Video Clip of Perhaps the Worst Leader you Have Ever Seen

After a break of developing teams in both Nevada and New Mexico last week, I came across a fairly new reality show on television titled "Tabatha's Salon Takeover." Wow! I found it to be a great reality show on team and leadership development.

 

Tabatha is a salon/team development/leadership consultant and coach who goes into hair salon businesses and attempts to transform the look of the salon and the team. In this particular episode she is working with an owner (Nikki) who is perhaps the worst leader you will ever see. Nikki is in denial that she is the problem, but clearly she is. At one point in the show (not in the following clip though) she states that she doesn't care about her employees. That they aren't her family or friends, they are basically just hair dressers. She doesn't believe in positive reinforcement and she spies on her staff with cameras!

 

I have included a brief clip of Nikki and Tabatha below. What would you say to Nikki?

 

Tabatha's Takeover airs each Tuesday 10/9c on Bravo.

Mike Rogers

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Comments

[John E. Smith]

Hi, Mike

Thanks for the post and the clip. I can't say I enjoyed watching that trainwreck of a situation, but it does illustrate some very basic issues about leadership and emotions.

If you just listen to Nikki's words, without the sound and the dynamics of the interaction, she's talking about relationships that are not working, non-existent trust levels, and a complete lack of self-awareness regarding her own actions.

This is a good example of a time when an owner should "retire" to the country club or the bar and let someone with competent management skills do the daily grind. This won't happen, of course, because Nikki has two major blindspots: how to positively motivate others and how her own actions contribute to the very behaviors that she describes so sarcastically.

Well, now I can at least talk intelligently to my wife about this show, which she mentioned a few days ago. I had no idea it was as bad as the clip showed, though:).

John

[Mike Rogers]

Thanks John for your comments. It is amazing to me that a manager could be in so much denial. I wonder how she is as a mother?