I always enjoy getting together with other nail professionals and talking shop. In fact (there's that comma problem again), if you ever want to get me into a long and serious conversation, just get me on the subject of doing business. It doesn't matter if we're talking about worker classification; booth renter vs. employee vs. independent contractor — and yes there is a difference between an IC and a booth renter — whether it's how you are classified vs. what you really are or how you classify your workers vs. how you should. Or what products you use and why; what services you offer and why; where we work; what we charge ... oh my! Let's face it there are so many facets of our businesses I could go on forever with the list of things we could discuss in a conversation.
So last weekend at the ISSE show in Long Beach it was great fun to have the opportunity to chitchat with several colleagues throughout the weekend and — not surprisingly — find myself deeply involved in lively debate about how we run our businesses.
We nail professionals are an opinionated lot. Nevertheless I did end up in at least one conversation that left me wondering when I asked for advice on how to run my business.
As I sat in the circle of professionals from all different areas of the U.S. discussing our prices and the products we prefer, it occurred to me that one person in particular had taken on the task of giving me some "helpful" advice about how I could improve my business practices and — ergo — my bottom line. Which has gnawed at the corner of my mind all week as I go over the conversation again and again in my mind and ask myself, "when did I suggest I needed help?"
No one ever asked me how long I'd been doing nails. What average prices for my area were. How many clients I see in a week, a day, or overall, or what my client retention rate is like.
Seems to me like someone — while trying to be helpful in their own way— overlooked several key factors that determine success in the business while managing to be ever so slightly insulting in the process by overlooking the fact that I've been doing this for a really long time now and seem to be doing OK.
[shrug] Just throwing it out there folks. Before you start giving out professional advice to someone who's been in the business three times as long as you have, you might want to take a moment to find out if that person might have something useful for you too.
