I saw a post in here earlier today about not working for small businesses and I can’t agree more.
Back in Nov, I left a steady (but toxic) job with benefits bc my friend/stylist offered me a receptionist job in her salon that was at the time pulling in over 70 new people a month and on track to be a million dollar salon in 5 years. It seemed like a perfect solution to how burnt out I was at the time.
In the beginning it was great and I was much happier, had 37 hours (less than the 40 agreed upon), and had the holidays and Sundays off to spend with my family. Then, one of the lead stylists left and everything went to shit. We weren’t making money and were in the red and kept having subpar work leave the salon. In Jan, the only reason we survived was bc my friend/salon owner got a 7k loan that she spent almost immediately. By Feb, we were 5k behind and she didn’t tell anyone until the end of the month. When I asked her what happens at the end on Feb if we’re so far behind I got “Idk”. I’ve never met a business owner who doesn’t know their own business.
It all came to a head this week though, things had been sketchy because we weren’t making money and she couldn’t answer questions about numbers. I started looking for another job and was up front about it bc she acknowledged she couldn’t offer me more money for the extreme hours she cut. I went from 37 hours to probably 30 bc we lost more stylists and had to cut down to only being open on her schedule. Then we didn’t get paid last Friday when we were supposed to and she got angry when I asked her about it and told another employee that I’m the one who handles the checks usually when I just pass them out if they arrive and said that I didn’t “see her vision” despite being one of the few people to support her when she opened 5 years ago. She said that to the other employee while telling me it was a “glitch” with her accountant and we would get paid on Monday. On Saturday I was taking to the other employee and she told me what the salon owner said and that she accused me of being the reason she hadn’t gotten her check yet. When I got to work, I asked SO to step outside and confronted her and she admitted what she said but then got angry with me for confronting her and tried to gaslight me because “she would never accuse me of such things” if our positions were reversed and that it was “disrespectful “ to confront her. She closed the salon Monday without calling her clients to let them know she wouldn’t be in and then fired me and the other employee Tuesday for “gossip” and a whole list of other things that are broad and were never brought to my attention or even discussed. Jokes on her though, I got hired to be HR in my old company same day and I start Friday.
Some advice? Never work for friends or small businesses