(repost from 2023-09-28) Over the last 30 years, Eric Fisher has opened four salons that are repeatedly voted Best Hair Salon in Wichita and named among the Top 200 Salons in America.
“Do you want to be good at what you do? Do you want to be great? Or do you want to be one of the best?” We think Eric Fisher is one of the very best! Hairdressing has taken Eric all over the world working with some of the biggest names in the industry. In this episode we chat about his start in the hair industry and he breaks down his road to success.
- Why hair? Eric talks about the gratitude and appreciation that comes from being in the hair industry.
- Eric shares advice his father gave him that always stuck with him “Do you want to be good at what you do? Do you want to be great? Or do you want to be one of the best?”
- ‘Work with your idol’. Eric talks about what it was like working with Roger Thompson.
- Eric and Chris talk about the success of Eric’s first salon, which enabled Eric to open more salons, and lead to his next step, opening a Cosmetology School.
- Everyone makes mistakes, including falling off stage! Listen to Eric talk about the mistakes he’s made and how you have to work through them.
- What do successful people do that sets them apart? Listen to Eric break down the points that most successful people follow
- “People today have a scarcity mentality as opposed to a mentality of abundance. Life will give you whatever you ask of it.”
Complete Transcript
Chris Baran (00:00:00):
When I was working my way up, I always wish that I had the chance to be able to have a little chat with
the people that I looked up to and the ones that I saw on stage and really wish that I could be like, well
my name is Chris Baran and I have been around probably about 40 plus years now couple of hair awards
behind me. And I figured I’ve got the opportunity that I can bring to you the hair heroes that we look up
to and admire and let you have a listen in while we have a conversation and find out their mistakes,
find out what they did right and wrong. Welcome to Chris Baran’s Headcases. Hey, I’m really excited
about bringing you this week’s head case, Mr. Eric Fisher. And I want to give you just a few of the awards
that this man has had. Top 75 Educator of the Century, top 10 Living Legends, catch that, nominated 25
plus times for NAHA. His business brain gives him these two entrepreneurial awards from UCLA two
Global Business Awards and he’s also received the Jerry Gordon Leadership Awards. Let’s get into this
week’s head case.
Chris Baran (00:01:24):
Eric It. I’ll tell you, first of all, it is just a pleasure and honor to have you on and I might add the first, the
nuMe Uno episode of Head Cases and I’m just honored to be here and listen. We’ve been friends Road
warriors for quite a number of years and just for our listeners’ purpose, I, I’m sure, I don’t know think
there’s many people that don’t know who Eric Fisher is, but in the off chance that there might be
somebody out there that’s new to the business or whatever and doesn’t know who the hell you are, cuz
in earlier I read off all your accolades and quite frankly I’ve seen a lot of resumes before and this one
impressed the hell outta me. But first off, I wanna know, thank you. And I know a little bit about you, but
I know and your past where you came from, your parents, et cetera, but why hair? That’s just like what,
there’s so many people out there that think of hairdressing and that people just opt into it or whatever
because they couldn’t get another job or whatever. That’s the one myth that’s out there. But why hair
for you? What got you into it?
Eric Fisher (00:02:37):
That’s a good question. I’d say Mom was a hairdresser. So when I was a kid she had a place called
Aristocrat Hair for Men and Women and she was like my babysitter. So I used to go watch her work and I
saw the way people treated her and I really loved it. She’d do somebody’s hair and they would be so
thankful, so appreciative that hug her, kiss her and then they’d reach in their pocketbooks and pay her.
And I thought, okay, you get this gratitude, you get this appreciation, you get this love and then you get
some money from it. How cool is that? I mean, what could be better? And I thought mom always had a
great gig, always. I don’t know if she was good, I don’t know if she made any money, but I know she
looked forward to going to work every day. She loved it. And my dad was military, so he was just a really
tough guy.
(00:03:23):
Big 6 3, 2 30, tough guy, fought in a couple wars. He wanted me to go in the military and I was always
siding with my mom and not my dad. I love my dad, but I just didn’t feel that connection with that
redneck kind of thing, which I love. I love the military, but I just didn’t want to go there. And then I took
a girl to prom that was a hairdresser. My girlfriend broke up with me. I was a senior, she was my sister’s
roommate and I took her to prom and she was so good looking. She’s five years older than me, she’s
doing me a favor. She was a hairdresser. So she started cutting my hair and I go in and the music was
great. The girls had short skirts on, the energy was fabulous. I thought, oh my god, this is not my mom’s
salon. This is a very cool place. And my mother done my hair since I was a kid. So I kind of stepped out
on her and realized it was a big bad world out there of really cool hair. So that sparked my interest.
That’s really what I thought would be really cool.
Chris Baran (00:04:23):
And so now the other thing I wanna hit on is just that, let’s face it, you’ve been around the block when it
comes to hair. I don’t think there’s many things that you haven’t done, but your start in the business
where, so you’ve got, let’s take, you went to school you got there, what was some of the things and that
really kicked it off, got your going where you really wanted to push the envelope and not just Well,
behind
Eric Fisher (00:04:52):
The chair, I never had this prophetic vision of where I wanted to go, what I wanted to do. But my dad
said to me, he was a chief test pilot for Boeing. He said, if you’re going to do this, do you wanna be
good? Do you wanna be great or do you wanna be one of the best? And I had no idea how to answer
that. I didn’t even know what the best looked like. I had no clue. I’m like, I’m doing this for fun. I had no
R real vision about being a good anything. I was a musician. I worked nights and I love that, but I wasn’t
good enough and I could define quality as a kid. I knew I wasn’t going to be good enough to make a
living at it. So he took me over to London when I was about 19, dropped me off at Heathrow Airport.
(00:05:30):
I’m scared to death, he says I said, what do I do now dad? He looked at me in the eyes, he said, now
you’re a man, you’ll figure it out. And he got in his airplane and left me. And I mean, I was scared. I’d
never even taken a taxi before here. I’m in a strange country, I have no idea what to do. But when I got
down to Davies Muse, it was the Vien Academy, I saw people, Chris, from all over the world that were
coalescing such a positive tribal way doing these things with hair that were just unprecedented. And all
of a sudden the bug bit me. And I just loved it. It was just fabulous and I wanted to be really good. And
so I studied, I trained and my little beauty school license, like yours has taken me around the world.
(00:06:11):
I’ve worked London, Paris, Greece, Turkey, Korea Stockholm, cope all over the world and loved it. And
I’m getting paid to do this. And then I got this job in New York City with the famed artist, Roger
Thompson. And I had to cut a couple heads for him and I was still freelancing quite a bit. And it was so
much fun. And he was such a cool guy. And I got the job with our good friend Bri, Brian Smith. And Brian
was an awesome hairdresser, is an awesome hairdresser. And we shared a flat together. And then he
went to Europe. I stayed there and I just loved it. And then I don’t know, I went on from there and I met
this girl in Wichita, Kansas where I’m from and we decided to get married and I had a gig in Italy to do in
Bologna, the big Cosmoprof show.
(00:07:03):
So I took her to Italy with me and we actually got married in Vatican in Rome, and it was so cool. So I had
Dwight Miller, Michael Baker, van Band Council, all these, the makeup artists, badass bottles, Tini was
there from San Frank oh gosh, from a Sasoon guy was there. So it was just fun. Our parents couldn’t
afford to cover, it was just us. And then she didn’t wanna move to New York. And I said, come on, New
York is, I was charging 150 bucks back then. And of course I only made 20, 20% commission, but I was a
badass with Roger Thompson. She didn’t wanna move there. She convinced me, you’re a smart guy. I go,
listen, I know nothing about management. I don’t think I’m such a smart guy. I don’t know how to deal
with people, I don’t know, cash flow, long-term debt, inventory, none of that. I don’t wanna open a
business. She was a lot smarter than I was and she convinced me. And so I came back, lived in her
sister’s basement for about nine months to open a place that was the beginning of the salon story and
the school story and the Prosper Youth story.
Chris Baran (00:08:07):
Yeah, I mean I wanna get onto that just in a bit here. But I wanna take you back to the Roger Thompson.
There’s so many people out there that are from our era that do know who Roger was. But a lot of the
younger viewers, listeners in this, you probably, they may not know that name, but that was one of
probably the most iconic names in the Sasoon organization. And a lot of when they published
photography, hair, photography, always cutting edge stuff on they had making that, taken that turn in
our industry where everything was shampoo and set and styled and the haircut was really wasn’t
important. And they took our industry, they turned it upside down by their feet, shook it and made all
the other stuff come out. And then they filled it up with architecture in cutting hair. And the little known
fact is that most people that go back to look at those iconic photos, a lot of ’em were created by Roger
Thompson, who I believe was the first creative director for Soos. Was, am I correct on that or was there
somebody
Eric Fisher (00:09:19):
Before me? I do. I do believe Roger was the first guy. And everybody needs a master. Everybody needs
somebody to look up to. So if you can work with your idol, I know how many people idolize you, Chris,
you’re held in the highest of steam in the industry. And people it’s, it is more than an influential or more
than anything else to have somebody that has done it that knows how to do it, that can help you. So
when I was there and I wasn’t busy, I would go watch Roger with his permission. And he was such a fine
craftsman. The best cutters are the best commerce. The way he would approach a head of hair, just the
visual integrity, the acuity. He would look at it and he would feel the bone structure and he’d look at the
growth pattern. I mean he did all this way before he even cut the hair.
(00:10:07):
He was like an intimate guy and you didn’t say, Roger, this is what I want to do. Roger would say, this is
what you’re getting. And it was always a masterpiece. And very seldom Chris, would he pick up a blow
dryer or a brush. By the time he got done cutting, it was always over an hour for, it was beautiful, just be
graduation would be flawless. I go and I thought my ego was big back in my younger days it was really
big cuz I was a badass. But then I watched a guy like this and I go, oh my gosh, let’s talk about humility
because I’m like, this guy’s so good. But it was such a good lesson for me to be more intimate with the
fabric. B, be more intimate with my time. And it’s more about the technical expertise that it takes to
produce a desired result that you have already defined your outcome ahead. He knew he didn’t have
any discoveries. He knew what he was cutting little graduations, brush back, little fireflies. And were, by
the way, no long hair at all. Everybody, we all did hair above the shoulders, period. And if somebody had
long hair and they wanted a haircut, say no, I’m sorry I don’t do that. We are known. We have defined
what we do and we are known by our defining statement of cutting the best short hair on the planet.
And that’s what we did. And it was great and I enjoyed my time there.
Chris Baran (00:11:27):
So let me ask you this being person, now that people know a little bit more about Roger, and also for
you in your growth, was he, tell us a little bit about him. Was he a task master when you were cutting
hair was No. What was he like as
Eric Fisher (00:11:42):
Roger? Was he He’s just a wonderful guy, a very sweet guy. I mean there’s a story about him working for
a large company and he felt they paid him a huge amount of money to consult and all that. And there was a story about him that he confirmed that they gave him like $20,000, I can’t remember the number.
And he said, I didn’t earn this, I can’t take this. I’m giving it back to you. And that’s what an integrity
based individual. And during the interview, he didn’t interview me, somebody else did. And then I
reached mean there were probably a hundred people applying for this job that Brian Smith obviously
had and told me about. And then he sat down with me and he was so calming, he had such equanimity.
He was just the most amazing guy. And he was even tempered. Great. He allowed you to make mistakes.
That’s how you learn.
Chris Baran (00:12:40):
Mean that’s really interesting that you know, have somebody like that of that caliber. And if you think
back to the old greats, the Michelangelos and et cetera the I heard mean I’m old enough that I could
have probably asked them personally, but I do remember hearing stories about them that when his
apprentices would come in to learn from him, he would just say, well, okay, there’s a subject painted.
And then when they were done, he would ask them to tell me what worked, tell me in essence he was
doing a debriefing with them way back then because he didn’t show them what to do. He saw what they
could do, saw the areas that they needed correction in and then helped them correct that. And I think
that’s kind of what sets our industry apart right now. Educators and things, and God bless them all
educators, I have the utmost respect for
Eric Fisher (00:13:46):
Me too. But
Chris Baran (00:13:46):
It was sometimes if you’re too full of yourself that you can be intimidating to other people when they’re
trying to achieve and see what you are about. And I think they make, it can be made that it’s
unattainable. Whereas I’ve known you and now that I know I would’ve given my right arm to be able to
have had those experience with Roger, who was my hair, one of my hair heroes. But it was a, that’s
amazing stuff to see that when people let people make mistakes
Eric Fisher (00:14:26):
He was, and we do the same thing in our school, in our salons. Once you reach it, the barometer is
always the demand of the clients. If you’re in demand. I just was in Chicago with a good friend of mine
doing a show and somebody said, you still do celebrity clients? And I said to me, now a celebrity client is
anybody that demands you, requests you, comes in every five weeks, buys all the retail you sell, tells
their friends read books, leaves you a great review, gets color. That’s a celebrity to me. That’s the way I
treat, right? So nothing says more. And I’ve gotta reflect back because ego is something that’s good for
you and it’s bad for you. So when I started working in the salons, I cut very strong hair. I didn’t cut long
hair. It was very strong. And sometimes the clients wouldn’t come back and I go, what?
(00:15:14):
What’s wrong with her? I gave her the best haircut. But you know what, sometimes the haircut was just
ugly on that client. But I was Eric Fisher, I had this big ego, I had great training, worked at Roger. It took
me a long time Chris, to realize it wasn’t about me, it’s about the client. And that was a metamorphosis
for me. And I think Roger wasn’t in back. We had such a client pool that was about us. It wasn’t about
the client. I mean if they had specific demands you’d listen, I really wanna bang, I really want to fringe,
then you go, okay, this will work for you so I can do that. But other than that, we weren’t order takers, great. Jennifer Aniston gets a haircut, it’s great, they get new color, it’s great. It will galvanize our
business. So we’ve been in a transitional period. Look at all the Vidal, Sassoon salons that have closed down all
around the world. People don’t demand that kind of work.
(00:20:18):
But it’s funny, I was talking to Steven Moody the other day and he said something, he said, it’s like a long
dress. When the dress gets so long, the skirt gets so long that you’re stumbling over it, then it’s time to
raise the length. Now that length gets so short that your privates are showing and it’s just wacky and it’s
time to grow the square out. So we are in that transition and it’s one of those vicissitudes of life. It just
happens ebbs and flows. And when hair, I know what a great haircut you are and luckily I’ve got my
clients, all my clients love me, they’re all from that. But Elsa staid, they’re all in their sixties now. Not all
of them, but a lot of them, yeah, they still love little graduations and I still love doing them. If I had to do
long hair, long layers and beach waves, I’d shoot myself.
(00:21:06):
I, I’m not cut from that cloth. I’ve defined my skills. I’ve got my defining statement of what I do, who I
am and the quality work workout. And I’ve earned that right after all these years to do what I wanna do.
Now when you’re young, you gotta do everything you know, don’t say no, you say yes. But when you
migrate towards a certain level of skill and you go, I like short hair, I love little bobs, I love little French
Bobs layered, bobs graduated, bobs SpongeBobs, whatever they are, I love these and this is what I’m
going to be known for. I wanna be known as cutting the best bob in my hometown. And I love that. I
love that thanking.
Chris Baran (00:21:48):
Yeah, and it’s interesting how that kind of thinking Got it. Is what started your build of your brand of Eric
Fisher who the haircut on the road. And I want to spin this back right now, I’m going to give a right now,
you said something really interesting where you said I’ve got my clientele, I’m going to go out on my
own right now. You have such a qualities that very few people in our industry do. And I’m not blown
smoke here, but you’re artistic, you’re very creative, you’re a photographer as well. You’re an
entrepreneur who teaches business as well and probably any business magazine and that’s in our
industry has either had you uncovers or doing massive amounts of interviews and writing articles for
them. So with that in mind, I want to spin this around with, in our industry right now, the difference
between an entrepreneur and somebody who is self-employed going to start their own business.
(00:23:10):
There is a big difference between being self-employed where you’re still managed by the clock, you’re
still only can make amount the same amount of money that you could within the hour versus
entrepreneurship You have, I know you said you have a hundred stylists working for you, but you
probably got, what about with the academy and everybody else? You probably got about 150 to 200
people that work for you. And to me the big difference is you know, make money while you sleep.
Whereas the person oftentimes is working harder for less money than what they would make working in
a salon. So
Eric Fisher (00:23:54):
You’re absolutely right.
Chris Baran (00:23:59):
What got you onto the entrepreneurship? That’s kind of where I want to go with this.
Eric Fisher (00:24:03):
Well that’s interesting because again, I didn’t have this prophetic vision of owning all these salons and these
businesses. But when I came back to Wichita and I met a guy named Frank Carney and he started Pizza
Hut, I started cutting. Everybody wanted to come to me. I did all the guys that founded Ren Center
Jamie Coulter, still a good friend of mine had 324 restaurants. So I went to business school with these
guys and I would sit down, I’d cut their hair instead of the 30 minute haircut, I’d go an hour and Jamie
Coulter used to call me. He says, Hey, I’m flying in. These guys all had private jets, they’re all
multimillionaires. I’m flying in tonight at 11. I need my haircut cuz I go in San Francisco in the morning,
can you do it? I go, what time in the morning? They go, no, no, I mean I’m getting at 11.
(00:24:49):
Can you come down to the 10th, the salons I’d open it up, drink a couple bottles of wine. These guys
would give me a lesson in business, what’s your mission, your vision, what things are your strengths,
your weaknesses? What are your core values, your principles? What are you think are most important?
What are your strategies to go with these visions? And it was amazing that what I learned and things like
well location, location. So I opened up the best. All four of my salons are in the best locations. I pay
more for ’em. Best locations. Make sure that you manage the client’s experience. So what does that
mean? You look at the things that can go right and the things that can go wrong and you don’t just look
at it but you manage by that. Things like consistency with the client. You gotta have that.
(00:25:35):
We test everybody to make sure that they are empathetic and caring and that they care about the
customer. That they will come in early or stay late or go beyond the call of duty for the client, whatever
it takes. So I went to business school and so we opened our first salon and we were doing great. 1,147
scare square feet. My wife answered the phone. I had a colorist and assistant, just four of us. But we
trained and trained, everybody wanted to work for me. So every about three times a night would train
for four or five hours, I’d have tons of people. I eliminated the people that could not hang in and we
grew fast. And so I went to Jerry Gordon who was the double shift manager. So we started double
shifting. We opened seven days a week. We were open from 7:00 AM to 11:00 PM which I still do.
(00:26:21):
All my salons were open seven days a week. And then we got so busy we started to open another salon.
So we went out west, opened another, we opened another salon cuz we were so busy and because we
train our own staff, they imprinted the culture of the company, the standards. It’s a culture by the way,
the best definition of a culture I’ve ever heard. And this applies to me so well and to you like-minded
people coming into an environment where they can thrive as individuals and thrive as a whole. The key
is that, so I wanted everybody, whether this is right or wrong, but to imprint to my standards to do what
I wanted. Cuz I felt like I knew what is your vision? Yeah, it was my vision. And then I was so
disappointed with the beauty schools because would have to retrain everybody.
(00:27:08):
And I said, I went to all the schools and this is true, all the schools, I like these guys but weren’t running a
good show. So I said, let me put a training program together for you. I wouldn’t even charge you. I’ll set
my creative director in, I’ll help, we’ll put this train. And all of them were, thank you Eric, but we, it’s too
complicated, we don’t wanna do that. We’re happy with what there were. So I said well I’m going to be
formative competition and I’m going to open up a school. And so I felt like I could ameliorate the bad
things, capitalize on the good things. I was very idealistic. I went around to some of the best schools in
the country, hired the smartest person I could find who was just brilliant. She was a consultant, paid her
lots of money and I said I wanted the best school in America.
(00:27:51):
And so we did that. And in fact our loan default rate, I’m really proud of this. Before covid was 3%. Wow.
That means that 97% of my students pay back their loans. And we have students from New York, from
Texas, from la, from Chicago all over. And we did that because I didn’t really care about the money.
Everybody gets more mannequins. What I cared about, money has always been a byproduct for me. It’s
a commitment to your capability I guess validation of hard work. But I wasn’t do it for the money, I just
wanna have the best students. I wanted to love what I did. In fact, I was at the school today, we start a
new class, I always go every new class I’m there, I give everybody my phone number. I’m like wow. I’m
like the head cheerleader. I’m so excited you guys are here.
(00:28:37):
I can’t wait till you discover it. Some will be intimate like me and you and some won’t. You know, just
accept that. And so that’s kind of how it happened. And then we saw with our school that we were
missing a beat. What is missing this, we got great technical skills but we realized that we needed
business skills and nobody likes the numbers, including me by the way. But you know, look at your steps,
you count your miles, the price of gasoline, you look at your cal recount. So we decided that the
business skills are so important and the same thing we’ve been doing every Tuesday night after class we
say, okay, you’re cutting hair real good. Rebook that appointment, sell some retail, ask for a guarantee,
let’s leave a Yelp review. What does that sound like? And so we worked on this thing. So what we did is
once again I hired the smartest people I could find Chris. And I said okay, you guys are all professors,
you’re a lot smarter than I am but here’s my content. I’ve done books and tapes on this forever. And I
said I want you to take this and dwell it down into content that is engaging for students. It’s gotta be
engaging cuz people don’t pay attention. Learning is difficult
Chris Baran (00:29:46):
Especially now.
Eric Fisher (00:29:47):
Yeah, especially now. And so they did that. Their Prosper U was born about 10 years ago and then we
said how can we make it better? So I’m at the Prosper U Office right now and right now we have
probably close to 10,000 students using our programmer around the United States. And it’s the funnest
thing I do. Yeah. Like I said, I was just at Chicago and I’m at a bar, I just get in, got my longest, go to the
bar with see my friends. This girl comes up to me, says, oh my God, you’re the prosper you guy. And I go,
oh yeah, now Chris, I used to be known as a badass hairdresser, now I’m known as the Prosper.
Chris Baran (00:30:22):
Well listen, I mean I think number one, you’re still both in my mind. But the reality is what I love that
you just say you were just talking about was how you systematized. And I think that’s, that’s the area
that so many people just, I want to get my shingle on the front of the salon and because I’m good and
I’ve got a lot of clientele and I bring them in they do that. But I think that what saved, I mean the same
thing with me. I knew I’m going to say poop from Shinola, but I didn’t know anything about business. But
it just happened that some of the training that I got from our sales consultants and cuz then there’s
sales consultants and we’ve got some amazing sales consultants right now and I always look up to them
because they’re our pipeline to the classes that are going on.
(00:31:15):
They’re the ones that go, listen, this class is coming up. And to me, I, to me it was creative, it was about
hair, it was about all of the things, photo competitions, blah blah blah blah blah. Yet the one thing I was
lacking was the business side. And our sales consultants are the one that turned us onto that. And to m
that think is what really makes the difference between an entrepreneur and somebody who just owns a
business and is doing what you did. Where is it scalable? What do I do to eab, establish systems? What
do I do to hold people accountable so that we can grow together based on the vision that we have for
the overall? Well
Eric Fisher (00:32:00):
Very well stated. And I always say I’m not a good manager. Managing is about implementing policies and
procedures. It’s about understanding the business side of it, hiring, firing, regulations and all that.
Leadership is about having a vision for your company and about movement. And it’s not about stillness
and stagnation, it’s about movement and change. So I’ve always been a great vision guy but I’ve never
been a great manager. I mean Jess who runs Prosper u I couldn’t do what she does. She’s amazing. She
does so much better than I do. I could never be in that position. The people that run the salons, they are
much better at managing than I am. I don’t wanna have to tell somebody, well you gotta show to work
up on time. You know, gotta dress right. I don’t do good in those roles. And the same way with the
school. Stephanie runs a school and she does an amazing job. So one of my gifts with entrepreneurship
is always hiring people that are a lot smarter than I am than
Chris Baran (00:32:58):
You are.
Eric Fisher (00:32:58):
Exactly. And every category, Aaron, who’s our customer service liaison is amazing. He just hosted our
annual event meeting of the mines. I couldn’t have done it better than that. He was amazing. He just
covered all dotted his eyes crossed hist and he’s entertaining and engaging at the same time. So I think
part of my gift was see weaknesses in everything. And I could walk down an aisle of a beauty store and
say, make the aisle bigger. Put your best products at eye level, dust these shelves off. You only have two
of these, you need at least five of them. I can do that really easily, but am I the guy to do it? I don’t
know. I’d prefer that somebody else knows that and does that. So when you see weaknesses,
Chris Baran (00:33:43):
That is the part of being a true leader though it’s one of my fortunates and I’m thank in my life thankful
for a gentleman by the name of Blair Singer. And Blair is part of the Rich Dad poor dad group. And that’s
where we got a lot of our teaching style, our business style from love that and this story, there’s a story,
and I can’t remember if he told it to me or if one of his other disciples told it, but he was doing an
interview with John Maxwell, the
Eric Fisher (00:34:17):
Traits John Maxwell
Chris Baran (00:34:19):
Doing traits of leadership, et cetera. And he was having a conversation with him and he were talking
about giving away all your information. What do you do? And I’m probably misquoting some of this, but the gist of it was he said, look at what happens when somebody gives away everything that they do. And
some people tend to hold back because I don’t want ’em to know everything otherwise I’m not
necessary. And John Maxwell said something that was so profound. He said, your job as a leader is to
have hire people that are smarter than you are and better than you are and and grow them to be even
bigger so that they can help you. And I’m not saying it in the brilliant way that he did, but that’s what I
see that people like you do is you say, look, that’s not an area that I like. I’m going to buy, I’m going to do
what I do well and I’m going to buy somebody else. Yes, pay them to do that for me.
Eric Fisher (00:35:23):
Two things I’ll say. First of all, if anybody out there doesn’t read John Max while he’s fabulous, you
should read and you become what you think about. So focus in on these good writers, watch good
artists. The second thing that I would say is Steve Jobs said this, I think this was in his book, that when he
hires people, he’s hard. He’s a book called Radical Candor out there that talks about how to talk with
people, how to deliver the message. And he delivers his message really strongly. But he will tell you, I
didn’t hire you so I could tell you what to do. I hired you so you could help me make my company better.
You can tell me what needs to be done. And I love that. And that’s what I tell my people and they say, I
paint the big picture. I want these guys that have master’s degrees and education, whatever they have.
(00:36:18):
Just say this is what we need to do and this is how we should do it. And that’s what I love. I love my
people and sometimes we butt heads Jess and I go head-to-head constantly about content and things.
But what I value, value and I never deprecate. They’re their decisions, but I value ’em. And then once we
made that decision, I will never usurp their authority or their capability. I always ’em take the run with it.
Sometimes it’s the wrong decision and that’s okay because you’re going to make mistakes. I told this
class this morning, I said, Hey by the way, don’t think that, first of all, don’t ever let the past failures
influence the future successes cuz you are going to fall on your ass. I guarantee you you’re going to
make mistakes. Client’s not going to love you. I still have that. I cut a haircut the other day, the client
came back in and said, I think one side’s longer than the other. And I didn’t say, well it grew out faster
than the other side. I didn’t say that. I said I made a mistake
(00:37:19):
Apologies I screwed up. And it’s okay to admit your mistakes and it’s okay, especially when you’re
learning and you’re growing. I still make mistakes. I still, I’ve done things that are just really, I made
precipitous decisions based on stuff that I was totally wrong and my ego’s big enough to say I was
wrong. I admit my mistakes. In fact, I’m married so I do it all the time
Chris Baran (00:37:45):
And my wife is sitting here so I’m just going to have to nod and agree. Yeah. So I love what you’re talking
about mistakes. And when I look at Eric Fisher and I later on I want to talk about how we actually met
that. I think that’s a wonderful story and I still cherish that moment. But when people look at you and if
they’re just hurting, hearing about the things that you do creative one awards, what was it like? You had
like 25 or some odd nominations for Naja with you and your students. You help your students do things
for that. You do the photography yourself, you’re an entrepreneur, you have successful salons, you have
an academy with Rover, run with students in there that love the training you give them. And when
you’re on stage doing hair as Eric Fisher, the humble generously humble person that I know, people
would look at you and they’ll go, well that’s just totally unattainable for me because they see you on
stage, hear about your accolades, they watch you do this hair that they feel, oh my God, I will ever get to be able to do that. And if so, would somebody ever hire me to be on stage? And I think it’s really
important that people know that we, I, I’m just going to call it we FIA up as well as everybody else does.
We’ve done things that wrong paths or whatever.
(00:39:24):
Is there things that, mistakes that you’ve made along the way that you would say don’t do that. If we
could just hear some of those that you would give advice for other people?
Eric Fisher (00:39:35):
I always tell, I told these students, be a possibility thinker. Think about the possibilities for you. And then
I follow that with, if people say to me, Hey Fisher, I want to be rich and famous, how do I do it? And my
first question is, what are you willing to do? What are you willing to do? And it all comes down to what
are you willing to do? And for me it’s been a labor of love. I’m simple minded. I get focused on
something I want to do photography. I was a freelancer. I worked with so many great photographers
that I always felt like I could take pictures. So I just started doing it. I was terrible in the beginning, but
I’ve gotten passable pretty good. But as far as the stage stuff, oh my gosh, Chris mean you and I
probably have so many war stories.
(00:40:21):
I fell off a stage in San Francisco in front of a thousand people right off a five foot high stage. And
everybody goes, Ooh. And I go, I’m okay. Okay, well let me tell you, I think I broke my back falling off
that stage. But I just fell off. It just happened. I was doing a show in London one time for 5,000, the hair
congress thing. And I got a Mike comb. Mike Comb got stuck in somebody’s hair on stage. Most
beautiful woman I’ve ever done in my life. She was absolutely fabulous. She was half Chinese and half
Jamaican. And Mike Comb is stuck in her hair. How embarrassing. I have made so many mistakes. It’s
unbelievable. I was shooting for Cosmopolitan Magazine one time in Mikonos who said, Torin you
someplace. And I went out the night before, went to a club, we’re drinking, we’re breaking plates, I’m on
the tables.
(00:41:12):
Well guess what? I didn’t wake up the next morning and the boat is leaving without the hairdresser and
oh my God, oh no. Oh it was terrible. And they’re spending obviously lots of money on this shoot. They
were so pissed at me. So I mean I still do stupid stuff and hopefully I’ll not perfect. Nobody is perfect and
I’ve made so many mistakes when I was younger. Like I said, I’ll let my ego get in the way. I used to think
I was the catch meow and then I realized that people didn’t like me because of that and I just thought I
was too good. So you’re going to make mistakes, you’re going to fall down, you pick yourself back up
and they’d call this generation, the resignation generation of kids because they don’t have the fortitude
or the resilience to see things through. Well I don’t think that’s a fair title or label.
(00:42:02):
I think if they could just reach that sweet spot like you and I have where somebody looks at their hair
and they go, oh my God, I feel great. I’ve been feeling so depressed and the dogs got the flu, my
husband left me, I ran over the mailman. But you make me feel so good. There’s nothing like that
feeling. Or they sit down and they tell you, only you about their problems. I’ve got cancer. Right?
Nobody knows. And I thought you should know is you’ve done my hair forever. And by the way, I go to
people’s homes all the time because they are disabled having challenged, they’ve been clients for years.
And I don’t charge, I do it cuz I love them and they love me. And at the end of the day, it’s not about the
money, it’s about the relationships. And if you give up every time you have a mistake, then you’ll be a
fundamentally pedestrian, flawed individual.
(00:42:59):
You just work through it. You don’t reach your level of attainment by giving up. And I know you struggle.
I’ve struggled and cause we’re all guys, we’ve done what we’ve done And it’s not always easy, it’s not a
cakewalk, it’s about hard work, but it’s about that kind of dedication you wanna be there and sometimes
it’s practicing basketball, you know, gotta get under the rim, you gotta throw the ball up. Well I don’t
feel like it only learning stops at a certain place and greatness stops. You gotta do that perfect practice.
You gotta get through those stages and then it’s like a merry-go-round. You pushing, you pushing, you
push, you push, push, push and then guess what? You can jump on and you can coast for a while. But
you gotta do a lot of pushing before you start coasting. And you and I exactly we’re at that great stage in
our life where if we wanted to sit back and I know you, you’re such an entrepreneur, you’re what,
probably 10 different businesses. Some people just can’t, can’t give that up. You and I are two of those
people that will be like we are till the day we die
Chris Baran (00:44:11):
Again. I always say I’m not smart enough to come up with this stuff on my own, but I’m a great study
and I listen well when my teachers are telling me something. And there’s two things that you hit on and
I’d like to wrap up in not the conversation but in that context, the part about being a perfectionist, I can
honest, hi, my name is Chris and I’m a perfectionist. I like
(00:44:41):
But, and I wore that badge, I wore it like a badge, I’m a perfectionist. And my teacher told me, and this is
one that I think that people just need to write down, make a sign about it and have it around your house
so it takes you out of that mode. And that was my teacher said, if you are a perfectionist, you are
doomed to a life of frustration. Doomed to a life of frustration. Cuz there is no such thing as brilliant
perfection as a human being and I know I do it. I’ve been trying my best to get away from my perfection
aside and sometimes can drive my team crazy with it. So we had to adopt and they came up with the
help of my business coach. I think everybody should have them that we’ve got an 80, one of our rules is
80 and done is that you? Number one, if you can do a project, get start, this gets started on it and if you
can sell it then you’ve gotta do it. But you only have to get it to 80% and before you launch it, if you’re
constantly waiting for something to be a hundred percent, you’re never going to get there. So get it to
80% launch it, then tweak, make things better as you go along. But it’s never going to be a hundred
percent. So that’s my advice to people is 80 20 rule just 80.
Eric Fisher (00:46:12):
If I could piggyback on that, I think you’re absolutely right. The 80 20 rule per percent rule is fabulous.
And what I was a perfectionist like you and it was really hard for, I’d follow the client out to the car
finishing the haircut. I used to do these shoots where I would be a maniac and the photographer would
say, would Mr. Fisher, Eric, could you get the hell out of the scene and let me shoot this. Nobody’s going
to notice what you’re doing anyway. Yeah. And you did have to step back and realize that sometimes it’s
not going to be exactly perfect and perfectionists. Oh my god, perfectionism is a, it’s really hard. I
remember watching you, I was in your audience I think it was a Redken show you were doing and I always
admired your work always. And I didn’t know you really well but you were doing this set on pipe
cleaners and it all hair. Oh I remember. Oh my god it was perfect. I mean I’m like hot. That must have
taken it. He must have gotten up at two o’clock in the morning to start this set. It was a 10 o’clock. So I said, how did Chris Baran, I gotta ask him how he did that. And it was just amazing. And so I went home,
of course got the pipe cleaners and I go, I don’t have the patience for this. I don’t know how he did it,
but it was, I don’t know, it
Chris Baran (00:47:31):
Was just incredible. Don’t know. I don’t remember the exact, I remember that. I don’t remember the
exact show, but I do remember that I kind of developed from, I went from what made me get rid of the
pipe cleaners was and evolved. It was, I remember doing a show somewhere in the Midwest, I don’t
remember where it was. And in those days we all had to do that finale. We had to do a finale in the
evening. Gratis. Yeah. The manufacturer just, or the distributor said we’re we are having an event in the
evening bring on one or two or three models, do a presentation. And this is, I’ll kinda lead from this into
how we met. But I remember I went, okay good, I’ve got this pipe cleaner set. I’m going to do the pipe
cleaners. And I would do like it, you hook it through, then you wrap it around and you got these amazing
curls out of it.
(00:48:25):
And I said okay, I’m just going to do the set and I’ll got five minutes, I’ll take the pipe cleaners out and on
stage and then just run my fingers through it. And so like 10 minutes later I still haven’t got these damn
pipe cleaners out of the hair. And I was total disaster anyway, I think, I don’t even know if I finished it or
I think I pulled out, did some of it, the rest of it in and walked off stage and I went, oh my god. So we
evolved and were, I would take and strip down the cables that you got for your dryer and yeah we had
the cording that was inside there. So I strip all that copper wire out and I made probably about maybe
18 inch hairpins and we made that out so they would just slide out that solved that problem. But it was
such
Eric Fisher (00:49:13):
A smart idea.
Chris Baran (00:49:14):
Great. Well yeah, but it was a screw up on stage and <laugh> quite frankly. I dunno if you ever have me
back after that one I wanna talk a little bit about how you and I met. Do you I don’t know. And
sometimes the way when I talk to my wife about how we met our stories are different, but I think she’s
not here right now so I can say mine was the correct one. But what’s your recollection on the way that
we first met at a show?
Eric Fisher (00:49:45):
I know that you and I have been doing this both of us for well over 35 years, probably 40 years doing
shows I think. And if I can’t, it seems like we were in a bar at a show, in a hotel bar and drinking. But I
can’t recall exactly but I think a lot of great relationships happened in the bars at shows. Yeah. And not
that you have to be an alcoholic or anything. I mean I enjoy be now and that’s where The camaraderie
starts.
(00:50:16):
That’s where the camaraderie and you know, break bread, you drink. So that’s kind of my recollection. I always admired you
Chris Baran (00:50:24):
Remember that? I remember being there. And then I think the part where there was you, Brian and
Sandra and I we were in the bar, but then what cemented the deal for me was when we had to do that
evening, we had to do one of those gala presentations evening presentation. And I remember that, I
think, I don’t remember the order that we were on or who went first, who went last, but all we would all
line up and get ready for your five minute presentation of whatever. And you were with one
manufacturer, I was with another and Brian and Sandra were with another one. And I remember going
up to them and you generally wouldn’t go and associate with the other people. That was kind of taboo
at the time. Not what we did it, but the way we operated. But I remember going up to her, up to them
and saying that hairpiece that you made is one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen.
(00:51:21):
And we kind of set it up there and then we remember we were, three of us were lined up backstage,
ready to do our order of our walk on and we were watching on the monitors, it was all rear projection so
you could see what was going on. And one group went on with a model in a red rider wagon and the
audience was all drunk. They they paying no attention to the, no attention to what was going on stage
chattering around you. It was just a real fiasco. And I remember the three of us getting together and
nobody was applauding on anybody’s presentation. And I remember we looked at one another and
went, I’ll applaud for you if you applaud for me. <laugh> name applause we were getting from was from
behind stage. But I think that that was what Bruce said.
(00:52:17):
That getting together before and then after the shows is just really supporting one another even though
we were from different manufacturers.
Eric Fisher (00:52:25):
Well I think at certain levels there’s no competition. And I know sometimes the manufacturers are like
that don’t the enemy, you know, want to get their audience in your audience. But I remember, I think
that was actually a aha show and we were the entertainment and back in those days, you’re right, we
did it at night. They had a black tie dinner and that’s what I think it was. And anytime that, what we used
to do these club shows all the time I was a creative director for a company back in the Los Angeles for
about eight years. And that’s how we did it. We’d rent out a club, we would hire a producer to produce
the show, hire the best models, the skimpiest outfits, but everybody would be drinking. So if you
thought you were going to make a presentation, forget it. Because people are talking.
(00:53:14):
And I love those shows. Even though you’re not there, you’re nobody’s going to buy anything. You’re just
there to make an impression. And if guys that are good talkers like you on stage or me, they’re not going
to listen to us. Cause nobody’s listening to anything. They’re having fun. But I do remember that, that
was a great time. And seriously, there’s a group of people I’ve always admired. You’re always on that list
because your capabilities, your commitment, everything was there. And I thought, this guy is going
places and you did, you’ve done so great for yourself and you know, want your friends to be successful.
You want them to own companies and sell companies and make money and love what they do. And you
know, admire that. You want people in our industry to be super, super successful and somebody starts a
company and sells it. You and I know dozen, at least a dozen people that have done that. And I’m always
so damn happy for ’em. And it makes me joy When you see people in the trenches, you want them to be
successful.
(00:54:17):
Exactly. Especially if they’re working hard and if you can help them at all you do. That’s what good
people do. They reach out, they help. They’re not competitive. Competitive, don’t get me wrong, you
and I do a show on stage, I’m going to kick your ass and you’re going to kick my ass, by the way. And
then we’re going to hug each other and have so much fun doing it. Right.
Chris Baran (00:54:36):
Exactly.
Eric Fisher (00:54:37):
So that’s the fun part.
Chris Baran (00:54:39):
Yeah. I think, well you have to do a job. You’re doing your job. But it’s just, and whether people love or
hate sports I love when I see, even if you don’t fighting on stage whether you call it a sport or not, I do.
But when you watch m a or boxing or whatever, I don’t like the trash talk, but what I do is when
somebody gets in there competitive, in this case they’re trying to beat the hell outta one another. But
then after greatest respect, they hug one another, congratulate one another. And I think that’s what it is
cuz they can show that they’re going through competition, but it’s not based on anger. And I think that’s
what happens in our business is you’ve gotta work, you can work for somebody else, you can work down
the block, but you’re still hairdressers and you still can communicate. You’re still, that’s right. If you’re
on stage, you can still be friends. Communicate jam, jam with other people is what I think is what gets
you even better than what you can on your own. Cuz I’m a collaborator. Collaborator,
Eric Fisher (00:55:46):
You just said it. I mean everybody’s got something to give. Everybody’s got gifts and talents and I think
that I love the boxing and we actually sponsored an mm m a fight not too long ago. We love that. And I
think it’s emblematic of life. I mean some people want to get in the arena, some don’t. I mean it’s your
choice. You don’t always have to be the best at what you do. If you can find personal satisfaction, if you
go to work every day, cuz you wanna be there. Not because you have to be there if you love it. Even if
your prices aren’t high, you work in a small town. I got lots of my students work in small towns here in
Kansas, great Bend or liberal. And they love going to work and they make a good living Now. Good living
there is different than a good living in where you live and or New York City or Miami, you know, gotta
make big bucks there to survive.
(00:56:40):
But I love that and I think that, you know, gotta be the architect of your life. You gotta decide what you
want. You’re in charge, the director, you’re the producer, you’re everything. You’ve gotta think. And I
think the biggest problem that a lot of people have is they don’t really take the time to think about what
they wanna be, where they want to go, what kind of life they really want. They let life happen to them
as opposed to guys like you and me that have pushed life. We’ve pushed life in every direction. We
decided that we wanted to be great. We decided to work really hard. We decided to go into business,
but maybe we were naive at first, but we learned as much as we could about it. We’re constantly
learning, constantly evolving. Our lives are about movement and change and not about sitting still and
hey, what’s on the next Netflix?
(00:57:27):
I mean I wanted to go to Paris to learn from Jean Lu, David and Jacque De and Harlows. I’d go, I worked
in Paris doing hair for photographers, but I love watching really good hairdressers. And how do you do
50 people in one day? How do you cut 50 like John Louis David does, yeah it 75. And then Andre Shk and
Washington DC will do 80, 90 people a day. And how do you do that? I’ve got a friend of mine that, this
is unbelievable. They’re two twins. I do a haircut masterclass down in New Orleans every year. And
these girls take my class, I love them. They’ve been to Wichita, I love them. And average ticket $327, 26
clients a day. Wow. Each one of them brings in between seven and $10,000 a day. Really? And I’m not
making this up, it’s unbelievable, we brought ’em in for Prosper U to say, to do a live event for us.
(00:58:23):
These girls make bank, are they the best hairdressers in the world? No, but they’re the best at, they’re
the best at making their clients love them and being absolutely intractable about their prices. You get a
color, everybody gets a color, you get a conditioner. Not, well I don’t really need one. You either need
shine moisture or your hair is a little damaged. You need something to some protein. So I love that. I
think that’s amazing. Could they cut the best little graduated bob in the world? No, but they’re going to
make a hundred times more money than most people do. They’re amazing individuals. So there are
certain gifts and talents and I think for our audience, I’d just say you gotta find out who you are And, and
I have been lucky enough to do that, but it’s not a, I’ve got four kids and some of them struggle and I’ve
got two of them in the business. I want my son to go in the business. He, he’s really a big kid. He says,
dad, I’m too big to bend down like you do. But he says, I do like the scenery. It looks like it’d be a lot of
fun.
(00:59:28):
I’m like, that’s the wrong reason. But that’s why your old band did it.
Chris Baran (00:59:33):
The said something really profound there about these twins that they’re charging what 3 75 is their
average ticket. Average
Eric Fisher (00:59:46):
Ticket, yeah. 3 28. Yeah,
Chris Baran (00:59:49):
Simon Bowen is, he’s been another one of our great teachers that we’ve had in our company. And he
talks about your finding your genius model. And he talks about that when it comes to pricing. Not just
you can have what people hear, see and feel right up front. So this is what I’m selling, this what I’m
doing. If it’s just about what you can hear, see and feel, then it becomes about price. But he says you’ve
gotta take him into that. So that’s the tangible, you take ’em into the next area, which is the intangible,
how you make them feel, et cetera. And then people will pay more money. There’s more value because
of the way you make ’em feel. But he said, and that’s what I recognize that these twins are doing, is
they’ve taken their customers into the transformational area. In other words, the zone where they’re
transforming lives and transforming people. And people will pay any amount of money for that. And I
think that that’s the key rate in there, that the more value you give, the more transformation that you
do with people. Whether that’s your haircut, your color, your balayage a retail product that you’re
recommending to them, it you’ve gotta take transformation how you make people, people feel. Yeah, and I think you’re right. I think people today sometimes have a scarcity mentality as opposed to a mentality of abundance and
Chris Baran (01:01:22):
Abundance deal.
Eric Fisher (01:01:23):
And life will give you whatever you ask it. And I think people are afraid to ask. These girls have created
such a great atmosphere with what they do. So they’ve got a big round table in the back, in the
mornings. Everybody sees the same person they saw four weeks ago or five weeks ago. They have
coffees and donuts. It’s a social thing, it’s a social table in the evenings, it’s the same thing. These guys,
hey, I saw you five weeks ago. It’s the same group of people. They sit at the table, they have wine, they
have snacks, and they’ve created that kind of luxury where people and everybody looks great. The hair is
always beautiful. It is transformational, as you said. So I always tell my students, you know, can be an
order taker or an order maker. You can say you can set the client down in the chair.
(01:02:11):
And I was a freelance maker artist for a while. So you can say, Hey, what have you thought about
defining your brows? Cuz it would open up your eyes. Or when you put on your eyeliner, you know,
really you’re using a pencil and that’s good. Follow it with a brush and use the same color. But you want
a tapered brush. Squirrel hair’s really good. And then just massage it in there so you can’t see where that
eyeliner stops or starts. And by the way, you should curl your lashes. You got great lashes, curl ’em. Put
that island next to your lashes. Or have you thought about some highlights around your face? Because it
would make your blue eyes look bluer and your skin tones look better or what a fringe on you a bang
would look absolutely amazing. We don’t have to do a deep commitment here, but when you partner
and you intrinsically have your client’s best interest at mine, they will drink your Kool-Aid.
(01:03:02):
And I’m going to brag on one of my estheticians. Friday had a thousand dollars retail day over a
thousand dollars in retail, a thousand dollars one person, an esthetician. And does she know how we
retail our system at prosper You absolutely. But she is just magnificent. And why? Because she really
cares. She’s given me facials. She she’ll, like Eric, I can tell you’ve been out in the sun too much, Eric, I
can tell. You know, need to moisturize in the mornings and at night, Eric, you’re doing a great job with
your face, I want to tell you it looks really, really good. So I, and I tell this to my students, don’t just be
their hairdresser. Don’t just be their esthetician or their nail person or their barber, be their partner.
Really have that intrinsic motivation of mine that you really care. And the difference, and a lot of people
don’t understand this or realize this, but tips are a big deal.
(01:03:57):
So if somebody like you, gross a hundred thousand in total sales, 20 percent’s our average tip in our
company. And we know this cuz we use tippy 20%, so that’s 20 extra thousand dollars. But it’s not just
about good service because good service, you go to a waitress, you got good service, she does
everything, you spill your water, she wipes it up, but a different levels when she gets down and at your
levels and she looks at you and she says, here’s our specials, but I don’t think it’s the best thing on the
menu tonight. I would try this. Or if you like seafood, try that. She really is caring, even though you
might not even know her, then you don’t leave a 20% tip, you leave a 25% tip because she’s blown you
away. So it transcends past just doing the right thing, smiling, mentioning the client’s name into
partnerships, into really caring about that individual. And I love that. And not everybody has that gift. I
Eric Fisher (01:01:11):
always say fake it till you make it. Maybe the, you know, got the flu you missed, you don’t feel good, you
ran over the mailman but you’re on your best. You’re doing your best that you can possibly do at that
moment you’re on stage, you know, don’t get that opportunity always. And that’s why you gotta make
the best of every situation.
Chris Baran (01:05:19):
Yeah, bingo. So listen, I wanna sign off with this one last thing here. And our tag that we have for this
podcasting is that successful people have this saying, and it’s, it’s called Goya. I think it’s the real
translation for it is get off your ass. So what do you have to get off your, but ours is get off your assets.
What asset do you have that you need to do to help get you grow? So with our audience that we’ve got
right now, what would you say that the Goya, what do they need to do in order to be successful and
have the degree of success that they want?
Eric Fisher (01:06:20):
Well and that I could talk hours on that statement and I do believe that it gets people thinking, but I
always say successful people tend to define the outcome first. If I’m doing a haircut, I might have
discoveries and changed my mind, but I’ve defined what I wanna do first in business, I’ve defined the
outcome of my school. When I opened the school I knew exactly, exactly. And then you have to have
strategies. It’s like the things that you value. What are my personal core values is good health. So what
am I going to do for good health? What’s my why? I brush my teeth, wash my hands, I work out, I eat.
And I don’t just do it once in a while. I don’t go to the gym once a month and work out for eight hours.
It’s little by little day by day everything builds up.
(01:07:10):
It’s having that consistency. So I would say define the outcome, define the strategies define the values
that you value out of that outcome. Have strategies for those values. And then even when you don’t feel
like it, you do it inch by inch, day by day. I always think of success. You’re going to the top of a mountain,
top of the mountain is prime Chris for success. That’s when you’re booked, you go to work cuz you
wanna be there, you’re making lots of money, you’re having lots of fun, you’re traveling, you’re learning.
But on the bottom in beauty school, you gotta take that path and that path isn’t easy, it gets dark, it gets
rainy, it gets scary, you know, lose your way, you fall down, you get splinters, you go, you should I give
up or should I keep going? Well everybody can get to the top if they desire.
(01:08:01):
So you just keep going. Now if you got a coach like you or like me that says, Hey, here’s the mistakes I’ve
made. Try to avoid these, or here’s the path I took. I think this is the right path. Then you get up to
where you know you’re above tree line, you can see things clearly and you see the top of the mountain,
you’re not that far away. You just work a little harder, A little harder. Then that sweet spot comes. But if
you haven’t defined first that you wanna get to the top of the mountain, then got, and then the road
less travel. If you dunno where you’re going, any road can take you.
Chris Baran (01:08:35):
Yeah. Well I love what you said about, you have to define what it is that you want. My areas that I’ve
gone into in the last while is where I’ve evolved into is more into the coaching, into helping people get
what they want and so on training, et cetera. But the one thing that I’ve found that fits so well when you
say direction and understanding that particularly people when you’re starting out and learning
something is that y you’re, you’re going to screw up and you are going to make mistakes. But what I’ve been telling people, look at, if you’re training somebody before you train them, sit down with them and
say, what is it that you want? What do you wanna be? And if I want to be X, Y, Z hairstylist, I want to be
earning this amount of money. I want to have a home and a car and so on.
(01:09:36):
And I wanna be able to feel. So if you can get them to say, what does that look like? What does it feel
like and what you wanna be able to do with it, you see it. That’s so you’re helping them with their vision
then when they have a hard time, and cuz they all know it, they can do something. Whether you’re the
type that mops or breaks into tears or has an anger moment or whatever that might be as your coach, if
you can go back to them and just say, okay, what, what’s, go back to what’s your vision again? And then
all of a sudden the mistake that you made becomes very minuscule and it’s easy to get past. So
Eric Fisher (01:10:18):
I absolutely love that. It kind of reminds me of I used to read all of Zig Ziegler’s books and he said
something like, you’ve got to believe it before you can see it. You know, gotta believe in yourself. And
you can’t let those challenges, those mistakes to you as an individual. You just gotta realize when you
read history, the greatest people in the world, the Thomas Edisons, the Abraham Lincolns, the people
that defined history for us all were riddled with challenges and mistakes and in bad terms and this and
that. But they had the fortitude in the tenacity to work through those challenges and to get to where
they are or were. And that says everything you can’t give up, you can’t be that resignation generation.
You gotta say I, I’m intrinsically motivated to be more, do more and have more and this is what I’m going
to do. You just can’t give up and people give up too early, too soon. Yeah,
Chris Baran (01:11:20):
I’m with you. I’m with brother. So I just wanna say that it has been a pleasure to know you as a friend,
get to know more about you as an entrepreneur. I mean, I’ve known about your businesses, but listen, if
anybody wants to get a hold of you, and I love the fact that your title is talent developer but is there, if
people wanna stay in touch with you or what is your Insta Handles, et cetera, how can they get a hold of
you if they wanna know more about you?
Eric Fisher (01:11:50):
I would say probably just DM me on Instagram. It’s Eric Fisher hair and Eric Fisher Academy. We have
Facebooks and Instagrams and all that social media stuff. But that’s probably the best way. And I am
inordinately busy, so I try to get back with everybody. Mean if you call me, I’ll call you back. But the best
way is probably just through my Instagram.
Chris Baran (01:12:18):
Okay. All right my friend. Well listen it was a pleasure and honor having the Eric Fisher here as my
number one episode. And I look upon this very favorably and it’s been a pleasure and honor to have you
on and to be able to call you friend. So thank you very much. It was a pleasure having you on.
Eric Fisher (01:12:42):
My pleasure. And you are a dear friend and thank you for having me on. It’s an honor to be on your first
episode. Thank you so much, Chris.
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