Last month we talked about incentivizing your staff to sell/perform better and about the concept of how owners need to inspect what they expect from their staff.

If you are a salon owner, you need to except the fact that most staff will never be as motivated and good at selling as you probably are. It’s really not their fault. Most staff members are working for you while they continue their college education, working part-time or just passing through until they get a different job.

Working in retail requires a certain skill set and attitude that the typical 9-to-5, Monday through Friday mentality people just don’t understand. I love retail, and I love selling, so I can’t imagine doing anything else. Often times, though, your staff isn’t quite as motivated as you are.

After all, they don’t have skin in the game like us owners do. We bought or built our businesses from scratch. We’ve invested large amounts of money, have leases and obligations that we can’t just easily walk away. So yes, we are motivated every day to work 24/7 to avoid working a 9 to 5 job.

Most staff you hire really do want to be able to do their job well. No one takes a job with the intention of not liking it or doing a bad job. What typically happens, though, is that business owners don’t do the best job setting proper expectations and training their staff for peak performance.

One of the best ways to prepare your staff to do their job as good as possible is to have scripts for all the important sales functions. Many people will cringe when they hear the word “scripts,” but without having them you are at high risk for letting staff say whatever they want.

Click here to read the entire article in the latest issue of Smart Tan Magazine online.