Importance of experience when becoming a trainer

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1. Background

The path to becoming a brow trainer has piqued the interest of many artists, prompting numerous inquiries to the Powderbrows.com research team about the qualifications and steps required to make this career transition. To provide comprehensive insights into this pressing question, we interviewed 42 seasoned PMU trainers, each bringing their unique wealth of experience to the table. Furthermore, we consulted with 55 artists who have considered venturing into training but have not succeeded in that. This article offers an informed perspective on the subject, grounded in actual real-world experience and insights from those deeply embedded in the industry.

2. Becoming a trainer

True motivation

We could try to sugar-coat it in various ways and concentrate on how different artists phrase it. However, that does not change the essence of most people's motivation - it is related to making more money, increasing income, gaining significance, and boosting one's earnings simultaneously.

The real problem

Wanting to supplement income is not inherently problematic, but it becomes a concern when artists view training as a quick solution to compensate for decreasing earnings in their primary role. Although it's rare for an artist who has failed in their field to seek a career as a trainer, it's common for many aspiring trainers to have a significant portion of their potential working hours available. This often indicates that they have a lower demand for services than their local competitors - other artists offering similar services. Such a situation can be problematic, as it suggests that training is being pursued in a position of strength and success in their craft, but rather as a response to a lack of client demand.

Long and slow failures

Research conducted with over 200 artists from 2017 to 2022, part of which is still ongoing, reveals a concerning trend. In most of these cases, artists transitioning into trainers without a solid foundation in their original craft tend to fail. The data shows that over 87% of such trainers only attract a marginal number of students year after year, eventually conceding to having "failed their initial expectations" in training.

However, this failure is not typically a sudden, dramatic crash. To the frustration of many trainers who began their careers amidst genuine service demand, the decline of self-proclaimed trainers is often a prolonged and winding process. It can span months or even years. This gradual decline is frequently due to attempts to balance slow periods in their artistic careers with finding students for their training programs, and vice versa. This cycle of trying to offset dips in one area with increased effort in the other ultimately leads to a slow yet inevitable failure.

A distorted perspective on the starting point

A common issue for artists aspiring to become brow trainers is a distorted perspective on their starting point in the industry. Often, an artist may observe an established trainer and attempt to "bridge the gap" by emulating their methods. This approach typically involves comparing oneself with the attributes of an experienced trainer, viewing the transition from artist to trainer as a logical next step under current circumstances.

The problem with this mindset is that such comparisons significantly misrepresent the development timeline of successful trainers, who often have many years, sometimes over a decade, of experience in both training and maintaining a parallel career as artists. Their transition to trainers occurred years or even a decade or more ago. This journey encompasses layers of experience that have significantly shaped their approach and skills as trainers. Therefore, the belief that merely mimicking the current status of a trainer will enable an artist to achieve similar training potential is profoundly misguided. A successful transition requires acknowledging the time, effort, and evolution of becoming a seasoned trainer, which cannot be bypassed or rushed.

3. Foundation of genuine success

Before delving into what makes experienced trainers exceptionally effective, it's crucial to define how a trainer's "effectiveness" or "quality" is measured. This criterion is what distinguishes great trainers from good ones. The most prominent factor is the results of their students, specifically, the trainer's contribution to the financial success of their students.

The value of a trainer's service equals the financial success of their students

While one might argue that various factors contribute to a student's financial success, such as motivation, location, prior experience, etc., research with numerous trainers and academies over the years has shown that these variables tend to balance out. With a substantial number of students, a significant portion typically achieves financial success.

Relative shift in success

It's essential to view the "financial success" of students not as a binary outcome but as a spectrum. A trainer's input often correlates with the relative “additional success” on top of the success of their careers they otherwise achieved independently. In other words, for students who are already successful, a good trainer's guidance can further enhance their success. Even a marginal increase in their achievement underlines the trainer's substantial impact.

The secret of successful trainers

Successful trainers often have an interesting pattern: many of their "success stories" involve students who were already doing well or had the potential to excel due to their dedication and motivation. This is corroborated by two research projects that monitored the activities and performance of over 400 students from different trainers for 36 months post-training between 2017 and 2023. Successful trainers tend to attract students who are already on the path to success. When these trainers introduce new concepts and techniques, their students become a testament to the trainer's value, enhancing the trainer's reputation. Thus, the key to becoming a successful trainer lies in attracting already successful artists and not disappointing them.

4. Key factors of successful trainers

Having established the context, we can now delve deeper into understanding why certain trainers achieve success. Successful trainers often attract artists already progressing towards their own success, and importantly, these trainers don't disappoint them. To comprehend the key to this achievement, we find that these trainers provide unique insights derived from their extensive experience.

Insights from two research projects involving over 400 artists who attended such trainings shed light on the attributes of these successful trainers. These attributes fall under the following criteria: experience from atypical situations, contributions to the field, the ability to detect minor mistakes, business acumen, and a holistic experience as a trainer. Let's unpack these criteria to understand what lies behind them. This exploration also addresses an essential question: "What does it truly mean for a trainer to have extensive experience?”

5. Experience from atypical situations

Tailored individual approach

The ability to handle atypical situations is a crucial aspect that trainers cannot acquire solely through extensive learning. Often, even trainers themselves are unaware of the key insights they will provide, as these are drawn from a wealth of knowledge accumulated over years of experience. This can be likened to a 'knowledge bank' built only through hands-on practice.

Importance of exceptions

The hallmark of such experience is often its focus on exceptions - scenarios where the best practice diverges from standard procedures. While guidelines and manuals provided by producers in the pigmentation and powder brows field must offer safe and universally applicable advice, real-life situations sometimes require approaches that deviate from these norms. Such nuanced advice is invaluable, born from extensive experience and recognition of specific patterns.

This depth of experience-based knowledge distinguishes accomplished trainers from those relying mainly on theoretical material learned during training. Seasoned professionals can adeptly handle various technical challenges their students may face, going beyond simply repeating the guidance they received as learners. Their students frequently acknowledge that the perspectives these experienced trainers offer provide a fresh outlook, different from the information available in the public domain. This ability to impart unique, situation-specific wisdom is a key attribute of truly effective trainers in the world of semi-permanent makeup.

Unexpected advice that can change careers

For instance, an experienced trainer might advise on a unique approach for a client with multiple intersecting factors, such as specific skin type, age, skin health issues, personal desires, and social and ethnic background. While a good trainer might offer advice based on logical analysis, an experienced trainer provides recommendations drawn from real-life observations and hands-on experience. This distinction highlights the depth of understanding that comes from actual practice, allowing the experienced trainer to tailor their guidance to each client's unique combination of needs and circumstances. This level of personalized advice is a testament to the trainer's comprehensive knowledge and ability to apply their insights in diverse situations.

6. Unique contributions

Adding to established techniques

Seasoned trainers often introduce innovative approaches to pigmentation procedures developed through years of experimentation and refinement. This sets them apart from those who adhere strictly to established practices. While such trainers can outline their techniques comprehensively, replicating these subtle and complex methods typically requires extensive practice. The depth of understanding they develop, including minor yet pivotal adjustments, is often not immediately apparent but can profoundly affect outcomes.

Less-experienced individuals aspiring to become trainers may try to mimic these specialized techniques, yet they often fall short of capturing their true essence. The research underscores that unique contributions to the field often result from a combination of factors, including experience, openness, and creativity. However, most trainers emphasized that experience plays a crucial role in their ability to innovate effectively.

Engineers who construct bridges and not just talk about those

For instance, a skilled trainer might develop a new, complex set of brow patterns unprecedented in use by modifying technical applications based on factors like skull structure and light reflection. This is akin to an expert engineer designing a unique bridge across a challenging river, where they consider a multitude of variables. In contrast, a team of average engineers may not achieve such an innovative feat regardless of their numbers or the time invested. Similarly, average trainers with less experience might attempt to create new approaches only to end up rebranding existing techniques. Despite their efforts and time, they lack the crucial elements, particularly experience, necessary to innovate and make a lasting impact in the field.

7. Minor mistakes and tendencies

Understanding of minor mistakes and tendencies

A crucial yet often overlooked aspect of being an effective trainer is noticing and analyzing minor mistakes. While seemingly inconsequential, these small errors can significantly impact a student's psychological state during learning. If a trainer fails to identify and address the specific, unique errors a student makes in their approach to the procedure, the student's training remains incomplete.

Death by a thousand paper cuts

Later, when practicing independently, the student may encounter these issues without understanding how to correct them. These accumulated minor errors can lead to a situation akin to "death by a thousand paper cuts." The student might realize that their work is not meeting standards but may struggle to pinpoint exactly what is going wrong. This uncertainty can erode their confidence and willingness to continue practicing.

For example, a less experienced trainer might observe a student working on latex with a pigmentation machine, pointing out obvious technical mistakes and analyzing the result to suggest improvements. While this helps, it often lacks the deeper level of insight that comes with experience.

Intuition based on experience

Experienced trainers, having worked with hundreds or even thousands of students, understand there's more to teaching than following a conventional "list" of errors. Their extensive training experience affords them an almost intuitive sense of what a student needs to change to elevate their technical skills. This insight often involves recognizing a wide range of idiosyncratic factors about the student and understanding the typical learning curves of similar students. Thus, a single, experience-based observation from such a trainer can be transformative, potentially altering an artist's career trajectory. This ability to discern and articulate nuanced feedback sets seasoned trainers apart from their less experienced counterparts.

8. Understanding of business

Versatile Business Acumen in Real-Life Settings

Holistic business acumen is a crucial quality that sets experienced trainers apart from novices, extending far beyond technical proficiency. To achieve financial success as an artist, it's essential to understand the diverse approaches that yield results for different students.

Trainers who are just beginning to find success as artists, or worse, those who have not experienced significant financial success, typically fall into one of two pitfalls. They might either recommend the same strategies that worked for their business success or merely speculate on what could help students succeed in the pigmentation business, particularly in creating powder brows. Unfortunately, both approaches often lead to suboptimal outcomes.

Mindset of experienced trainers

In contrast, trainers with extensive experience adopt a completely different mindset. They recognize that their financial success as artists is just one part of the equation, often due to circumstances that no longer apply. To effectively mentor students from varied backgrounds and market conditions, these trainers understand the limitations of methods based solely on personal experience. Seasoned trainers, drawing from a wealth of mentoring experiences, provide highly personalized advice that addresses the unique business challenges of each student. This guidance is based on their experiences with students facing similar challenges.

For example, a trainer with thousands of students from multiple countries can immediately tailor their advice on specific marketing channels, pricing models, and design aesthetics to suit similar situations encountered by successful students. Less experienced trainers, with fewer students and limited exposure to different economic cycles, cannot match this level of tailored guidance, regardless of their efforts or good intentions. This nuanced understanding and ability to adapt advice to each unique situation truly define the relation between the actual value the trainer can provide and their experience.

9. Training experience

Training experience and Creative coaching approach

Effective training experience transcends mere subject matter expertise; it involves adapting coaching skills to suit specific circumstances. Trainers who lack substantial experience may struggle to find the right balance in their training environment, often veering between two extremes: either too formal and distant or excessively informal and overly friendly. Each approach comes with its own set of challenges.

Too distant approach

A strict or distant approach can hinder the development of a constructive trainer-student relationship, making students hesitant to share feedback openly. This restricts the trainer's ability to pinpoint areas needing improvement. Conversely, a relationship that is too close can lead to dependency, where the trainer might shy away from challenging students due to fear of causing failure. Such a "safer" method can impede students' growth and their readiness for real-world situations.

Danger of dependency

Additionally, an overly friendly dynamic can lead to issues, especially if the student relies on the trainer for ongoing support. This is particularly problematic as the trainer's student base grows and they cannot provide the same level of individual attention, leading to potential disappointment and diminished training effectiveness.

Unconventional but surprisingly effective coaching methods

Seasoned trainers excel in striking a crucial balance: they create an environment conducive to open communication and learning from mistakes while maintaining professional boundaries that promote independence and problem-solving skills. This balanced approach enriches the learning experience and better equips students for their future careers.

These trainers often build strong bonds with students, not by succumbing to the extremes mentioned but by implementing unexpected and unconventional training strategies. These might include taking unplanned breaks to rejuvenate, dividing students into groups, adjusting the training schedule based on group dynamics, interspersing exercises with storytelling from personal experience, employing authority and contradiction judiciously, or tuning down the emotion, among other techniques. While one might try to replicate these methods based on their experiences as a student, such imitation rarely produces the same results. This is because each training session is unique, with its group dynamics, individual psychological profiles, timing, and overall emotional milieu, all of which require a tailored approach by the trainer that can only be based on excessive experience.

10. A case for the academy model

International academies with extensive experience in the permanent makeup field offer significant advantages in the training realm, especially for those aiming to become brow trainers. Although these academies may implement strict guidelines on brand affiliations and pricing structures, they provide a comprehensive and well-structured pathway for trainer development that can be challenging to replicate independently.

A crucial filter requireing experience

A critical advantage of the academy model is its emphasis on rigorous experience standards. While some may view these stringent criteria as limiting or unnecessary, they fulfill an essential function. The model is meticulously designed to ensure that only individuals with sufficient experience and expertise qualify to become trainers. This approach effectively counters many of the challenges and pitfalls previously discussed.

The experience-based qualifications of these academies act as a filter, ensuring that trainers are not only technically proficient but also well-equipped with the necessary pedagogical skills and business knowledge for effective teaching. In essence, the academy model enforces a quality control mechanism, allowing only those who have demonstrated their proficiency in real-world scenarios to train others. This rigorous standard reassures prospective students of the quality of their education and maintains high training standards that might be lacking in more informal or ad hoc training environments.

11. Logical path to becoming a trainer

The journey to becoming a brow trainer is often perceived as overwhelming or unattainable, a myth sometimes perpetuated by successful trainers to deter newcomers. Contrary to this belief, the trainers we interviewed suggested a more accessible path. In their view, the first crucial step is mastering the craft oneself becoming a recognized expert in the field.

This mastery involves two primary components: an intense focus on perfecting a specific procedure and dedicating substantial time to practice. An aspiring trainer encounters various challenges by concentrating on a single technique, each providing invaluable learning experiences. These experiences contribute to developing a unique approach, setting them apart from practitioners who adhere strictly to traditional methods.

Such a preparatory phase hones the artist's skills and shapes their perspectives, forming a strong foundation for potentially transitioning into a training role. While the road to becoming a trainer is challenging, it is not insurmountable. The path becomes clearer and more attainable with dedicated practice and excellence in a chosen specialty.

Indicators one is ready to become a trainer

Recognizing when one is ready to transition from artist to trainer is often influenced more by external factors than by self-assessment. Contrary to popular belief, readiness to teach doesn't solely stem from an internal sense of preparedness or mastery. For many established trainers, the turning point was marked by external demand for their expertise—when prospective students began seeking their knowledge. In the world of permanent makeup (PMU), the old saying "When the student is ready, the master appears" takes a unique turn. It's more apt to say, "When the students appear, the master is ready." This external validation is a crucial indicator of having attained a level of expertise and mastery that others are eager to learn from, suggesting that one might be well-prepared to step into the role of a trainer.

12. Conclusions

The path to becoming a brow trainer is often shrouded in misconceptions. It’s commonly viewed as a direct route to financial gain, but this perspective can lead to failure, mainly due to a lack of comprehensive experience. A common error among aspiring trainers is misjudging their starting point relative to established trainers, not recognizing the depth and duration of the journey these professionals have undergone to build their expertise.

Experience is crucial for several reasons, spanning both technical and non-technical skills. Technically, trainers must have a rich background in handling atypical situations, enabling them to provide specific, tailored feedback. They should bring unique contributions beyond basic knowledge and have a history of learning from their mistakes to prevent similar pitfalls for their students. Without this level of expertise, students might face discouragement from unexplained suboptimal results, potentially leading them to abandon their pursuits.

On the non-technical front, a capable trainer requires solid business acumen, evidenced by sustaining a successful practice through various market conditions. This experience is vital to offer practical advice for diverse business scenarios. Effective pedagogical skills are also essential, striking a balance in the trainer-student relationship that fosters open communication without creating dependency.

The academy model is often a beneficial pathway for aspiring trainers, thanks to its stringent criteria ensuring readiness and aptitude. Those opting for an independent route should specialize in a particular style, achieve mastery, and start training only when there’s a real demand from prospective students. Becoming a brow trainer is thus not just about mastering technical skills; it's about combining technical prowess with business insight and educational skills - a multifaceted endeavor that demands a comprehensive approach.