What it takes to become & remain a successful nail technician
By Katie Barnes | 23 July 2019 | Expert Advice, Feature
Becoming a nail technician is often a career choice that is snubbed and looked down upon. It is often perceived as ‘just painting nails’. Anyone that has ever tried to paint nails well, will appreciate that this is a skill in itself. This element is just the tip of the iceberg of a nail technician’s repertoire.
At the Scratch Stars Awards 2019 after winning the Nail Stylist of the Year accolade
A successful nail technician requires various qualities and abilities. This is especially true if the tech has goals of greater success and well paid jobs. Your formal training as a nail technician will only give you the foundation for your nail career. There are many routes a nail tech’s career can take, including salon owner; mobile services; cruise ships; session work; education; brand owner and much more. How you then choose to pursue your career choice and the expertise required, is up to you.
The technical artistry itself is a small component, as a nail technician must be knowledgable in all aspects of health & safety; COSHH, Health & Safety at Work Act along with other national and local legislations and guidelines; product chemistry; customer care; marketing; accounting and much more. Without all this other experience, a tech’s practical capability and success in their career will be redundant. A nail technician’s occupation is a business not a hobby, so completing a variety of business courses in the above fields alongside the technical training is essential for running a successful nail business. A nail technician can be a fun and creative job but don’t forget that you need to be incredibly disciplined to make yourself stand out and accomplish your goals.
To achieve and to stay on top of the game, a nail technician must constantly refresh their skills in all these avenues regularly, including revisiting basics. The nail industry is such a fast evolving world that a tech cannot afford to be left behind. Trends; techniques; products; legislation and marketing techniques are constantly advancing. Nobody knows everything, so this is valuable to techs at all stages of their career.
As well as the technical expertise, these are some of the most important yet overlooked qualities a successful nail technician requires:
- Practice
The technical skills cannot be mastered until the tech has practiced repeatedly.
- Patience & commitment
Success doesn’t come overnight and many techs try to run before they can walk by jumping straight to advanced techniques before mastering the basics. While they may have always had aspirations of where they would like to be, an F1 driver didn’t happen overnight; they started with basic driving lessons. Mastering the fundamentals is the first step to successfully achieving your goals. When learning to become a nail tech, it is compulsory to carry out a substantial amount of practice and case studies if you want to become successful. This takes patience and commitment. Your training doesn’t end the day your initial training ends; keeping the practice up requires commitment from the tech to put into practice those skills from their foundation training.
- Perseverance & dedication
Throughout life you will get knock backs and your career as a nail technician will be no different. You will receive complaints and negative comments; this is part of dealing with the general public. How you deal with this will determine your success in the industry. Turn any negatives into a positive and use them as a lessons on your journey. To become a successful nail technician you must be dedicated to both your customers and your trade.
Practicing and perfecting your skills takes perseverance and dedication. You will make mistakes. It is important to learn from these and not give up. Everyone that you aspire to has achieved because of this.
- Precision
A nail technician requires creativity and great precision. This includes ensuring your clients receive neat services and when working with tools and chemicals, precision is also imperative. Not all techs are naturally creative, so art courses can be beneficial to help achieve precision by learning simple yet vital skills such as brush angles.
- A steady hand
To achieve precision, a steady hand is a must. This takes practice and also means ensuring you eat and drink regularly throughout the day and that you don’t go out the night before and therefore suffer from the day after shakes.
- Concentration
As well as concentrating on the job in hand, it is also important to concentrate on the client. The client wishes to be pampered. As part of your customer service skills, you must be able to pay attention to all the client shares with you from nail requirements to personal conversations.
- Good eyesight
When working so intricately, great eyesight is non-negotiable. When you struggle to see well, mistakes will occur. These can be minor or serious and result in a claim being made against you. Regular eye tests and good lighting are vital to your success as a nail tech.
- Great memory
A nail technician has a lot to remember: the client’s name; about their personal life; their nail preferences including how they look after their nails in between services and what colour they had last time and whether they liked it. When a nail technician remembers this, it makes the client feel valued and oozes professionalism. If your memory isn’t great, make notes and read these prior to each individual client’s appointment.
- Reliability
Good timekeeping and diary management is a skill every nail technician must possess. Arriving in plenty of time to set up for the first appointment; sticking to treatment timings and not cancelling appointments. Whilst emergencies can occur, don’t become that nail technician with the reputation for being unreliable.
- Multi tasking
A nail technician must be able to multi-task to achieve success in their business. Much time can be wasted when talking with clients and techs stop working to chat. It is paramount to always be working throughout the service and this starts with learning to ‘talk to the hand’.
With these skills and the foundation built from a nail technician training course, a nail technician is on the right path to success.
Love Katie B x