50% Raise, Self-Advocacy, and Informational Interviews with Sarah-Neel Smith, PhD and Jamie Lee
My client Sarah-Neel Smith, PhD, is a walking masterclass in why we should never wait for the right opportunity to land in our laps.
Opportunities are created through human-to-human conversations that spark collaborative cognition, cutting-edge insights, and key connections that lead to offers.
As a recovering people-pleaser and introvert, I completely understand why these conversations can feel “risky.” That discomfort is exactly why I titled my podcast Risky Conversations.
Because, as Sarah-Neel’s journey proves, the risk is worth the reward.
The Results
✅ Pivot 1: Successfully transitioned from Academia to Private Investigations with a 7% salary increase.
✅ Pivot 2: Leveraged her momentum into a 50% pay increase in Philanthropy.
While I supported her through the negotiation and mindset shifts, Sarah-Neel generated these opportunities by mastering the art of structured informational interviews.
She turned casual "coffee chats" into strategic engines for insights, referrals, and new roles.
I sat down with Sarah-Neel on the Risky Conversations podcast to deconstruct her process. We discussed:
The mindset required to leave an industry you’ve outgrown.
How to conduct informational interviews that actually move the needle.
The bridge between self-trust and a 50% salary jump.
If you are feeling under-appreciated or caught in a "stagnation trap," this conversation is your roadmap.
In Her Own Words: Sarah-Neel’s Journey
On Seeking Coaching to Bridge the Gap
“I sought out coaching because I had used all these other tools, including workshops and podcasts and exercise books and workbooks and informational interviews to figure out what I cared about and what I wanted to do next, and I'd gotten pretty close, but I didn't know how to navigate my way into those new professional situations. That meant I didn't know how to negotiate a salary. I didn't know how to write an email to someone that I had a new professional relationship with, and wanted to really explicitly take it to the next level of working together, and I needed someone to walk me through how to do that.”
The Proof of Concept: When Advocacy Clicks
“So I certainly had that when I undertook my first salary negotiation and actually got a 7% increase on the salary I'd initially been offered. It's the same reason I do the informational interviews is because it really works. And so I think there's a whole spectrum of career transition or related skills that it's all well and good to read about in the abstract, that one should do them, or you can do them, but it's really when you actually pull it off the first time that you're able to sort of internalize that and take that with you and repeat.”
On Shifting Identity through Self-Advocacy
“Well, it's huge. It's like discovering a whole new dimension of yourself, the ability to clearly state what you need in a given situation, whether it's professional or personal or any other context, and to advocate for that, it's a real eye opener when you realize all of the times you haven't been doing that. And it's also, by contrast, a real eye opener when you start doing it. So, yeah, I would say Game Changer all around.”
The Compound Effect of Confidence
“I think probably the second time you do it, it feels even better. So I'll give you an example. I'll give you an example just related to the salary negotiations. I managed a 7% increase in the first negotiation the second time I upped my salary by about 50% five, zero. That's another aha moment where it's just very, very clear the ways that in your given professional trajectory, your own sense of value has been recognized or not recognized, and that advocating and clarifying for other folks exactly what it is and what it should be actually works.”
The Bravery of Choosing Rest Over Hustle
“It takes a lot of effort to take a break, to cross that threshold into just doing it, what you just described about all the wonderful things that result totally true creative sharpness and creativity, and all of the things that you just can't drum up when you're burned out and busy. But in a lot of ways, I think it's almost scarier if you're a doer, or you've been on a track, or you've been in an emergency situation, or you're just a hard worker, it's almost scarier to take the break.”
The Final Verdict on Taking a Break
“But the trade offs are worth it. The trade offs are worth it.”
Dispelling the "Informational Interview" Myth
“I think the biggest one that I hear when I teach people about this is they feel uncomfortable asking for something, and they think it's because they're giving nothing in return. And that actually is one of the top assumptions that I think is important to dispel, because every time people do informational interviews with each other… the people who are answering the questions always come out of it glowing, right? They're like, Oh my gosh, I realized stuff about myself, about my own career, that I hadn't even realized until I said it out loud.”
Building Skills for the Everyday
“Once you have done a couple of these, you're much more comfortable talking about yourself. You're much more comfortable asking people about themselves, you're much more comfortable going into a room where you don't know anything about the situation and confidently and professionally using a sort of structured way to approach it, to learn about it.
And those are really powerful things to carry with you.”