face shape, coloring, contrast, like really looking at people.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_02: You can conduct stronger consultations, you can recommend solutions with confidence, you know, it's like anything that you can identify as a place where the guest journey could be elevated, like that to me is a successful, successful time spent together as a team because you're also then learning from one another's successes and even challenges.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_04: Lindsay, I think what you said was like the highest purpose of a salon meeting is not correcting the team, it's actually developing the team.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_04: You know, during that team celebration, you could always talk about shared standards.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_04: And without time together, what happens is each beauty pro then kind of creates their own, excuse me, entire separate experience behind their own chair.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_04: So if you really truly want to create that team-based experience, the team has to.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_04: It's a must 100%.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_04: They have to, you know, spend time learning together.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, Jin, I we call it a salon celebration instead of a team meeting for lots of different reasons.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you were the one who originally came up with this concept.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_02: Do you want to kind of just explain it a little bit?
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_04: So at one time I was, we were working with um um another company and they wanted me to speak on salon meetings um because you know, they've heard about how and and you know, exciting and um how much we learn from the salon meetings that we have in our in our salon.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_04: And I said, you know, I want to call them salon celebrations.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_04: That's what we call them because we're truly celebrating.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_04: We're celebrating the good, we're celebrating how we can be better, we're celebrating all the things that are gonna make our guest experience exceptional.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_04: And the person said, Well, you can't call them celebrations, they have to be called meetings.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_04: And in that moment, I was like, I kind of got the ick, you know.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_04: I was like, Yeah, when you think of a meeting, even the word meaning is just like coming together to discuss something.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_04: But when you think of celebration, like you're celebrating your team.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_04: You're calling forth the incredible things that they've created, the hospitable moments, the birthdays, the anniversaries, like when you view it through that lens, like of course a team wants to show up to a celebration.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_04: A hundred percent more likely to show up to a celebration than just to a meeting.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I think Jen, what stands out to me about that is like a celebration isn't the absence of accountability.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_02: Truly, what it does is it reinforces the behaviors, the values, and the results that you want repeated.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_02: And so it's no wonder that that particular person couldn't see the value in a celebration.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um, because when someone's committed to creating chaos, they, you know, aren't trying to reinforce behaviors and values and results that they want repeated.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_02: And I think, you know, correction shows people what to stop.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_02: But celebration shows them what is possible.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_02: And to me, what it makes me, what it reminds me of is like the difference between like a really strong football coach and a weaker football coach.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_02: I know Nick Saban gets credited for this.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if it was him or not.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but you know, when he tells a person, you know, when a play goes wrong, for example, somebody fumbles the ball, he doesn't say, don't fumble the ball, because then that's the story.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_02: They're like, don't fumble the ball, God, I'm so worried about fumbling the ball.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_02: He says, what does he say?
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_02: Something like hold the ball or cradle the ball or keep, I can't remember what it is exactly, but he tells them what to do, you know?
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_02: So it's the difference between correction shows people what needs to stop, but celebration shows them what's possible.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_02: It shows them what to do.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_02: You've got to help create paths, not say you're doing something wrong, don't do this.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_02: You got to say, here's what we want you to do.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_04: Lizzie, you're just sharing.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_04: Um, we just did your salon retreat back in Kansas City, and you were just telling me a really cool story that I think is a great example of like when you celebrate how much impact that can have on the guests, but also your team members' lives.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, that was one of the one of the people on my team.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um, she's beautiful, and we all grow up in different environments and experience different things.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_02: And one of the things that we practiced was giving compliments, like and receiving compliments.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_02: You know, so many, so many people are able to give help.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_02: If you can relate to this as a solano nurse, say me.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_02: You're able to give all the help.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_02: But then when it comes to receiving it, like, I don't know, there's some sort of resistance around it.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_02: And so one of the things that, you know, we worked on was giving and receiving compliments.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, that was one of her takeaways from the retreat.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_02: She was like, I I just didn't grow up where that was a thing where we gave a lot of compliments.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_02: And she said it was honestly, it was kind of hard for me to receive them at first.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, I think that that was such a big breakthrough.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: Like, if we had just sent that in an email and said, Hey, why don't you guys go ahead and give people some compliments, you know, they would have been like, cool, Lindsay and Jen, that's a great idea.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna take that water up and toss it in the trash, you know.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_02: But when she experienced it and she had that breakthrough, she was like, Wow, it felt good to see that other people could see these wonderful things in me.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_02: And it honestly felt good to be able to express great things about people that I care for.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, that couldn't have been in an email or a text.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think sometimes we punish people for not knowing something that no one has ever taken the time to teach them.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_02: Yet we expect them to know it.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_04: And something else he mentioned on the video too is confrontation.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_04: Um, you know, and if you truly understand, you know, we know that words are powerful and every word has a meaning.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_04: If you understand the word confrontation comes from the word confront, which literally means to be with.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_04: So, you know, it means being face to face with someone.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_04: And when you're just with someone, that makes the your larger point even more accurate, right?
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_04: Confrontation itself is not inherently negative, unless we make it that way, right?
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_04: Healthy leadership does require the willingness to come face to face, to be with reality and have those direct conversations.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_04: You know, the concern is the phrase I love confrontation.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_04: He did say that, right?
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_04: Especially when confrontation is being framed as something uh one person does to another.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_04: That's not what we confrontation, does not mean that that's almost force.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_04: Like when you're viewing confrontation from that standpoint, that's force.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_04: Because force, it creates like immediate compliance.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_04: I know we've been talking about that through our leadership studies, but it rarely creates that ownership, you know, but a productive conversation to just be with someone, it can be direct without being demeaning and clear without being compatible, compatible.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_04: So when you think about that, some possible language would be like, you know, um, leadership is not using force against someone, it is having enough courage and care to stand face to face with someone and tell the truth in a way that they can actually use.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I love that.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_02: That would definitely help elevate somebody's life, you know.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_02: And so um, you know, I think here's a practical filter for you to use today, listening.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, before scheduling a meeting, ask, you know, is this about one person's behavior?
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_02: Have a direct conversation, then ask, is this simply information people need to receive?
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_02: Send an email, text, or an update.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_02: And does the team need to learn, practice, align, collaborate, or celebrate together?
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_02: Hold the meeting, you know?
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_02: And this is truly what will help you elevate your company.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_02: It's not avoiding meetings, canceling meetings, like, and if you're worried that someone's gonna leave, they're probably already one foot out of the board, you know, but if you hold another meeting, they're just gonna leave and go somewhere else while you're focused on the wrong things then and you're not helping people get better.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_02: And I actually um forgot about this.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_02: I came into the salon over the weekend and found a cute little thank you card sitting on my desk from one of the girls on my team that actually made me tear up when I got it.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_02: And um, she said one of the things that stood out was, thank you for always seeing things in me that I wouldn't have been able to see in myself without your encouragement.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_02: You are a beauty pro through and through a great example.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_02: I'm so lucky to have a mentoring you.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_02: This isn't about me.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_02: This is about who you can become when you're focused on the right kind of leadership and you're focused on looking for those opportunities to call forth the good in somebody else.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_02: That is absolutely what happens during a soul on celebration.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_04: What a beautiful gift that was that you got, Lindsay.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_04: It's so beautiful.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_04: And you guys, the other thing, too, of this is like that's not we have scheduled meetings.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_04: We're not just pulling meetings together out of thin air because we need something to dress.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_04: No, we schedule the meetings a year in advance.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_04: So everyone knows when they are, they know when we get to celebrate.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_04: Actually, people on my team will be like, when's our next salon celebration?
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_04: I'm ready for it.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_04: I'm like, wow, isn't that such a different perspective than people like, oh gosh, another salon meeting?
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_04: Um so just something to think about.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_04: So, you guys, we don't believe that every issue requires a meeting.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_04: You know, if one person needs that feedback, respect that person and the rest of your team enough to have that direct conversation.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_04: But don't confuse poorly led meetings with unnecessary meetings.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_04: Like your salon needs that consistent place where people can learn together.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_04: You know, we can train their eyes, we can strengthen the guest journey, we can practice hospitality, and we can celebrate what is working.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and then email can communicate information, uh, direct conversation can create individual accountability.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_02: And a great team meeting or salon celebration can develop people, align a culture, and elevate the experience your entire salon creates together.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_02: The goal isn't simply to have fewer meetings, it's to make sure every conversation is happening in the right room with the right people for the right reason.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_02: And that is today's Salon Success Secrets.