How to Motivate Your Team When You Can't Afford Big Raises

48% of salon and clinic owners say managing and motivating staff is the single hardest part of running their business, not marketing, not finance, staff. And if you're one of those owners that's invested thousands in training and equipment and benefits only to watch your best team member walk out the door, this episode might just save your sanity. Hello, hello, hello, my salon friends. Phil Jackson here, your queen of salons, coming all over the airwaves again with another dose of my wise owl wisdom. How on earth are you? Achingly well, I hope, as always, as we steam towards the end of October. My goodness, where is this month gone? What a busy one. Heading into November, one of my favourite months for marketing is we get to start talking about Christmas, we get to talk about Black Friday, we get to talk about lots and lots of money making opportunities. But that's all for another month. Today, we're going to talk about something that probably keeps you awake at night more than anything else in your business, and that's your team. And I'm guessing if you're an employer, you're dealing with at least one of these things right now. Right now, you've got a therapist you're worried is about to leave, or you've got someone on your team who's good at their job, but just seems a bit checked out emotionally. Or you're paying someone really well, like really well, and they're still not bloody happy. Or maybe you've just lost someone you've trained and invested in and they took half their client list when they left. And if any of that hit home, you are not alone. Over 48% of salon and clinic owners, salon and clinic owners rather, said that managing and motivating staff is the most difficult aspect of running their business. Not getting new clients, not marketing, not even money, but staff. It's the number one pain point. And here's what makes it even harder. You're doing everything you can think of that you're supposed to do. You're paying decent commissions, maybe even too much commission, buying the nice equipment, you're flexible with scheduling, you're trying to create a lovely culture, and still people leave. Or even worse, they stay, but they're bloody miserable. And that misery seeps into your entire business and is that parasite draining your joy. One salon owner I spoke with said they pay between 52% and 56% commission with no product charges and retail commission on top.

And they're just treading water for nine years now, taking out personal loans, not getting paid properly themselves. And finally, at a situation where they have to close and give their staff two weeks notice. And guess what? They've got to pay redundancy for those team members too. And it breaks my heart because it's not unique. There are so many owners bleeding themselves dry, trying to keep themselves happy, asking themselves what they're doing wrong, why they can't give good, why they can't keep good people. So here's what I want you to hear first. You're probably not doing anything wrong, but you might be focusing on the wrong things. Because here's the truth that nobody really talks about. Money matters, obviously, especially at the moment when people are struggling financially. But it's not the main reason that people leave. In fact, it's not the main reason people join our industry in the first place. There are easier ways to make a living than standing behind a hairdressing chair or carrying out massage services. Trust me. I don't think that's why people are attracted to our industry. And yet it's the thing that we rely on again and again to motivate them. But that's good news because it means that we can find other things, things that may cost you almost nothing, but that actually work a lot harder when it comes to motivation than money does. It means we need to be intentional. It means we need to be consistent. And sometimes it means we need to have those uncomfortable conversations, too. So what's the truth about why people really leave? Well, like I've said, it's not always about the money. And that might be hard to believe, especially if you think you're losing all of your team members to go self-employed where they can earn more. Money is often the reason people give when they leave, but it's not always the real reason. Think about it this way. If someone comes to you and says, I've got an offer, 5% more commission somewhere else, so I'm leaving. What they're really saying is that they don't feel enough value here to turn down 5% somewhere else. If someone leaves, if someone loves where they work and they feel valued and appreciated, if they're growing, they're learning, the culture is good, they're not going to leave over a small difference in pay. They might negotiate with you, ask for a raise, but they're not just going to walk out the door. So why do people leave? Well, reason number one is they feel undervalued. And it's not just about money. It's about recognition. It's about appreciation. It's about feeling that their contribution matters. So think about your own team right now. When was the last time you genuinely, specifically, publicly thanked someone?

Not just a casual good job, but a real specific acknowledgement of something they did well. If you can't remember, that might be your first clue. Reason number two, and this is the big one, is no growth or learning opportunities. If people don't feel that you're taking their future seriously, they will take their future seriously themselves. When people feel stagnant, when they're doing the same services, the same cuts, the same facials, the same treatments month after month after month, with no opportunity to level up, they start looking for those opportunities elsewhere. One of my beauty salon owner friends told me that her best therapist left to go to a spa that sent their team on advanced skincare training twice a year. That was it. It wasn't anything to do with money. It was just the training. Now, the interesting thing with training is, yes, there's an investment of time and investment of money, but if you decide that you're going to pay, I don't know, let's say an extra £10 a week to your best beauty therapist, that's going to cost you £500 plus per year. £10 a week, they're not even going to notice it. They're not even going to feel that that's any better. And you've got to do that across your entire team. It could cost you thousands. Well, you might be able to pay someone £500 to come in and give some motivating training to your entire team, get a lot more bang for your buck and actually keep people more motivated. Reason number three is lack of control, lack of autonomy. And this one surprises people, but it's massive. So you've got team members that feel micromanaged or controlled. They will eventually leave no matter how much you pay them. If you're dictating every single aspect of how they work. So, yes, of course, we're telling people what products they use. But if you're telling them also how long each service is going to take, requiring them to upsell specific things in specific ways, you're treating them like robots, not professionals, not technicians. And professionals hate that. Now, I'm not saying you shouldn't have standards. You absolutely should. But there's a difference between having professional standards and micromanaging every single detail. Reason number four, and you know this, is toxic culture or feeling unsupported. It's the drama. It's the gossip. It's the cliques. It's the favoritism. It's putting up with that one person who's rude to clients because you need their money. An owner that doesn't address these problems. You might be paying top dollar. But if the environment is toxic, good people will eventually leave.

Now, you know, deep down, whether you've got a toxic culture and have a really good long hard at the conversations that happen in your salon, the vibe that you're creating, the culture that's being nurtured. And be honest with yourself. Does something need addressing? Reason number five is work life balance. And this one has got huge over the years. People want flexibility. The young people coming into our industry now do not want to work full time hours. They want to be able to take Tuesdays off without guilt. They want a side gig that takes up the entirety of their Friday. They want to be able to leave at six instead of staying until nine. Lots of people leaving because they need to pick up their kids from school and salons just can't be flexible. So that flexibility, yes, it's going to take some managing. But ultimately, if you can get someone who's really productive, who does an amazing job, who builds up a strong clientele, that clientele will fit in around the hours that you have available. And reason number six is people want to be their own boss. And this is the one that scares you the most. Someone leaving to open their own business or to go and rent a room or to rent a booth somewhere. And you're terrified you're going to take they're going to take all their clients with them. And honestly, sometimes this one is inevitable. You can give people control over their own destiny, control over their own column. But you can't compete with that dream if people want to be their own boss. The thing is, I don't think a lot of people actually want to be their own boss. I think sometimes that's the only way they can get the other things that we've highlighted. So we can make sure that while people are with you, they're getting the value so that they're not constantly fantasizing about leaving. But there are some people who just want their name over the door. And we need to be able to support that and nurture that so that people leave on good terms. So what do we do about it? Well, after this short message, I'll give you my three high impact retention strategies. Let me guess. Your appointment book is full, but your bank account isn't. How long are you going to let that go on for? Isn't it time that you got paid properly? My Get Paid Properly program isn't just another course. It's your roadmap to boosting your profits, increasing your takings, finally getting rewarded for the hard work that you do. With nine straightforward modules, my foolproof pricing spreadsheet,

and I'm even throwing in a one-to-one coaching call to answer any questions that you have about the training or anything else that's getting in the way of your incredible success. Head to getpaidproperly.com forward slash podcast and you can save a hundred pounds on your sign up and get that bonus coaching call with me. The program is backed by my signature 90-day no-quibble guarantee. Take the training, take the coaching call, and if you don't feel you know enough to confidently set your prices profitably for the future, I will coach you myself until you do. Head to getpaidproperly.com forward slash podcast, lock in that saving, and finally take strides in the direction of getting rewarded for your hard work. So now we understand why people leave, let's talk about what we can actually do to keep them. And these are my three strategies that I think have the biggest impact and cost you as little as possible financially. And then we'll talk about what to do if we really do have a pay problem. Strategy number one is recognition. And this is probably the single most underutilized tool in our entire industry. And it's pretty much free. And it matters because people want to be seen and they want to be appreciated. When they do a good job and no one notices, my darling, they feel like they're just a cog in a machine. But when their contribution is acknowledged, specifically, genuinely, it helps create loyalty. So here's how we're going to implement it. Well, first of all, we're going to figure out what kind of team you've got, because I'm going to be talking about public praise, essentially. But I've got to acknowledge there are times when public praise does exactly the opposite. There are people who would rather die than be called out in a team meeting or on a team chat. And we need to know that about our team. So if they would rather that you recognize something in private, then absolutely go along with that. But let's assume that we've got a team that actually wants acknowledgement publicly. So in your team meeting or on your team WhatsApp or Slack channel or on your social media, we can say Emma absolutely crushed this facial today. Her client said it was the most relaxed she'd felt in months. Can we all give snaps for Emma? The key word here is specific. Don't just say good job. Say I noticed you stayed 30 minutes late to finish that dermaplaning treatment,

even though you had somewhere you had to be. It's the kind of dedication that makes us special. Thank you so much. When a client raves about a team member, don't just say, oh, that's nice and move on. Share it with them immediately. Share it with the team. Create a compliments board in your team break room or a dedicated channel in your team chat. Some businesses even notice a compliment of the week and highlight it on social media. Of course, because something's in the public domain, we can share that on social media too. Imagine how valid, how valued your esthetician feels when you publicly celebrate their work. Someone's been with you for over a year. Celebrate it. Two years, five years. Don't let these moments pass unnoticed. It doesn't have to be huge and expensive. A card signed by the team, maybe a small gift, a social media shout out, perhaps team lunch if it's been a number of years. The gesture matters much more than the cost. Well, how about this one? How about a Friday win? How about going around your entire team, if you're small enough, send a group message asking everyone to share one win from the week. It could be a professional one. They nailed an amazing balayage or got an amazing result on a chemical peel or something personal. You know, something about perhaps what their kids have achieved this week. But it creates a culture of positivity and acknowledgement. It makes everyone notice when things are going well. And one of my clinic owners told me that they implemented the recognition scheme and were shocked at how much it changed the vibe. Literally cost them nothing but five minutes of being intentional each week. And suddenly the team starts to feel like a team instead of a group of people who just happen to work in the same building. Strategy number two, and we are so bad at this, but it's about transparent communication. And this one is scary for lots of owners because it sometimes means we need a bit of vulnerability, but it's incredibly powerful. Firstly, regular one-to-ones. We've talked about this on the Build Your Salon podcast before. This is non-negotiable. At minimum, you need to be having a proper conversation with each team member once a month. Not just how it's going, but real structured check-ins. If they're not hitting performance measures, then we need to be upping the frequency of those regular one-to-ones to weekly. But also, perhaps in a team setting, we need to be honest about the business challenges. You don't need to share every single detail of your finances,

but you can share when we've had a slow month. It's probably not going to be a surprise to some people anyway. And we could share that we need everyone to really focus on rebooking and retail. Why not share some of the struggles so that suddenly owning your own business isn't the grass is always greener, it's the reality. And perhaps sharing the reality of what we can afford to do as we move forward in the business is actually really valuable information. When you're transparent, your team feels like they're partners in your business instead of adversaries. They understand why you're making certain decisions, certain tough decisions. And they're more likely to have grace when things are tight. And don't assume that you know what your team wants. In this open communication, ask them, what would make this a better place to work for you? I did this. I was brave one day. I went around my entire team individually, and I did it quickly before word got round. And I said, if you could change one thing about working here, what would it be? And I didn't tell them, but I promised myself whatever they came up with, we were going to do. I wanted them to feel they had an impact on my business. And I got a huge variety of answers. One person said, I think that the commission structure we have is really unfair. Because I had stylists who were cutting stylists, and I had stylists who were colour specialists. And the colour specialists received a slightly lower commission than the cutters. And she said, I feel that's unfair. I said, OK, let's work together. Let's make this fair across the board. Another team member said, do you know what would really make my day better? I said, what? She said, can we get a new mop? The mop we've got is really ineffective, and it makes cleaning the salon a lot harder than it needs to be. For the sake of, I think it was £8, she went out, bought a new mop, and felt like she'd had an impact on her day. So go around the team. I'm not suggesting that you promise that you're going to do everything that they come up with, but ask them, what's the one thing that I could change to make this a better workplace? What's one thing that I could do to make your job easier? Or what kind of education are you most interested in? You might be surprised by their answers. Maybe they don't want a big raise. Maybe they want one Sunday off per month.

Maybe they don't care about a bigger commission. They just want a little bit of training that you haven't even identified yet. You don't know unless you ask. And strategy number three is the education investment. And we've talked about this. Remember how people want to grow and learn. This is how you give them that without breaking the bank. So here's what it looks like practically. Firstly, share skills internally. If somebody goes on external training, make sure they bring it back and train the rest of your team. They can tell the rest of the team what they've been learning on that course that they went on. Or if they're fantastic at brow shaping, get them to do a little 30-minute demo for everybody. If they're really good at consultations for Botox or amazing at blow dries or brilliant at difficult waxing, get them to share that knowledge internally. Firstly, everyone gets to learn something new. Secondly, the person gets to feel valued in their expertise. Win-win. And it costs you nothing but 30 minutes of their time. Secondly, online education. There are so many affordable online education platforms now. Maybe you've even got access to some of them through your suppliers. They wouldn't cost you absolutely anything. Maybe there's webinars on new techniques or product knowledge. Maybe colour theory or cutting technique videos for your stylists. The point is continuous learning. If they've got some downtime between clients, wouldn't you rather they were polishing and refining their skills? Or maybe order pizza once a month. Could you watch a new tutorial together? Discuss a new technique. Review before and after photos as a team. Make it casual. Make it fun. Make it a regular thing. One salon I know does a treatment Tuesday. It's only once a quarter, but they practice new massage techniques on each other and try out new products. One clinic I know does a quarterly skin science session because they've got some people who are kind of geeky about skin on their team. Costs almost nothing but creates massive value. The key here is consistency. Don't do education once and then forget about it for six months. Make it a regular part of your culture. Because guess what? If your team member leaves and works for themselves, education is suddenly really expensive. By the time they've carved out time in their week and paid for the training and paid to attend it, suddenly they're making a massive investment and you're doing this as a salon owner and it's costing you almost nothing. But what about the money? What if you're thinking, this is all great, but my team genuinely isn't paid enough? Well, if compensation really is the problem and you're genuinely underpaying and you're only paying as much as you can afford to, guess what? It's got to be a pricing conversation.

If you can't make ends meet, if you can't pay your team as much as they deserve and you're not making the profits that you need to, we've got to restructure your pricing. But you've got to do it in a way which is mindful of your commission. It might be we need to change pricing and commission at the same time. If you're not charging enough for your services, but charging more means you're just losing more in wages and you're still not making profit, that's not tenable either. It might be that we need to overhaul the finances of the business all in one go. Or maybe we need to get a bit creative. Perhaps we need performance-based bonuses. Hit this retail target and you'll get X bonus. Perhaps we need to look at different suppliers. Perhaps we need to start looking at white label products where the profit margin tends to be a lot higher. Don't just look at commissions in isolation. Let's look at it across the board as part of the financial makeup of your business. Don't forget to be transparent in those conversations. If you're genuinely struggling and can't afford raises, be honest with your team. Not in a guilt trip way, but in a here's the reality way. My team always knew that they were the best paid in town, but I paid as much as I profitably could. Paying them more meant making a loss and that just wasn't an option. They never came to be asking for more money because they knew the answer had to be no. But don't be held hostage by your team members. Some team members know you're scared of them leaving and they will use that to leverage more and more without an increase in performance or an increase in loyalty. And guess what? That's the difficult truth. That's when retention becomes toxic. There are times when we just have to let someone go. If they're not meeting basic expectations, if they're toxic to your culture, if they're actively undermining you, if they're checked out but won't leave, if the relationships become hostile or it's become all about the money, it's time to let them go. But maybe that's a discussion for another time. What do you think? What am I missing? What's happening in your business? I would love to hear from you on this. Reach out and let me know. Phil at buildyoursalon.com. You know I love hearing from my salon lovelies anyway. Also reach out if you'd like to be a guest on a future episode of the Build Your Salon podcast. I'd love to be sharing your success story. And don't go thinking. You need to be part of a huge business or have a massive team. Some of the most inspiring stories we share come from small business owners that other listeners can relate to. Just seven short days until I'm coming all over the airwaves again with another dose of my Wise Owl wisdom.

And until then, my loves, take care. Sit down and see what's going on with the queen of salons. Hair, beauty and more successful tips for business owners. All on Build Your Salon.