The WHY, WHAT, WHO, WHEN, HOW of Salon Spas

I see "What we do" in salon more of a by-product of "Why we do it" and so rank Why higher in importance. Also because our Why tends to change less often than What we do.

In our career our Why naturally must first meet our own hierarchy of needs. We start by  needing a job to pay the bills, but to stick at that job, our Why will soon grow, so that the job also needs to satisfy our interests, challenge our skills, fulfill our passions.

For many our Why evolves further still, to others; delighting clients and nurturing those in our circle of influence following the same career path.

For some the Why gets even bigger as what we accomplish in business allows us to give into more social projects, even as much as leaving a legacy others benefit from after we've gone.

It will be hard for your Why to grow to higher levels of meaning if you don't excel technically in "What you do", so for anyone starting out with whatever 'Why' that motivates you, a focus at being good at "What you do" should be where you begin. After all a qualification in What you do, is only just the beginning of your career.

As for "How we do it", I feel this becomes a lot easier, when we next think about "Who we do it for" followed by "When we do it".

In this often ego fed industry, pointing out that the 'Who' is not You, is not quickly received - because if you don't look after yourself, no-one else will, right? True, however, we have already got 'You' covered up to this point. You have taken action toward a career path to meet your current 'Why' and you have concentrated your attentions to become good and always getting better at "What you do". So You are covered enough at this point, for it to be OK for the rest of "Who we do it for" to not be about You - and that's where You can truly be rewarded. The Why - What -Who questions create a constant circle. It's in the circle of flow, that greater things come back to you.

As a skilled salon professional, the Who is now all about the client. When you don't have a client in front of you, make it about training others in your team, (unless you're still the least trained in the team, then learn from others) otherwise offer up spare time to work ON the business.

Remember I started by saying "What we do" is more of a by-product? This is really important when we focus on the "Who we do it for", because if What we do is, for example a haircut, then it goes without saying that the client should receive a great haircut - its what they are paying for, so the very least they should receive. However they can get a haircut from any salon, so what is their why for coming back to your salon?

The client must value the experience and to come again and again, they must trust the experience, hopefully enough to recommend it to their friends. Their experience is largely the responsibility of the team members performing the "What we do" in salon and so if the team is not constantly focused on this "Who we do it for", they are likely to miss out on their part of providing a delightful client experience.

"When we do it" is the easy part. Every visit, every time. Okay so maybe its not that easy to delight a client every time, but the important thing is for the entire team to be consistent in your intent to delight every time, which means not getting complacent with our most frequent clients by skipping on consultations to check we are providing full care solutions or recommendations to met their needs, or to know if they are ready for some new suggestions.

Which finally leads to "how we do it". Truth is How a salon chooses to do it, isn't important, so long as you can do it consistently, profitably and measurably to know its working or not. Efficient operations providing good work in 20mins without the need for an appointment can be just as successful as opulent establishments that allow an hour to deliver the same by-product, and everything in between, as there will always a customer for every place in the market.