ITS NOT ABOUT THE PASTA, ITS ABOUT MANAGEMENT

When I ask a salon owner or busy stylist, “Do you ever watch reality TV?” they are understandably skeptical. You may or may not know that I am a passionate reality TV viewer. I’ve loved it since the beginning, early housewives, first season of survivor, you name it and it is highly likely that I’ve watched it. I like escapism, and if we’re being honest I’m not above watching  the drama. When I read Everything Bad is Good For You: How Today’s Pop Culture is Actually Making Us Smarter by Steven Johnson, I realized why I REALLY like reality TV. His theory is that reality tv forces us to explore and understand complex networks of relationships, and that this focus on relationship dynamics is actually more stimulating and thought provoking than classic sitcoms praised throughout TV’s history. I love reality TV because it’s “entertaining” but also because it examines the way people relate to each other, hear each other and change based on interpersonal experiences. And what is more exciting than that? In an industry that is reliant on a stylists ability to deal with all kinds of people from the most maximum Karen all the way to the sweetest possible human, the way we change and adapt from these experiences is EVERYTHING. 

I believe strongly that humans can learn from literally everything, not just online courses textbooks, or youtube videos (big shout out for #tiktoktaughtme) and there are MANY things I’ve learned from reality TV that translate into salon success. There’s one that keeps coming back- how to address staff drama according to Lisa Vanderpump. 

If you don’t know who I’m referring to, Lisa Vanderpump debuted on Bravo’s game changing Real Housewives franchise in 2010, and  despite departing as a real housewife, she hasn’t left our screens. Aside from her appearance on the show, Lisa and her husband Ken are owners (either in full or in partnership) of over 30 restaurants between the UK, California and Las Vegas, and at last check, she and her husband had a net worth of over 80 million dollars. Additionally, she is obsessed with all things pink, has two children (now adults), and participates in both animal rights and LGBTQ+ charity with passion. At the close of 2021, she had raised almost a quarter of a million dollars for dog rescues in Cameo appearances alone. 

Lisa isn’t a perfect person, or boss. And the staff she has is FAR from flawless, but LVP handles employee drama with poise and composure that can only come from experience. People obviously love watching the antics in the SUR-vers workplace, the show has had 9 successful seasons, and the 10th will air this year. While it’s great to watch on TV, everyone says they want a “drama free” workplace, and despite the thus-far endless drama that has come from this group of colleagues, I think Lisa demonstrates some high level management on the show. From my vantage point, she does three things that I consider must-dos if you’ve got drama to squash with, about, or around your team: directly confront it when it happens, value and seek out expert advice, and hold her top performers accountable. This list is not exhaustive, in fact, its the tip of the iceberg, but starting here, and modeling these three behaviors will show your team that drama isn’t part of your company culture, and that they’re going to need to take a private jet somewhere far away from your business before trying anything close to SUR level shenanigans. 

First and foremost is the timeliness of addressing any drama or staff related rumors.Lisa handles these types of concerns IMMEDIATELY, and while it is imperative to think through what you’re going to say or do regarding the incidents in question, waiting too long can have major consequences. The further away the conversation is from the event, the fuzzier the details become, and the harder it is to demonstrate to your team the natural consequences of their actions. Let’s take tardiness as an example. When a salon owner tells me that they have a service provider that is late, the first thing I ask the owner is if they’ve talked to them about their lateness. Oftentimes the answer is no, because it usually starts really slowly, and innocently. First clocking in right on time instead of a few minutes early, then just 5 minutes late and the progression continues until you’ve got guests waiting for service providers who aren’t even at the salon yet. It can pose a challenge for an owner to intervene, because something like being late can start really slowly, and build into a larger problem, making it challenging to determine when to discipline the offender.  The surest way to prevent this progression is by confronting it at the first issue, and re-setting expectations. In season 1 episode 5 Lisa does just that. Her team goes to vegas to celebrate a birthday, and most of the featured servers and bartenders attend. To put it lightly they forget their better judgment at home, and act wildly inappropriately at a restaurant owned by a friend of Lisa’s. Before they can even have their first shift back at work, Lisa calls a staff meeting and confronts the issue by saying, “I’ve heard a lot of stories, and now I want to hear the truth.” She sets the tone for the meeting as serious, but also that she intends to give them an opportunity to speak about what happened and why. With employee shortages at an all-time high, recognizing the need of staff to be heard is a seriously good move. She also clearly identifies the problem- “From what I understand, this happened at a restaurant, and you were all there. When you’re there you’re representing my restaurant. SUR was there, and that’s why this upsets me.” Lisa clearly identifies and explains what the problem is, and why it is a problem without getting into the messiness of the interpersonal drama (yet). The debauchery at Lisa’s friend’s restaurant JUST happened, and Lisa’s reputation was impacted. Instead of waiting until it happened again, or she pulled each person aside individually, she confronted the issue immediately, universally, and explained why it was a problem to her, and their collective workplace, making their bad behavior something that would impact not just the people directly involved, but every SUR team member from the owner to the bussers. Our previous example of timeliness has the same impact- if a service provider is late to work, it impacts everyone from the guest services coordinator to the assistants, to the clients. Intervening in a Lisa-esque way, directly and immediately, you can preserve your hard-earned team culture and prevent the progression to cultural breakdown. 

Lisa doesn’t just handle the drama that happens outside of SUR, she tackles the problems her team causes inside the restaurant too. After hiring a secret shopper, or in this case a secret diner, Lisa gets the report that some of her senior bartenders are making drinks inconsistently. This seems like a no-brainer right? Bring it up during a one-on-one, have them make the drink in front of you and move on. But Lisa knows something that I share with people ALL THE TIME. Things you tell your staff over, and over again sound different coming from someone else. So instead of Lisa, or even their direct managers re-training Jax and Tom, they bring in bartending experts and bar managers from one of Lisa’s nearby (and newer) venues. While her team doesn’t exactly immediately embrace this new voice of authority, they do learn from him, and go on to add two new cocktails, which quickly become the two most popular on the menu. While we aren’t  making pink martinis in the salon, we are constantly learning new skills. Salon owners tell me all the time about the veterans on their team who do not have the foliage, triple process skill set that their new talent, and trendy clientele need.The answer isn’t wait for a redo, it is bring in a voice who is a credible authority on the subject, and get your team to learn from them. In order to get your team to take someone with less work experience and more specific needed skills seriously, it starts at the top. You need to talk about young stylists as the experts they are in their specific craft and provide them with a platform so that everyone, regardless of industry background, learns. 

Lastly, Lisa holds her top performers and her most senior staff accountable in a way that I know is challenging for a lot of salon owners. There is an archetype of a certain kind of stylist that has a long tenure at any given salon. It does NOT refer to stylists with experience and open minds, or stylists with long careers who are as excited today as they were when they graduated from beauty school. For the purpose of this example, we’ll call the specific type of stylist I am referring to Kristen. Kristen can absolutely roll a perm, but isn’t passionate about it, she has a pretty robust clientele of guests she’s seen for decades and she does not change their retouch formulas. Kristen doesn’t seek out education, but attends if the class is at the salon (and mandatory). She doesn’t do hand painting, brow lamination, hair tinsel, or tone her blondes. She doesn’t win contests, sell much retail or have an instagram account. Mostly the Kristens of the salon world fly under the radar UNLESS an owner wants to make a change. Then Kristen will be the first one to object, and point out all of the ways that this new policy will cause problems. Lisa has a Kristen, and in season 1, Kristen was one of Lisa’s longest standing employees. Despite her long tenure, Lisa holds her accountable for breaking team policy. But she doesn’t stop there. In season 2 episode 3’s staff meeting, she also holds Tom Sandoval, also  a veteran employee (7 years at the time of taping), accountable despite his significant value  to the team. In fact, Lisa professionally disciplines all of the cultural leaders featured in the show when they break protocol. This sets the tone that even top performers need to be on board for the cultural tone of the workplace. In the salon setting described above, Kristen would need to learn the difference between air touch foils and foliage, or be suspended. 

I have had the fortune to work with a lot of business owners in my career who have all taught me a lot about managing a salon staff, maintaining team culture, and a plethora of other essential lessons, all without being on TV. Truly, I am grateful for my experience to get to learn from them all. But I’m also grateful for my opportunity to learn from Lisa, and for my perspective. I don’t see reality TV as just a waste of time, or an escape. I see it as an opportunity to learn about how people will behave in a given situation or under a certain set of circumstances. And while I don’t think that you should do everything that Lisa does in her restaurants, or friendships, or even with her team; and I certainly don’t think that her staff is the epitome of what you should train your staff to be, I do think we can learn about management from Vanderpump Rules. Lisa’s passion is something to emulate, and her ability to consistently relate to a young audience is something that many salon owners would love to have. She also undeniably insists on a team culture that results in great staff retention, in an industry known for employee volatility. I think it comes down to this quote, “ I know they don’t care, but it is my job to make them care.” And by my watch, she does.