Viva la diva

Divas can often make the most passionate employees, and the best at driving change in our fast-paced industry, writes Hellen Ward

One of my senior leadership team sent me a post from Instagram recently. Cristiano is our artistic director and has been with us for nearly three decades, having been trained by Richard. Crissy joined us from his native Sardinia and we took him under our wing, both creatively and pastorally. He is equally passionate about his career and the salon. He doesn’t come to work to win a popularity contest (although the staff love him) and is one of the most driven people I have ever met and completely uncompromising – artistically and professionally.

The post Crissy sent me was a video of an interview with Eric Schmidt, former chief executive of Google. In it he says that you should always hire the divas, contrary to what every management textbook tells you. Schmidt argues that the people who are divas are the ones who truly believe – who drive the culture of excellence, who despite being a pain at times are the most passionate employees.

Divas expect a lot, are controversial; they drive people hard and therefore drive change. Schmidt’s own experience of working with a diva involves none other than Steve Jobs and he goes on to say that if you’re not working with one, you are probably working for one, adding that he means the word diva in the most flattering terms! “The question is,” I said to Crissy, “which one of us is the diva?” We concluded that we both are!

Driving change is a key element of keeping business fresh, innovative and inspiring, not just for the team but for the business owner, too. Taking my foot off the gas a bit now and trying to spend more time out, I know it’s vital that the team are motivated to find better, more efficient operational systems that allow us to focus on what matters most – delivering the customer service to a level of excellence that allows us to maintain our premium price point. I see my role now as creating the policy – conducting the orchestra, not trying to play all the instruments myself – and to do this, I need to be open to the new and embrace change, which at times, is not easy. But I read recently that the seven most deadly words in any company are “but we’ve always done it this way”.

Dare to change

Accounting is an obstacle for us, for example. We still run a double-entry account system and reconcile manually to the bank, as well as using Quickbooks. So many software systems are seamlessly integrated and have been ergonomically designed to a level which works beautifully in theory. Some very brainy tech department full of coding wizards (who have probably never run their own client-facing businesses) have no doubt developed the perfect functionality to make our working lives easier. But do these square pegs actually fit into the round holes? Being at the coalface, you see issues with things that those who are working conceptually and not practically may not.

For instance, there is an increasing number of companies providing operational systems that take payments direct from source revenue. It sounds simple, but the fact is we need to enter through our accounts the turnover, not the revenue after their costs have been deducted. In the past, this has stopped us moving forward with changing our EPOS systems, for example. We used to get an invoice from the provider, breaking down the percentage charges and the terminal rentals, which we would pay every month like any other supplier.

''Trying to spend more time out now, I know it’s vital that the team are MOTIVATED TO FIND BETTER, more efficient operational systems that allow us to FOCUS ON WHAT MATTERS MOST – delivering EXCELLENT CUSTOMER SERVICE''

Now, we are looking at other potential providers and it seems they all take the charges out straight away, before the turnover hits the bank, so reconciling what we have actually produced in turnover with what is on the bank statement will always be a headache for us. Something so simple causes so many issues. Do the people that create these systems realise that?

Many companies like to make their living from our sector and I always urge them to speak to somebody who actually has the salon keys in their hands while whatever they are developing is on the drawing board. Failure to do so is bound to result in far more work putting everything right and making this work on a practical level.

Having said that, sometimes the technology means you have no option but to fall in line and adjust your systems to move with the world, however irritating it is to change things operationally. Once you reach the tipping point where a system becomes the norm, the old ways will be consigned to history.

Digital futures

I can see a time in the not-too-distant future where VAT will be integrated and payments will be deducted straight from revenue by HMRC, almost making accounting redundant. Making tax digital means we are all connected with them anyway, so corporation tax and other charges like NICS will no doubt become automatic (however, in a recent inspection, the tax man that visited us was delighted to see that we backed up our systems with old-fashioned pen-andpaper books.)

One thing is sure, when the tidal wave of change starts, you have no choice but to dive in and embrace it – diva or not.

Hellen Ward is managing director of Richard Ward Hair & Metrospa in London, vice president of The Hair & Beauty Charity and co-founder of Salon Employers Association (SEA).