Two new people

So, we've finally hired the last two people...well, not "We", Becky has hired the last two people.  All of us went to the same cosmetology school, all at different times, some of them overlapping.  I'm still the one with the most "salon" experience....should prove to be interesting, since none of us are truly trained in the way things are supposed to be done.  Sigh.....

Rita, I've discovered, is quite the kiss ass.  She wants the manager position, BAD.  I could rightly care less, really.  The longer I work there, the less I want that job, especially if it means training myself and not getting a whole lot of guidance from my supervisor.  Becky was in the salon for exactly half the day yesterday, barely spoke to anyone, then left.  Seriously??  I guess, since she feels we all get along so well, she doesn't need to be there.  Well, guess what, sister??  You do need to be there....we all have a lot of questions that aren't being answered.  In a timely manner, or otherwise.

What's funny about Rita is she wants the leadership position, but has no idea how to lead.  She doesn't have enough experience in hairdressing to be able to judge when to do "X" to someones hair and when not to.  Here's an example.  This nice lady came in the first week or so that we were open, wanting a perm.  Rita cut quite a bit off her hair, noticed it didn't feel right, but went ahead and permed her hair, anyway.  After the perm was done, she noticed the condition of the hair, which wasn't very good.  So, I got the warning that this nice lady had called and wanted her perm checked out, because it has no curl in it.

A few days later, she came in and I looked at her hair, talking to her about her hair the entire time.  Asking all the questions we're supposed to:  Do you have well water or town water??  Do you take a lot of medications, specifically a high dosage of blood thinners??  Are you brushing your hair instead of picking it??  Did you wait 48 hours before washing your hair??  No, she didn't brush her hair (although you could clearly tell it had been brushed), yes, she's on medications, although no high blood thinners, she has town water.  Okay.  Let's go wash your hair and see what happens.

So, I washed her hair....once I got it wet, I  could feel the permanent color in her hair.  Saw it first and asked how long it had been since she colored it, which was quite a while, based on her regrowth.  It was professionally done, by the very ladies I used to work with.  So, that told me, right there, before I even felt her hair, what condition her hair was in prior to perming her hair.  Trashed.  Rita had even commented to me about how her hair felt trashed.  I told her "If the hair feels that bad, refuse the service and explain why."  So, I wound up showing this nice lady (who is around  my mother's age---70) the curl that is still in her hair, and instructing her, even though she's already heard this, again, in how to take care of her hair.  And the fact that she had pre-existing permanent color in her hair made the two chemicals not get along very well, so her hair feels pretty awful.  And it will stay that way until the hair color is all cut out of her hair.

What people (including my co-workers) don't understand is that once you color your hair, even if it's been years, if the ends of the hair are a different color than the root of the hair, the color is STILL IN THE HAIR.  And, just because a "professional" colored your hair, doesn't mean it was done correctly.

Whether or not we keep this nice lady as a client remains to be seen.  However, I was professional, honest, and nice to her about her hair.  It's all I can do.

What my co-workers need to learn is if the hair is in horrible condition, don't do the service.  Quit thinking about making your paycheck bigger and think about the CLIENT.  If their hair can't take it, don't do it.  While we're all here to make money, we're not here to ruin hair.

I did also get the opportunity, finally, to tell Lindsay that when you have a child/teenager in your chair, you need to speak to the parent about what you'd like to do to the kid's hair, not the kid themselves.  The kid isn't paying for the appointment, the parent is.  Which means the kid shouldn't be making any decisions regarding their hair and what extra services they can get.  Talk to the wallet.  She understood what I said, but I'll be interested if she actually follows through with it.  Oh, and Lindsay also broke our security gate...she struggles with the dumb thing (we all do, really) and instead of taking a deep breath, calming down, and figuring out how to operate the thing, she kicked the crap out of it and jammed the knob so we can't get it open.  Sigh...don't know if Becky did anything about that issue or not...