Why you and your team need a salon whatsapp group

  If you thought it was just an app for sharing gossip, think again. Award-winning stylist Petros Mairoudhiou explains why you and your team need a salon WhatsApp group. "A WhatsApp group is a great way of keeping communication with your team open and providing your team with real-time updates," he says. "In our industry, many won't check emails for a couple of days, never mind look at a notice board," he continues. "So WhatsApp is a great way to engage with people quickly. Our group is more visual and creative - it's effectively an interactive notice board."

Here, Petros shares his advice for making your group work for the whole team.

1. Start by setting up your group and adding all your staff members. Make sure you ask people to download the app first! 2. Send out a first message that makes clear on what the group is for. I.e. make sure it's clear that it's for management to communicate team updates, not an informal group for chit chat. 3. If your staff members start using it to communicate things like sick leave, don't hesitate in sending a quick reminder note to the group to advise that company best practice remains the same. 4. Don't bombard staff with messages. Keep the group for important notes only, so there are no excuses for staff to say that they've missed a memo! 5. If people leave the group, don't be afraid to pull them up to ask why. Feedback is important. It needs to work for the team, but it's also effectively a group work email,  so you'll need to get them to rejoin! 6. If you want to ask for feedback, leave that for staff meetings. What do they want from the group?