Why are my staff leaving?!

Employers in the hair and beauty industries are left scratching their heads over what they’re doing wrong to have so many staff leaving them. While there may be some room for improvement in how some businesses function – it’s not always their fault.

In 2022, most, if not ALL industries are seeing a huge increase in employee resignations. While the complete data around it may not be ready for a long time, there are definitely some trends to keep an eye on.

We are having regular conversations with therapists and hairdressers, here are a few of the sentiments that have been shared about the reasons employees are looking for work elsewhere.

Burn out

Burn-out comes in all shapes and sizes and may be a reason your staff are leaving. Some employees burn out because they no longer feel aligned to the business or leaders they are working with, others burnout because they’re working long hours and struggle to create a work/life balance for themselves.

It can be tempting to allow an employee to over-do it, because sometimes it can really benefit the business. At least they get overtime pay, right?!

Not always ideal in the long run.

Some people are work horses. Their productivity and work ethic seem unstoppable but encouraging even these employees to have adequate rest time and time spent away from work will help them stay engaged with their positions and significantly reduce the risk of burnout.

Staff are leaving to change careers

Unfortunately, we’re hearing a lot of this lately.

For the best part of 18 months, our industry was deemed ‘non-essential’ and it did nothing for the reputation of a career in hairdressing and beauty. It’s no wonder so many staff are leaving the industry and exploring other career options in droves. While this has always been the case, COVID really was a driving factor for people finally biting the bullet to go try something new.

There’s not a lot you can do about this one, however it’s worth keeping in touch and on good terms with team members that go try something elsewhere. They may soon realise that the grass is not always greener and you want them to come to you first, if that’s the case.

The ‘working from home’ movement

Most of the corporate industries have had to (very quickly) make adjustments to their flexibility around working from home, and everyone wants a piece of this pie.

For our industry, it’s just not possible unless of course – staff are leaving to open their own. There is an undeniable and sharp increase in home salons opening since COVID began and we’re likely to see a continued increase until there is more regulation, which could be years away.

Similarly to above, keep in touch with these ex-employees. Working from home can be lonely work and just as quickly as there are people leaving salons to open from home, there are hairdressers returning to the traditional salon environments.

Have you had team members leave recently? We’d love to hear your experience! Reach out to us at admin@headhunter.org.au or use Headhunter to find a new team member.

Keep up to date with the latest in employment and recruitment in the hair and beauty industries at the HeadHunter blog.