Let’s tackle the problem at the source!

By Kristie Kesic

Recently I advertised for a first- or second year apprentice, and I received 111 applications. This was the largest number of applicants I have ever received in 8 years of owning my business. Now I’m not going to try and say they were all good, some never returned our calls, some didn’t turn up for interviews and some weren’t for us, BUT the fact that 111 people took the time to apply to work at my salon was something I take great pride in.

As I sorted through applications, the alarming trend I noticed was the number of second and third-year apprentices applying, saying that they know they are behind because they’ve never received the training they needed or wanted, and they were willing to go back a year to restart their training.

I found myself wanting to apologise to all of them for their bad experience, and I did apologise to those ones I had in for interviews. But hang on, why am I apologising? I didn’t do anything to them, I didn’t give them those bad experiences, but people in our industry did, and that doesn’t sit well with me. So that’s why I found myself apologising on behalf of our industry, so for just a second they knew we weren’t all bad.

Of the applicants I got in for interviews they all said they responded to my ad because I said I closed the salon on Tuesday afternoons for training. Some said they had wanted to get into the industry for a while, but they had friends who were apprentices that told them how shit the industry was because they got no training and they just cleaned so because of that it had deterred them from starting hairdressing.

This was a total light bulb moment. Why is it always the apprentices that get the bad rap. Have we ever stopped and thought to hold account those owners who are employing these apprentices and not giving them training and treating them badly forcing them to leave the industry because they are sick of being cleaners.

Why is it so easy to put the blame on apprentices, why isn’t the focus on the lazy owners. If all owners did what they are meant to and train their apprentices, these apprentices wouldn’t be lazy because they won’t be bored. If they got the correct training, they wouldn’t turn into unskilled seniors.

If apprentices were treated with respect, they wouldn’t be telling their friends how bad our industry is deterring others away from our industry. Imagine if they were instead telling their friends how great our industry was enticing them to join our industry.

I’ve had to put some hairdressing pages on mute or leave the group because it’s all bitching and whingeing about staff being unskilled, there’s no positive coming out of these open Facebook groups and negativity feeds negativity.

My view on this is how about we start looking at the source of this problem.

Look at sports. You have a coach, your coach plans the training sessions each week for you to turn up to, you participate in said training sessions, your coach shows you drills and skills, adjusts training sessions to get the best out of you and gives you feedback for you or your team to get better and to perform at your best.

In sport if your team doesn’t perform the blame ultimately lies on the coach. If an athlete doesn’t perform well individually or as a team you will always hear them say when interviewed that along with their coach, they will go back to the drawing board and work on what they got wrong and fix it. If a team or individual performs well, the coach is always congratulated because they did that, they trained that. Food for thought, how many coaches get sacked because their team constantly underperforms?

So, bring it back to our industry. If owners aren’t planning training sessions, if owners aren’t allocating time for training sessions, if owners aren’t showing our apprentices the skills and giving them the knowledge they need to become a skilled senior, who’s fault is it that the apprentice is unskilled? If apprentices are unskilled, how do we expect to grow skilled seniors and a skilled industry? Who’s really failing our industry? I’ll tell you who, owners who aren’t training their apprentices.

Now don’t get me wrong when two of my incredible apprentices left recently (one moved interstate and one left the industry to do music) I found myself with the mentality of I too have had enough. What was the point in putting in all this work and training when they can ultimately just leave? I was ready to pivot my business, just hire assistants and work one-on-one with our clients.

Thankfully I very quickly snapped out of my self-pity party and went if I do that, I too become part of the problem and I only want to be part of the solution. If we all have the mentality of what’s the point in training apprentices anymore, where does that leave our industry? I have the mentality that when great apprentices or any staff leave, I have had the privilege of being part of their journey and I will still be their biggest supporter.

If you’re reading this and thinking who is this woman and what does she know? I’ll tell you who I am, I am an owner that has had an apprentice mum threaten me, has had times in which 3 applicants responded to my job ad and an owner that went through something in which I had advice from 3 lawyers, the AHC, and an apprenticeship board for a problem that literally had nothing to actually do with my salon or me but was made my problem.

So, trust me when I say I get it when you say it’s too hard. But I am also the owner that closes her salon of 8 staff every Tuesday afternoon for 3 hours for training, I am an owner that has seen members of her staff win apprentice of the year, 2 x hotshots team members, curate award winner and this is just my emerging team and I’m the owner that still thinks the biggest flex or achievement is seeing your team achieve their goals.

If you are reading this article and thinking for even a second, I could be talking about you then now is the time to look in the mirror and put your hand up and say I’m part of the problem. You then have a choice to be better and a chance to change your ways and be part of the solution.

I said above negativity spreads negativity, but this also means positivity spreads positivity. If you are an owner questioning your ways and not knowing where to start, start by surrounding yourself with the positives of our industry, and those people doing amazing things. I choose to be surrounded by owners in the industry who are the leaders and who are only doing good.

The ones training their apprentices and growing a strong industry from within the walls of their own salons. The ones that go through all the feels and still choose to embrace apprentices and be their support and think of apprentices as just as important as any other member of their team. At the end of the day, I can’t do my job without my apprentices and if we aren’t training apprentices how will they grow into skilled hairdressers and then what happens to our industry.

Kristie Kesic Owner - Cobelle Creative @cobellecreative@kristiekesic_colourist