I believe I’ve mentioned that in the last few years I’ve had several former clients embark upon a career in the nail industry. Most of them didn’t even tell me. Some of them were former clients who hadn’t been in to get their nails done in some time. A couple of them came in one day, said they were taking their nails off because of financial reasons, and then I found out they were in nail school a few weeks later.

It breaks my heart. I can’t imagine that I have ever given any of my clients the impression that I would not be supportive of their choice to get their license. My clients know I spend a lot of time networking and mentoring. My clients get to hear far more rants than the Internet ever will. And one of the regular rants is about how I don’t understand so much of the cattiness and the secretiveness among techs who feel that other techs are out to “steal” their clients and/or their ideas.

So when someone who knows me decides to pursue a job in my industry, I can’t blame them; I’m sure I’m setting an appealing example. But I don’t understand why they don’t talk to me? Why they wouldn’t want to make good use of their relationship with an established nail professional who could help fill in so many of the gaps that the manicuring program and licensing process leaves open?

One former client has kept in touch throughout her cosmetology licensing process. And I’m tickled to get word from her recently that, as a newly licensed cosmo, she wants to “shadow” me for a while.

I laughed when I got the message. I told her she was going to discover how much downtime I really have and other secrets that I don’t share with just anyone. But of course, she’s welcome to hang out with me. I’ll talk nails at her till she’s sick of me.

Soon I will have a new minion to do my bidding. I’m very excited. It’s been a long time since I had nail tech friend to hang out with all day.