Revolutionising Hair Education: A Passionate Perspective

By Nathan Yip

Here I am with the second opportunity to share my thoughts with this influential industry magazine.

In my first article I covered toxic perfectionism, a syndrome that affects way more of the industry and humanity than we realise, it was a real vulnerable moment for me as it was my first blog but also jumped straight into a lot of the deep work that I have been doing over the last few years.

I had many people reach out and come up to me at the AHIA Awards and tell me how much the article helped them and brought awareness to their own toxic relationship with “Perfectionism”. This was super rewarding and validating for me and am very thankful for the people that took the time to reach out.

This time I want to speak about something I’m very passionate about - Education.

Before I start, I want to preface that the following is my opinion and by no means do I want to offend anyone. I want to address the way hair is being taught, I have seen the good, bad and the ugly when it comes to education and facilitation, a lot of the time facilitators lack a deep understanding of the content but simply know how to instruct to follow the curriculum.

What this means is that when a student doesn’t hold their graduated section at exactly 45 degrees, they are told that they are “WRONG” and are made to feel stupid (the reason many hairdressers left high school), instead of being shown how they are holding their section will create a different result and what that will look like and why.

Many in our community didn’t fit into systemic schools and the idea of a hands on and creative art is a great option however this is quickly and rudely stifled by the ancient curriculum and the way it is taught. Not only is the content, language, and resources severely outdated but also the way it is facilitated.

One of my first learning experiences at a salon, the person trusted to teach me, was a great hair cutter but not a great teacher or communicator. When I asked questions about what they were doing I was answered with “Because it works” “That’s how I was taught” “Just do it this way” which escalated into anger because he didn’t have the answers I needed to know. His ego showed up to protect his insecurity of not knowing and got angry at me for questioning him when all I wanted was the answer to why the technique worked.

This situation is all too common and doesn’t help anyone because as soon as someone is yelled at, the brain will be so far in fright or flight it will not retain anything.

I have spent a lot of time and resources over the last 3 years understanding human communication and how people learn and how to teach.

What I have learnt most is that you have be hyper-aware of people's learning styles, communication cues, personalities and how to adapt instantly to each learners needs.

Being a good teacher is being aware of all of these things, having a high EQ and empathy, knowing your content back to front, and being able to communicate well with a wide variety of people, this includes being able to articulate techniques and concepts in many different ways and being able to attach them to anecdotes or stories, use language that is appropriate and relevant and not necessarily technical (I know so many hairdressers who don’t understand elevation, layers, degrees and angles but do understand them when I use simple relevant language) and appropriate body language.

The best educators always work to serve others and not from ego, they know how to empower the learner by leading them to the answer themselves rather than simply giving it.

If a teacher doesn’t possess these skills, they are simply a person instructing a technique.

I think as business owners and employers we need to get serious about training our staff properly and establishing clear career and training pathways as well as allocating appropriate time and resources to helping them learn.

It may seem like a good idea for an apprentice to get a model in on a quiet morning or pull a mannequin out in down times but unless it is being supervised properly from start to finish it can actually cause more harm than it’s worth.

I often hear apprentices getting halfway through a model and their supervising senior saying they are too busy to come over and they “will be fine, I told you what to do”.

I have seen the level of anxiety and trauma this has created in apprentices and stylists even years later.

To move forward as an industry and rebuild our profile we need to start by investing in our apprentices, in how and when we teach them and making changes to the apprenticeship course and curriculum and offer more courses for teaching, communication and leadership.

If this strikes a chord and you would love to connect and have a chat about this topic or want to enquire about booking some custom education, please reach out on one of the channels below!

Insta: @prettyvac_nt @theweekendsociety.sandgate Email: nathan@prettyvacant.com.au