Duties of a hairstylist. Are you familiar with all of them?

Duties of a hairstylist. Are you familiar with all of them?

If you have been working in the industry for quite some time now, you may be really surprised (or maybe even slightly offended) by this question. Of course, you know your responsibilities! You are an experienced specialist, not a mere rookie. Maybe you found this article while doing some research for recruiting a new hairstylist - but for sure there will be nothing to surprise you. Right? Well… let’s find out together!

What are the types of hairstylist duties?

To make listing all of your responsibilities easier, we divided them into four different categories:

The basics, which are focused on your role in the salon
The managerial, which are connected to managing your schedule, work station, tools, products, etc.
The educational, which are all about ensuring your skills are up (or beyond) the industry standard
The interpersonal, which ensure that you provide great customer service

The basics

Let’s begin with the obvious. Naturally, your duty is to perform the services you were thought to perform - namely:

To wash, treat and dry hair using products fitted to the client’s hair type and condition
To cut, trim and shave hair using proper equipment and techniques
To colour and chemically treat clients’ hair using proper equipment and techniques in order to achieve the desired end result
To style clients’ hair according to their needs and wants

However, you know well that you are not a “hairstyling machine” and it’s actually your knowledge and experience that clients count on the most. This is why it’s also your job to:

Be knowledgeable about different hair textures, lengths, types and be ready to work with all of them
Be able to recognise different hair or scalp problems and be prepared to give professional advice
Recommend cuts, colours and styles according to customers’ face shapes and tastes
Know the theory behind different treatments (especially chemical ones) and be able to react properly if something goes wrong

The managerial

The managerial responsibilities will largely depend on how the salon is being, well, managed - namely: what the employee hierarchy, division of duties, spheres of influence are and how much independence a regular stylist has. The managerial duties may include:

Cleaning your work area and making sure it meets all the health and safety requirements
Properly cleaning, sterilising and maintaining tools
Properly cleaning, sanitising and maintaining equipment
Managing the level of supplies and informing the salon manager/owner about the need to place an order
Taking care of your work schedule

Now, whatever your salon organisation methods may be, mind that many managerial tasks can be automated. Such a solution not only relieves you and your employees from unnecessary tasks and allows you to focus on more important things, but also makes the automated elements foolproof. Imagine a world where scheduling and editing appointments is made by convenient drag and drop and all the changes appear automatically in the calendars of all team members. Imagine no more double-bookings, as the system you are using warns you of any overlaps. Imagine creating digital work schedules, generating detailed work reports accordingly and calculating commissions automatically. Imagine that a software verifies the availability of equipment and rooms for you and checks stock status, sales and product consumption. Is this even possible? With Booksy, the best program for hairdressers on the market - it is. Test-drive Booksy today for 14 days, absolutely free, with no obligations nor cancelling fees (and no credit card required)!

The educational

The hair and beauty industry is one that never stands still - the trends keep changing, techniques keep developing, new products and tools are introduced almost every day. The unspoken truth is that once you stop working on being up to date with all of that, you start falling out and slowly, but undeniably, become irrelevant. This is why one of the most important responsibilities of a hairdresser is to never stop working on your skills and gaining knowledge. This includes:

Taking various, industry-related courses (regarding products or techniques, but also customer service, finances or management)
Learning about new techniques and developing new skills
Reading industry-related books, blogs and ebooks, watching videos and webinars, listening to audiobooks
Going outside your comfort zone and trying new things

The interpersonal

Finally - the responsibilities that require having the so-called “soft skills” (or “people skills”). They are extremely important - even if you are a declared introvert, you need to learn how to appear friendly and approachable, as it’s a part of your job! Of course, no one is forcing you to try to change your personality - it’s absolutely not the case, you are perfect the way you are. However, you need to keep in mind that working in the service industry, you are sentenced to regular social interactions, during which you need to be on the active side. Interpersonal responsibilities are mainly about providing great customer service - they include:

Greeting the customer, showing them to their chair, asking for their beverage preference and so on
Being able to sense whether or not your client is in the mood for conversation
If so, running a friendly chit-chat (gracefully avoiding sensitive topics)
Making the client feel comfortable during their treatment

Interpersonal duties are mainly about customer satisfaction, but not entirely - they also intertwine with sales and marketing. This is why a hairstylist’s responsibilities may also include:

Selling salon retail products, for example by using techniques such as up-selling and cross-selling
Encouraging clients to become regulars
Running marketing activities (to some capacity, depending on the salon’s hierarchy and division of tasks) for example by publishing posts on social media fan pages

Now that you are familiar with all of the duties of a hairstylist, it will be much easier for you to run a recruitment process in your business and develop management processes for your existing team. Keep in mind that you should always fit staff roles to your needs, management style and personal preferences - and that you don’t have to rely solely on manpower to keep things running smoothly. Test Booksy for free and see for yourself!