Interview with Dr. Maya Borgueta: How Ambitious People Overcome Anxiety and Burnout

Though I believe we are all born to thrive, I know there are days when that truth can feel like a lie, because of anxiety. 

We experience anxiety more acutely when we most need our courage to brave a high-stakes conversation like negotiation. 

In this valuable conversation with Dr. Maya Borgueta, a clinical psychologist and founder of Stella Nova Psychology, we explored: 
- Why it's important to be prepared to know your worth at any time during job interview process 
- What purpose anxiety serves 
- Why it's not an emotion you need to avoid or push away 
- How to manage your anxiety level in a simple, yet powerful way 
- What self-compassion has to do with managing our anxiety 
- How to recognize burnout 
- Steps to take to address burnout 

Learn more about Dr. Maya Borgueta on www.stellanovawomen.com

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 39 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

Usually, I start each podcast episode with a really chipper, “I believe we are all born to thrive!”

I do. I really do.

But I also recognize there are days when that can feel like a lie.

There are days when I wake up filled with a lot of anxiety, self-doubt, guilt, shame, and it doesn’t really feel like I am born to thrive. It feels more like I am born to crawl back to bed.

Ever have one of those days?

I think we all do. I think it’s the human condition. But if I’m wrong, please let me know. And if you never have days like that, I would love to hear about your life! Email me, jamie@jamieleecoach.com.

I think we have days like that and I think that’s only human because our brains are hard-wired to seek out comfort and pleasure and safety. There’s a part of our brain that has never evolved from when we lived in caves and had to seek safety and comfort as if our life depended on it. As if our survival depended on it.

And so, yeah, there are days when it can feel like our brains are working against us, not for us. And I think that’s why mental health is so, so important. And on that topic, I have a very special guest.

My guest is Dr. Maya Borgueta. She is a clinical psychologist and founder of Stella Nova Psychology, a therapy group in downtown San Francisco that specializes in supporting professional women in their careers and in their personal lives.

Her practice focuses on supporting women in their 20s through 40s who work in tech, business and other industries, and the practice also strives to serve the needs of underrepresented groups like women of color. She has previously worked in a variety of settings, including university mental health, veterans’ affairs, rape crisis centers and, most recently, the health tech industry.

This conversation is going to be really useful for all of us who struggle with anxiety. I do. And I’m really interested and looking forward to learning about concrete ways we can help ourselves so that we can show up to brave uncomfortable conversations even when we have anxiety. We can do something to not let anxiety stop us from being courageous and taking the lead so that we can thrive.

So, without further ado, please enjoy this interview with Dr. Maya Borgueta.

Jamie: Hello! Dr. Maya?

Dr. Maya: Hi, Jamie! How are you?

Jamie: I’m doing great! Thanks so much for coming onto the podcast.

Dr. Maya: Thank you for inviting me. I’m glad to be here.

Jamie: Yeah! So, first thing, I’d love to hear about a negotiation in your life or career that had the biggest impact for you.

Dr. Maya: Sure. I was thinking about this recently, because a lot of my clients have been going through a salary negotiation process recently and I actually came to learning these salary negotiations, I think, a little bit late in the game. In my last job, actually. And previously, being a psychologist, I was in school for many years, I was applying for internships and practicum positions which just had a fixed salary. After that, I was working in universities where they had a fixed salary and you just kind of got set on the pay schedule and went up the ladder, kind of step by step, everybody was in the same position and then I transitioned to the private sector. I worked for a role at a mental health tech company, a startup.

So, my first salary negotiation happened at that last job and it happened really out of the blue. I didn’t know I was going into it. I was expecting to go through several steps before we got to the salary negotiation. I thought that I was going to interview and then I’d go home and if they wanted me, they’d call me and, you know, talk to me about salary then. And that’s not at all what happened.

So, I went in for the interview, and on that day I met with a bunch of people and last I met with the CEO of this tech startup and he basically said I had the job if I wanted it and asked what I wanted right then and I was not at all prepared to answer that question. So, I was winging it completely, which maybe was a good thing because I might have been a little anxious had I known I was going into a salary negotiation.

Jamie: So, he basically asked you to name your salary.

Maya: Exactly!

Jamie: Yeah. So, what did you say?

Maya: So, I dove in and I asked him...so, I’d been doing a little bit of contract work with the company before I was interviewing for this job and I asked him to match that hourly rate for my salary, which was a wild ask. It was way more than anything I could have possibly expected for the job. It would have made me probably one of the most high-paid people at the company. And he very quickly did the math in his head and told me that wasn’t gonna happen and he came back to me with, “Okay, well, what is your current salary at your job?” And at that time I was working at a university counseling center, so in college mental health, which is fun work but it is notoriously not paid well. So, he asked me what my current salary was and I answered truthfully, which was about $75,000 at that time and he said they were thinking of offering me something around that number.

Jamie: Quick question.

Maya: Yeah!

Jamie: Was this in California and how long ago was this?

Maya: It was in California and, let’s see, that was around 2015?

Jamie: Oh, okay.

Maya: Yeah, summer of 2015. So, I know that there’s laws now that you can’t ask that question.

Jamie: That’s right, that’s right.

Maya: Yes. But at that time, it was not off the table.

Jamie: Yeah.

May: Yeah, so maybe I started off with a mistake there. I was caught off guard. So he said, “Okay, well, that’s around what we’re looking to offer you.” And so I countered that by telling him, truthfully, that I was also looking at other employment in the private sector at the time. Even thought this job was, by far, my first choice, I was looking at other jobs at that time and I told him that I would be able to make closer to, you know, around $90,000 in other jobs that I was looking at, so that that $75,000 was not a good point of comparison for me as I was thinking about making financial decisions about my next job.

Jamie: Right, yeah. And then, where did you settle?

Maya: So, we settled on that. We settled on $90,000, which I was very happy about at the time. I actually did end up re-negotiating my salary about a year later. I learned that my salary was still below what was considered median for a psychologist in this area here. It can vary quite a bit around the country, as many jobs do, but it was below median, so I was able to re-negotiate that again.

Jamie: Great job! So, what did you take away from that experience? What was your lesson?

Maya: So, my lesson was that it is a valuable thing, always, to be prepared to know and discuss your financial worth confidently. Even though I wasn’t expecting to have that conversation that day, I think I could have set myself up for a better discussion. It ended up turning out well for me in the end but I think about it actually a lot like another concept that I discuss with my therapy clients a lot, which is setting boundaries. I tell them, you can’t set boundaries with other people until you have a clear idea of what you yourself need. And I think it’s similar with your salary. You can’t negotiate your salary without having a firm understanding going into it of what you need and what you can accept.

Jamie: I couldn’t agree more. I think how you negotiate one thing is how you negotiate other things in your life and, you know, salary negotiation is just an extreme example of setting those boundaries. Like you’re saying, “This is the work I will do for x amount of money,” right? Yeah. Great lesson and great story! Earlier this week, I gave a webinar about how to anchor and basically, you ended up anchoring at an extremely high place and your to-be employer set a new anchor and then you effectively broke the extremely low anchor by countering, saying, “I am also looking at other jobs and I’m looking to make $90,000,” so, well done! This is a great story and a great lesson to take away.

So, as a psychologist, I’d love to hear about how you approach and explain anxiety. You know, for me, anxiety is something that I deal with on a daily basis, and I think anxiety is something that comes up when everyone, like a lot of people, when they think about negotiating, there’s just anxiety there in the top of their mind. So, I’d love to hear, in your expert point of view, what we can do to manage it.

Maya: Sure, absolutely. So, anxiety, as you’ve already said, it’s a really common concern for people. It’s actually, I think, the number one issue that my clients in my practice come to talk to me about. And we don’t all experience anxiety disorders but virtually everybody experiences anxiety that comes up in certain situations. And experiencing anxiety says nothing, actually, about your ability or about your competence. The clients that I work with, in particular, are really high-functioning, intelligent women. They’re accomplished and ambitious professional people, so I just want to point that out to bust a little bit of the stigma around there.

Jamie: Yeah, and it can feel like the truth when your anxiety is saying things like oh, you can’t do it, blah blah blah.

Maya: Oh my goodness, yes!

Jamie: And I call my voice the Itty Bitty Shouldy Committee.

Maya: I love that, yes. That’s exactly true. And we tend to think of anxiety as an emotion, which it absolutely is, but it’s also a really complex series of physiological responses that we have in our bodies whenever we are anticipating something to be potentially threatening or potentially dangerous. And our body doesn’t really distinguish between threats like messing up an interview and being embarrassed or something that’s actually physically dangerous, like you’re getting mugged, right?

So, when we’re headed into a scary-feeling negotiation, we’re actually, in our bodies, experiencing a low-level or sometimes a full-blown fight or flight response. And actually, we now know that that fight or flight response that most people are familiar with is actually fight, flight or freeze. So, if you’ve ever experienced freezing up when you’re in a moment of anxiety, feeling like you can’t think or you can’t talk or your brain is just on pause…

Jamie: Or crawling back to bed.

Maya: Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah, so, in your body, when you’re anxious, what types of feelings do you usually have?

Jamie: When I’m feeling anxious, I feel nervous. I feel shame in advance.

Maya: Mmm, yeah, absolutely. That anticipation.

Jamie: Yeah, yeah. I have this anxiety around public speaking. Even though I do it all the time, the anxiety still comes up every single time. And I would say it’s that the heart is beating really fast, like you talked about, the flight or fight response. There’s a temptation to be like, “Uhhhh, I don’t know if I can do it,” you know?

Maya: Yeah, yeah, so your heart races, you get that, maybe, sometimes when I feel really anxious I feel a little bit short of breath. Especially when I’m talking, like I can’t really catch my breath. A lot of people feel it as stomach upset, so, you know, nausea or just cramps in your stomach or, you know, that butterfly feeling.

Jamie: That’s right.

Maya: It’s really, really common. And I like to point out, you’re saying you get a little bit of anxiety every time you go to speak. A little bit of anxiety is not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself. A little bit of anxiety can actually be helpful for performance. If we’re not at all anxious, maybe we don’t prepare as well, right? You know, a little bit of anxiety can make you go the extra mile as you’re getting ready. In the moment, it can improve your alertness and it can give you a boost of energy, too. So, a little bit of anxiety is not necessarily a bad thing. Too high anxiety in the moment can really be paralyzing and particularly if you’ve ever had a panic attack, that’s a really acute high level of anxiety. You really can’t function at all. So there’s a wide range of what anxiety can look like, right?

Jamie: Right.

Maya: So, when I’m working with a client, my goal, I always tell them at the beginning, to kind of set expectations around this and normalize that anxiety is an okay emotion to have. My goal is never to eliminate anxiety completely or make anxiety the enemy. It’s to turn the volume down so that your anxiety’s not up at a 10. You want your anxiety maybe to be at a 3 or even a 4. That’s a level that most of us can still function perfectly well at.

Jamie: Yeah, yeah, that’s a really interesting point. In an earlier episode, I was having a conversation with a career coach and she made the distinction between confidence and courage and I think there’s this kind of a myth about the very confident person who shows up with zero anxiety, zero fear but in reality there’s always gonna be a little bit of anxiety and, in fact, what I’m hearing is that it actually can serve a really great purpose in helping you to prepare, be alert, do your best.

Maya: Yeah. Anxiety is, like all of our emotions, actually, it’s an evolved response and it’s evolved in humans because it helps us. If you think about your health, if you had zero anxiety you probably wouldn’t do routine things like getting your pap smear or your physical. I’m out in California, so the example that always comes to mind is a little bit of anxiety is going to get you to build your earthquake kit so that you’re prepared, right?

Jamie: Yeah. What if you feel like you’re teetering on the edge of like 8 or 9 right before you engage in a high-stakes conversation like salary negotiation?

Maya: Yeah, absolutely. And I think salary negotiation is definitely one of those situations that can trigger that level of anxiety for a lot of people. So, in that moment, I think doing something to ground yourself can be really helpful. I really love, one thing that works for me and that I actually pull out as a tool when I’m finding my anxiety creeping up, anywhere from, I get a little nervous on planes when there’s turbulence, I do it when I’m on a turbulent airplane ride, I do it before I go to the dentist, and I do it before I get on stage or go up to do speaking as well. It’s something called box breathing. Have you heard of it before?

Jamie: Yes, I have heard of it before.

Maya: Yeah, so the idea behind it is that when you’re in a state of anxiety, your nervous system is really overactivated, so it’s a way to calm down your nervous system. And it’s really simple and the idea is just that you are taking some nice, slow breaths but you’re doing it in a really specific way. It’s called box breathing because you are going to inhale to a count of four, hold that breath for a count of four, exhale for a count of four, and hold the breath out for a count of four. And when I do it, I find that even doing that for like four or five cycles of breath can be enough to really, dramatically change how I’m feeling. It sounds simple and it is simple, actually, but it’s really effective and so I love having a tool like that for going into something that I know will be challenging.

Jamie: I read about it in Brene Brown’s book and I remember doing it, doing the box breathing as I was walking to work because the thought of going into work, into the office was creating anxiety for me, yeah.

Maya: Yeah, definitely, and that’s one of the nicest things about it is it’s a tool that you can literally do anytime, anywhere. I’ve done it during meetings before. Nobody has to know you’re doing this thing to manage your anxiety. It’s really kind of a stealth anxiety management tool.

Jamie: Yeah, and I love that it’s something that is so easy and it’s just breathing, but breathing in a very conscious and deep way, intentional way. Yeah, that’s very powerful.

Maya: Yeah, and I remember hearing Brene Brown actually talking about that. She learned about it from people in the military. They actually are trained, they don’t call it box breathing, they call it tactical breathing, but they do it as a way to center themselves, even in a combat situation. So, it’s used really everywhere from the military to yoga studios.

Jamie: Wow. And I know you recently gave a talk at Bullish Conference about self-compassion for ambitious people and I would love to hear from you, what is the connection there?

Maya: Sure, sure. So, I have become a little bit of an evangelist about self-compassion with the ambitious professional women that I work with and before I get into the anxiety connection, just to tell you a little bit about self-compassion and what it is and how I think about it: the reason that I ended up developing this talk which I’ve had the opportunity to give in a few different places at this point is that I was noticing this thread coming up again and again with my clients and also myself, for that matter, the tendency to be really hard on ourselves. And even really accomplished, competent, ambitious women were struggling with really impossibly standards for themselves, harsh self-criticism, stuff that we [audio drops] goes on with people in our lives that we care about.

So, to give an example of this, you could imagine watching your best friend just blow a presentation that she’s worked really hard on for the past week, for past six weeks. Everything’s gone wrong. She’s tripped up, she’s forgotten things, she’s given misinformation. Most of us, in that situation, we would really, deeply cringe for her, right? It would be painful to watch. But we’d also comfort her. We’d remind her that she’s still awesome, that she’ll get the next one. We might actually even also help her figure out what actions she needs to take to move forward, right? Maybe she needs more practice, maybe she needs to talk to a therapist about her performance anxiety that might be getting in the way, right? What we generally don’t do with our best friend who’s messed up in this way is we generally don’t call her a loser. We generally don’t tell her she’s never gonna amount to anything or that she’s worthless or that she’s nothing but an embarrassment.

Jamie: Ooh! Good one! Yes! You hit it on the head right there.

Maya: But the thing is that when the tables are turned, when it’s us that’s made the mistake, it’s exactly what we do. We tell ourselves we’re idiots, we’re losers, we’re stupid, we obsess over the situation and we can play it over and over again in our heads.

Jamie: Yep. Been there. Done that.

Maya: Yeah. I think it’s really relatable. When I did this talk for the first time in San Francisco, I was actually just like kind of putting it out there. I put some tickets up on EventBrite. I was like, I don’t know if people will come to this, but worth giving it a try. I was just starting to build my practice. It sold out in three days. I didn’t do any paid marketing, I just posted in a few Facebook groups. And it resonated so deeply because it’s something that I think is so, so very common.

So, basically, self-compassion is the practice of treating ourselves with the same care and kindness that we would treat somebody we loved. It doesn’t mean that we’re coddling but we are supporting and encouraging and offering empathy and kindness to ourselves. Even and especially when we’ve messed up.

Jamie: Yes. So powerful.

Maya: Yeah, so bringing it back to your original question about anxiety, what does this all have to do with anxiety? Well, one thing is that you can imagine that your self-critic can cause a ton of anxiety. It’s obviously anxiety-provoking to be hearing you’re not smart enough for this, you absolutely can’t mess this up, or everybody thinks you’re an idiot, right? Anybody would be anxious hearing somebody telling us that, whether it was somebody outside or ourselves telling us that same message. So, when we learn how to calm that inner critic and quiet that inner critic it can really be helpful for soothing our anxiety.

Jamie: And I think the first step is just recognize that this is the voice of the inner critic. It’s not me. We tend to over-identify with our own thoughts, so being able to make that distinction, oh that’s just the inner critic. That’s just the part of my brain that talks to me like that. Nothing’s actually gone wrong.

Maya: Yeah, exactly. You know, you were saying before about anxiety how when you’re in the middle of it it just feels true. It feels like all your anxious thoughts are true. I think we can have that same kind of distortion around our inner critic that because it’s being harsh, it’s the unblemished, objective truth and that if we think anything else, we’re just deluding ourselves. But really, having a negative bias on how we look at ourselves is just as harmful, if not more harmful, than having an overly positive filter.

Jamie: Yeah, and I love the self-compassionate way, because compassion just means to be with, right? And so it takes being able to recognize and acknowledge it, not push it away or reject it, but like, okay, I have these thoughts in my head. These are just thoughts. For that reason, I always advise my clients, what I do all the time is write down the stressful thoughts, the anxious thoughts, like you’re not gonna amount to anything, you didn’t do a good job, or whatever. You’re a loser.

Maya: Exactly! So, you know, if you were noticing that you were anxious, either, you know, some people are more tuned in with their body, it’s easier for them to kind of first recognize that they’re feeling anxious, because they notice that their heart’s racing and their palms are sweating and they’re feeling a little shaky. Other people are really heady and might notice that they’re really just ruminating on an anxious thought. Whatever your personal kind of red flags are that, ooh, this sounds like anxiety, this sounds like my self-critic, it’s a signal to yourself to check in and take a pause and see what you need in that moment. Self-compassion is figuring out what is good and helpful for you in the moment.

Jamie: Excellent. Yeah, so I have one more question about this.

Maya: Sure!

Jamie: So, I know that anxious people, anxious people who are very ambitious, we also tend to burn ourselves out because we listen to that inner critic that says you gotta do and do and do and do more.

Maya: Right.

Jamie: So, I’m curious to hear, what are some ways, some strategies that you advise your clients take to avoid burnout?

Maya: Yeah, so burnout is a really specific type of exhaustion. It’s one that we get, mental and physical exhaustion, when we’re under chronic stress and it seems to be a theme in our conversation today but we don’t always realize that we’re in the middle of it. So, the first step is to be able to recognize that that’s happening for you. It’s something for me, as a psychologist, that I’ve had to work at because I think, you know, those of us that are in caregiving types of professions can burnout and experience compassion fatigue at really high rates.

So, you know, signs that I look for to recognize when I’m burnt out is if I’m feeling tired all the time. Even when I’m getting enough sleep, I still have that bone-deep exhaustion. Another sign that can come up is feeling cynical or pessimistic or maybe even resentful about some kind of project that you really care about, something that you’re working on. If I find myself getting unusually annoyed at my clients, that’s a sign to me that I’m burnt out. And another one that is, I think, particularly relevant to those of us who identify as being ambitious, professional women is we can lose confidence in ourselves and also find it really hard to enjoy our success and kind of discounting that.

So, that’s step one. Recognizing that you’re in the middle of it. And the next step is figuring out what needs to change in the structure of your day-to-day life. A lot of people kind of jump from oh, I’m burned out, I need to take a vacation. And a vacation can be a wonderful first step, but just taking a vacation does not solve burnout. I think we’ve all had the experience of going on vacation and it is lovely and it’s heavenly for a week and you think, “Ugh, I’m gonna go back to work and I’m never gonna be stressed again. I’m just gonna imagine myself back on this beach.” And you get back to work and your emails have piled up and maybe your boss is still a jerk, or maybe there’s still too much work to get through in your work day and you’re there until 9PM. And nothing has changed and you’re right back to square one and maybe even more underwater now that you’re back from a vacation. So, take a vacation, I am not anti-vacation, but you need to think about what needs to change in a bigger way in your life.

Jamie: Oooh.

Maya: Yeah. Are you making space for your self-care basics? Do you have enough time for food? Are you getting routine medical care? Are you making time to get enough sleep to be fully rested? Not just enough to function, but to be rested. Are you exercising? Are you getting social time? All of those things are non-negotiables. And maybe we need to set boundaries in our life or delegate some of our responsibilities if we’re not able to make time for that.

Jamie: You’re giving me a lot to think about here.

Maya: Sure. What stands out for you?

Jamie: It’s thinking bigger. It’s not just about quick fixes but structurally, how are you designing your career?  How are you operating in your life? I think those are the bigger questions that you’re helping to raise for me. Thank you!

Maya: Absolutely. And I think it can be helpful to think about what is your personal mission statement. Or what are your core values? What really matters to you in your life and are you getting to engage with that stuff in your normal day-to-day?

Jamie: Yeah.

Maya: If the answer is you’re not doing that much, then if you want to reduce your burnout, you also need to find a way to fit things you’re passionate about into your life. And it seems a little counterintuitive, right? Add something new in when you’re already burnt out? But those are the things that energize us. We need rest for energy but we also need kind of emotional energy that we get from doing things that are really meaningful.

Jamie: I think for me it’s the constant thinking about work.

Maya: Mmm-hmm. Yeah, yeah. I’m a psychologist but I’m also an entrepreneur and building a new business and I’m in the process of hiring employees and we’re getting ready to move into a new office and there’s always something new on the table and that has been something that’s a struggle. Putting work down at the end of the day.

Jamie: Yeah. It’s mental hygiene.

Maya: Exactly. We need to take care of our mental health as much as our physical health.

Jamie: I love that even those of us who work with people and help other people, like you and me, we still gotta do our own work.

Maya: Absolutely. You know, I think it can even be harder sometimes. One of the downsides to being a person who loves to help other people and who really gets joy out of being able to help people reach their goals is we can lose sight of our own and there has to be that balance. Because, you know the saying, you can’t pour from an empty cup.

Jamie: Exactly. This has been such a valuable conversation and I’m really getting a lot of insights for me. Thank you. Where can people go to learn more about you and the work that you do?

Maya: Absolutely. So, you can go to my private practice website, which is stellanovawomen.com and that is the website for my therapy practice in downtown San Francisco where I focus on serving the needs of professional women to care for their own mental and emotional health. And you can also follow us on Facebook and Instagram and Twitter @stellanovawomen.

Jamie: Okay! Dr. Maya, thanks again for your valuable time. I have some things to follow up now after this conversation and I look forward to hearing more about the wonderful work that you do at stellanovawomen.com.

Maya: Okay! Thank you so much, Jamie. It was really wonderful talking to you.

Jamie: Bye bye!

Maya: Bye bye!

How to Negotiate a Career Pivot with Lisa Lewis

If you are ambitious and analytical, and if you want to grow your career through strategic pivots, you won't want to miss this value-packed conversation with career change coach Lisa Lewis. 

Lisa Lewis is a career change coach helping ambitious, analytical individuals feeling stuck in their current jobs find different work that “fits” who they are. She does this by helping you clarify who you are, what you want most, what a great job for you looks like so you can make your career transition in the easiest way possible.

In this conversation, Lisa shares how she successfully negotiated a career pivot with a $10K increase in salary offer. (Listen carefully for the word-by-word script!) 

We also explore how the growth mindset can help ambitious people like you overcome the trap of perfectionism so you can embrace change, risk, growth, learning and joy. 

Learn more about Lisa here: LisaLewisCareers.com 
Watch the Carol Dweck's TED talk here:www.ted.com/talks/carol_dweck_the_power_of_believing_that_you_can_improve?language=en

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 37 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. This is Jamie Lee and I am recording this intro at the Phoenix Airport.

I am here because my flight back to New York was delayed by three hours. Well, originally, I’m here because I presented a talk at the Human Capital Institute’s HR Call to Action conference here in Scottsdale, Arizona and you know what?

I think I did a B- job.

I pride myself on being a frequent public speaker and I learned that I have a lot more that I can offer. I have a lot more to learn. I have a lot more to grow in terms of my public speaking capacities. That’s my biggest takeaway from attending and presenting at this marvelous conference for HR professionals.

I’m telling you this because this podcast episode touched on something really big that is helping me work through my feelings of inadequacy, feelings of embarrassment, dare I say shame because I did a B- job at my public speaking engagement.

This is a really wonderful conversation I had with Lisa Lewis who is a wonderful career coach. She is in my coaching alliance. I have an alliance of coaches who...we all support each other and we help each other be held accountable so that we can continue to do the work of growing our business no matter how often we are told “no” or people don’t respond to us.

In any case, Lisa Lewis is great and she is a career change coach who helps ambitious, analytical individuals who are feeling stuck in their current jobs find different work that fits who they are. And she does this by helping people like you clarify who you are, what you want most, and what a great job for you looks like so that you can make your career transition in the easiest way possible.

And in this conversation, we talked about so many really amazing things. We talked about a wonderful way to negotiate your career pivot. She shared with us the Jenny Blake career Pivot Method, the four-step process. We talked about the trap of perfectionism. We talked about how to work through the fear of change. We talked about how courage is different from confidence. And we talked about the growth mindset, which is the mindset I am trying to apply to myself today as I work through my feelings of inadequacy because I didn’t do a perfect job.

So, if you are somebody who is ambitious, who wants to pivot, who wants to grow, who wants to risk change, risk uncertainty and thrive nonetheless, I think you will find this conversation super, super valuable.

And I want to give you a heads up that I am doing another webinar on October 17th. Come over to jamieleecoach.com to sign up for that and also, if you are interested in being on my podcast, write me at jamie@jamieleecoach.com and let’s take it from there.

Without further ado, here is the conversation with Lisa Lewis.

Lisa: How are you?

Jamie: I’m doing great, how are you?

Lisa: I am good, thank you. So honored and excited to get to show up on your podcast. Thank you!

Jamie: Same here, same here! So, I want to just share with you that...I’ve shared with my audience that you’ve been holding me accountable to grow my coaching business, so thank you for that, and I’m curious to know: What is a negotiation in your life or career that had the biggest impact on you?

Lisa: Well, I’m so excited to get to share parts of this story because it has some overlap with how I got into being a career coach myself. So, back when I was still working in the corporate space, I was doing digital marketing work, and I had been marching up the career ladder, and getting promotions and raises and additional responsibilities and it all felt exciting and very seductive. But more and more, the further I climbed up the career ladder, the less and less the work felt like it was aligned with my heart and my soul.

Jamie: Yeah.

Lisa: So, I had gotten myself into a great situation at an ed tech company where I was making really good money, I was eligible for a pretty strong bonus and by all accounts on the outside, I would have been in somebody’s dream job. It looked fabulous. But it just felt soulless for me.

And I spent a good, probably two or three years of my life trying to figure out how to find work that felt a little bit more like me, that I would feel alive and excited to do that work. And pretty quickly after I had moved into this job doing marketing work and managing multi-million dollar ad-spends for this tech company, I had started my own career coaching business on the side. It was my little test-drive side hustle to see if the type of thing that I had realized that I really loved doing was something that people would actually pay me to do.

Jamie: Hmm.

Lisa: And, slowly but surely, I started to get one client and then two clients and then three clients on the side while I was still doing my 9-5 job in the marketing space. But what I was realizing was that I was becoming more and more unhappy in my 9-5 and that dissatisfaction and unhappiness was bleeding into the rest of my life, as it is often wont to do.

Jamie: Mm-hmm.

Lisa: So, I was trying to figure out a way to make an internal pivot and get into something else at my organization. And I tried the route of making a pivot into HR, because I thought, you know, marketing into HR isn’t too, too big of a leap and HR feels kind of like it’s aligned with career coaching. You know, it’s very focused on employees and their happiness and creating sustainable career paths but that didn’t work.

And I tried to make a pivot into corporate communications because I thought, okay, corporate is a little bit more removed from the day-to-day work that I’m doing for our clients and our partners, so maybe that would feel good.

And then I realized that we had a career services offering that we did as part of the education branch of our work as a company. And so I talked to the folks on the career services team and they prefaced the conversation with “You know, we’re not hiring right now, but happy to have an informational conversation with you.” And I said, “Great! That works for me!” You know, anything to start to plant some seeds to make a transition felt like it was directionally correct and helpful for me.

Jamie: Mm-hmm.

Lisa: So, I sat down with the head of the department, head of the team, and had this great 45-minute conversation with her and by the end of the conversation, she said, “You know, I know I said that we weren’t hiring but let me see what I can do.”

Jamie: Mmmmm.

Lisa: And within a week she came back to me and said, “Hey, we have an offer for you if you want to make a transition but the offer is for a pretty significant amount less money to come over and make the transition because your responsibilities and the place that you would fit into our org chart is different from where you are on the marketing side of the house.”

So, I stepped up to the negotiation plate and said, “Hey, I am so grateful and so honored that you would think of me and that you would make this possible and I’d love to see if there’s a way that we can make this work for both of us. You know, I would love to be a part of your team but I also want to make sure that it feels like this is whole and this is fair and feels good for both of us.” So, I countered and said, “Hey, you know, I would love to see what else you can do to close the gap on salary and bonus in this new role.”

Jamie: How did you frame that? How did you create the basis for that ask?

Lisa: Well, I said, “I appreciate…” and this is all sort of me trying to recreate the memory, so forgive me if it’s not 100% accurate to how the conversation perfectly played out, but I remember saying something to the effect of “You know, I really appreciate everything that you’ve done for me here. I know that this is a difference in terms of the level of responsibility and the level of management that I would be moving into, but I also know that I have a lot to contribute, I’m really capable, and that there are going to be possibilities for me to really make a difference in this role. And if I come into this role and accept the pay as it is, it’s likely not going to be a sustainable good fit for me in the long term, so I’d love to see if we can find something in the middle that allows for me to feel whole. I’m happy to take a part of paycheck, a pay decrease, a pay cut to make this work but we’ve gotta find a way to get a little bit closer to the middle.”

Jamie: That’s fabulous!

Lisa: Thank you! So, HR and the department head put their heads together and they talked about it and they came back to me with an offer that was $10,000 higher than what they had initially offered me, which was great, but it was still a pay cut.

So, at that point, I said, “Hey, I feel like, I’m so appreciative of everything you’ve done to champion and find a way to make this a win-win. I think we’re almost there. Would you be open to talking about, once I get into the swing of things for this job, being a little bit more flexible on the hours? You know, potentially, instead of doing five 8-hour days, talking about doing four 10s instead. Making sure that I’m still meeting all of the obligations, I’m still serving all the students and clients that we have here and taking really good care of everything that needs to be done but in a way that feels like, again, it’s making me whole in all of this and it feels really fair and like something I’m excited to say yes to.”

Jamie: Excellent, yeah. I love how you brought in the non-monetary component of your work arrangement and it increased the overall value of this opportunity for you.

Lisa: Absolutely, but Jamie, here’s where the story gets interesting is that they agreed verbally that they would definitely be willing to talk about that and see how quickly we could put that into place and they even said things to effect of, “You know, we’d want you in the office five days a week for the first couple of months for training, but then that seems really reasonable and really doable once you are, you’re in good shape and you’ve been trained and you have relationships with all of our clients started.” And so I made the transition into the role and was feeling pretty good about it, but then that two months of time turned into three, turned into six, turned into nine.

Jamie: Mmmm.

Lisa: And I had some pretty frank conversations with my direct supervisor where it became abundantly clear that while he had said that that was something that he was open to, it wasn’t actually something that he had any intention of creating the space to accommodate for. So, it’s an interesting negotiation conversation in that I both was able to really close the gap and make some meaningful differences and compensations in the negotiation package, but that there are always times when sometimes your employer will say certain things or make things feel a way that might make them seem more concrete or more certain or more appealing than they may be when you get in the door and that negotiation is not a one time, you know, you do it and then you wash your hands of it, you’re done kind of thing. But it’s really an ongoing state of mind and an ongoing conversation that you’re having with your employer at all times to take care of yourself.

Jamie: Right. Yeah, what I’m hearing is that negotiation doesn’t end once you sign that agreement. It continues. It’s a series of agreements and you have to continue to ensure that the agreement is implemented and that everyone has the same understanding of what has been agreed to. Like you said, it’s an ongoing process. Thank you so much, this is a really rich lesson, a great success and also really great takeaways. So, you are a Pivot-certified coach and I’m curious to know what that means and would you walk us through what the Pivot Method is?

Lisa: Absolutely. I love talking about it. So the Pivot Method comes from a book written by Jenny Blake who is a fabulous coach and speaker and author. And the idea of a pivot is something that she borrowed from Silicon Valley, you know, because you’ve heard the parlance of if a startup has gotten their seed funding, they’ve entered the market and then they’re realizing that either their business model, the market-product fit, the profitability, something out of the way that they are trying to monetize isn’t quite optimal, isn’t quite getting them to the profit level that they need, then they oftentimes talk about a pivot. Which is their way of taking stock of what they’ve done so far, reorganizing their assets and their capabilities in a way that will likely be more profitable.

And while, in the world of Silicon Valley, that’s really seen as a product of failure and a negative thing to have to make a pivot, Jenny wanted to reclaim that phrasing and that ideology in a way that’s really empowering and really exciting for individuals. As a way to essentially take what’s working about who you are and what you’re doing and parlay that into mapping out what could be next for you.

So, the framework that she thinks about and that I coach and teach in my work has four different elements to it. Number one, it has what she calls the plant stage, and that is where you are trying to figure out what could be next and you start by taking stock of exactly where you are, who you are, and what’s working for you right now because if you don’t ground yourself in what’s already working and what you know to be true, it’s going to be really, really challenging to map out what could be next in a way that doesn’t accidentally having you, say, throwing out the baby with the bathwater or feeling like you’re starting from scratch and starting completely over. So, you start out in the plant stage to get your grounding, get your sea legs, and get a sense for where you could potentially go.

Then, once you’ve planted, the second part of the Pivot Method is to scan and take a look at the marketplace, your environment, your surroundings, to see what else is out there and evaluate the possibilities. Jenny often describes it as thinking about a basketball player, you know, you’re dribbling down the court and then when you’re about to make a pass, you stop and get your plant foot that keeps you grounded in one place, but then visually, you’re scanning down the court to see who’s open, who’s moving, what the different defensive and offensive possibilities look like.

So, it’s really doing the same thing with your own career. So, thinking about what trends are coming up in the marketplace that you could take advantage of and that excite you. Who are the people that you’re seeing out there as movers and shakers in the sort of role you want to move into, are in the industry that you’re curious about that you could draft off of or you could use maybe some of that professional envy in a really positive, productive way to sort of reverse engineer their path and their success to figure out what pieces from that you might be able to use?

Jamie: So, plant and then pivot…

Lisa: Well, plant and then scan.

Jamie: Oh, okay, I’m sorry.

Lisa: I know! There’s a lot of terminology! So, you start with your plant. Then you do the scan. Then you figure out what your pilot is going to be.

Jamie: Oh!

Lisa: So, your pilot is a pretty common piece of language for a way to do a test drive. What is your pilot program? What’s your beta test? How do you dip your pinky toe into the water of what might be next so that rather than going straight from the idea to jumping right into your pivot, you’re doing some risk management work to make sure that whatever feels good for you next doesn’t just feel good in the dream but it also feels good for you in the reality.

Jamie: Mmmm-hmmm.

Lisa: And then, once you run that pilot program and see how it feels and see what data you’re bringing back from that about what you want to do next, then if you are piloting in a direction that feels great, then you go ahead and you can make your official pivot where you commit, you go full-throttle towards the goal and you put together your strategy for how to do market entry into whatever the new role is, the new project is, the new organization is, to make that happen for yourself as efficiently and effectively and safely as it can.

Jamie: Hmm. That’s interesting. So, you...I find it really interesting that you use the word safe because it is a risk that you’re taking, no?

Lisa: Oh, absolutely! I think that’s a really important point that you’re bringing up because I don’t mean safe to mean comfortable and complacent and known. I mean safe in the way of you’re putting yourself out there and you’re taking risks and you are trying something that requires a lot of courage but doing it in the way that’s the smartest and most managed so that you will keep moving forward and sort of feeling the fear and feeling that uncertainty and yet taking action anyways, as opposed to getting to the point where you are excited about some future possibility, but it feels so far away and so different and so overwhelming that you end up totally stuck in analysis paralysis or in one of those perfectionistic, you know, brain holes that doesn’t allow for you to actually explore what it is that you’re curious about.

Jamie: Yeah, that’s excellent, because you specialize in working with ambitious and analytical people and as an ambitious and rather analytical person myself, I know that in my experience, when I do risk assessment, there is always that underlying fear of failing and you mentioned courage as a component of this and people often seek out coaches like you and like myself because they want to feel confident in the process of changing their jobs, in the process of negotiating a new offer. So, I wonder if there’s a distinction here that you can help draw for us. What is the difference in being courageous as opposed to simply confident?

Lisa: Absolutely. I’d love to go into that. And I want to come at it from a bit of an angle around perfectionism and I know, I remember back in Episode 3 of your podcast, you talk all about perfectionism and the Itty Bitty Shouldy Committee, which is so great and so memorable.

Jamie: Yeah.

Lisa: But what I often see is that people who tend to identify with a little streak of perfectionism, shall we say, get themselves into a certain way of thinking that is very black and white, right and wrong.

Jamie: Yep.

Lisa: And typically, this is not a thing you did to yourself on purpose. This is not a thing you did conscientiously. It often goes back to the way that you were socialized and you were affirmed growing up. So, Carol Dweck is a research psychologist who went to Barnard, just like I did, which is sort of a fun thing.

Jamie: I just picked up her book!

Lisa: Did you?

Jamie: It’s amazing!

Lisa: Oh, yeah.

Jamie: It’s an amazing book. I want to recommend Mindset by Carol S. Dweck to everyone who’s listening. It’s phenomenal. I’m sorry for the interruption, please continue.

Lisa: Well, if you’re gonna put some things in the notes from today’s conversation, you could also link to her TED Talk, which is also a fabulous resource and a good sort of appetizer teaser before you buy the book.

Jamie: Mmmm. I will watch it, thank you for that tip.

Lisa: Yeah, absolutely! So, Carol has these two different mindsets that she identified in children and students. One is a growth mindset, which is where you’re really focused on progress and action-taking and the process and the other is a fixed mindset, where you’re very focused on the outcome and really sort of the identity of who you are relative to that outcome. So, I think about this, you know, when you were a child and you think about the way that people would remark on what you were doing and who you were, would you get the sort of feedback about, “Wow, look at you reading! You are doing so much reading over there.”

Jamie: I got that. I got that.

Lisa: Yeah, well that type of feedback tended to be associated with growth mindsets. But the other type of feedback that people might have gotten was, “Look at you over there. You’re such a good reader. You must be so smart!” And it is ever so subtle in the difference in the way that that was posed to you. But if you’re getting the feedback of, “You’re a good reader,” somebody has just put a qualitative judgment on your activity and your action to make it good or bad.

Jamie: Mmm. Can I add something to that?

Lisa: Yes, please!

Jamie: I’m definitely a recovering perfectionist and I used to get straight As for most of the time and I remember feeling like such a failure when I got an A- or a B. And so I wonder if there was a lot of times in my very early childhood where I was praised for doing things well. Like, “Oh, that was good! You did it right! You got the right answer! That’s good. You didn’t get the right answer. That’s bad.”

Lisa: Yeah, oh, absolutely. And nobody does it maliciously and nobody does it intentionally but we all received that sort of feedback and especially high performers, you know, the type of people who seek you out as a coach and the type of people I meet, too, tend to have gotten a lot of feedback of,  “You must be very smart. You must be a great reader!”

That then not only puts a value judgment on the action, so the action can’t just exist in the beauty of the action itself, it has to have a label that it’s good or bad. But it also then becomes a part of your identity. When somebody says, “You know, you’re really smart,” then you internalize that you are smart and that any information that may challenge that or expand that or change that definition of who you are becomes a psychological threat.

Jamie: If you try things, that might make you look dumb.

Lisa: Right. One hundred percent. This is where the intersection point between perfectionism and courage comes in. Because if you have a fixed mindset about work, writ large in your life, whatever it is, you tend to be very fearful about the identity pieces. You know, I’ve always identified as a digital marketer, I’ve always identified as a technical project manager, I’ve always identified as whatever. And the possibility of expanding yourself to grow in a different direction feels like a threat to that identity because if you try it and you’re not immediately successful, then all of a sudden, it comes into conflict with who you had thought that you were.

Jamie: Yeah.

Lisa: And so confidence tends to come from that validation and that certainty of knowing what you’re doing and knowing that whatever you’re going to do is going to turn out well. So, perfectionistic people tend to be pretty confident when they’re in their own swim lane, but they tend to have a very difficult time summoning up the courage to try something new at which they might fail or they might be rejected. And I reject the word fail, writ large, because I really don’t think that that is something that exists but to try something that you don’t get the results you were hoping for from.

Jamie: Well, I also have experienced people define failure as when things don’t go as expected or as planned. And I mean, things almost always go as unexpected. We have plans and then other things happen all the time, right? So what do you call that?

Lisa: I think that’s exactly right. I think that life intervenes in all kinds of different ways that we could not have foreseen or foretold but that rather than looking for outcomes as you expect, like  for certain things to happen, I think it can be really helpful to focus on how you want something to feel.

Jamie: Mmm.

Lisa: And I think that this ties into another concept that I know, Jamie, you and I were talking about before we had gotten on the recording today about the idea of a beginner’s mindset. Because when you’re trying out something new and trying out an experiment and you’re not totally sure how things are going to end up, if you’re not used to that feeling of being a beginner and being experimental and creative and being okay with things not turning out as you had hoped, it can feel really, really painful to try something new.

Jamie: Yeah.

Lisa: But if you make that ever so slight, ever so nuanced, and ever so powerful mindset shift to say, “Well, I’m gonna try this as a beginner and see if I enjoy it, see what happens,” and you let yourself be really present in the experience and play with the craft and the process of whatever it is that you’re trying to do, there is so much potential for enjoyment and joy.

Jamie: And learning.

Lisa: And learning! And the beautiful, lovely, almost addictive rush of learning something new and feeling like you have this new knowledge, this new insight, this new wisdom about how things work in the world.

Jamie: Yeah, absolutely. Some of my most successful clients, they take that approach that every opportunity, every conversation, every interview is an opportunity to learn, right? As opposed to an opportunity to prove themselves as smart and successful, they go into that conversation with an attitude of curiosity and that can really transform not just the nature and the result, but the outcome of that conversation. And I think you’re touching on something really big, which is that we have the power to choose how we feel about anything.

Lisa: Yeah, absolutely. And I’d love to actually let you speak on that a little bit because I remember that one of the things that I noticed about you and your coaching which is such a gift that you’re giving to the universe is that you’re really able to help people peel apart the difference between an outcome and the story that they tell themselves, that they make that outcome mean about who they are, what they’re capable of, what is out there in the market for them.

Jamie: Right. And this is something that you, me, and Carol S. Dweck will all agree upon, which is that what we believe, what we think and believe about any given circumstance will have the impact on how we feel, on how we react or respond, and the result that we get. So, as you were saying, if we believe that we must be seen as smart to be successful, then you fall into the fixed mindset trap. But if you believe that you’re here to learn and that you can learn by trying and even if things don’t go as planned, even if the outcomes are not what you hoped for, there’s always room for more learning, because, as you said, you approach it with a beginner’s mind, then everything can be a joy. Even when you don’t get the job, you’re like, oh, that was a great opportunity for me to learn what not to do at a job interview. That was a really great opportunity for me to realize that, you know, I have more value to offer, etc.

Lisa: Oh, absolutely, and one of my favorite quotes from Marie Forleo is that “Everything is figure-out-able.” And if you walk into any situation, any interview, any possibility, any new skill-building opportunity with that mantra, that will inevitably lead you down the growth path because you will constantly trust in yourself and your own ability to figure things out, to use Google, to use your resources and not to put the pressure on yourself that you have to have all the answers and you have to be smart and you have to be perfect and you have to be right, but to allow for much more space for playfulness and creativity and learning and growth and for many different outcomes to come as the fruits of your labors.

Jamie: Absolutely. I couldn’t agree more. So, I so appreciate your wisdom, your insight, you expertise, and you’re a very eloquent speaker, Lisa. I so enjoyed having you on the podcast. I think many of our listeners would also enjoy learning more about you and your services, so where can people go to learn more about you and what you do?

Lisa: Well, I appreciate getting to speak to your amazing audience. I mean the sort of person who’s going to be listening to you is probably already really hungry for growth and improvement and advancement and opportunity and it’s a joy to get to be a part of that conversation. But if you’re listening to this and you’re interested in learning more, you can find me at my website which is lisalewiscareers.com.

Jamie: Wonderful. Do you have any upcoming events that you want to share with the audience or workshops or…

Lisa: I don’t have anything that is scheduled at this very moment to share, but I do have a brand new, what I’m sort of calling my white-hot paper on the four career fulfillment pillars that I see over and over again can lead to the difference between feeling like you made a move into a role that fits who you are versus making a move into an opportunity which looks shiny and seductive on the outside but actually isn’t in alignment with your values.

Jamie: Ooooh!

Lisa: It’s at the very bottom of my website and I’m just starting to share that gospel around and I feel so strongly about it that I would be honored to get to have any of your listeners go and check it out and give it a read.

Jamie: It’s a white-hot paper. I love that!

Lisa: Thank you!

Jamie: Well, Lisa, it’s been a pleasure, as always. Thank you so much for being on the podcast and sharing your insights. I will talk to you soon.

Lisa: Sounds great! Thank you again.

Jamie: Alright, have a good one!

Lisa: You too. Bye bye!

How to Avoid the Trap of Impostor Syndrome

One of the most insidious traps in negotiation is the impostor syndrome. If you’ve ever struggled with feeling like you are good enough, or if you’ve sabotaged your outcomes because of imposter syndrome, you won’t want to miss this episode. I walk you through the root of behavior that generates our results and concrete steps you can take to shift your mindset, from a place of lack to one of abundance, confidence, and power.

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 36 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

It feels really auspicious to be recording and publishing the 36th episode of this podcast while I am still 36.

My birthday is on December 31st, so I have the whole year to be 36. I’m really looking forward to turning 37, actually.

But, in any case, I just want to say thank you so much for listening, for subscribing to this podcast. If you have any questions for me that you would like me to address, please, feel free to reach out. I read every email. I respond to every email. jamie@jamieleecoach.com

I want to just reiterate that I believe that we are all born to thrive.

I believe that abundance is our birthright.

I believe that it is our nature to be in peace, to be in cooperation with other people, and that’s why negotiation skills help us lead, influence, and thrive, because through negotiation we can collaborate, unlock more value, and contribute in a bigger way.

When I say thrive, you may think, “Oh, does it mean just act happy?”

This is something that one of my clients actually said to me the other day when I was explaining to her some of the concepts that I will explain to you today.

She was like, “Oh, I get it! You just act happy!”

I’m, like, “No! No no no! You’re not getting it! No. It’s not about acting happy, it’s about getting to the root of our behavior so that we can generate bigger, better results in our lives.”

And I want to explain to you where I’m coming from.

I define leadership as creating solutions in the best interest of everyone. I define negotiation as a conversation with the intention of reaching agreement where everyone has the right to say no. Our basic autonomy. Our fundamental free will, in other words.

And in the conversation where you’re negotiating, you want to understand so that you can align your interests with theirs and ultimately you want to influence other people’s behavior.

But before you can influence other people’s behavior, you have to first be able to influence your own behavior, right? I mean, you can’t do with other people what you can’t do for yourself. That’s why you can’t love other people before you can love yourself.

And today I want to talk to you about some self-sabotage behavior when it comes to negotiation due to Impostor Syndrome.

It’s something that I have experience with. I was coaching an analog astronaut earlier this week. Did you know there are people on Earth who recreate the experience of being in outer space for the benefit of furthering science and exploration in outer space? I didn’t know, and they’re called analog astronauts.

So, anyway, I was having a coaching session with this analog astronaut and she’s like, “Yeah, you know what? I think we’re talking about Impostor Syndrome here.” And I’m like, “Yeah, I think so, too!”

So, Impostor Syndrome. What is the behavior that is associated with Impostor Syndrome? I will speak from my own personal experience. I know that when I was in the grips of feeling like an impostor, like a hack, like a fraud, I would try to please everyone and anyone by never saying no, not setting boundaries, saying yes to all the distractions because I would rather be distracted than feel the discomfort of feeling like an impostor.

And I also have heard from my clients that they see this in their own behavior. Let me give you one example from an entrepreneur client: He says that he oversells himself. You know what I mean? You are kind of acting out of desperation, neediness, and you try to pitch somebody even though they’re not all that interested and in your overselling you kind of create this unintended consequence of looking like you really need the job, not that the client really needs you.

And this can have an adverse impact on the perceived value of whatever it is that you’re offering to your potential or current client, so my client was self-aware enough to realize that yeah, this behavior is not serving him.

I have another client who explained to me she sees this self-sabotage behavior when she feels like she’s not good enough - in other words, when she’s in the grips of feeling like an impostor. She blows herself up like a blowfish. And we both agree this is a great analogy where you blow yourself up to be something you are not. So, it’s kind of like trying to be a fake to be accepted and it’s painful, it’s awkward, it feels uncomfortable, and in the long run it doesn’t serve you because you’re kind of selling people on a false bill of goods.

So, now that we’ve identified some behavior that’s associated with Impostor Syndrome that can sabotage your outcomes, I want to talk to you about the root of this behavior. The root of all behavior really comes down to your mindset.

What are you thinking and believing?

Because what you think and believe will generate the emotion that generates action that generates the results that you get.

And for me, I know that the thought associated with Impostor Syndrome is: I am not good enough. I haven’t done enough. And I’ve worked on this mindset for years now, and I still do. It’s a life-long process.

You might have thoughts like: I’m a hack. I don’t deserve it. I’ll never have enough money because I’m not good enough. That’s another one that I can relate to.

Here’s a very insidious thought that can have a really adverse impact on your negotiation outcome: I need other people’s approval to prove my worth. I need money to prove my worth. In other words, I need external circumstances - the things that are outside of me - to make me feel that I am enough.

What happens, what do you feel, when you have these kinds of thoughts?

For me, the biggest emotion that’s associated with feeling like an impostor, like I’m not good enough or I need other people’s approval to feel that I’m good enough is resentment. Feeling this anger and frustration. Resentful.

Mostly at myself.

There’s a lot of self-loathing associated with that.

And this comes from comparing other people’s shiny outsides to my shabby inside.

Just a few years ago, I remember so vividly how I would go to my life partner’s work functions and I would see the happy, well put together professionals having beers, hanging out, laughing and they seemed very relaxed. And I would see their shiny outsides. They’re very young, they seem content and I would compare their shiny outsides to my shabby inside where I was hating on myself and I would just feel worse.

Does that sound like something that you do as well? I’ve been there! Done that!

And what happens in this cycle of self-loathing is that you project your resentment onto other people. Especially other people who are in a position of authority. For example, your boss, your parents, your teachers. Because when we’re thinking that we need other people’s approval, we need other people to give us money, praise, promotion, raise, whatever, to make us feel good, what we’re doing is we give them the power to make us feel something.

And they can’t do that.

Nobody has the power to make you feel something.

I know this is contrary to a very popular and pervasive myth that people make you feel something but they don’t. The only person who has the power to make you feel that you are enough, make you feel that you are worthy, make you feel that you are valuable, is yourself.

Because the only person who has the power to choose your thoughts is you.

No one has the power to choose your thoughts for you.

What we do is we often fall back on default patterns of thinking. Patterns of thinking that we were taught to have when we were young. Patterns of thinking that we inherited from our parents. Patterns of thinking that we see other people like our friends have and then we adopt them because we feel like, okay, if they feel and think that way then it’s okay for me to feel and think that way.

That’s default thinking and so many of us fall into that trap. And when we do this, we feel powerless because we feel like we need other people to make us feel something and help us feel it by giving us something that we feel would make us feel better.

I want to quote master coach instructor Rich Litvin who says, “You can never have enough of what you don’t need.”

We don’t need external validation. We don’t need money. We don’t need other people’s approval to make us feel that we are worthy. We can do that for ourselves.

And I want to talk to you a little bit more about how to do that but before we get there, I want to talk a bit more about the trap of Impostor Syndrome when we give other people power to make us feel something that we’re choosing not to feel because we’re not choosing the thoughts for ourselves.

There are three types of traps. Basically, you freeze, or you take flight - you run away, you avoid - or you put up a fight. And I’m talking in the context of conversation, negotiation with other people who have the ability to help you or to cooperate or to say yes or no.

When we are in the traps of feeling powerless and resentful at people because we feel that we are not good enough and we need them to give us something to make us feel good, we feel powerless and we feel trapped. And from that place of feeling trapped and powerless, the amygdala is triggered, basically our lizard brain, and we either freeze, fight or flight.

Is that something that you can relate to? Because that is something that I’ve definitely done. I’ve frozen in conversations with my bosses because I was just in this mental spiral of oh my God, I don’t know what to say, I’m not good enough, he doesn’t like me, he doesn’t think I’m good enough and oh, this isn’t gonna go well. So, I’m just in this mental spiral and I don’t know what to do so I get frozen.

I’ve avoided conversations because I didn’t feel I was good enough. I’ve done that a lot.

I’ve taken up fight, like go in there and make demands and try to manipulate people into giving me something that I feel would make me feel good. And that has never worked out. All of those attempts have backfired on me and I’ve talked about them a few times on this podcast.

So, how do we get ourselves out of this trap?

I want to offer you a simple process. But first, you gotta take a pause. If you’re feeling like an impostor, if you’re feeling like you’re not good enough, if you’re feeling like you’re a hack, take a pause - a strategic pause - to first, feel your feelings.

The traps that I mentioned where you freeze or your fight or you flight, the cause of this trap is that we’re trying to do away with feeling the discomfort and the pain, and the frustration, and the anxiety and do it away by either running away, or picking up a fight, or freezing.

And emotions like resentment, frustration, anger, they’re all just vibrations in the body. You will live if you allow yourself to feel the feelings. You will be okay when you acknowledge what you feel instead of reacting first by doing things like freezing, running away, or fighting.

And if you want to know more about this process of accessing your felt resources so that you can feel your feelings, ground yourself, please check out Episode 31, interview with expert and somatic coach Jay Fields, who talked about this in detail.

So, first you gotta pause. Second, you gotta feel the feelings. And number three, you want to write down your thoughts, your stressful thoughts. Write it on paper. And write them in short, simple sentences.

I have a journaling process that I’ll share with you.

When I’m feeling kind of anxious, resentful, frustrated, stuck, afraid, I do a thought download in my journal and it’s a very simple prompt. I just fill out the blank in this sentence: I’m afraid that __________.  I’m afraid that I’m not good enough. I’m afraid that this will fail. I’m afraid that people will be disappointed.

Just write as many as you can think of. And once you get the hang of writing your thoughts down in this way, just allowing your brain to empty itself out, what happens is that you get to realize, oh, these are just thoughts! And they’re outside of me. These are just sentences in my head that are causing me to react in a way that doesn’t serve me in the long term.

You could also do other sentence prompts like:

I want _______________.  

I need ________________.

I should _______________.

I want people to like me. I need people’s approval. I need to make more money. I should be doing more.

These are all sentences that are associated with Impostor Syndrome, at least for me. And once you have done your thought download, once you have written down your thoughts on paper, the fourth step here is to distinguish, differentiate between what is fact versus bad fiction.

What is fact? What is true? What is observable, measurable, repeatable, provable in the court of law versus what’s just a story?

It’s very likely that the thought I’m not good enough is just a story, an opinion that you have. An opinion that you’ve been repeating in your mind so much that it feels like it is true. But can you absolutely know that this is true? Can you prove in the court of law that this is true? If so, how? If not….hmmm. That’s interesting, isn’t it?

What are the facts of your circumstances?

And circumstances, I want to emphasize, are neutral. And when I do this work with my clients, something really surprising happens. Here’s how. So, I ask my clients to just list the facts of their situation and it’s something like this: I have an interview tomorrow or I have a client. The interviewee or the interviewing company or the client, they asked for something. They asked for x and the truth of the matter is I have experience in x, in digital marketing or software development or whatever. I have done this in the past and I can do more.

So, when you list just the facts, we realize that the stories we have about ourselves, about our ability, they’re just stories. They’re not necessarily true. And often they are bad fiction.

And once we have written down the facts of the situation, of your circumstance, here’s another question. How do you want to feel about the facts? Because you have the power to choose your story. You have the power to choose a perspective that serves you.

And often my clients tell me they want to feel accomplished. They want to feel confident. They want to feel proud. They want to feel okay.

And so now that we have identified how we want to feel, as opposed to how we feel through default thinking and Impostor Syndrome, now we can generate some new thinking, a new mindset, a new perspective.

And here are some new perspectives that I want to offer you:

I have something the other side wants. Because, let’s face it, otherwise they wouldn’t even bother initiating a conversation with you, right? And in fact, negotiation expert Chris Voss says that if you are in a conversation with somebody it means that you have leverage. If you are in a hostage situation and the hostage takers are still talking with you, it means that you have leverage. You have something they want.

That’s an extreme example, but for most cases, in work situations, you have something that people want. You have value to offer. You have experience, you have skills, you have strengths that people benefit from.

Another thought is: I have something to add. I can create more value. I can add more value.

Another thought is: I’m doing a good job. Who’s to say that you’re not doing a good enough job? If it’s just a story in your mind, you can also tell a new story that you are doing a good enough job. And in fact when I walk my clients through this process, this is the point when they tell me, “Oh, you know what? Actually, come to think of it, my supervisor just sent me this praise. Come to think of it, this hiring manager said ‘She is awesome,’ and they meant me when they said ‘she’.”

And here’s one more thought: I am enough. No matter what.

This is a thought that I’ve been practicing intentionally for the last year and I have to say, it has really generated some amazing results in my life. And one of my clients just this morning wrote me an email to tell me that in the process of working with me for about a year, she’s been changing jobs and the most recent offer that she got was 33% higher than the offer she had at the same time last year, and she said she really attributed that result to the thought work that she’s been doing that she is worthy, that she is enough and that she can believe in her own value.

So, what about you?

What are some thoughts you have in your mind that are creating Impostor Syndrome, that are creating sub-optimal results, that are creating resentment and feelings of powerlessness. If you are experiencing this, I invite you to do a thought download. I invite you to separate fact from bad fiction. And I invite you to think about, “How do I want to feel about the facts and what are the thoughts that will help me work through this so that I can have an abundance mindset? I can feel that I am enough and I can feel that I can create more value in the world.”

Because this is how you will thrive.

I believe in it.

The question is, will you?

I want to wrap this up with an invitation to another webinar that I will be doing in partnership with the United Women in Business. It’s going to be held on October 17th and if you come over to my site, jamieleecoach.com, you can register for free. There’s no obligation. I also have some free resources for people who are preparing for salary negotiation. So come check me out. Please subscribe and please leave me a review if you can.

Thank you, and I wish you an abundant week.

Three Key Principles for Negotiating as a Leader

It's no coincidence that the principles behind interest-based negotiation framework dovetail with time-proven leadership principles. 

1. Success is 80% mindset and 20% tactics. My clients are applying this insight to reinvent their lives and careers from stifling to thriving. Success is an inside job.
2. Ask open questions to understand their why before seeking to be understood. Far from being "nice," this is a powerful strategy that enables my clients to win over a room of naysayers, flip no to yes, and turn transactions into transformational conversations.
3. Be ready to tell a new story. My career changed when I stopped telling myself, "I can't do it," and started saying, "I will walk the talk I give."
What new story will you tell? Come to www.jamieleecoach.comfor future webinar updates and more.

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 35 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

I believe that we are all born to thrive.

I know that some people are rolling their eyes when they hear me say that but I really do.

I’m not religious. I do consider myself spiritual and I know that we are all created for a reason. For a really good reason which is to expand, to thrive, and to be happy.

And for me, I thrive when I get to help other people thrive and that’s why I feel like I have the best job in the world.

I work as a coach. I train and I teach people leadership and negotiation principles that can help them become more brave, bold, and better paid.

And, you know, I’m on a mission to help double women’s income.

Late last year, at the end of 2017, I was visualizing what would make the end of 2018 really awesome.

And here’s a lesson for you, if you are working towards a goal, start from the end. What would you like to have happened at the end? What would make whatever project or goal you’re working towards, what would make it super awesome for you? What would be the x, y, and z that you would want to see?

And for me, that was having made such an impact that I’ve helped double somebody’s income.

That’s really an exciting goal for me because I want to be part of the solution, not the problem, when it comes to the gender wage gap and I believe that we can make change happen one conversation - one really powerful and transformational conversation - at a time.

And that’s why I teach negotiation because negotiation is simply a conversation with the intention of reaching agreement. I don’t think of negotiation as confrontation, manipulation, or some sort of a trick or a game that you play.

And I also believe that money is awesome. Money itself is not the end-all, be-all of success but that money is a really great tool that can help solve problems, like money problems.

And when you have money you can save time and when you have more time you can do more good. You can make even more impact. So money is awesome.

And I believe that women who negotiate are to be celebrated, not judged, because women who negotiate are women who lead and we need women to lead.

So, I want to share with you three quick principles.

Well, not quick. They’re key principles behind collaborative, interest-based negotiation framework which is the framework that I teach my clients because they dovetail so beautifully with time-proven leadership principles.

So, the first one is that success is 80% mindset and only 20% tactics.

I know a lot of people get hung up on, “What do I say? What do I do? Tell me all the tactics you use!” and I think that’s a mistaken approach.

First, we have to get clear on what we are thinking and believing because what we think and believe get expressed through our emotions, our body language, our tone, things that we do unconsciously like self-sabotage. And it’s in the actions that are generated from our feelings that generate our results.

Let me say it one more time: What we think and believe are so powerful because they impact our emotions and our emotions impact our actions or inactions, and it’s our actions or inactions that generate the results we have in our life and career.

And I think the really powerful thing is that when you believe in your worthiness, no matter what the circumstances are in your life, that’s when you show up as a leader. That’s when you show up brave, willing to risk change, willing to risk a brave conversation and be engaged, willing to make change happen.

Now, when you hear me say that you’ll be like, “Ugh! Here’s another coach who’s telling me I gotta believe in myself. Okay, tell me, how is this new?”

It’s not.

But what I will tell you is that you don’t just believe in yourself after you just decide, you just snap a finger and it’s done.

No, no.

You really gotta practice. You gotta put in the work to believe in yourself and I’ll be honest with you, this is the biggest part of my coaching work with clients. It’s not so much the strategy and script. Yes, I mean, I do the strategy and scripts, but at the heart of it, we gotta believe in you.

You gotta believe in you before you can say the words and really mean it and have other people believe in it.

It takes consistent effort to have the thoughts that support the feeling of confidence, the feeling of bravery, the feeling of courage no matter what.

A lot of people, and I make this same mistake, we are waiting for the circumstances in our lives to line up with the results that we desire. We want to wait until the circumstances are lined up with the results that we want for us to think that we are worthy, for us to feel good and confident, for us to be able to take that confident action and get what we want.

It doesn’t work that way, right?

Think about it. The people who really believe in their vision, they take action, they sound confident, they stand tall, they engage, and they get what they want because they are thinking and feeling and acting from a place of worthiness, of self-respect, of self-appreciation.

So, this takes work, like I said. It sounds like, “What?! What do you mean success is an inside job? What do you mean success is 80% mindset? That’s so fluffy and soft and I don’t get it.”

Well, the truth of the matter is this is bloody hard work.

It takes a lot of effort to really believe in yourself, consistently, with practice.

The second thing I want to share with you, the second key principle of collaborative, interest-based negotiation that also happens to be a really powerful leadership principle, is that you want to ask open questions first to better understand your counterpart’s why before you seek to be understood.

I think I am quoting Stephen Covey and the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.”

I did a webinar yesterday on the 7 Elements of Negotiation Framework and I had somebody ask me, “Okay, so when you know your position, when you know what you want, do you start by stating your position, stating what you want?” and my short answer is: No.

You don’t start with what you want. I mean, sure that can be effective in a very specific situation, if they’re asking, “Just tell me what you want!” Okay, you might want to start there, sure. There is a caveat that this advice should be taken with a grain of salt, depending on your situation, on the very specific context of your situation but in terms of overall principle and big picture strategy, first you want to better understand why the other side wants what they want.

So, let’s break it down. First, you want to understand what they want, right? Then you want to understand why they want it. And even better, you want to understand, okay, what are their preferences? What are their goals? What are their fears? What are their desires?

And you do that by asking them open-ended, diagnostic questions.

And this takes courage. It’s a powerful skill to ask really good, open-ended questions. It’s the strategy that the FBI hostage negotiators use, it’s the strategy of the most successful coaches and leaders.

It requires you to be bold and to lead with your ear.

It requires you to manager yourself so well that you can listen more deeply than anyone has ever done for your negotiation counterpart.

This is how you win people over.

And this is not a strategy of being nice. It’s not a strategy of being a pushover because just because you’re asking open-ended questions doesn’t mean that you’re just immediately gonna go do whatever they ask you to do. No. You are gaining really powerful insight and information which is power.

This is a powerful strategy and I’ve given some examples in this podcast and past webinars but asking open-ended, diagnostic questions has the power to turn transactions into transformational conversations.

To give you one example, when I worked as an operations person at a startup, there was a bit of a conflict with the Sales Director around some reporting procedure. And it was very tempting, I was in the meeting, the emotions were kind of running high, it’s a little tense, yeah? And I have the Itty Bitty Shouldy Committee in my head and it was very tempting to let my brain run off with the story that Oh, they are mad at me! It’s my fault! I didn’t do a good enough job! This is gonna reflect poorly on my performance review. Everyone thinks I’m a whatever, failure, not good enough, blah, blah, blah.

Boring, boring old story.

But I decided that I’m going to apply some of the strategies to myself, you know, the negotiation strategies I had learned over the years. And I decided, in an instant, that I’m not going to get defensive, I’m just going to get curious. I’m just going to open myself up. Maybe I don’t know what’s going on.

So, I asked, “Okay, Sales Director, I hear that this is the situation. What would be an ideal outcome for you?”

And this completely transformed the nature of the conversation. He visibly relaxed and he said, “Well, actually, the ideal outcome would be that the sales team own this process, end-to-end. That would be the ideal situation.” So I realized, okay, this wasn’t about me at all. And from there, we arrived at a collaborative solution to the problem that we were sharing.

So, ask open-ended questions. Ask them more than you ask leading questions.

Last week, I led a workshop for the Association of Corporate Counsels, and going in, I thought, “What can I teach a room full of high-flying lawyers who negotiate day-in and day-out, every day?”

And it turned out that the strategy of asking open-ended, diagnostic questions to get past impasse, to get past no, to better understand the underlying interests or the underlying why of the other side was something new to them. It was something that they hadn’t really thought about, so it’s a very powerful strategy and a very powerful leadership tool as well.

And finally, be ready to tell a new story.

For me, I started teaching negotiation six years ago because I needed to learn it so badly, and I realized the best way to learn is to teach it. And so, I started learning so that I can teach and apply it to myself.

And I had the story that oh, I can’t negotiate for myself. People will judge me, will call me a bitch - excuse my language - will call me names or think I’m aggressive.

I had the same stories, but then I stopped telling myself that I can’t do it and I started saying I will walk the talk I give.

And that story generated the feelings of bravery. That story generated the feelings of determination, commitment. And from there, I started making bold asks, and now I have the best career.

And so, start telling a new story.

What about you?

What is the story that you’re telling about you in regards to your negotiation and leadership skills?

And is that story serving you? And if not, what’s a better story to tell?

Again, we’re coming back to the mindset because it’s just so important. 80% of your success is mindset. The strategy, the tactics, that’s just 20%. That’s just details.

And so, I just want to wrap this up with: Please let me know. Feel free to reach out to me at jamie@jamieleecoach.com.

I will be hosting more webinars in the Fall. I will be doing more collaboration webinars with other women’s networks, as well. So, if you want to stay up to date, come to jamieleecoach.com and feel free to reach out to me.

I hope you have a wonderful week and I will talk to you next week. Bye bye!

What if You Lowballed Yourself? #SalaryNegotiation

What if you took the job without asking for more? What if you find out only later that you’re getting paid under-market rate? I’ve done this a few times early in my career. In this episode, I share my own experience, insights into shifting your mindset, and concrete strategies and script for renegotiating your pay by articulating your value with confidence and framing for mutual benefit. Please register for next week’s free webinar (9/12/18, 12pm EST) here: www.jamieleecoach.com

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 34 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

My mission is to help ambitious people like you become bolder, braver, and better paid. And in service of that, I talk about negotiation skills in the context of leadership skills because I believe that when you lead, when you influence, when you negotiate, you thrive, which is exactly what you’re born to do.

Yeah, I believe that.

Tonight, I will be leading a negotiation workshop for the Association of Corporate Councils. This is really interesting. This is kind of funny to me because the event is called “The Power of the Purse: Negotiating as a Woman,” which I love.

And the phrase “power of the purse” reminds me of my mother who came to America as an immigrant around the age that I am now with three little girls in tow and she, while speaking English a little bit worse than Margaret Cho’s mother - Margaret Cho is an Asian-American comedian who does a hilarious imitation of her mother’s broken English, and literally my mother speaks English a little bit worse than that - and yet, she ran her own business.

As a single mother.

As an immigrant.

She worked intensely with an iron-clad work ethic and she managed to put all of us girls through college. She did it single-handedly and it’s still, every time I mention it, it’s like woah. How’d she do that? She did it. She used the power of her purse.

It’s funny to me because, when I was growing up, I realized my mother really valued her purses. She loved, I should say she still loves, her Louis Vitton bag and it’s very valuable to her. I remember being a judgmental teenager and saying, “Mom, why would you do that? Why would you spend hundreds of dollars on a purse? Don’t you want to go on a vacation?” She valued that purse over vacations because that’s how important it was for her, and it’s symbolizes her work ethic, her dedication to excellence, and I’m sure other things.

But when I think of the phrase “power of the purse” I think about my mother and how much she worked, how much she showed me the power of being diligent, believing in ourselves and setting a really powerful example of what is possible for women, for mothers, for immigrants.

And the second part of this event, the second part of the title, is “Negotiating as a Woman,” and I love that. When you read all these articles online you could get the impression that negotiating as a woman is something to be overcome, not to be celebrated.

I am of the opinion that who you are, however you define yourself, as a woman, as a she, as a he, as a they, it is to be celebrated. And it is an asset that brings value because of who you are uniquely in this world. You bring a different perspective, a valuable, a unique perspective to the conversations, to the negotiations that you partake in.

So, that said, I want to talk to you briefly about what to do if you’ve lowballed yourself. What if you didn’t negotiation your salary before accepting a job because you needed to pay the bills, because you needed a job, whatever? You didn’t even realize you were lowballing yourself until later you see that your salary is below market value.

I’ve done this a few times in my career. I’ve had about ten different jobs before I settled on becoming a coach and speaker and I’ve done this a few times. So, I want to offer some strategies today on how to address this.

And the first, the most important thing, is to understand our mindset around this. Now, when we use this phrase “lowball your salary,” what does it make you feel? What are the thoughts that are associated with that? Do you feel that you lost the negotiation by forfeit? That you left money on the table and gosh darn it, you screwed yourself?

Now, nobody wants to be a loser. Especially in our culture that loves to herald winning and success. Negotiating for yourself, negotiating for money can feel like a really precarious walk on that very fine line between failing and losing, winning and succeeding.

And so no wonder so many of us are reluctant and so many of us are anxious to negotiate because we don’t want to fail. If you want to stay safe from failure, it’s tempting to not take action, it’s tempting to not assume any risk, it’s tempting to not risk.

And so the first thing I want to suggest, if you have the thought that you’ve lowballed yourself, is to get clear on your thinking. If you’ve been listening to my podcast for awhile, you would know that my philosophy around this is that your thinking is extremely powerful and your thinking generates the results that you see in your negotiation, in your leadership, in your career, in your life.

So, if you have the thought that you lost, I want to challenge you to reframe that thinking. Get curious about yourself. Why did you do what you did? Why did you not pause to consider whether this was going to be a good offer for you, that this is going to be a good fit?

Is it possible that you had the thought that, “Oh my goodness, if I don’t take this job, I’ll never get another job”? “If I don’t take this job, that means that I would be a failure.”

Also, when I get still and ask myself, okay, why did I do what I did back then, early in my career, take these offers without negotiating for more, I see that I almost unconsciously had this thought that I don’t deserve a great job like this. And before somebody finds out, I’m just gonna take it so that they can’t take it away.

And the emotion that this thought had created in me was fear, anxiety. And from that place of fear and anxiety I just impulsively accepted the offer and the result I had from taking this action was that I had more feelings of unworthiness because then now I realized oh, I didn’t negotiate my salary so I’m a terrible negotiator, I screwed myself and so this thought that I don’t deserve it creates the kind of results that support the thought that I don’t deserve it.

It’s a cycle.

It supports itself.

I want to offer to you, if you can relate to that kind of thinking pattern, I want to offer to you that, no matter the circumstances, no matter how much money you’re making or not making, no matter what your job is, you are enough.  

Why?

Because you are. You exist. You exist and therefore you are enough. Period. You’re breathing. You’re existing. It means that you are here for a reason. You were created and you are enough. It’s not a matter of deserving or undeserving or being a winner or a loser. You are enough. You are okay. Period.

And from there, it takes work, it takes consistent effort to generate new thinking that will help you, that will empower you to renegotiate your salary. Because everything is negotiable. Your job description. Your compensation. How you do your job. Who you do it with. It’s all negotiable. I believe that.

And so, what is the thinking that will help you?

For me, I see that I needed to recognize my own value. I had to own and believe that I add value as a contributor at this organization.

When you think about it, of course you do! Because otherwise, why would they have hired you? Why would they have invested thousands of dollars in the recruitment process, in the interview process. Thousands of dollars, many hours of several people to recruit you, to tell you about the job, to sell you on the job and then to make you this offer, a lot of time, money, effort was invested to get you there because the employer can see that you will add value and that having you in this job, in this company, creates more value than if they had not hired you.

Companies hire you to see a return on investment because they recognize that having a person in this role that you’re in right now creates a multiple of value compared to the money that they’re paying you.

So own it!

You are there because you add value.

You bring value to the table.

And when you can believe that, I think it will help you feel confident and brave. And from this confident and brave place, I want to encourage you to initiate a negotiation or to renegotiate. And in the process of negotiating for a different compensation package or additional perks or benefits, whatever it would take to help you feel that you’re being compensated fairly, you want to demonstrate, you want to articulate, and you want to advocate for the value you bring.

You want to demonstrate that you have brought value in the past, whether that means at past jobs or within the past couple of months or a year, however long you’ve been with this company. You want to show them that you have brought value and you want to articulate what it is that you help them do because a lot of employers, especially busy managers, they don’t realize how much value you’re adding.

Are you helping to resolve problems, to bring in more revenue, to create technical solutions, to bring innovative solutions? Are you helping to solve problems and save money? However it is that you’re adding value, you want to articulate it.

And you want to also advocate for the future value you will add. And I want to stress that because when you go to renegotiate your compensation, a key strategy there would be to show that you have outgrown the job description that you were originally hired to do. The scope of work has increased and therefore the compensation will also increase. Makes sense, right?

I have a client who is a purpose-driven leader in her company and she is really driven by her values of creating positive change in the world. And so the pay is secondary. For her, doing that purpose-driven job is so much more meaningful than money but at the same time, she was getting paid at a level that was below her actual job description.

Even her manager, when he found out that she was at grade x and not grade x+1, he was surprised. He said, “Oh, I thought, you should already be at pay grade x+1. We should really address that.” So, for her, having that ally, her manager, who recognizes her value and agrees that she should be paid at a higher pay grade is definitely beneficial.

And so if you don’t have that ally, go create one.

Demonstrate your value. Articulate your value. Advocate for the value that you are bringing and help your ally see that you would be best served by being at a higher pay grade level because when you are being compensated at a level that is commensurate with the contributions that you bring, not only will you be happier, not only will you be more motivated, but the employer would benefit as well from having retained an engaged employee.

I hear this statistic all the time, I don’t know how true it is, but only 20% or 30% of employees are actually engaged, so if you are engaged, if you are motivated to do good work and to contribute more value, it is a win-win solution for you to be compensated at market rate.

So, having said that, what else should you be curious about? We just talked about getting curious about your own thinking, how to pivot your thinking or to reframe your thinking to see this negotiation as a win-win solution. Also, you want to be curious about the employer.

Why do they do the thing that they do? Why do they offer this below market-rate salary? Now, it’s really tempting to start going into judgment and blame and thinking, “Oh, they don’t deserve me, they don’t value me, blah blah blah blah blah,” right? But that doesn’t help you negotiate in a way that creates connection, understanding, a better reputation, a better relationship.

Just, really get curious without the judgment. What were they thinking? Maybe they didn’t realize how much leadership potential you have.

I coached a client, and she works in the software industry, and what she really wanted was to be a technical solution architect but she didn’t know how to articulate it. She got an offer, she kind of thought, “It’s okay but what would really make this offer great was if it was $15,000 higher and I had a bigger scope of role because I want to grow into that.” And so I coached her and she told them what she wanted.

She said, “I want to grow as a leader. I want to be a technical solution architect because I have these skills and I know that these skills and experiences will benefit both the employer, both you, and our clients.” And the potential employer, when they heard this, they were really happy. They were excited to hear that she wanted to grow as a leader because they hadn’t thought of it. They didn’t realize that that’s what she wanted and so when she said that’s what she wanted they increased the salary offer by $15,000. They gave her a bigger title, Technical Solution Architect, and my client was really happy. So, it’s possible that when your employer gave you the offer that they had, they hadn’t realized that you had this leadership potential, that you could be doing more, that you could be contributing more, that you do want to do this. Because you hadn’t told them!

It’s not too late, if this is the case. Let them know what you’re capable of. Let them know what you want to grow into. Articulate your future potential.

And also another thing to consider is, okay, beyond what I want, beyond what they want and what is possible, are there hidden constraints?

I have done some operations consulting work for tech startups here in New York and sometimes there is cash crunch with these tech companies because for them, demonstrating the value, demonstrating their value proposition is a higher priority than making a profit. And so they invest a lot of money into hiring the best people, into growing their company, but the top-line growth is not there, so there’s no profit. They’re funding the company with investors’ money and sometimes they use up more of the investor money than they can earn and so there can be a cash crunch.

So is there a cash crunch at your company? Are they going to be strapped for money? And if that is the reason why they can’t afford to pay you the going market rate, how can you help address that concern? Can you help them create more revenue at a faster pace? Can you help the company save more money? And if this is the case, could you consider equity compensation? Could you consider other types of compensation? Could you consider a flexible work schedule? So, this is where creative solutions come into play.

And finally, I want to offer just a few concrete strategies before wrapping this up. First is asking for an accelerated performance review schedule. Usually companies do performance reviews, salary adjustments once a year but if you feel that the salary you’re getting is not commensurate with the level of your contributions then maybe you can ask them to do a 6-month review or even a quarterly review.

Say, “Hey, you know, I’d really like to do this because I really feel strongly that the value I’m bringing is beyond the scope of role that I was hired to do, so it would really help me be up front with you and also maybe revisit the compensation structure because I’m invested in the long-term growth of this company.” I think it’s really important to underline how both your interests and the other side’s interests are in alignment.

And of course, the second thing you can do if you feel you’re undervalued is get another offer. Get a competing offer. This is a lot of work and also you don’t want to do that unless you are 100% ready to take that other job if you cannot renegotiate a higher salary with your current employer. But sometimes having that best alternative to a negotiated agreement really helps and it can also create a very clear, absolutely clear signal that your market value is higher than what you’re getting paid now. So this is kind of a last resort, but also a very powerful option that you have.

And finally, the third strategy is use this as a learning opportunity. Every negotiation, every conversation is a learning opportunity. And what have you learned from having so-called lowballed yourself, having accepted a job without negotiating for more?

Perhaps you have learned that you really want to negotiate for more. You really do want to articulate, to demonstrate and advocate for your value and ask for more because getting paid fairly, getting paid the high end of the going market range makes you feel so much better about doing an awesome job. And when you do an awesome job, you do a more awesome job and the employer benefits from your awesome job and their clients benefit from you doing the awesome job, so it’s a win-win-win solution.

So, the three strategies, I just want to reiterate: First, you can ask for an accelerated performance review. Number two, you can consider the ultimate last resort which is to get another offer to signal to your current employer that you really need to have a market rate adjustment, otherwise you will walk. And only do this if you are 100% ready to walk and take that other job. And third, use this as a learning opportunity.

So, I hope this podcast was helpful and I want to let you know that next week I will be doing a webinar, a free webinar, on the seven core elements of negotiation framework. What that means is I’m going to walk you through the seven steps of the at-the-table strategies. At the negotiation, what are the seven key things that you want to see happen? So if you do want to renegotiate your salary, how should you set the stage? What happens at that conversation? I’m going to walk you through the steps and explain how this framework applies to both salary as well as everyday workplace negotiation situations.

Please register at jamieleecoach.com and I look forward to seeing you there and I hope you have a wonderful week. Talk to you soon!

Webinar Recap: How to Deal with "Difficult" People

With webinar series "Bolder, Braver, and Better Paid," I am working towards my mission of helping women double their income and impact. 

This is a quick recap of the kick-off webinar "How to Win Over Difficult People." 

I give an example from my own life, when I felt that my manager was difficult, that he had power over me, and that I wasn't given the chance to speak at meetings. 

Download the one-page PDF of open questions here:bit.ly/2MC8xu4 

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 33 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

Yesterday, I had the wonderful privilege of hosting a webinar on the topic of how to win over difficult people and today I thought I’d like to give you a quick recap on that webinar and also invite you to the next one which will be on September 12th at noon. At the second webinar we will be exploring the negotiation framework. The seven elements of negotiation framework and how they fit into salary conversations, for example.

So, if you are preparing for a salary negotiation, a job offer negotiation, you won’t want to miss it. I’ll have the registration link up shortly, but for now, mark your calendar and I hope to see you soon, in two weeks, at the next webinar.

I’m doing this series of free webinars, I’m calling them Bolder, Braver, Better Paid, because I am on a mission to help double women’s income and impact. This is really important to me because I know first-hand that when women have financial abundance, people benefit, families benefit, children benefit, communities benefit.

My mother was a role model for me. My mother is a role model for me, I should say. And she is a single mother, immigrant, still speaks broken English, and she created the abundance with hard work, diligence, so that all three of us daughters can go to college and become gainfully employed professionals.

And so, I just love the idea of helping women double their income and impact because I know that that will create exponential results in our world.

This week I had some of my best clients see some really amazing results in their performance reviews, in their communication with loved ones and in their own lives and I’m just so amazed and I feel privileged to be part of this amazing transformation that they create because they are stepping into their own power. Owning their own value, living their purpose and making a contribution.

That’s what this is all about. It’s about making a contribution.

That said, yesterday, as I said, we had a really exciting and engaging conversation on how to win over difficult people. And I shared an example from my own life, when I felt stressed out and frustrated because I felt that my manager didn’t have my back. I felt that my manager had power over me and I felt my manager was cutting me off every chance he could.

So the situation was this: Ten years ago, I was working in a hedge fund as a qualitative analyst. I was gathering information, news information, research and I would put together a comprehensive report to be reviewed with the entire team of stock traders. And every week I would distribute the reports that I put together and then I would start to speak, I would say, “Uh, so this week…”

And as soon as I said those words, almost immediately, my manager, whom I will call “Sam” for now, would cut me off and say “This means duh duh duh duh duh and duh duh duh duh duh,” you know? He really didn’t give me a chance to have my say or so was the thought I had back then and so this made me feel, like I said, powerless, resentful, frustrated and even depressed.

And so, what did I do because I was feeling this way? I didn’t do much of anything.

Because I was feeling powerless and because I had the thought, the belief, that he had power over me, I didn’t speak up. I didn’t try to butt in. I didn’t interrupt the interrupter and say, “Well, thank you, Sam, for that and also what I’ve noticed is this,” or “Thank you, Sam, I was just about to say that. Let me share with the team some of my updates.”

I didn’t proactively seek out opportunities to present my findings. I sort of interpreted the situation as something negative. I gave it a negative interpretation and then let that negative interpretation create negative emotion in action and the result was that the situation continued for two years until I left the fund.

And so, I share this story with you to demonstrate the power of our thinking and the power is because of the thought.

Yesterday, I walked the attendees through the root of all behavior and basically, you can understand the root of all behavior by exploring the thought model.

And the thought model is this: There is a neutral circumstance about which we have a thought or an opinion and often we have default thinking. We’re not consciously creating thoughts about circumstances, we just have the knee-jerk reaction thought, and for me, back then, ten years ago, that was that I am powerless, and that thought creates the feeling that generates the action that generates the results.

And so, the trap here, when we allow for the default thinking, for me again, the example that I shared was I am powerless. And I notice that many people who feel that negotiation is very difficult or they struggle with it, they also have similar thinking around negotiation.

They have the thought that the other side has power over them. They have the thought that they hate it. They have the thought that they can’t do it. And the pitfall in continuing to have these default thoughts is you fall into the 3-A Trap.

And the 3-A Trap is you Avoid, you Accommodate, and then eventually that resentment and that anger from accommodating and avoiding the situation it builds up to such a level that then you explode and then you Attack.

So the 3-A Trap is Avoid, Accommodate, Attack.

And the really tragic thing about the 3-A Trap is that sometimes you attack the wrong people. You don’t even attack the people at whom you are angry. You go home and then you attack the people who are closest to you but don’t have recourse to fight back, like your children or your partners, and I have experienced this myself and I believe this is something that Brene Brown has termed the Chandelier Effect. When that pain and that shame of avoiding and accommodating something that is really bothering you and it continues until you just chandelier, you just let that pain spill over to the people closest to you.

So this is unsustainable, it doesn’t help you, it doesn’t help your career, it doesn’t help the people who are closest to you. How do we get out of the 3-A Trap?

My suggestion to getting out of the 3-A Trap and to dealing with difficult situations and difficult people is to first, let’s just revisit the facts.

What are the facts of the situation?

And a fact is defined as something that everyone - you, them, people who are not involved in the situation, everyone - would agree to be true.

So, let me give you an example of that. Right now, it is 76 degrees in the room that I’m in. If you walked up to the thermometer, it would read 76 degrees. You would see the number 76. And everyone who can see it would agree that it is reading 76, right? That’s a fact. Everyone will agree.

However, in a difficult situation, we often have thoughts that are subjective. In other words, they are opinions, they are judgments, often they are subjective.

I had the thought that I was powerless. I had the thought that my manager did not respect me. Would everyone agree that I don’t have power? Would everyone agree that my manager did not have my back?

I mean, I had the thought, but does that make it absolutely true? Just because I have the thought that my manager is difficult, would everyone agree that he is indeed difficult?

I think the answer is no.

Yesterday, one of the webinar attendees asked a brilliant question when I was discussing this point. This person asked, “Okay, so does this mean that nobody is in fact difficult?” That’s something to think about right? Is it true that anyone is in fact difficult. Just because I have the thought that you are difficult, doesn’t make it true.

When I was growing up as a young, immigrant kid in New Jersey, I was often the only Asian kid, the only “yellow” kid in the classroom, and I was called several things. One of them was Chinese. I’m Korean, but a lot of people said, “Oh, go back to China!”

Did that make it true, because people had the thought that I was from China and that I should go back to China?

No! Absolutely not!

So, go back to the facts only. To return to the example I gave earlier, ten years ago, when I was a hedge fund manager, I had a job. That’s a fact, right?

I put together the reports. That’s a fact.

I attended weekly team meetings. That’s a fact.

I also did not have prior experience in finance. That is a fact. Everyone will agree that to be true because I don’t have a finance degree, I did not work in finance before I had that job at the hedge fund.

I got the job because I speak English, Korean and Japanese. That’s a fact.

I distributed the reports. That’s a fact.

I started to speak. That’s a fact.

And my manager spoke. Again, that’s a fact.

So, when we just consider the simple facts of the situation and just look at it from a purely objective point of view, what comes up to me, what this brings up for me is a new way of seeing the situation.

And I do have a bias for optimism and positivity. I’m a relentless optimist and so what I also see is that wow, I was there. I was part of a hedge fund with no background, no experience, not a lot of knowledge. I had a task. I did my task. I showed up to the meeting. And I also see, I had power. I had the power to speak up. I had the power to interrupt the interrupter if I had a different way of looking at the situation.

What if I came to the meeting with a thought that I am here to learn. I have a lot more to learn. What if I came to the meeting with a thought I am going to share my opinions no matter what the other side thinks? I am going to ask questions if I am not clear instead of staying quiet. Because now that I’m talking about this out loud I realize there’s a part of me that just didn’t want to seem stupid and so I held back out of fear of looking bad.

So, I want to wrap this up with a list of questions, some questions for you to consider when thinking about difficult people, difficult situations, how to negotiate them.

The first is: What are the facts? Facts only. Not your thoughts, not your current default thinking, but just the facts.

And from there: What are some new thoughts that you would want to have? If the current thinking you have is creating negative emotion, how do you want to feel in an ideal situation? And if you were feeling the way you would ideally feel, how would you think about the situation?

And for me, now that I’m looking back to my hedge fund experience, I would want to feel proud, I would want to feel confident and the thought that I would want to have in that feeling good place would be I am here and I am contributing value.

Another question: What are they thinking that makes them do that? What are they thinking that makes them do that? And for me, in my experience, it’s possible, it’s very possible that my manager Sam had the thought that he had to do it all. He was a workaholic.

So, what about the people in your life that you feel are being difficult. What are they thinking, do you think, that’s making them do what they do? What is their thought model, in other words? What’s driving their behavior?

And also one other question I want to leave you with is: What is the solution to this problem? If you just consider the facts only and think about, okay, now that we’re just looking at the facts and not our opinions, our judgments, what can be done? How can we resolve this? What is a possible solution?

I have put together a one-page pdf of a summary of this discussion that we had yesterday as well as some other open-ended questions that you might want to consider for yourself as well as ask the other side in a negotiation.

So, if you’re interested, reach out to me at jamie@jamieleecoach.com. My website is, again, jamieleecoach.com and I look forward to hearing from you, seeing you at the next free webinar on September 12th, as well as future free webinars. I am doing this because I’m on a mission to help create exponential results in my client’s lives and to double women’s income and impact.

Thank you, and I will talk to you soon.

Bye!

Interview with Eric Kohler: How to Take a Stand #MeToo

Eric Kohner is an ally who taught me how to coach -- which I love not only because it's a grand way to make a living, but also because coaching skills are at the intersection of leadership and negotiation skills. 

Eric is also an internationally recognized executive coach and keynote speaker. He founded eKCosystem, a global corporate training company dedicated to bringing HUMAN BEING into business, because “in today’s highly competitive world, the new hard skills are the heart skills.” 

In this interview, Eric shared personal stories of: 

- How he negotiated a conflict with his employer, from anger and resistance to connection and vulnerability
- How he encountered unconscious bias in the most unlikely of places and gained empathy for the marginalized
- How he took a stand for himself and you can, too, in the era of #MeToo so we can press for progress. 

Learn more about Eric's work here: www.ekcosystem.com 
Or reach him directly via email here: eric.kohner@icloud.com

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello, Hello! Welcome to Episode 32 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

My mission is to help people like you - ambitious people like you - become bolder, braver and better paid.

My guess is that, if you’re like me, you may not fit the bill, you may not fit the description of most people in high positions of power in corporations, law firms, and organizations. They happen to be mostly white men.

And I want to help you break through that glass ceiling and so, today, we’re going to brave that uncomfortable and hot topic: white male privilege.

And we’re also going to talk about bias. We’re going to talk about Me Too. We’re going to talk about the hot-button issues of today and I have very special guest. His name is Eric Kohner.

He is a white dude. But he’s an ally. He’s my ally. He’s someone who has taught me everything, almost everything, all the really, really good and juicy things that I know and that I practice in my coaching.

Eric is an internationally recognized executive coach and keynote speaker. He founded EKCOsystem, which is a global corporate training company dedicated to bringing HUMAN BEING into business because in today’s highly competitive world, the new hard skills are the heart skills. I love that.

EKCOsystem is successfully bringing the heart skills to high-level executives in global organizations such as the US Navy, Capgemini, and ING, just to name a few. So, without further ado, here’s the interview with Eric Kohner.

Eric: Hello?

Jamie: Hi, Eric. How are you?

Eric: I’m good. How are you?

Jamie: I’m doing awesome. So happy to have you on the Born to Thrive podcast!

Eric: Well, I’m excited to be here.

Jamie: Amazing. So, I’m really honored because you were my coach trainer. You taught me how to coach and coaching is really important to me, not only because I do it and I feel like it’s my life calling, but at the same time, what I recognize is that coaching is at the intersection of negotiation and leadership, which is what this is all about.

And so, I’d love to hear from you, what are some of the key learnings in your life around negotiating?

Eric: Great question. You know, interestingly enough, one of my biggest learnings came about when I was working for a coaching company. And one of the things that I was doing with them, they were licensing their IP to me, and it was a very generous agreement and I was bringing this into a corporation, the trainings.

And then overnight they decided that it wasn’t working for them and they basically decided that they were gonna take back their agreement and then centralize it and take all the clients that were licensing material from, take it away from us. And, needless to say, this really upset me. But I was also an employee of that company and so it made it very difficult for me to really take a stand and one by one, each of us kind of folded and allowed this to happen.

And, literally, I know this sounds like a cliche, but literally, I looked in the mirror and I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror, doing that.

And so I decided to take a stand and it took about a year and a half  but it was a very long, drawn out negotiation and ultimately me and the CEO of this company had a huge fight. And, ironically, it was when both of us kind of allowed our emotions to really cut loose, something magical happened. And it was a real lesson for me around allowing yourself to take a stand for yourself.

Something magical happened. Intimacy got created between us and both of us kind of realized in that moment of anger that we needed to kind of, both of us needed to reinvent the conversation. And from there, I mean, it still took some time, but from there, we were able to, I believe, come up with a win-win situation for both of us.

Jamie: This is so fascinating, because so many of us...I mean, I’ll just speak for myself, you know? I’m afraid of conflict. There’s a part of me that does not want to get into an argument with people because I’m afraid that it is going to ruin the relationship and they’ll never work with me again. There’s a lot of my own ego involved in that…

Eric: Right.

Jamie: ...wanting to protect my ego. And so, I’m so fascinated to hear that, for you, having those emotions come to the surface and allowing that conflict, to just have that conflict, confront it, was the pivotal point that made things better not worse.

Eric: Yeah, it was really counterintuitive because, I mean, I really thought, you know, when this was happening in the moment, I thought I saw my career flash through my eyes. And I really want to give this CEO a lot of credit because he was the one that actually, he got very, very angry with me and I said, “Be angry!” Right?

Jamie: What did you say?

Eric: He said, “I’m really, really angry with you right now!” And I just said, it was funny because there was a part of me that went into coach mode and wanted to allow him to, I don’t know, there was this split second where I thought, “Maybe I should coach him right now.” And then I thought, “NO! I’m negotiating, I’m not coaching right now. I have to take a stand for myself!”

And so I just said to him, “Be angry! If you’re angry, fine! I’m angry, too!” And then there was this long silence and he just said, “I’m so frustrated,” and I didn’t respond. I just listened to him and then he said, “You know, maybe there are some things that I got wrong on this.”

Jamie: Wow.

Eric: Yeah, and like I said, I mean, he’s the one that actually got vulnerable with me. And once he, the second he got vulnerable then I was able to then also see his side of things. And we were able to then kind of relook at the whole thing and find a way for both of us to come out of this in a way that worked for both of us.

Jamie: So, my negotiation hat tells me - my hat is talking to me right now - that there were three amazing things that happened. First is that you took a stand and you didn’t fold when the emotions were getting heated. And then second is that you created this space where you allowed for anger to just be. You said you kind of vacillated whether to coach or not, but you’ve taught me that in coaching we all get to be, so you did that!

Eric: In that way, yes, but let’s put it this way: As you learned in coaching, it’s always about holding the other person’s agenda. I had an agenda.

Jamie: Okay, I see. Got it.

Eric: So, in that way, I wasn’t coaching him, but you’re right. I allowed him to have his feelings. I gave him space. And I also gave myself space to have my emotions. And for some reason, as I said before, if somebody would have told me this beforehand, that this was the way that we were gonna break the impasse, I would have told them they’re nuts! But that’s what happened.

Jamie: That’s so beautiful because, like I said, there’s a part of me that is afraid of conflict and that’s because there’s a part of me that does not want to feel negative emotion and what your story illustrates is that allowing us to feel all the feels, even the bad ones, is sometimes exactly what you need to do to get through.

Eric: Right, and I would even push it a little further and say anger isn’t necessarily a negative emotion. It’s just an emotion. And when we give ourselves permission to have all of our emotions and at the same time be responsible with them. So, I’m not talking about being angry and hitting somebody or being angry and manipulating with that anger, but really allowing oneself to have their emotions in a clean way, it’s healthy in negotiations, it’s healthy in relationships. It’s healthy.

Jamie: Yeah, that’s really rich and powerful. Thank you for that. I just want to add one thing which is, you did a third thing that was really amazing, which is you held silence.

Eric: Yeah.

Jamie: Yeah, and that became the space in which the CEO was able to introspect and then allow himself to be vulnerable. That changed everything.

Eric: Yeah, I mean, a lot went on in that timeline, so that’s all I can say. And as always, silence doesn’t mean nothing’s going on, when we allow for that silence.

Jamie: Yeah, which is a great coaching skill as well as a negotiation skill. One thing that comes to my mind is that some people might hear your story, some of my audience who are mostly women, and they’ll be like, “Yeah, but that’s because it was a guy and guy conversation,” you know what I mean? Like, “Of course he was able to get there because it’s a man talking to a man.”

I’ve been asked recently to address white male privilege and for women, professional women who tend to be in like the junior or mid-ranks of corporations and organization, how do they get through to men who are at the upper echelons of these organizations? How do we get through to the old white guys?

Eric: So, what’s the question? How do you get through to people like me?

Jamie: So, we’ve addressed the elephant, we’re getting closer to the elephant in the room.

Eric: No, I love that you’re bringing this up. [Inaudible]

Jamie: So I’m wondering if you would share with us, what do you notice, what do you see about women in leadership? And I think you have a great story to share, an instructive story to share. I’d love to hear from your perspective.

Eric: Well, two things are popping up: something that happened in the past, maybe eight years ago, and then also I kind of want to address what’s happening now.

Jamie: Yeah.

Eric: You know, because now we’re in the Me Too, Time’s Up kind of movement and so I think that my perspective has shifted a lot since eight years ago. But, you know, I was once invited to facilitate a leadership program in a global bank.

Jamie: Hmm. Where?

Eric: It was in Singapore. The bank itself, their headquarters is in the Netherlands, but, like I said, it was global so they had people all over the world. And, if I remember correctly, it was called the Leadership Inclusion Program, and what they meant at that time, inclusion meant specifically including women. You know, that was their main focus.

So, these were some of the top women leaders in the company that were going through this program. And I was delivering like one piece of a much bigger program. So, I flew in. There were about forty women, twenty went in one room with me and my co-facilitator and the other twenty went in another room with two other facilitators. We finished the first day and for whatever reasons - it was all women, my co-facilitator was a woman also, so it was all women - and for whatever reasons there were a few women in the class that I just rubbed the wrong way. I just walked in and I don’t know what I did. To this day, I know when I mess up. In this particular case, I didn’t know what I did.

Jamie: Could it be, Eric, that you were a white dude?

Eric: You know, I don’t know if I was a white dude, but I think what I represented to some of the women were arrogant executives that they had to deal with.

Jamie: Mmm, so they were projecting that onto you.

Eric: Yeah, because I can be very direct, you know. That’s just a part of who I am and that can be perceived as arrogant at times. So, I have to be honest, I don’t know. I don't’t know what I did. But I get this phone call at 1:00 in the morning, that evening, from the lady that was in charge of the program and basically said, “I’ve heard some real negative comments from a few of the women in the group. They don’t like you and we’ve decided…” She said it much nicer. She said, “I don’t want to do this, but I’ve decided I’m gonna replace you.”

Jamie: Ouch!

Eric: Yeah. And I just said, “No.” I kind of…

Jamie: You took a stand again.

Eric: I took a stand again. Yeah, I said, you know, this happens and I said to her, “This isn’t about me. This is about what happens inside organizations. Whenever there’s a problem, people don’t go directly to the person that they have the problem with. They go around. They’ll go to HR or they’ll go their manager. They won’t go directly speak to the person that they have the problem with.”

I said, “You know, if they don’t want me in the class, I’m happy, well, not happy, but I’ll accept it. But they’re gonna have to fire me.” And so, the lady was taken aback but she said, “Okay. We’ll do it that way then.”

And the next morning, I felt like I was walking into the lion’s den and my co-leader was very supportive and she basically said, “You need to stand up for yourself. We’re not gonna walk in here and just allow them to railroad you like this.” So, she did something brilliant, okay? Before we started on all that other stuff, she just talked about how she’s really excited to be in Singapore because once she’s done with this thing, she’s gonna go shoe shopping and she’s gonna just go shopping, right? And somehow, that, she met the group in a way that they could relate to, right? And so the first ten minutes they were talking about clothing, basically. And I was just sitting there waiting for the inevitable.

And finally, I just said it. I said, “Look, I heard from the person that’s in charge last night that there’s some people that have a problem with me. I want to give you the space to say whatever it is that you need to say.” And basically the class just said, “Oh, no, we don’t have a problem with you,” or “We’re past all that,” which kind of, you know, I knew that not to be true, right?

And then finally there was one woman in the group that said, “I know that this is an inclusion program but I just have to tell you, there’s something about you I don’t like.”

Jamie: Hmm. Can I just pause you right there and say that’s the kind of feedback that so many of my negotiation workshop share with me. That’s the kind of feedback they get. Vague. Subjective. You know, there’s no concrete basis for this. They get told by their mostly male, sometimes female supervisors that they just don’t have the chops. There’s just something lacking and they don’t know what it is. They’re too aggressive. They’re too whatever, too shy or too aggressive.

Eric: Yeah, I get it.

Jamie: You’re getting a taste of what they get.

Eric: Exactly. And that was the upshot of that whole program because after that, I mean, I said to the lady, “Thank you very much, I really appreciate you telling me this and I’m facilitating this workshop and part of my job is actually to make you uncomfortable. Because leadership is about stretching you. And I’ll do the best I can. Let’s talk during the break if there’s something I can do to make it easier for you.”

And then we moved on and the rest of the workshop was magical. The rest of the workshop was a huge success, and one of the women, in the feedback said, “You know, we really got a lot out of the workshop, actually, by it not working at the beginning because it allowed us to go through this journey. Like, there was a struggle at the beginning but the end result gave us a lot of learning.”

So, yeah, that’s number one and when we finished the workshop, exactly what you’re talking about, Jamie, I said to them, “Thank you.” I thanked the group. I said, “I now know what it’s like to be the only woman in the room by experiencing some of the feelings that you had about me. I can see what’s it’s like to be the only of your gender in the room. So it was a great learning for me.”

Jamie: And thank you, I appreciate you sharing this story because it shows again that we’re all biased.

Eric: Yeah, we are.

Jamie: It’s not restricted by gender or by position, by class. Bias is in all of us and if we’re not conscious and if we’re not willing to brave that discomfort which you have demonstrated over and over again is the critical thing that can help people get past impasse and create that fulfilling connection where something really magical happens.

Eric: Yeah, exactly, and, I mean, here’s the thing: I also consider myself a feminist. And what I mean by that is when I was growing up, you know, my mother, she read Anais Nin, I don’t know if you know who she is but my mother was at the beginning of the whole feminist movement, so I was influenced by her.

And I am a product of a white, patriarchal society, so as much as I want to see women as equal, I’ve still been impacted by the environment that I was grown up in. So I said to you the other piece is the Me Too movement, when I look at the Me Too movement, when I look at all the women, I mean almost everybody I meet now has a story. I have to take responsibility as a man and say not all these women can have these stories without men being guilty as charged.

And so, what it’s done is it’s made me take a real deeper look at where have I been responsible for some of this? Where have I personally not seen women or objectified women or been impacted by mob mentality, the mob male mentality, I’m talking about, and allowed myself to not be the best that I can possibly be? And so, I think it’s a good time and it’s a very vulnerable time, also.

Jamie: Yeah. I appreciate your vulnerability. I can relate to you. I’m an Asian immigrant woman and I am also a product of both Korean patriarchy, white patriarchy, I mean, I think what I learned is that this bias, yes, it’s systemic, yes, it’s embedded in our society and companies, organizations, but it’s also embedded inside of us. And it’s so hard.

Eric: Insidious.

Jamie: Yes, it’s insidious and it’s so easy to miss that unless you’re really consciously thinking about what you’re thinking about. And so it’s really uplifting to hear from a male ally who is going through this journey and it’s not easy. It’s not easy.

Do you have a personal story? Do you have another personal story that you can share with us about Me Too?

Eric: Yeah, actually, this happened right before the Me Too movement. I was leading a workshop and once again, I can honestly say that the accusations that were made against me were not true. And I also would like to say that probably at other times in my life, I’ve been guilty as charged, okay? But in this particular moment, I wasn’t.

And there was a woman in the class that...I was working with, my co-facilitator was a woman of South Asian descent and for whatever reasons, there was a woman in the class that felt that I was both being sexist and racist. And she reported me to the company that I worked for and I was thoroughly investigated because that’s what happens and it was really, it was hard. It was very, very hard.

Jamie: Do you mind my asking, what do you think triggered this response?

Eric: Well, the only thing I can think of, I mean, you know what I look like, okay?

Jamie: Because I’ve met you, yes.

Eric: So, to the audience, I’m a New York...I look like a tough guy, okay? I’m not saying I am a tough guy but I just look like a tough guy. I look like I could belong to the mob, okay? And I think that just happens a lot. I’ll walk into a room and sometimes that’s worked in my favor, but other times it hasn't. And I think that goes for everybody. What we look like sometimes can work for us or against us.

And I have a condition where my hands shake, so during the class, she did all the flip-chart stuff and at certain points, I would say, “Hey, could you put this up?” You know, I would just tell her. And I think the lady in the class kind of saw me bossing her around. Or she thought I was bossing her around.

Jamie: She saw your co-leader do all the flip-charts and her mind that meant that she was being bossed around by you.

Eric: Yeah, like I was telling her to do all the menial work, I guess. And that’s the only thing I can think of. And, as I said, I’m a pretty direct person and sometimes that directness can get interpreted as bossy or arrogant or I don’t know. That’s the only thing I can think of. She was the only one who had that feedback in the class, so I don’t know. But the point, for me, was that it was horrifying to be accused of that and it was really, really difficult.

And the upshot of it, though, was I suddenly got what it’s like to be profiled. And I suddenly realized, wow, this happens all the time with women of color or people of color, period. And women constantly in the workplace are getting profiled and it really sent me in this journey of not only personal introspection about this but learning systemically what’s going on.

And I really feel like I’m just a beginner in this. I don’t feel like I really know, yet, what this all means but it’s taken me on a really rich, new journey around Me Too, around Black Lives matter, around white privilege. All of that, you know, before this incident, it wasn’t that much on my radar, to be honest with you. And now it’s something on a daily basis that I look at and it’s taken me in directions that’s very fulfilling, let’s just put it that way.

Jamie: Yeah, and thank you for that. And, you know, I’m really encouraged by what is happening in our culture, in our popular culture and social media culture. You know, we’re raising awareness. The conversations, the tone is changing and the media is...last night I saw Crazy Rich Asians and…

Eric: I was gonna ask you about that! I’m gonna see that this weekend.

Jamie: Oh, it was amazing!

Eric: With my daughter, actually, and my wife’s a Filipina so my daughter really kind of identifies with being Asian, so I look forward to that.

Jamie: Yeah. I cried and it didn’t dawn on me how much I had yearned for this kind of representation, seeing people who look like me, people who have a similar background as me on the big screen. And it’s a fantasy, but still, the dream is so meaningful because it touches us emotionally.

Eric: Right. I get it.

Jamie: And so, on that note, I want to wrap this conversation up with a question to you: What is a vision that you hold for equality, for gender equality, where we’re not so systemically held back by these old stories about what it means to be a man, what it means to be a woman, what it means to be of color, like, what’s possible for us in the future? What do you think, Eric?

Eric: Hmm. Wow. Do we have four hours? I think that - and I’m hope I’m not ruffling any feathers to your audience when I say this - but, you know, politically, right this second, we’re in a very, I don’t know, the only way I can put it is constrictive period where the government is, how do I say this...

Jamie: But take us into the future!

Eric: Well, this is what I’m about to say. So, politically, right this second, we’re in a period of...it’s dark, okay? But, culturally, I think we’re in an amazing period right now. Like you just said, Crazy Rich Asians, Blackklansman just came out. I don’t know if you saw the TV Show Pose. Have you ever heard of Pose? It’s completely cast, it’s about Black and Latino transvestites in the 1980s, and it’s completely cast with real transgender actresses.

Jamie: Wow.

Eric: And both in front of and behind the camera, the LGBTQ community is totally represented in that TV show. I think a lot of groundbreaking stuff is happening right now, so I think the future is very bright. And demographically, I think that it’s very colored, that the United States is moving towards an era where, hopefully, a lot of the issues that we’re talking about today won’t be issues anymore.

Jamie: Thank you.

Eric: I’m very optimistic.

Jamie: Yeah. So, what’s gonna be one thing that we can all do to help bring us closer to that vision?

Eric: You know, I mean, it’s paradoxical because, you know, I mentioned that this is systemic, so change is going to be systemic and it’s personal. So, I think that we all have to find what’s important for us. Like, obviously, what you’ve chosen is to empower women in the area of negotiation.

Jamie: Yeah.

Eric: That’s specifically your thing. For me, I’m just newly embarking on doing work in the social justice field around training people in underserved communities, training them in coaching skills. So, I guess what I’m saying is that, you know, I think all of us have to individually look into ourselves now and see what is the area that we want to carve out that can make the world a better place. And then do something about it.

Jamie: Beautiful. Yeah, and I’d love for you to come back and I’d love for us to have one more conversation about how to use these amazing coaching skills and the tools to do exactly what you said. How to enhance, how to bring us closer to that compelling vision of a more equal, more just world. So, please share with us, how can our audience learn more about you and the work that you do? Where can they go?

Eric: Okay, so you can go to my website which is ekcosystem.com or you can just email me at eric.kohner@icloud.com.

Jamie: And I’ll make sure to include your website link as well as your email in the podcast notes and for those who are curious, you can also reach me at jamieleecoach.com. My email is jamie@jamieleecoach.com and Eric, thank you so much for your bravery, for your vulnerability and for these really great stories. I hope you have a wonderful day!

Eric: Hey, it’s been a pleasure.

Jamie: Yes. Same here. I’ll talk to you soon!

Eric: I love the work you’re up to!

Jamie: Thank you.

Eric: Bye bye!

Jamie: Bye!

Hey, before you go, I just want to let you know that I will be doing a free webinar. The series will be called Bolder, Braver and Better Paid because, after all, that’s the mission I’m serving, and the first webinar is going to be next Wednesday, August 29th on How to Win Over Difficult People and I’d love for you to join. The link to register is on my site, www.jamieleecoach.com.

Hope to see you there. Bye!

Interview with Jay Fields: How to Use the Brain in Your Body to Overcome Anxiety and Building Confidence and Strength

Jay Fields is a somatic educator and therapeutic coach who teaches women how to regulate their nervous systems -- or "the brain the body" -- so they can manage anxiety and difficult emotions with empathy and connection. 

In this impactful interview, Jay walks me through exactly what happens in our bodies, our brains, our nervous systems, and in our behavior when we encounter negative emotions like anxiety in the moment of a high-stakes conversation. 

We explored: 
- How to deal with anxiety in the moment of negotiating without freezing, fleeing or fighting
- How to manage negative emotions so they don't sabotage your outcomes
- What it means to have your own back and the power it gives you to name the "elephant" in a negotiation
- How to get better at setting boundaries and saying no with confidence and strength

Learn more about Jay here: jay-fields.com

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 31 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

My mission is to help ambitious people like you become bolder, braver, and better paid. I believe that negotiation skills are leadership skills and that good negotiators lead the conversation and that good leaders negotiate.

And today I have a really powerful conversation that I’m really happy to share with you. It’s an interview I did with Jay Fields, and in this interview, we talked about The Big F.

Yes.

Feelings.

We talked about the power of emotions. The impact emotions have on our bodies, our brains, on our nervous system and in our reactions or in our behaviors. I think it’s so important to acknowledge, to accept, and to manage emotions in order to become a better negotiator and in order to become a better leader.

And so, I hope you find this conversation useful and you use the tools that Jay shares with us, because I certainly have, and I have used them to do better in my public speaking, I’ve used them to improve my coaching, I’ve used these tools to improve my negotiation, and I’ve used these tools even at home to deal with conversations, sticky situations in my interpersonal relationships.

To learn more about me and my services, please visit jamieleecoach.com and I hope you enjoy this interview.

Jay Fields is a somatic educator, therapeutic coach, and author of the book Teaching People, Not Poses. Jay is unique in that she teaches women how to regulate their nervous systems and have empathy for themselves so that they can manage anxiety and difficult emotions and stay connected, engaged with the people and projects they work with.

So, without further ado, here’s the interview with Jay Fields.

Jamie: Hi, Jay!

Jay: Hey, Jamie.

Jamie: Thanks, again. I want to say. This is our second time trying this recording. Thanks for making the time.

Jay: Of course!

Jamie: And I’m really excited to talk to you about how to deal with the anxiety that arises in the moment of negotiation. Because I think that’s the really tough part. Preparing, coming up with a script, it’s not so hard, but actually dealing with that negative emotion in the face of pushback or the first sign of pushback.

And so, I want to ask you, what do you have in terms of strategies that you can advise our listeners, how to communicate with clarity and conviction that makes it easy for people to connect with the other side?

Jay: Right, yeah. I hear you. Even if you have the script it doesn’t necessarily make it easy. So, before I answer that question, let me put what I’m going to say into some context. So, anxiety and emotions, other emotions, are felt sensations that we have in our body that then our brain in our skull interprets, okay? And so, that means, for example, you get a tightness in your chest and you interpret that as I’m scared.

And what happens then is that, if you’re unaccustomed to being in tune with your body, and/or you’re not willing to have an emotion in the time that it’s coming up, such as in a negotiation, it will affect the nervous system. So, your nervous system is the brain in your body, right? And what usually happens is either there’s the fight/flight response that revs up the nervous system and you get that amped feeling in your body or there’s the freeze, or sometimes called collapse response, where your body just kind of flatlines, your energy flatlines, you numb out. And either way, it feels hard to gather your thoughts, it’s hard to say a sentence clearly, to make sense.

And so I bring that up because when we talking about managing anxiety or managing emotions, especially in the workplace, I think it’s really, really important to understand that on the first, primary level, it really is about managing sensation in the body. And that, I think, people can go oh, okay, maybe I could do that.

And so, the way to do that is...I mean, there’s multiple ways to do it. One of the ways that I feel is really great to do that is through practicing what’s called a felt resource, and a felt resource is something that is inside your body that you can go to to bring yourself back to your best self. And there’s three. One is grounding, one is centering, and one is orienting.

And I’ll unpack them a little bit, and as I do, I’m going to encourage you and your listeners to just get a sense, to go through it with me and see what happens.

Jamie: So, should I try it now? As you talk me through it?

Jay: Yeah! Because the felt resource, what I think is so great about them is, it isn’t something that you necessarily need to sit down, eyes closed, back straight, fifteen minutes, practice this. These are the sort of things that they’re best used in the moment and come back and come back and even if it’s three or four seconds, just see what happens, okay?

So, the first one is grounding, and that’s literally just putting your feet on the floor or imagining that you can feel the connection to the earth. You feel the 6,000 miles of earth underneath you, or if you’re sitting in a chair, you feel your butt in the chair, you feel your weight supported. And so, just notice, as you do that, as you feel your weight in your chair, or you feel a more intentional connection to the ground if something happens to your energy level or to your breath.

Jamie: Yeah, I feel like I kind of slowed down my breathing a little bit.

Jay: [Breathes out] Yeah, so there’s kind of like a [exhales].

Jamie: Yeah, like I’ve calmed down a bit.

Jay: Yeah, so that’s one. Another felt resource would be to center. And by centering, what I mean is to imagine you could gather all of your strength or all of your power into the center of you, wherever it is you experience that. So it might be your belly, it might be your heart, and this is one of the things that, when we have the fight/flight response, often what happens is it feels like our energy dissipates. It just kind of goes bleh in every direction.

So, I’d like you to see what it feels like to imagine that you could kind of pull yourself back to your center. Bring all your focus there and just see if that makes sense in the way of, does something happen on a sensational level in your body that lets you know it’s working?

Jamie: Yeah, well, I just notice I took some sugar and caffeine to power through the day and so I’m feeling the blood pumping through my veins right now.

Jay: Okay.

Jamie: And I have a question for you. So, what happens if you’re doing the centering exercise and you don’t like it? You don’t like what comes up.

Jay: Yeah. Exactly. Okay. So, let me come back to that and tell you the third felt resource before I forget, because I probably will, and then I’ll come back to that question, okay?

So, the third felt resource - there’s grounding, there’s centering - the third one is orienting. That one is looking around the space that you’re in and taking in the familiar objects, the colors, the textures. It’s kind of like the YOU ARE HERE sticker at a trailhead, you know? Where you’re just kind of looking around and reminding yourself, okay this is what’s happening, you’re expanding your awareness. Because the other thing that’s happening when your nervous system goes into fight or flight is we get tunnel vision. We get beady eyes, right? And all of a sudden all you can focus on is the thing that’s freaking you out. So, to just look around the room, and you don’t have to do it in a big way that makes you look like you’re crazy, but just to kind of take in okay, there’s the couch, there’s the desk, this is happening, I’m here.

So, back to your question. It’s a really, really great question. What happens if you check in with one of these felt resources, it brings you back into your body and what’s happening and you don’t like it?

Jamie: Yeah.

Jay: First off, you’re a human being. That’s what happens for most of us, which is part of why this is hard for people, is, for the most part, our internal experience, for many of us, isn’t comfortable. It isn’t welcoming. It can even be painful or full of anxiety and so part of what the felt resource is for is not just to bring you back, but to then also be a container for what’s happening, meaning you will experience discomfort, or you might experience discomfort, and if you do, it will not kill you. And, here’s the thing, because the nervous system responds to discomfort as a threat, it feels like it will kill you.

Jamie: Yeah.

Jay: It feels awful. Nobody likes it. And it won’t [kill you]. And so, what if you don’t like the experience? Well, one, acknowledging this is the experience I’m having, I don’t like it, and it won’t kill me.

Jamie: You know, can I add to that?

Jay: Please.

Jamie: Yeah, I love that it’s not gonna kill you, but it feels like it might. I think about my early career experiences and I’d think, “Oh, I can speak up and mention this,” or “I can speak up and ask for this,” and then immediately my mind goes to oh, but then they’ll think I’m blah blah blah, or they’ll push back and it’ll be so embarrassing and that future projection of how things might go wrong for me was so frightening!

Jay: Right, and you spin out, and I think what you just said is super important, Jamie, the future projection. Because that’s the thing about the felt resources, is they bring you into the present moment. And in the present moment you might be having a sensation that is uncomfortable, however, you are not in danger. In a physical sense, you’re not in danger.

But the other piece that’s really important, so you’ve got the felt resources, and then you have the other piece that I call having your own back. So, in order to have your own back, first is you need to be able to feel what’s happening in your body.

Jamie: Literally.

Jay: Literally! Like what’s happening? Do I have a heaviness in my stomach? Do I have a tightness in my chest? Are my hands sweaty? You know, do I feel like I’m just dissipating energetically and I’ve got no skin left anymore? Am I disappearing? You need to be able to feel those things first, but the second piece, and this is the most important piece, especially when it’s something you don’t like feeling, is meeting yourself with your presence.

So, that’s what the grounding, centering, orienting helps you to do. So, meeting yourself with your presence and then adding empathy and kindness. Meaning, the easiest way that I’ve found to do this, because this is really, really, really hard for most people, because most of us are used to meeting a sensation that’s uncomfortable with well, you shouldn’t feel that way! or buck up! or get your shit together! We kind of try to snap ourselves out of it.

Jamie: Yeah, you might go to your center and start thinking, oh, I need to some more ab exercises, which is a thought I did have.

Jay: Yeah, totally! That happens too, like oh, what’s happening here, right? So the adding empathy piece, so there’s the use the felt resource, get present with what’s happening in my body and then there’s the second piece of use that presence to essentially say to yourself, of course you feel that way.

So, you’re in the negotiation. You’re already anxious because you’re asking for something that’s a really big ask for you. The person that you’re speaking with goes, “Oh, really? Because I don’t think we can do that.” And they push back and all of a sudden the anxiety increases, the rev in your body increases, and if there is a part of you that can go, oh, this is happening, I don’t like that it’s happening, and of course it’s happening. Right? You affirm the thing that’s happening, and if we scan back out, this is what all good relationships are built upon, right, is empathy and understanding. Being able to say, “Oh, Jamie, as your friend, of course you feel that way, you know, I understand that.” If you came to me and said, “I’m super anxious right now,” I wouldn’t say, “Well, figure it out because this is high stakes, come on!”

Jamie: “Buck up!”

Jay: Exactly! I’d say, “Of course you feel that way, this is a big deal.”

Jamie: Yeah, or “I’ve never done it before.” or “You haven’t had so many opportunities to negotiate on behalf of yourself. You were always expected to negotiate on behalf of other people, so it feels foreign.” Yeah, and I love that you’re, I guess you’re talking about compassion for yourself, ultimately, yeah? Because it’s like having empathy for yourself as if you’re your own friend.

Jay: Yeah. Kindness! Like this novel idea that you could offer kindness to yourself.

Jamie: Yeah, I think it’s so powerful to be kind to yourself in a negotiation.

Jay: Mm-hmm.

Jamie: It probably is the last thing people think of. Oh, I need to have the right words and the power and the leverage, but yeah, what about kindness to yourself?

Jay: Yeah, and I want to acknowledge for a lot of us it’s really, really hard. It’s not how we were wired, especially in a high stakes situation, we were, a lot of us taught that the harder you are on yourself, the better you will be.

Jamie: Right, and there is the gendered stereotype that women are emotional, therefore they are not rational decision-makers, therefore they’re not good negotiators. And so, what you’re saying, sort of just subverts all of that. What you’re saying is acknowledging your emotions, allowing for emotions to come up and be present is actually a power, not a deficit.

So, I want to ask you a follow-up question about that, because I think a lot of us, even some of my clients tell me this, they think, oh, I just need to buck up! I just need to put emotion out of this and just power through! So they want to pretend that they don’t experience the anxiety, the fear, and the doubt. So, what’s the problem with that?

Jay: Okay, yeah, so you can do that. The problem is it disconnects you from yourself. There’s a way that you can’t be present to yourself, with what’s happening, and deny what’s happening. And when you do that, it means that you also can’t be present to the other person.

Jamie: Oh.

Jay: And it means that you can’t be present to your inner resources, like all the amazing stuff that you have on your resume that got you to this point where you’re negotiating for a higher salary. You don’t actually have access to those things if you are trying to deny your own experience in the moment. Does that make sense?

Jamie: Yeah, so when you deny yourself and you deny your own experience in the moment, you’re not present to yourself and therefore you’re also not present to the other side.

Jay: Exactly, and so it’s not about like, you have to tell the person I’m freaking out right now. Nor is that if you’re scared you need to curl up in a ball and manage that that way. It really does work to simply feel the feeling. Like, the sensation is I’m tight all over. I interpret that as I’m scared. And then just naming it and then on some level, even if it’s just like a hand on your heart or a hand on your leg, of course you feel that way and I’m here. Right? Being able to say to yourself, “And I’m here.”

Jamie: I’d love to add to that. I think it’s so powerful what you’re suggesting because our mutual friend and my mentor, Lisa Gates, she always talks about the power of naming the elephant in the room.

Jay: Right.

Jamie: And sometimes the elephant, you know, it’s not visible, it’s not something that we can perceive with our eyes, but it’s something we feel with our intuition. And so, being able to name that feeling, let’s say you’re negotiating with a bully and they’re implying some very nasty things but not making it explicit, right? So there’s an elephant in the room. You feel the feeling of having been, I guess, put down, right? And being able to tap into that feeling and naming that. Saying, “Hey, you know, I’m surprised you would say something like that and not realize that would really hurt my feelings.”

Jay: Right.

Jamie: That’s a kind of naming the elephant.

Jay: That’s so great. Naming the elephant, when it comes to it being your own experience is a way of really standing for yourself. Having your back.

Jamie: Right.

Jay: And that’s what the negotiation process is in the first place, right? This is just the second layer to that.

Jamie: Right, yeah. And it just deepens it and makes you more present. The more present you are, the better questions you can ask, the more information you can gather, and that way you gain more leverage.

Jay: Yeah, and the less your nervous system is hijacking your brain, the more you can have access to all your best qualities.

Jamie: Yeah, beautiful. It’s so true. So that you’re fully present. Yeah, so another follow-up question is, for a lot of my clients and this audience, we tend to defer to other people’s comfort for happiness. I am a recovering, extreme people pleaser.

Jay: Me too!

Jamie: Yeah, and we do this by overdoing, not setting boundaries, not asking for what you’re worth, not saying no when you don’t want to, saying yes instead of no. So, it seems that becoming more aware of your feelings would just make you vulnerable and disempowered and I think that’s a misconception, so I’d love to hear from you, why is that not true?

Jay: Yeah, it is a widely held misconception because we just don’t know a better way and so this has kind of been spread as this is true. So, to answer that, I’m going to also step back again and put it in context. So, every human being has three needs. They need to feel like they’re safe, they need to feel like they belong, and they need to feel like they matter. So safety, belonging and mattering. All of us need these. And we get these needs met, or don’t, through relationship with others. And how we got them met or didn’t, growing up greatly influences how we feel about ourselves and how we feel about the fact that we have feelings.

So, we’re relational beings, right? So, we get safety, belonging, mattering from other people, and that’s great, but it’s also really important to be able to give it to yourself. To be able to feel that you can offer yourself safety, belonging and mattering. Because, to the extent that you can’t offer that to yourself, that’s when, like you said, you try to either please others or control them, because that’s the opposite. You either please or control others. You don’t have any boundaries or you have too many and you keep people at bay. Or this is where addictive behaviors come in or where just self-criticism and self-hatred come in. So, why am I saying all of this in relation to your question? That is because when you acknowledge how you feel, when you can say the sensation is this, the emotion is this, of course I feel that way, that is a way of offering yourself a felt sense of I am safe, I belong and I matter.

Jamie: Wow!

Jay: Does that make sense? Literally, in your body, if you were to say to yourself, “Of course you’re scared, Jamie.” There’s a way that you’re there with yourself so you feel safe. You’re acknowledging and affirming how you feel, so you feel like you matter. And putting that together there’s this sense of I’m okay, I belong. Regardless of whether this bully or this not-bully who’s pushing back is giving me what I want in terms of feeling safe, belonging or mattering, I can do it for myself. And what happens is, when you get that for yourself, you don’t do all the weird, strategic behaviors that we do to try to get them from someone.

Jamie: Right. I just really love how profound and simple that was.

Jay: Yeah!

Jamie: Simply acknowledging yourself and that is the secret. Simply acknowledge how you feel in that moment and I guess what you’re saying is allow yourself to feel all the feels. Right?

Jay: Yeah, well, and in the moment, this is what makes, part of what makes this challenging. If you’re in the moment, you’re in the office with your boss and you’re negotiating, you can’t actually drop in and feel the feels entirely. But you can affirm them. You can affirm that they’re there and they’re real. And then it’s gonna still be in your system, right? And you walk out of the room and maybe you go into the bathroom and you get into a stall and you just kind of shake a little bit. Or you have a cry. Or you punch at the air. Whatever you need to do to start running the emotions through your body as opposed to just acknowledging that they’re there.

Jamie: I see. So, there is a process. It’s not just like, in the moment, split-second, saying oh, I feel these things. There you go, I’m done! You allow yourself to have the full process of the experience of the body sensations.

Jay: Yeah, and the thing is is it might be done in the moment, right? But if it’s an intense sensation, if it’s an intense experience, it’s gonna still be there when you leave the room. That’s why you leave the room and then you go back to your desk and you feel all jacked up and you can’t quite concentrate and you’re a little fidgety, right, is because all that energy, all that anxiety is still in your body. So, that’s an opportunity, maybe now that you’re not in the heat of the moment with someone there with you, you just, again, ground or center or one of them will work for you. For most people, one of them is easier than the others. So, pick the one that helps you to go, “I’m here in my body,” maybe a hand on your chest and just go, “I am anxious and of course I feel that way.” And just kind of let yourself feel it as a feeling, as emotion.

Jamie: Yeah.

Jay: But it all comes back to a relationship with yourself, really. That empathic and warm and kind and it isn’t, it’s something that’s felt, not cerebral.

Jamie: Got it. It’s literally a sensation in your body.

Jay: Yeah. It’s like, what if your best friend came and sat down next to you and put her hand on your leg and said, “Of course you feel that way.” You feel it. That’s what we’re trying to offer ourselves.

Jamie: Is there a way for people to cope with that resistance? We’ve been trained from such a young age to repress certain emotions, right? I’m Asian, so in the Asian culture there’s a lot of that emotion suppression, right? And also, we’re conditioned to say certain things in certain situations. All different ways of sort of pushing down your emotions and so, do you have a suggestion for people who are so accustomed to pushing down anger?

Jay: Yeah, oh my gosh, this is one of my favorite questions, I’m so happy you asked this! Because most of us in some form of resistance most of the time. Most of us have been conditioned culturally and in our family to believe that emotions are just not the greatest things ever and we should probably not have them.

So most of us are in resistance, and what I’ve found, the best way to work with that is first, acknowledge you’re there. So, typically, most of us at this point in our life know what we do to try and avoid feeling, right? We work long hours or we watch long hours of Netflix or we eat chocolate or we go grab a drink, or we do drugs. Most of us know what our thing is that we do to try and manage. And so, if you can catch yourself if one of those behaviors or you can catch yourself in that feeling of, “I feel nothing,” right? Where you go to look in your body and you go to see what you feel and you feel nothing. Or all you feel is just pure tightness everywhere. The way to work with that is to say to yourself, “I don’t want to feel this.” And what that does is it brings you back to being aligned with what’s true in your body’s experience, which is, in your body, you are currently in resistance. You are in fight, flight or shut-down. And if you can name, “No. NO. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to go there, I don’t want to feel this.” You don’t even have to know what it is that you don’t want to feel. All you need to know is that your nervous system right now is telling you “No! I don’t want this.”

Jamie: So, acknowledge the resistance.

Jay: Acknowledge it! And what happens is one of two things: either you all of a sudden become aware of the thing you didn’t want to feel and you’re there with yourself feeling it, because it kind of sneaks up on you, right? Or you’re there feeling the no. But either way, you haven’t abandoned yourself, you haven’t left your resources. You can be angry and present. The same way that you can be resistant and present. And we’re just used to resistance looking like I’m not gonna be present.

Jamie: What might that look like? You’re angry and you’re present to it.

Jay: Good question. So, anger, typically in our bodies feels like heat. It feels like energy coursing through us. It feels like tightness, and so to be present to that is to acknowledge, I’m hot, my hands are gripping and I’ve got a lot of energy in me and I’m angry. And to allow that sensation to happen in your body. And you’re present with it.

So, I often talk with my clients about this in terms of, especially when it comes to anger, I talk about it in terms of wattage. If you think of yourself as a light bulb who’s typically a 60-watt light bulb and then somebody pokes the bear, and you get angry, and then all of a sudden, the sensations in your body feel like they’re 120 watts. And what we want to do is get out of there. That’s the nervous system response: fight, flight, freeze, this is too much wattage, I can’t handle this.

But you can actually, through using the felt resources and learning to be present with yourself, learn that wattage is just wattage. The same way that discomfort is just discomfort. It will not blow your circuitry. You can stand heat. You can stand tension. And then the interpretation of that is anger, and yes, you might have to acknowledge and feel the anger when you’re outside of this and outside of the situation,  but in the situation, if you’re with a boss and they’ve said something that puts you down and you get fired up right away, you can be with the sensation of I’m fired up and not have it come out your mouth as something you wish you wouldn’t say.

Jamie: Yeah. That reminds me of something you said earlier about how we’re containers of emotion, so it’s kind of like taking yourself from inside that boiling pot into realizing, no, I’m the pot that holds this boiling water.

Jay: Right. And the big thing is is that none of this is about making the emotion go away, and I think so much of the new age or holistic kind of approaches to things is like you shouldn’t feel emotion or there’s negative emotions. And I don’t like to think of emotions as negative or positive, I like to think of them as uncomfortable or pleasant, right?

And you don’t have to get rid of the ones that are uncomfortable. You just use your presence, that felt sense of yourself, to help you regulate how much of that is in your awareness, versus how much of I’m grounded, I’m centered, I’m here in this space, I have resources, I belong here, I matter, I’m safe, right? The emotion doesn’t go away, but the other things, you just turn the volume up on them.

Jamie: Mmm, well this is really tremendous. I think this is very important because I do causal coaching and I help people deal with their mindsets and improve upon them and when you work with what’s in your mind, that always generates emotion and some of them are very uncomfortable, like doubt, anxiety fear. So, I think the felt resources that you shared with us and reminding ourselves that we are safe, that we do belong to ourselves and that we matter to ourselves, it’s so powerful. I think it changes everything.

Jay: It really, really does. I say that all the time.

Jamie: Yeah, thank you. So, where can our audience learn more about what you do and your services?

Jay: I have a website, and it is jay-fields.com and on there you can learn about the individual coaching I do and the trainings that I do at organizations and there’s a recorded guided meditation for the felt resources if you want to go back through them and there’s a bunch of writing and articles about different aspects of having your own back.

Jamie: Awesome, and Jay, I am a huge fan of your writing. I love the book Teaching People, Not Poses. I found it very relevant for me even though I don’t teach yoga, I teach negotiation. Being yourself is a great lesson to be reminded of. So, thank you so much for your time again and I will talk with you soon!

Jay: Great, thank you so much. I’m so grateful for this. Have a great day!

Jamie: Alright, you too.

Jay: Bye!

Interview with She Negotiates' Lisa Gates: How to Name the Elephant and Lead Negotiation Conversation

Lisa Gates is my good friend and mentor who taught me nearly everything I know about teaching negotiation to professional women. She's also the co-founder and chief inspiration officer of She Negotiates, a leading negotiation consulting and leadership coaching company for women. In this interview, she shares timeless tips and pearls of wisdom on how women can cut through unconscious bias in the workplace, lead the conversation, and signal their potential for career advancement through storytelling. Learn more about She Negotiates at www.shenegotiates.com

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 30 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

This episode is being published late because I had a last-minute business trip this week. I was in Huntsville, Alabama to deliver a keynote speech for the U.S. Women in Nuclear Conference as well as a day-long workshop on everyday workplace negotiation skills.

It was a phenomenal event and I got this gig through Lisa Gates, She Negotiates co-founder and negotiation and leadership coach who also happens to be my good friend and mentor. She was booked to deliver the keynote and the workshop at U.S. Women in Nuclear Conference this year. Due to an unforeseen circumstance, she couldn’t make it and so I replaced her. She called me last Thursday morning and on this Monday, so four days later, I was on a flight to Huntsville, Alabama!

It was a phenomenal opportunity for me and it just goes to show how awesome it is to have people in your network who know you, who know the caliber of your work, who trust you to even fill in for them. And it was a tremendous opportunity for me to connect with some really amazing women who are doing cutting-edge work in the forefront of clean energy.

Today, I have a special treat for you. Lisa couldn’t make the conference but before the event she and I recorded this interview and in this interview, she shares some really timeless tips and pearls of wisdom on how women can cut through workplace biases and get heard and lead the conversation and signal their potential for career advancement within the context of a workplace negotiation.

Lisa is a negotiation and leadership coach and she sees her role as Chief Inspiration Officer. She operates under the radical philosophy that there is nothing wrong with women, which I love. In fact, she likes to ask, “What would the world look like if everyone negotiated like a woman?”

Hmm.

I like that question.

She combines storytelling, career development strategies, and collaborative negotiation best practices and then she nests them in women’s lived experiences to come up with solutions that help them become daily askers and confident actors in work and life. Lisa is amazing. So, without further ado, here’s the interview with Lisa Gates, co-founder of She Negotiates.

Jamie: Hi, Lisa.

Lisa: Hey, Jamie Lee, how are you?

Jamie: I’m doing well. Thanks so much for joining me on the podcast today.

Lisa: I’m really glad you invited me. Thank you.

Jamie: I’m really glad you made it. So, I want to hear from you about a negotiation that had the biggest impact in your life or career.

Lisa: In my life or career...probably both. You know this story because we’ve talked about it, but this is a really the story where I learned that I was actually in a negotiation and then how to duplicate it later on with great mentoring by a boss of mine.

Jamie: Okay.

Lisa: Yeah, so I was working in a public relations firm as the Coordinator of New Business, working for the VP of New Business. I was kind of a glorified secretary and I had a commute. I was living in LA. I had this really long commute. It was actually only about 18 miles but it would take me an hour, an hour and a half, and by the time I got to work I was always frustrated and angry from the drive.

And this went on for several weeks, about six weeks, when I went into my boss’s office really in a kind of breakdown. I was crying, which is really a great way to start a negotiation, had I known I was in one. And you know, I’m whining and I’m crying and I’m saying, “I hate this job. I just can’t stand the commute and it’s just really difficult to land and do anything of value for about an hour. So it’s just this huge waste of time.”

And he looked at me and I’m babbling and he says, “Do you have a question in there?” And I was just sort of dumbfounded. I thought I was just gonna get to complain and he was gonna wave the magic wand. And I said, “No,” and he said, “No. Think about it. What kind of a question do you need to ask me?” And it took me a minute to think and finally I said, “How about if I come in at say 10 or 11 o’clock and leave at, say, oh, I don’t know, 6 or 7?”

His answer was, “Okay.” I was completely shocked that he would even consider that. I thought I was being funny. And then he added this little piece where he said, “Tell me why that would be of benefit to me? Why would that be of value to me?”

Jamie: Oh!

Lisa: And I said, “Well, I can be your closer, right? I can make sure everything’s buttoned up at the end of the day, all the straggler pieces are kind of nailed down for a presentation that might be happening the next day.” And he said, “There you go.” He said, “You gotta ask and your ask always has to have a benefit to your conversation partner.”

Jamie: Mmm, that’s a good lesson.

Lisa: It was a huge lesson and I can’t say that in the moment I was completely aware that oh, this is a negotiation strategy but as I went through my career and started to learn more, I always harken back to that experience because it had so much value in so many ways. Just asking, period. Noticing that there’s something wrong and that you might have a solution. So, that was the other piece of it, he would always tell us, “Turn your complaints into solutions.”

Jamie: And benefit, offers of benefit.

Lisa: Offer a benefit and you and I both know that’s the key to a good ask.

Jamie: Right. I mean, now we know it because you and I both work as negotiation coaches.

Lisa: Right.

Jamie: You are the mentor who really taught me everything I know about how to teach negotiation skills, especially to women professionals, so it’s my deep privilege to have you and share your awesome insights and wisdom with us.

So, I’m curious. For the benefit of our listeners, would you share with us what your journey was that led you to become a negotiation coach for women?

Lisa: Thanks for that question, and I just have to back up a little. I really appreciate that you say that I was your mentor. You had so many chops when I met you, so don’t undersell yourself. You’re pretty amazing in your own right.

Jamie: Thank you.

Lisa: I trained and certified to be a coach around 2005, 2006 and after a few years of coaching mostly women I started to notice this pattern. Women were super fabulous at designing a career strategy and creating accountabilities and plans and they knew where they were going. That was the work that we did. But when it came to asking for promotions or raises or workplace kinds of things that were important to them to achieve, they just kind of stumbled.

They resisted, they avoided, they said, “I really can’t do this. It makes me nervous.” So, I decided to learn myself, what is this negotiation thing and why are women so afraid of it? And the first book I read was Women Don’t Ask and Victoria, my business partner and I had this similar reaction to it. We got about seven pages in and threw it across the room because it was so annoying to read all the statistics about how we behave and what was stopping us.

Jamie: And was it maddening because it was true or because it’s not true?

Lisa: Oh, because it was true. And also because we couldn’t believe it was true. These things are hindering and hampering me and everyone else? Really?! So a piece of self-awareness started to just percolate and we started to just rewind through your whole life, your whole career and look at all those places where, oh yeah, I didn’t even know that I could ask. I didn’t even think to ask.

So, there was that piece and then Victoria and I had been friends for a while. As writers, we followed each other around the planet, on the internet planet, and I called her up one day and said, “Why don’t we build a workshop for my clients and whoever else we want to invite from social media, people we know out there in the world?”

So we built this six week, online workshop and after the first session, we hung up and I called her back and said, “Oh my God, this is not a workshop, this is a business.” Because just in that first meeting, women were so hungry, it was like a sponge, they were like sponges devouring the water, you know, the negotiation water. There was a lot of desperation and confusion, so that’s our birth story.

Jamie: Now I’m curious. What was the biggest confusion around negotiation?

Lisa: Part of it was, it’s a thing that happens in two parts, even still with clients today and when I teach and train and do workshops, it’s apparently sort of confidence issues, self-awareness about your capacities, your strengths, all of the things that you bring to your role that you might not have your arms wrapped around well enough, right?

And then the other piece is actually the actual strategies and tactics, you know, getting super pragmatic about when do I anchor and how do I frame this in a way that helps them see a possibility for themselves or helps them see me in the light that I want to be seen in? So those are very tactical things that we have to learn how to do and as you know from working together, we like to simplify and make it as easy as possible to learn these things and not make it so complex that it feels like you’re in a hostage negotiation, right?

Jamie: It can definitely feel like one.

Lisa: Yeah! Help me out of this! I’m gonna lose my family! They’re gonna kill me! They’re gonna kick me out! I know. So, it’s those two places, the emotional place, the self-awareness, the self-acceptance, all of that, yeah.

Jamie: So on that note, what top three pieces of advice do you have for women who want to close their wage gaps and sidestep gender blowback?

Lisa: Ohhh, sidestep gender blowback, let me tackle that one. I don’t think you can sidestep bias. I think you have to be willing to walk through it, right?

Jamie: Interesting.

Lisa: Because you become aware of bias doesn’t mean it’s not gonna happen, right? So you can’t tiptoe around it and get where you need to go. You need to name that elephant as it happens. So if you’ve been passed over two and three times for a promotion, are you just gonna take it? Or are you actually gonna be transparent and talk about, look I’ve been passed over a few times and each time, Joe and Dave and Don get the role? I can’t help but think this is gender-based, help me walk through this. How do you see it? What would you do if you were me?

So, I just feel that especially now with the Me Too movement, in a way corporate America has sort of co-opted the initial meaning of the Me Too movement. There’s this other leg of it, which is economic disempowerment. The biases creating roadblocks to our financial well-being, so we have to talk about it. We have to bring it up when it happens. You know, somebody is mansplaining or talking over you or interrupting you in a presentation, you need to deal with those things as they happen or soon after they happen.

Jamie: So instead of sidestepping it, step right through it!

Lisa: Like a cow patty!

Jamie: Right, because bias is something that we all struggle with, isn’t it? I mean, who among us is not, I mean, people will say, “I’m not biased,” but…

Lisa: Oh, right! I mean, you walk out your door and you have an opinion about the person who just walked in front of you. You’re making judgments about what they’re wearing and where they’re going and who they think they are and why they’re walking so fast. We have all these opinions, we’re human, it’s not something that we can change, but as our awareness ratchets up and especially collective awareness in our workplaces due to the work we do on gender bias training and implicit bias, all of that, anything we can do to ratchet up our ability to see it as it happens is great.

Jamie: So first, walk through it. I like that.

Lisa: Yep, walk through it. Name the elephant. And then the other thing, I think, is to take a leadership role in your interview process and what I mean by that, I wrote about this recently, that I think there are two questions we need to ask our prospective employers, or even if it’s a promotion conversation, asking: What is the company’s commitment to gender balance? Not only in leadership roles, but all along the path to promotion? What is your commitment? And let them explain who they are and what their vision is. And sometimes that might be kind of a stumping question, they might be stumped by it and not be able to answer it terribly well and that should be a red flag. Or you might hear some corporate speak that sounds okay, good, but it doesn’t have a lot of substance so you really have to perk up your ears for that answer.

And the other question I would ask is, what assurances can you give me that your offer will be in alignment with what men in similar roles are making? You just come out ahead of those questions.

Jamie: That’s a really good one.

Lisa: You kind of signal to them, hey, I’m expecting a market value offer. I’m expecting something in alignment with my experience, education, contributions, all of that. It’s similar to the first one, a lot of transparency and a lot of self-leadership.

Jamie: I know it’s, I’m going to be mixing up the metaphors here, but it also shows a lot of balls.

Lisa: Yeah, exactly! It does demonstrate, your directness demonstrates who you are as a leader and how you’ll be for the future in that company. Now, if somebody kind of gets squirmy about that and feels like oh, wow, she’s kind of ballsy. She’s kind of bitchy/bossy/demanding. Well, maybe you just don’t want to work there. There are other fish in the sea and move on. Move on. It’s time for you to take care of yourself, to put yourself first.

Jamie: This reminds me, I have clients who are disheartened. People who work in technology, women who work in technology and they see management is all dudes, no women. And they want to work for companies that have gender diversity. They want to see that, not only are they saying they’re going to honor diversity, they’re actually doing it.

Lisa: Yeah and it’s kind of invisible, right? In many tech companies. So, bro culture is so on steroids that it’s hard to kind of push your way through by yourself, which is hard. This might lead into another tip, which is to really, really be building alliances and building your influence so that when it comes time for project x or new project y or a promotion or a raise conversation, that you have people in your back pocket that will back you up and echo your value. And that, I know, is difficult when there isn’t anybody who looks like you, right? So, it is not an easy task in many companies and instances to develop that kind of influence, but it still needs to be a part of your plan.

Jamie: This happened to me in the last tech company I worked at. I was the manager and I did have a person reporting to me who looked like me. She was a young, Asian woman in her 30s and she wanted a raise and she asked me to pitch on her behalf for management because I met with them every day as part of the daily management meeting. So I did, and I remember when I brought up that she wanted a raise, they looked at me and they said, “You’re sure this is what she wants?” I’m like “Yes, this is what she wants!”

Lisa: Oh, interesting little turn there. Curious how they turned it on you, or was it more about, “What do you mean she’s asking for a raise?”

Jamie: You know, it’s possible that I may have asked for a little bit more than…

Lisa: Oh, what a great manager to have!

Jamie: Yeah, I went to bat for her and then I just, I don’t know, I fattened the ball? It’s a terrible metaphor. And then they were like, “Wait, is that what she wants?” I’m like, “Yeah! That’s what she wants! Of course, she wants more!”

Lisa: First of all, that’s a great use of influence and I’m curious, when she asked you that, did you have any little bias hackles going up? Did you have a perception about her?

Jamie: It’s possible that my perception, you know, it’s true, my bias may have been that she’s asking for too little.

Lisa: Oh, wow, okay! How interesting. You were really protecting her. You were a good manager. And that’s what we’re talking about, how great it is to learn these skills, it’s not just about advocating for yourself, although put your oxygen mask on first, right? But advocating for others and having the, not just the chops to do it, but the understanding that thereby you build engagement and longevity in your employees.

Jamie: Right. And you know, she did end up taking over for me when I left and she did...for three, two more years, I think? So, yeah, just as you mentioned, longevity, engagement, it did happen.

Lisa: There you go. That’s awesome.

Jamie: Yeah, yeah.

Lisa: I love that story. I don’t remember you telling me that one. That was great. You know, okay there’s another point... The third point then, or the third tip is to learn how to tell great stories. So you’ve told me two stories, I’ve told you the birth story and the negotiation story. These are critical to people buying what you sell, loving what you offer, getting to know who you are. And I’m talking about a story that has a beginning, middle, and end. Crisis, drama, and resolution.

So, it’s one thing for somebody to say, “Tell me about yourself,” and you say, you know, give them your career credentials, but if you can back up your credentials...usually if you do that, you sort of say who you are, people will say, “Well, give me an example of when blah blah blah,” and that is an opportunity for a real, live story. Think of Cinderella is a rags to riches story and she’s forced to go live with her mean old stepsisters, and then, lucky her, she gets this invitation, she gets to go to the ball and complications set it. The crisis and drama starts to happen where she doesn’t make it in time because of the pumpkin, she loses her slipper and everything works out in the end because the prince saves her.

Well, that’s not a great, feminist story to tell, but we can turn it on its head to look at how you want to have those kind of elements in your story so that people can see how things were working, how they broke down and what kind of strategies you employed to turn things around. And lessons learned from that process.

Jamie: Yeah, that’s a good point because I’ve been reading this book, Conflict Management, and in it, it says that MIT researchers found that feelings is the most influential factor in negotiation outcomes. People are influenced by how they feel about their partner, how they feel about the negotiation outcome, how they feel about themselves and how they’re doing in the negotiation. And stories is the best way to get people to feel.

Lisa: That’s right! You know you think about the old, what is it? Logos, ethos, pathos? Right? You use logic but logic with emotion is, human beings connect with that kind of thing, we need it to make decisions. And it’s part and parcel of all the work I pretty much do with every single client is to really get at all the accomplishments and contributions and the history of your work and what those accomplishments reveal as your strengths, your capacities, your skills. And those accomplishments have a story behind them. The better ones have stories and it’s about identifying those so you can tell them in the interview process but also as part of your ask when you actually get to the point of saying, here’s what I really want.

Jamie: That’s really interesting because I know you have an acting background and when I watch emotionally gripping dramas on Netflix or whatever, there’s always a story that the hero tells as they’re coming to a critical decision or they’re reaching this shocking agreement with the enemy. Basically, they’re negotiating!

Lisa: That’s exactly right and we have come to expect it. We want logic and feels. How many times have we read, maybe it’s in old literature, but you know, do not be emotional, do not… you know, feeling is different than being emotional. Inducing feeling through story causes the other person to...it’s one thing for me to say, “Hey, I’m really good at building Lego sculptures,” but if I tell the story about the last time I built a Lego sculpture and how many times it broke before I actually got it right, the other person is making all kinds of judgments and assessments and they’re making up their own story about your value. They’re seeing things that you might not even be meaning to convey. It’s like how somebody will read a piece of poetry and one person will say, “You know what I got out of that?” and they’ll talk about it and it will be completely different than what the author might have intended.

Jamie: Right, right.

Lisa: So it just allows people to...it’s show versus tell.

Jamie: Show versus tell.

Lisa: Demonstrate versus just the facts, ma’am. Yeah, it’s super powerful.

Jamie: Yeah. You do powerful work with your clients. So, I’m sure people who are listening to this podcast are saying wow, this is really great stuff. I want to learn how to tell better stories. So, where can they go to learn more about you, your work at She Negotiates?

Lisa: They can knock on my door in California and say hi. They can take a train from New York to L.A., no, you can find me at SheNegotiates.com and right from the homepage, leadership coaching and negotiation coaching are the two things we provide. And the occasional workshop, public workshop, so come on by. Sign up for the newsletter. Read the blog. See what you can learn. Lots of resources are downloadable on the website and come say hello!

Jamie: Alright, excellent. Well, Lisa, this has been really valuable and I really appreciate you taking the time again, and I will talk to you soon!

Lisa: Thank you so much, and great job on a really fun podcast.

Jamie: Thank you!

Interview with Simon Brady, CFP: How True are Truisms?

Simon Brady, CFP® is founder and principal of Anglia Advisors, a fee-only personal financial planning and investment management firm in New York specializing in a clientele of younger professionals in their 20s, 30s and early 40s as well as foreign nationals based in the US. He also hosts the Angles, The Anglia Advisors Podcast, on Anchor. 

If you are a working woman, if you are in a domestic partnership or marriage, or if you have children or family that you want to take care of, you won't want to miss this interview. 

We explored: 
- How and why women tend to be better investors than men
- The dangerous assumptions people often make in a domestic partnership or marriage
- How money or taxes have little to do with estate planning
- What to do today to ensure the best possible outcomes for your loved ones in case of worst case scenarios
- What the best kinds of investments are if you are a young professional
...and so much more

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Episode 28 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host, Jamie Lee. I work as a coach and my mission is to help ambitious people like you become bolder, braver, and better paid.

I just got this wonderful email from Natalia, who’s been following me on LinkedIn and she said she negotiated her salary increase by 30%. That’s awesome! Amazing job, Natalia!

Today I want to share with you an interview with Simon Brady, Certified Financial Planner, on what to do with the financial abundance that we negotiate.

What can we plan to do with this abundance that we negotiate and earn so that the people that we love the most - our family, our children, for example - can benefit the most into the future?

And also, what are some truisms? Truisms are true-ish, a lot of people believe them to be true, but they are not necessarily or absolutely true.

And some of these truisms hold us back from doing the right things so that the money that we earn, so that the financial abundance that we negotiate can be put to the best use possible in the long-term future for the benefit of people that we love the most.

And I think this is really important because, again, why are we bothering to negotiate and speak up and lead and influence? It’s so that we can thrive and so that our thriving abundance can benefit the people we love.

But also, why aren’t we doing the things that we know to be beneficial for the future, long-term? It’s because we have thoughts, we have beliefs about money, about women and money, about investing, about what it means to plan ahead for the future.

I’m going to kind of kick the tires on some of these truisms with Simon, who is a founder and principal of Anglia Advisors, a fee-only personal financial planning and investment management firm in New York. And he specializes in a clientele of younger professionals like you who are in their 20s, 30s and early 40s as well as foreign nationals based here in the US.

And I want to just let you know that Simon also has a podcast on the Anchor app platform. It’s called Angles: The Anglia Advisors Podcast and you might want to check out some of these awesome podcast episodes.

He talks about student loan debt repayment, which is big for some of my clients; estate planning, who needs it? why?; insurance, what is that all about?; procrastination, I know that’s a juicy topic; and stock picking and just so much more that I think will benefit the people who are ambitious, who are becoming bolder, braver and better paid.

Without further ado, here’s the interview with Simon Brady of Anglia Advisors. Enjoy!

Simon: Hi, Jamie!

Jamie: Hi, Simon! How are you?

Simon: I’m good. How are you?

Jamie: I’m doing great! Thanks so much for taking the time out of your busy day to answer my questions about financial truisms.

Simon: Yes, yes. Very happy to. Looking forward to the conversation.

Jamie: Yeah, so truisms, they kind of sound true-ish and a lot of people believe them but I want to question whether they really are true from the perspective of a financial planning expert. Hence, we have you!

Simon: Yes. The first three letters are actually somewhat misleading. Most truisms tend to fail scrutiny. But yes, I know there is a considerable amount of them that revolve around money and yeah, I’m looking forward to exploring that.

Jamie: Yeah. So let’s go to the biggest, the baddest one, at least for me. Men are better investors than women. Oof.

Simon: There is very little true in that and there’s plenty of data to back up that statement. I think before we necessarily look at whether it’s true or not, let’s explore why it is more important for women to be better investors than men.

Some of it’s very [audio dropped] The life expectancy of a female is about 81 years old compared to 76 for a man. A 65-year-old woman, the chances of a 65-year-old woman reaching the age of 90 is about 1 in 3. The chances of a 65-year-old man doing the same is about 1 in 5.

So, women live longer and life costs money. When you then throw in the gender pay gap, which is still around 80%, you’re talking about women living longer, having less social security available because they have earned less, generally, over their lives. And then let’s throw another thing into the mix which is that they spend fewer years in the workforce because they’re more likely to take time off to care for young children.

When you combine these three elements - the longer lifespan, the gender pay gap, and the fewer years in the workforce - the statistics I saw recently were that women are 80% more likely than men to be impoverished in retirement. And even if they save at a higher rate than men, and there’s evidence that they do, women will generally end up with smaller nest eggs.

So, this is why it is critical for women to learn to become good savers and investors and they cannot always rely on the husband to help out because the median age at which a female becomes a widow in the US is about 59 years old. Again, just pulling these statistics out, if you’re 85 years old, of 85 year-olds, 45% of men and 85% of women are likely to be widowed at that age.

Women are also less likely to remarry following divorce or widowhood. So, when you throw all these things together, it is critical that women take control of their finances because the statistics show that they’re more likely to be in difficulty in retirement and that they’re also less likely to have a partner to help them out at that time.

Jamie: So how true is it that men are better investors than women?

Simon: So, there’s plenty of evidence that shows that women, at about a 2 to 1 ratio of a man, favor a more comprehensive approach to their financial planning. So the men will tend to focus on what is the better rate of return that I can get on my investments? Which stocks or funds should I be buying? Whereas women will tend to also want to include in their workings with a financial advisor or a financial planner, they’re going to want to talk about estate planning as well. They’re going to want to talk about life insurance against the loss of a partner.

They’re more likely to take a more holistic approach to what’s going on, whereas men tend to focus on purely the investment side of things and just as an advisor with a significant number of couples and female clients, I can say, anecdotally, that that is absolutely the case.

Many couples I deal with, I find the men are looking very, very closely at the investment side of things, and then when the guy gets up to go to the bathroom, the wife leans over and says, “You know, we don’t have a will and I don’t really know where the money is and what if he were to die?” They tend to take a lot more holistic approach.

However, having said that, women tend to make a greater attempt to understand markets in general. They panic a lot less when things are tough, when markets get difficult, and this is sort of maybe counterintuitive to the caricature of women being more emotional than men. When it comes to money, it is absolutely not the case.

They are also more likely to take more reasonable levels of risk in the first place and the basis upon which they may make their investments are usually more - again, anecdotally, I can confirm this - usually more based on proper factors rather than a guy who is perhaps more likely to be more impulsive on the purchase side of things. Maybe his brother-in-law has this great stock tip. In other words, there’s a lot less overconfidence among women when it comes to making the investments in the first place and there’s a lot less knee-jerk reaction to panicking when things get difficult.

And it is very, very common for the American investors, in general, to lose money because they go into investments on very, very bad information and they get out as soon as things start to get difficult.  So, women are far less likely to show these behavioral traits.

Jamie: So, what I hear from you is that, first of all, we get to live longer. Women live longer and we save more and we take a more holistic approach. We’re more patient. We’re more resilient and maybe we’re also more calm in the eye of the storm. And these are all characteristics of a good investor.

Simon: Yes, and as I say there’s empirical data to show this. They did do a proper study in 2015, which was not a particularly good year for the markets, and they did find that women investing on their own lost an average of 2.5% that year compared with 3.8% for men. And this is because of this lower inclination to jump in and get out, which is the cause of the fact that most investors in the United States fail to even make the returns that the market offers because they jump in and jump out, which men are far more likely to do.

Bizarrely, though, in spite of everything we’ve just said, many women outsource the family finances to the man, the spouse, and then when there is a divorce or widowhood at some time, they can end up being financially paralyzed because, although they have these traits, they do not have the experience. They don’t know, necessarily, where the funds are. They haven’t been managing the family finances because they’ve tended to outsource it to the spouse.

Jamie: So, I hear that it’s kind of dangerous to just assume that men are better investors than women. It’s kind of a dangerous assumption to make. And speaking of assumptions, I talk about how that’s the worst thing you can do when you’re trying to negotiate, especially when you’re in communication with other people and so, again, I hear from you that just to assume that it’s better for the husband to take care of the money and take care of the investment, it could be a dangerous pitfall for a woman’s financial abundance.

Simon: Extremely, extremely dangerous, and not just necessarily for the woman’s financial abundance, but what you have in a couple is you have a team, and if they can work closely together on the family finances, two good things happen. One is that the traits that I’ve just described of women being less impulsive and generally better at investing will take the edge off the male spouse who may be left alone to his own devices. If it’s a joint effort, you can get benefits from both sides of the equation.

But more important than that is that the statistics are going to show that that woman is likely, either through divorce or widowhood, to be on her own at some point and will need to pick up the pieces in terms of running the family finance or running the finances of what could very well be her on her own then and if she has no experience of it, and in some cases not even knowledge of where the funds are and what they’re invested in, yes, they can be extremely dangerous.

Jamie: Yeah. I just want to add that you’re speaking to another dangerous assumption which is that if you are married or if you have a partner that this partner, your husband, your wife, whoever, needs to take care of you.

You know, people say, my husband, my wife, needs to take care of my needs and what I’m hearing from you and what I also know to be true for me is that I’m responsible for my own needs. I’m responsible for my own finances. That’s how I’ve structured my partnership. I’ve also seen this from the example of my parents’ divorce. I realized oh, I need to take care of myself!

Simon: Yes. It’s very common and I see it from, you know, 45-year-old women who don’t know how to pay a gas bill. Even though there’s money in the family, they don’t know where the assets are located and this is where things like estate planning and everything else come into play. I think if you have the kind of relationship where you can work together on these things, there are multiple advantages to be gained from that.

Another example is where, what’s very, very typical is that the husband will get a credit card, will put his wife as a named user on the card, they can exist like that for 20, 30 years and then the husband passes away and as a named card holder, the wife has not built any credit whatsoever on her own and when she needs to go out into the world on her own after the divorce or widowhood, she has no credit. She’s like a student out of college because all she’s had is this named card and the husband’s been taking all the credit for the credit.

Jamie: So, speaking of these worst case scenarios, you know them very well and you know them first hand. One of the other financial truisms is because I don’t have money, I don’t need estate documents or I don’t need to save for retirement or I can’t afford to invest.

I have a theory that this sort of truism is coming out of scarcity mentality that money is going to run out. That money is like a fixed pie. There’s only so much of it that you can get and so you have to scrimp and save and be very wary of how that money is spent. And so, I’d love to hear from you, from your financial planning perspective, do you see this to be true?

Simon: Do I see it to be true that this mentality exists? Absolutely. Is it a correct mentality? I don’t have a lot of money, I don’t need estate documents or I don’t need to save for retirement because I can’t afford to. Are those valid mentalities? Absolutely not. A lot of what is at the root of estate planning doesn’t have anything to do with money.

Jamie: What is estate planning?

Simon: So, estate planning really is a situation whereby while you are alive, competent, healthy to some degree or another, you are able to make plans for the people that you love as well as yourself for the circumstance where you are no longer alive, healthy or competent. Because once you cross that line from one to the other, there’s obviously very, very little you can do.

So, estate documents, estate planning is really not about you, because you’re gonna be dead, you’re not gonna care. It’s about the life and the process that your loved ones - your family members or your favorite charity or whoever you want to work on your legacy - how difficult their life is going to be when that moment comes.

And as I say, a lot of it is not to do with money. Because of recent tax changes, estate tax is barely an issue anymore. You have to be, as a married couple, one of you dying worth around about $22 million before you have to face any kind of federal and state tax, so the estate tax really has very little to do with it for 99% of the population.

What it is about is, obviously, when there are children involved, it’s guardianship because if you do not name a guardian in an estate document, in a will, the state, the court system will name one for you. And if they cannot find anyone they are comfortable with, the children will go into foster care in a case where there is no parent left.

So, if you have considerations regarding the upbringing of your children, whether it be their religion, whether it be however many siblings they have, whether you want to keep them together, you need to name somebody with whom you’ve had a very, very long discussion beforehand about what is going to happen to those children and what kind of upbringing they’re going to have in the case where there are no parents left. When I say children, I’m talking about people who are under 18.

You also have to consider yourself as well, in terms of incapacitation. That’s something else that’s covered by estate documents. If you’re hit by a car and you’re no longer able to make medical decisions for yourself, who do you want making those medical decisions? Who do you want hiring, firing doctors? Who do you want to make that awful decision as to whether to turn off the machine or to leave it going? And you need to nominate somebody for that and you need to have a long conversation with them about what you want to happen in these kind of circumstances.

So, it’s not just about what happens to my money. It’s about what you want to happen to you on a healthcare front and also, obviously, when there’s children involved.

Jamie: I can see why people would want to avoid doing estate documents because it’s scary and it’s uncomfortable to think about being incapacitated or deceased and the easy thing for our mind, for our brains to do is to avoid difficult things, avoid difficult conversations.

But as you said, it has nothing to do with whether or not you have money. You could be making $20,000 a year and you’d still be best served if you did the planning because that’s how you serve the people you love in your life.

Simon: Right. It’s scary, but it’s not as scary and uncomfortable as it actually happening.

Jamie: Yeah, good point! Thank you.

Simon: And you can break estate documents down. You can break them down as well. If you generally do not have a lot of money and you die without a will, the state has rules about where that money will go. Let’s take your example of $20,000. You have $20,000 in the bank. You die without a will. That $20,000, that you have not specified where it goes, if you have a spouse, it will generally go to the spouse. If you do not have a spouse or children, it will generally start moving up the curve to your parents.

And if you are comfortable with the direction that the money will move for you dying without a will then, you know, I can generally see, for someone who’s single, who doesn’t own any property, doesn’t have any kids and is quite happy for their parents to get whatever money they have, okay, don’t go out and spend $2,000 on a will. But get the healthcare proxy done, which I mentioned before about naming the proxy for your healthcare. Those documents are available online for free to be downloaded. They don’t even need to be notarized.

Jamie: Hmm. Okay, so money is no excuse here, then.

Simon: Money is no excuse. I mean, I think everybody over the age of 18 should have a health care proxy. Even though it’s bundled in with the concept of estate planning, it’s something that should be just absolutely normal. If you put health care proxy and your state, you’ll find a form, all it needs is two witnesses and there’s plenty of documentation about how to have the difficult conversations with people.

Jamie: Yeah, good!

Simon: And then the moment you have kids, of course, then you’re into needing a will because you need to start laying out guardianship provision.

Jamie: Yeah. So, could we have a chat about this resistance to saving or investing? Saving for the retirement or investing. You feel like I’m making $30,000, $20,0000 or $30,000. I don’t have money. I can’t do that. I can’t afford it. Is that true?

Simon: In some cases, it is genuinely true. I mean, there are some people who have obligations in terms of, whether it be rent, food, and there literally is nothing left over at the end. In those cases, it is a little difficult to be very preachy about oh, you should be saving money for retirement.

But most people, when it really comes down to it, are not in that situation. Most people, and again, you and I live in New York where we see a little bit of a bubble. But most people, when it comes down to examining their spending and what they’re actually spending money on, could reallocate some of that spending to assets that are very, very different from what they’re spending on.

I mean, I haven’t got the data in front of me, but when you look at the spending on lottery tickets by low-income individuals, it’s terrifying. It’s absolutely terrifying.

Jamie: Can I just interject here? My mom used to buy them all the time.

Simon: There’s libraries of studies on this thing. A lottery ticket really has, statistically, zero chance of making you any money in terms of a return on investment standpoint but the people who can afford to buy lottery tickets don’t buy them and people who can’t afford do.

So, to get back to your question, it really is a matter of taking a good long look at what you are spending on and there’s plenty of tools to do that these days from going through a credit card statement to sites like Mint.com which you link your bank account and your credit cards to and will then show you what you’re spending money on.

The sad fact is that, in order to maintain the lifestyle that you have while you’re working, on the day you retire, as a general rule of thumb, you need to have in the bank about 20x what you are earning in that final year to be able to get through. And again, to get back to the female thing, possibly women need more than that because they’re going to live longer than men.

We cannot rely on the pensions that our parents and grandparents used to get, where, generally, you would get income for the rest of your life. We’re now in a world of 401(k)s and IRAs where you have to make the contributions and the stream of income is not guaranteed until you die. So, you really are responsible for your own retirement. Social security, while I don’t think it’s going to disappear, is barely above poverty level in terms of what it provides.

Jamie: Yeah. So, Simon, I think this would be a great place to transition to the last truism I want to discuss with you, which is: salary is king, no matter what. Because, you know, we talked about the need for saving 20x your income. When I heard that, I’m like, woah! I need to save a lot more money, right?

People who are listening to my podcast, they’re also interested in growing their income by showing up as leaders and negotiating for what they want but there’s also this truism that salary is king, no matter what. And I think there’s a bit of emotional element to it, that this base salary reflects the respect that I get and I often have to coach my clients to think about the other compensation components, so I’d love to hear your thoughts on that.

Simon: Certainly. And just to clarify one thing, obviously, I’m not suggesting that people save 20x their salary. I’m really sort of saying that by the time they retire they need to have 20x their salary sitting there. Saving 20x your salary is a little tricky.

This is a truism to some degree that I have some sympathy for and I think that you and I will look at it in slightly different terms. So, the way you’ve expressed it to me just now is you’re looking at the salary as a component part of an overall package which could include very good or not very good health insurance, life insurance, flexible spending accounts, other…

Jamie: 401(k) contribution matches…

Simon: 401(k) matches, exactly. Non-salary benefits, that when you sit down and turn those into dollars and cents can be a very, very interesting alternative to a certain amount of salary. However, when I look at these things, I tend to bundle them a little bit more together. The way I look at what you’re asking is that I would just replace the word ‘salary’ with ‘ income’ and say income is king no matter what. I would say yes, in some degree.

An example of this would be, you’re going to go out and spend $2500 on getting a designation or going out and getting some education that could legitimately lead to a $10,000 raise at work if you had it, that is $2500 very, very well spent. That’s a far better rate of return than taking that $2500, putting it in a 401(k) and making a sort of 8%, 9%, 10% return on it over a long period of time.

So, the way I’m reading your question is perhaps a little different to the way you interpret it. I think spending money on your career and on the advancement of your career, if that does involve getting designations, qualifications or anything of that nature, is money very well spent and I would condone somebody reducing their 401(k) contributions for a certain period of time in order to fund something like that which will have a positive long-term effect.

Jamie: Well, thank you for that, because people do invest in working with a coach like me or a career coach or a performance coach so that they can increase their income and that has a huge impact on their financial abundance. What about when people transition from working full-time to part-time?

Simon: That can obviously be a very stressful time for people because, suddenly, no longer are they not getting, perhaps, the health care coverage that they were used to, but they’re now having to go out and pay for that health care coverage. I think both you and I have experience at this, having worked on the W-2, salary basis and then gone off on our own and it is quite shocking the amount of expenses that you were very comfortable assuming were going to be there when you were working for an employer that are no longer there.

I would say that transitioning from full-time to part-time needs to be something that’s very, very planned and a financial runway should be built in advance of that. I think waking up one morning and saying screw this job, I’m gonna go out and be an entrepreneur this afternoon is a very, very, very, very dangerous thing to do. I think it should be well planned and well thought out and specifically saved for. But yeah, be aware, in advance, of what you’re losing when you walk out of that office for the last time.

Jamie: Yeah. So, just to summarize some of the talking points: I heard from you that women actually tend to be better investors than men. It is rather dangerous to assume that men are better investors than women and to entrust them with all of the finances if you are in a household, and everyone benefits from having estate documents. If you are 18 and older and you have people who are relying on you, people whom you love, that you want to take care of even when you are incapacitated or deceased, estate documents have nothing to do with money because you can even set them up for free. And everyone can benefit from saving for retirement, but you agree that income, being able to grow that income, is a top priority. Probably especially for people in your clientele who tend to be in their 20s, 30s, and 40s because that’s the period when they’re growing their income potential at the greatest levels.

Simon: Very much so.

Jamie: Yeah, yeah. And we need to be more careful when we decide to quit our jobs and do our own thing as you and I have done. We need to plan ahead is the biggest takeaway that I’m gaining from this conversation. So, before you go, I just have two more quick questions. The first is: do you have specific tips or suggestions for people who want to create financial abundance?

Simon: I think you’ve touched on a few of them. Now I would say maintain a degree of independence, even if you are in a financially dependent relationship, such as a marriage, and make sure that the two partners in the relationship are as equal as they can possibly be. Not necessarily in terms of what they earn but in terms of what they are doing with their finances. Some things, in terms of 401(k)s and IRAs, you have to do it individually but I would say the financial abundance can result from great teamwork between couples.

I would also say know what you don’t know. Be aware of what you don’t know. Don’t go this route alone if you really are not inclined to devote the time, effort and education that’s required to do this. This is a little bit of a plug for using a financial planner. If my car breaks down, starts making funny noises, I’m going to the mechanic because I recognize I know nothing about cars and not everybody is able to handle this kind of stuff on their own. So I would recommend, and again, this is something, by the way, that women are far better at than men, seeing the limits of what they can do and being inclined to reach out for outside help.

Jamie: So where can people go to learn more about you and your services?

Simon: So there are a couple of different types of financial advisors, the ones who seek out clients, and there are ones who sort of await clients and I tend to be in the second category. I’m a CFP, so that’s a Certified Financial Planner. I have my own firm, it’s angliaadvisors.com which you can see details of at www.angliaadvisors.com.

But more important than coming to me is coming to the right kind of financial advisor. Make sure that any financial advisor you go to and I fall into this category is what’s known as a fiduciary. It’s extremely important that that advisor is required by law to work in your best interests at all times. If you go to a product salesman financial advisor, he is not covered by that rule and he will work in a world that has a lot of conflicts of interest where he is paid by how much he sells you. There is an alternative these days and that’s to pay a fee for financial services whereby the advisor is not incentivized to sell you garbage or sell you anything at all because the compensation method is such that you’re paying a fee and therefore there are no conflicts of interest.

Jamie: Good to know.

Simon: You can find those kind of people at cfp.net. There’s a search there or Financial Planning Association in your local state or you can come to my website as I say at Anglia Advisors.

Jamie: Thank you so much, Simon. You know, my mission is to help people, ambitious people, get bolder, braver and better paid so I think this is really valuable information for them to take and consider, especially that they can have and create financial abundance and make it work for them and for the people that they love. So, again, thanks so much for your valuable time and your expertise and I will talk to you soon!

Simon: Thanks a lot, Jamie. Take care.

Jamie: You too. Bye Bye!

Simon: Bye.

Word-by-Word Script for Leveraging an Offer to Get and Improve Another Offer

Let's say you're an information systems manager interviewing for a new job. You are a strong performer who consistently delivers on projects and assignments.

According to your research, the median base salary for this role is $105,000. Your current pay is $80,000, but you haven't revealed this because you know that past salary questions are becoming a thing of the past. Your past salary has no bearing on your future potential.

So with the new job, you're looking to close the salary gap and to stretch your capacity for higher-level work.

You've interviewed with several leading companies in your field, including Apricot Corp. and Bananas Inc.

Apricot Corp. just extended a verbal offer for $100K. But you're most excited to work with Banana, Inc. with whom you're still in the interview process.

So what do you do to expedite the process and improve the odds of you getting a compelling offer from Banana?

Here's a sample email script with my strategy notes:

Dear Bananas Hiring Manager,

I appreciate you taking the time last week to talk with me, and I'm excited by this opportunity to contribute to your team.

I understand Banana Inc. is looking to grow its functions in a more efficient manner. I'm confident that with my experience in X, Y, and Z and my dedication to excellence, I'll be able to hit the ground running when I join the team.

• To borrow the words of my client who recently negotiated a $15K salary increase, "be awesome to everyone." Continue concurrent conversations with contenders in a positive, collaborative way.
• Note the subjunctive mood of "when I join the team." It expresses enthusiasm and confidence.

In the spirit of transparency, I wanted to let you know that I received a competitive offer from one of the companies I'm interviewing with.

• There's no need to go into specifics or reveal names. The fact that you have an offer is a clear signal to them that you're a desirable and hire-able candidate worth pursuing.

I'm also talking with a few other companies, so I can't get into the specifics of the offer until I'm closer to making a decision. 

• You're letting them know you have multiple options (more options = more power = more leverage).
• You're also respectfully giving a reason why you can't go into specifics while communicating your boundaries.

I've been asked to make a decision by end of the month. But I'd really like to work with Banana team and on the exciting and unique opportunities that we discussed last week. So I'm curious to know if there's a way we can make this work.

• Create urgency with the imposed deadline.
• The language is empathetic with a focus on mutually beneficial solutions -- no ultimatums, which would put the relationship at risk. (Check out Haseeb Qureshi's article: How Not to Bomb Your Offer Negotiation)

Would you let me know if it would be possible to expedite the interview process?

• Get buy-in on the expedited interview process. This would give you a clear signal of whether they're serious about hiring you.
• If no, then part ways cordially. They'd do you a favor by saving you the time and energy of pursuing a dead end.
• If yes, then they may either ask about the details of the competing offer. Better yet, they may extend a verbal offer to not lose you as a candidate.
• At which point, you can do them a favor by letting them know what would make a compelling offer for you: Salary that's commensurate with the going market rate, competitive benefits, or specific perks that align with your personal goals.
• In the mean time, you can also ask Apricot Corp. to improve its offer to meet or exceed the going market rate of $105,000.

Every negotiation conversation is an opportunity for you to lead, by demonstrating your capacity to communicate and to create solutions that are in the best interest of everyone.

My guess is that you might be held back by the voices of the Itty Bitty Should-y Committee who clamor when you brave change. They say, "You can't do that," or "Who says you can ask for that much more?"

It takes courage to negotiate anyways.

Let's be brave,

Jamie

P.S. Can I help you? I specialize in helping my clients shift their mindset so that they can lead, negotiate, and thrive. I also work with my clients on co-creating custom scripts so they can ask for what they want and become bolder, braver, and better paid. Email me at jamie@jamieleecoach.com for details.

Your Future Potential

What is your future potential? What are you doing about it? There are three types of responses to this question: 1. Avoid thinking about your future potential out of fear of disappointment 2. Define your present and future by your past 3. Own your future and embrace that path to actualizing your future potential is paved with failure. In this episode I share what it means to have future potential, how to take action to fulfill your future potential, and examples from my life and from my coaching practice. “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.” - Eleanor Roosevelt

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to the episode 26 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee. My mission is to help ambitious people become bolder, braver and better paid.

Recently I’ve been focused on doing one-on-one coaching deep dives with my clients to help them lead a thriving life and career because I believe we’re all born to thrive.

In this process, I’m learning that one of the things that sets my ideal clients apart from others is that they are excited, they are motivated by their future potential.

So, I’m curious.

What is your future potential?

What is the future you want to create?

Or in other words, what’s your dream?

When I ask this question, I typically get three types of responses.

The first type is they actively avoid their future potential out of fear of disappointment. They say, “You know, it’s overwhelming to me to think about my future potential because when I start thinking about what I want to create in the future, my mind automatically goes to how it can all go wrong and I have evidence from my past to prove it will go wrong because it has gone wrong. That experience was so painful. I don’t think I can live with that disappointment ever again. So I’d rather not think about it. I’d rather stick to what I’m familiar with. Sure. I know I’ll get the same predictable results, the same-old-same-old. But you know what? I’d rather live with that than risk the status quo.”

Familiar with this type? They’re not very happy. But they’re getting by. And they want to stay that way and so they do.

The second type of response is the most common. They define their present and their future by their past. They say, “You know, in the past, I have done x, y, and z. So I can probably do x, y, and z in the future. I see myself as a person who does x, y, and z.”

And when I’m helping my clients with their unique value proposition statement as part of their negotiation strategy, we work on articulating their contributions and accomplishments, but often the emphasis is on past contributions and accomplishments only.

If you are curious about this process, I encourage you to check out episodes 8, 9 and 10 on how to articulate your unique value, which, I want to add, is not defined by your past contributions only.

There is tremendous value in your future potential if you can articulate it in a compelling way.

So, the last type, number three. This type, they own it. They own their future potential. They embrace that failure is not a barrier, but the path to creating the future that they want.

They say, “I want to make a positive impact in the world. In the future, I want to lead and I’m starting now by leading by my example and in my actions. I’m already contributing now but in the future, I will contribute in a bigger way and that possibility excites me. And for this future, I’m willing to be courageous today. I’m willing to be brave today. I’m willing to be generous because I will create abundance that benefits others. I’m committed to taking small, tiny steps every day to make that future a reality. Sure, I make plenty of mistakes and I fail often because I’m only human but I own my mistakes and I learn from my failures. I am learning by doing and failing is the best way to learn.”

This type, they articulate their future potential. They’re going to contribute more value, they’re going to lead, they’re going to make a positive impact. They take consistent and committed action to realize their future potential. This is my ideal client.

Here’s the thing about your future potential: it can be big. It can be audacious. Or it can be small. It can be specific. It can be anything you want. It can be anything that you can imagine.

I have a client who wants to become COO of an established tech company.

I have another client who wants to start her own consulting business and have more freedom to enjoy time with her family.

I have another client who wants to lead an international business that benefits third world countries.

I have another client who wants to create abundance so that she can become a patron of the arts. And I want to create a million-dollar coaching practice that creates exponential results for my clients.

Our future potential is our dream. It’s our desire for a bigger, bolder future that motivates us today to take action, to speak up, to brave uncomfortable asks. Our future potential drives our actions in the now.

But of course, by definition, the future has not arrived yet. By definition, whatever it is that we want in the future is impossible until the very moment it happens. So, until the very moment it happens, your future potential is just a thought. It’s a very powerful thought.

And this blew my mind when it dawned on me that your future potential only exists in the mind of those who believe in it and who can perceive it.

What you think of your future creates your future.

And that’s because your thought creates emotions that inspire action that generates results.

So, let me give you some concrete examples from my own life. When I was a kindergartener in South Korea - I was born in South Korea - my kindergarten teacher asked what I wanted to be when I grow up. And I gave this a thought and I realized I wanted to become a teacher or a writer and this thought of becoming a teacher or writer as an adult generated feelings of desire to learn and to grow and I followed through on that by reading a ton of books as a young kid and the result is that my dream has come true.

Now I teach and I coach adults on how to communicate and lead so that they can thrive. Every day I’m writing something to propel my coaching business, to prepare the podcast episodes like this one or to communicate or to prepare for my talks.

When I was maybe around 6 or 7, my father decided to emigrate the family to America. And he had a dream. He dreamed that his daughters would get an American education which is top notch and to become fluent in English. He believed that the ability to speak English would be the key that unlocks our future potential in America.

So, he had the desire for a better future for his daughters and he followed through on that by taking action, by moving us here and by working incredibly hard. My parents hardly took a vacation. I don’t think they ever took a vacation when I was a kid.

And you know what? His dream came true!

Now, three sisters, all of us, are fluent in English and some other languages and we are all college educated. We are all gainfully employed and we are all happy, functioning adults, and we all make more money than our parents did as immigrant shopkeepers.

Yeah, it’s real. It really moves me to think about that.

And when I was a high school student, by that time, my parents got a divorce, and I was living with my mother. So she was, by then, raising the three of us by herself as a single mom while running a small business and she wanted me to win scholarships to pay for my college education. She had a thought that Jamie can do it! So she sat me down and she told me she could pay exactly $2,000 per year for my college education.

She trusted I would figure it out. She trusted I would make it work. She trusted in my future potential.

And her dream came true! I applied to and I got into Smith College and I got a full ride my first year. You know, it probably helped that I came from a single-parent family with two other sisters and I worked incredibly hard as well and in the subsequent years, my mom paid just about $2,000 and the rest was covered by college grants. So, her dream came true.

And when I was younger, I see that my future potential was dreamed up. It was simply dreamed up by me and by my parents. And we worked hard to realize that potential because they believed in my future potential. They made huge sacrifices. They moved the family across the world. They worked really, really hard. And they did everything in their power to help actualize that dream, to help actualize my potential.

And I imagine that as you are listening to this, you can relate to my story. Even if you are not an immigrant from Asia, even if you didn’t go to college on scholarships, there was a part of you that dreamt of your future as a kid. There were people and adults along the way who believed in your future potential and they helped you get where you are today.

When we’re young, we dream. We plan for the future. We work towards it. But once we become adults, a lot of us stop dreaming of our future potential and we just start living by default. We just start living by defining our present and future by our past.

It was the same case for me.  For many years after college, it was very hard for me to imagine my future potential in a way that felt good, in a way that felt exciting, in a way that motivated me to do better, to show up, to brave uncomfortable conversations.

And now I realize that was because I had become so comfortable and familiar with school and its rules and regulations were the first 17 years of my most formative years. I knew school. I did school well. I identified as a student by my past whose future potential was become a better student.

And in the 10+ years since college and until now, I went through a period of time where I didn’t feel like I had a future potential because I couldn’t dare dream of something impossible, something that hadn’t yet happened in my life.

It was hard for me to dream of a future that was not defined by my past. And now, I’m in my mid-thirties, I’m still very young, and I’m reclaiming my future. My future need not be defined by my past or even by my present, because it’s just whatever I can imagine. It’s whatever desire, whatever I can dream of.

And I know that, from experience, what I dream of, what I can imagine, is my future potential and I have the ability to actualize that future potential.

So, I choose to believe in my future.

I choose to practice thinking in a way that generates this feeling of excitement, motivation and desire, because I know that this feeling of excitement, motivation, and desire will lead me to taking action, lead me to taking risks, lead me to creating podcasts like this one and that I trust it can make the kind of impact that I can imagine.

In other words, my future potential, my dream, drives me to create a bolder, braver and bigger tomorrow.

My future potential drives me to work hard to create that million-dollar coaching practice that creates exponential results for my clients.

It will be impossible until the moment it happens. It will be impossible at the moment I see a million dollars in my account or whatever, but I know that if I can dream it, I can do it.

So, what is your dream?

How will you make your future potential a reality?

I’d love for you to sit with that, think about it, dream about it, journal about it. Something magical happens when you write your dreams and goals down and there’s tons of research to support this as well.

Tell me about it! Feel free to reach out. I’m jamie@jamieleecoach.com and I’m really excited to hear about your exciting future potential and what awesome action you take today to help make that a reality. I know that your future potential has the power to create your future and that your future potential has the power to help you lead a thriving life and career. Talk to you soon. Bye!

Interview with Erin Davis, Change Agent and Connector

Erin Davis is Director of Global Talent Engagement at Stantec, an international design and consulting company headquartered in Canada. Erin connects with individuals, teams, and the community to talk about why inclusion and diversity are key differentiators for business success. Erin is a founding member of Works for Women, a group dedicated to making Alberta a better place for women to work. She also co-founded The Confidence Retreat, which brought a group of successful women together to talk about career strategy and help them outside their comfort zones. 

We discussed: 
- What it takes to negotiate successfully for our careers
- How to engage in conversations that win allies in the workplace
- What large leading companies like Stantec are doing to close the gender gap
...and so much more

Learn more about Works for women here:www.worksforwomen.org/ 
Learn more about The Confidence Retreat here: 
www.instagram.com/thecretreat/?hl=en

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Full Episode Transcript

Jamie:  Hello! Welcome to episode 25 of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host, Jamie Lee. I work as a coach for women on the rise and today I am really thrilled to have a special guest with me.

Her name is Erin Davis and Erin works as Director of Global Talent Engagement at Stantec. She’s based in Canada.

And Erin is whom I would call a powerhouse.

She is really impressive and she is super dedicated to helping raise the status of women.

What Erin does is she connects with individuals, teams in the community to talk about why inclusion and diversity is a key differentiator for business success. I love that.

Erin is also a founding member of Works for Women which is a group committed to making Alberta, in Canada, a better place for women to work.

And she also co-founded the Confidence Retreat which brought a group of successful women together to talk about career strategy and help them outside their comfort zones.

Oooo, it’s good stuff.

When she told me about the Confidence Retreat earlier this year, I was like, “Wow, I wanna go!” I love that you are going to get pushed out of your comfort zone at the Confidence Retreat because that’s where magic happens.

I first met Erin at the Catalyst Conference on International Women’s Day last year. I spoke on a panel about women and negotiation in the workplace and Erin reached out to me via email after the talk and it’s so rare that people take action like that when they see a speaker they like, when they see a leader that they admire. A lot of people say Oh, that’s great, I would love to be in touch with that person, but not take action.

Erin, however, she reached out to me, she wrote me an email, and actually, I led a negotiation workshop for Stantec in the New York office last Fall thanks to Erin.

So she is a connector, she is somebody who takes action, she is an advocate for women and she is amazing. She is a powerhouse.

So without further ado, I hope you enjoy this interview with Erin Davis.

Jamie: Hello!

Erin: Hi, Jamie.

Jamie: Hi, Erin. How are you?

Erin: I’m well, how are you?

Jamie: I’m doing excellent. Thanks so much for taking the time for this interview.

Erin: It’s my pleasure.

Jamie: Awesome. So, I’d love to hear, because we talk about negotiation and leadership and we met through a talk on that very topic last year at the Catalyst Conference. So, I’m curious to hear from you. I’d love to hear about a negotiation in your life or career that had the biggest impact on you and I’m curious to learn how did you engage, what did you ask for, and what did you learn?

Erin: So, this is a really interesting question for me and I sort of self-reflected on how I would answer it because I think I’m able to answer it better on behalf of the organization that I work for and the work that I do specifically around diversity and inclusion and help empower women to do their best work.

And certainly, it forced me to really think about my own career path and potentially how I actually took my own advice to heart and looked at negotiation.

So, I actually went back and looked at the definition of negotiation because often my brain goes to negotiation of salary, but that’s not something that necessarily happens every day. So I tried to think back on some examples of negotiation throughout the last year and some of my work practices, and I think for me, I’ve always thought about negotiation as reaching some sort of agreement, but really, trying to better understand where the other person’s mind is at to get us to a better resolution.

And I think part of my personality is always knowing where I want to end up and knowing the pathway isn’t always clear and so, figuring out how to maneuver that way. And so, I think a big negotiation for me, even though I didn’t necessarily think about it this way until I thought about this question is landing in the role that I’m currently in.

I lead part of the HR strategy for a really large organization and I don’t really have a background in HR and so I really had to work hard at letting people know why I would be really great at this role and really I guess “negotiating” with the right people in the right positions of, I would say, influence to let them know that I would be a qualified candidate for this role that I’m now in.

Jamie: Excellent. I love that you looked up the word “negotiation.” It’s something that I tend to do often, even though, well because I teach it. I’m like, okay, so what is it?

Erin: No, it’s a really good point because I think sometimes we hear a word so often and the best example for me that comes up quite often is the word “feminist” and when people bring that up for certain people it holds, like, a really positive connotation, and for others, it holds, like deep-rooted, like, pain almost.

So even with negotiation, it doesn’t have to be thought of in a negative way but I think quite often it is thought of like, okay, well I need to win this and I’m moving into like, what’s my game plan for this and I ultimately think in my work we need to be able to have open conversations and dialogue and I have to believe that through those conversations we can get to a better result.

Jamie: Absolutely. Right. So, my definition is negotiation is simply a conversation with the intention of reaching agreement and it’s beautiful when you do reach agreement, and sometimes you don’t. That’s a totally okay outcome.

I’d love to hear more about how you were able to understand what was going on in the minds of your negotiation counterpart.

Erin: Oh, that’s a really good question! I would actually go back to what we were just talking about and say that it is through conversation.

I would say that a lot of my pathway has been forged in my career around understanding what I’m passionate about and letting that lead a lot of the work that I do and it’s maybe a bit counterintuitive to how I’ve grown up in my career and trying to reach that next level and I don’t think about it that way anymore.

So, through that “negotiation” and understanding what was in the minds of those that I was talking to, it was just an open dialogue and really understanding what they were looking to find and understanding how I could potentially fit in there.

And then my personality is also like, well, how can I help shape this and make it better? Because I always want to leave room for opportunity with whatever role that I take on.

Jamie: Yeah. Now, I’m gonna use a word that sometimes has people roll their eyes, but what I hear from what you just told me is that you live with your heart.

Erin: Yes! And that is sometimes a very difficult word and I reflect on it often with the organization that I work for because the kind of default description is always, well, we’re a bunch of engineers and we certainly actually are not a bunch of engineers.

We definitely have a lot of technical minds and that doesn’t mean that we’re without emotions. We may choose to not tap into them all the time, but the one common thread amongst everyone is that we are all human and we all have a heart and that is part of what makes us human and so I am a very strong believer in understanding and leading with your heart and not only your head and it’s a balance between the two, certainly.

Jamie: Right, right. Because when you spoke about how passionate you are about working in this field of diversity and inclusion, you weren’t sitting there calculating okay, how do I get what I want?

You were really leading with what you stand for with your core personal values, and then you let that inform the conversation, be open to hearing the other side, be flexible in the moment. So, I think that worked out really beautifully because you brought your heart.

Erin: I think that’s my biggest advice whenever I have a conversation with someone about, you know, how have you navigated your career? And when you get to a place of leading with your heart, it helps you carve out the pathway that you need to go on and then you’re not trying to fit yourself into boxes which is a really, I guess, a different way to think about things but certainly has been very powerful for me thus far.

Jamie: Yeah. Sorry for all the sirens, actually, I’m in New York City and it’s very typical to hear a lot of noise. Yeah, So, that said, what top three pieces of advice do you have for other women? And in this topic of negotiation and especially for women in the workplace, we have to address the gender wage gap and the gender blowback.

So from your vantage point, since you have both the position and the experience, I’m really curious to hear what advice you would share.

Erin: Yeah, I guess I can share advice from a couple different points of view. I would certainly say from within my role and what we’re trying to do within our organization is understand the data that exists when it comes to the gender wage gap.

We’re a publicly traded company, so on an annual basis, we release a sustainability report that actually shows data that men are making more money than women but we are now putting together a team to actually look and understand why does that gap exist?

And I would say that part of my belief in the numbers is that we just don’t have as many women at the tops of organizations and so there’s some work that organizations need to do in this equation to help make the system work better for women. And so I think that that’s something that’s gonna be out there that women are gonna have to work with.

So my piece of advice for them is: have as many conversations as you can, whether or not it’s with your peers or your networks or previous bosses or your current boss because the more information we can gather, the better we are able to negotiate what we want. And so I think that’s a big thing, a lesson I’ve learned, and through my conversations with other women is we don’t always necessarily talk to each other about these topics and so I think that we need to because with a joint force moving forward and saying that this is what we want out of our jobs and out of our careers will have a positive impact from the grassroots level in helping organizations understand how they need to change some of their policies and practices.

And then the last piece of advice that I would give is really thinking from a personal perspective, and like we just talked about with leading with our hearts. I think that that’s a thing that women need to do and don’t necessarily try to fit yourself into a box and really take the time to understand what you are really good at, who you are, and lead with that because that will help carve your path. I think that big organizations need to understand that that’s how the workforce is starting to move and people are really getting tied to their purpose and they want to lead with that and so if we want these high potential people and individuals to come and work at our organizations, we need to create that structure internally that supports their wants.

Because we don’t want them coming into the organization, we don’t want women coming into the organization excited to do the work, but then seeing all of these barriers that exist for them moving up in the organization and potentially seeing this data that says, well, does my male colleague who does the same work make more money than I do? Well, how is that fair and why would I want to work at an organization where that exists? Certainly, we’re addressing that, but there’s things that the individual can do on a day-to-day basis to create change as well.

Jamie: Yeah. It’s one of the tenets of negotiation, which is: know what you want and why. In other words, find yourself.

Erin: Mm-hmm.

Jamie: Yeah. I think that’s very important and it’s really wonderful to hear that your organization is taking steps, proactive steps to address, to shed light on a problem so that we can all take part in fixing it.

Yeah, so I’d love to hear more about your work. Last time we chatted, we briefly discussed your work around unconscious bias in the workplace. So, tell us more.

Erin: Yeah, so that actually is one of the central tenets of our work with looking at the wage gap is also pairing the world of unconscious bias and raising awareness in providing training related to where do our unconscious biases sit? How are they showing up and causing us to make certain decisions within our work that could result in a barrier to the advancement of women or the advancement of other underrepresented groups within our organization?

So, certainly from a holistic perspective for diversity and inclusion, or I’m trying to change my language and say inclusion and diversity because we definitely want to lead with inclusion and building those diverse teams so that every individual can feel that they are a part and can play a role in that team.

So, the unconscious bias training is saying are there things that are pre-programmed in our brains? And we’re not saying that it’s wrong, it’s based on the experiences that we’ve had throughout our lives and how that’s showing up for us and could we rethink how we do things?

And certainly, that shows up in so many different ways in a large organization and so step one is awareness.

Let’s talk about it. Let’s have some uncomfortable conversations

An example of that would be at certain levels of the organization do we just go out and strategically hire someone into the organization because we see them doing a really great job in whatever role that they’re playing and we want them in the organization?  

And so we go and hand-pick someone to bring into the organization instead of going out and saying we’re going to actually post this role and see who else may apply because if you’re not in that circle, you’re not in that network to know the hiring manager, then it’s a lost opportunity for you to say that, actually, I would be really great at this role.

And so we are addressing it from the point of view of who are we actually going to look at bringing into the organization? So from an attraction perspective, who do we actually want to retain in the organization? So what are the sort of unspoken rules that happen within our organization that are showing certain people having the ability to advance and maybe others not necessarily having the ability to advance?

And certainly that comes through promotions as well and who are we promoting and who are we not promoting? And so there’s so many different angles that we can look at from the unconscious bias perspective, but we’re starting with raising that awareness and saying, let’s stop and pause, and it’s actually quite simple. Let’s just stop and take a pause when we’re thinking about some of these big decisions that are impacting others in the organization.

Jamie: That’s really fascinating. So, what it sounds like is the organization doing introspection.

Erin: Yeah, and it’s actually pretty leading edge, I would say, in the work that we do. We are an engineering and design consultancy firm and I think that, historically, we’ve seen a lot of male domination in what we would call the STEM fields, so science, technology, engineering, and math.

And so there’s a really big push, even outside of our world, to say we want more women and actually more minority groups and that’s certainly a term that we use a lot here in Canada. But underrepresented groups, we want them coming in, and we want their points of view and we want their thoughts at the table and the research is out there. We all know that building diverse teams leads to greater innovation but if we aren’t purposeful about creating that situation to have those diverse teams, it’s not gonna happen by accident.

Jamie: Right. And our brains are hardwired to look for safety and comfort and people who look, act, and talk like us.

Erin: Absolutely.

Jamie: Yeah.

Erin: And you know, I think the hardest part in this work is often the best way to raise that awareness for someone is to find their personal story. And for them to figure out the A-ha! of Oh my goodness, I never realized, I hadn’t thought about it in that way before. Because, yes, you’re a hundred percent right, we, I shouldn’t use the term lazy, but we are kind of programmed to do things the way we’ve always done them. And so that will be our default, so it takes up a little bit of extra energy to think a little bit differently.

But let me tell you, what’s on the other side is really fantastic and so that’s why we want to have these conversations and we want to start the dialogue and we want to start the dialogue and we want to lead with how can we be the best organization out there.

Jamie: Yeah. And it starts with personal stories, connecting with people as people, humans. Yeah. This is great work. I’d also love to hear more about Works for Women.

Erin: Yes, absolutely. So maybe I’ll tell a little bit of the history of Works for Women and maybe that’ll give a bit more insight into what I was talking about earlier with leading with your passion and finding your passion and letting that move forward.

About two years ago, I was taking an executive leadership course and asking a lot of questions as I normally do and really got to know someone within the program here at the University of Alberta and through that conversation we kind of got onto the same topic that I do with many women and said, “Why don’t we see more women in leadership?” And we got to the point of saying well, what can we do about it? What can the two of us come together as a team and do to create change in what ended up being our province of Alberta, so both within Edmonton and Calgary, those are the two major hubs in our [audio dropped]?

How can we help women and men as advocates for this show some movement in terms of the number of women that we see in leadership roles and so it really actually took about a year for us to truly refine what our intention was, but our intention is to give women, the tools, but also the network to have conversations and lead with change in their own lives.

And so we want to, through Works for Women, activate change within the individual. So, who are you and how can you create change? Because if we wait for the “system” to change, there’s lots of statistics out there that say it’s gonna take a really long time.

And so I’m a true believer that there is power within change that the individual can create and sometimes it’s the simplest things or maybe always it’s the simplest things that actually create the biggest awareness and the biggest change.  

And certainly we’re trying to connect on social media and connect through avenues like that because our world, I think, has, I don’t want to say become smaller, but basically what I’m trying to say is the connectivity that we now have in this global world that we now live in means that, yes, we now have tried to serve Albertans in what we’re doing, but something that anyone could go to our website and download one of our monthly challenges and say actually, I want to learn more about mentorship and sponsorship and how is that showing up in my day-to-day and how can I go out and seek, potentially, a mentor, or how can I go out and create a situation where I truly educate my organization or my team on what sponsorship truly is?

Jamie: Yeah, that’s wonderful. I love that you’re trying to change lives. That is the objective. I shouldn’t say you’re trying, you are changing lives because people are coming in contact with your resources, information, challenges.

Can we actually have a quick chat about the most recent one?

I just re-read it and I love that you ask people to think through what would be so good that you would think it’s almost criminal? I love that question.

And I’d love to share my vision which, like you, with Works for Women, I’d love to create change in the lives of my clients and the people that I come in contact with and I’d love to create a million dollar coaching practice where I create exponential results for my coaching clients and I’d love to work with just a handful of really powerful women. Now that feels like so good that it would be criminal.

Erin: Well, and it’s so, it goes back to this, like, we need to put ourselves out there more and we need to have these conversations and there’s so much power in thinking it for stage 1, stage 2 is saying it out loud.

So there’s power in what you just said and now you are reprogramming your own mind to say, yeah, that is, I am so good at what I do and I want to work with these really powerful women.

Jamie: Yeah. Thank you! Thank you for putting it in the present tense context. I thought that that’s really important. You’re working on it. I’m working on it.

Erin: We’re all working on it.

Jamie: So, what about you?

Erin: Yeah, that’s a really good question because I would say I continue to work on it every single day and I continue to refine it. And I think I take a little bit of, take the example of Works for Women and it took us a really long, it took us a year to really refine what we want to do and I’d say we’re like 90% there, I think we could do a little bit more tweaking and we’re bringing more people onto the team, which is gonna be super awesome to get more perspectives.

But I think for me, we kind of already talked about it, like, I’m a connector and I love to connect people and I’m a change agent and I want to create the change. I cannot wait for it to happen. I have to be part of whatever the change is and I know, too, that it’s gonna show up in different ways in my own life.

Whether or not it’s change through the job that I have and the organization I work for, change with some of the other projects that I work on and we all know one solution won’t fix what we’re trying to fix. It will be the collective effort of all the people who believe that women need to rise and we want to have women empowered to do their best work, that that collective effort will move the dial.

Jamie: Yeah and I just want to say, people who are listening to this podcast, they are getting a really powerful example of what is possible through you.

Erin: Well, thank you for that. And that makes me, I’m like smiling and blushing now because how can one person’s story empower you to do even better work, right? And that’s where it comes back to this, we’ve been talking about having the conversation throughout our talk today and it’s so important and I think sometimes as women we get really stuck in our heads sometimes and so to have a conversation, whether or not it’s about a formal negotiation for salary or it’s just negotiation of what you want to do at work.

Because I’ve worked in organizations long enough to know that yeah, there’s defined roles, but you can lead with creating whatever you want to create if you have the right advocates and allies who can help you create that. I think anything is possible and you have to be able to lead with that and to have a colleague or a network of individuals who can help you realize that is gonna be really, really powerful as well.

Jamie: Can I ask a follow-up question to that? Because you are setting a really powerful example of what is possible within a really large STEM organization. It’s a field that a lot of women are not represented in, right? So, what do you think has been really crucial to your success in getting allies and influencers to align with your vision inside the corporation?

Erin: Well, that is one thing that I have so many examples of, is through conversation and getting to know people and figuring out where their passion is and helping them succeed and then they take on that mandate of how does our organization truly believe and invest in this idea of inclusion and diversity and having them move it forward.

So we have, I’m actually, like, losing track of the numbers because it’s growing so well, is employee resource groups. So, the first employee resource group that was ever started was Women at Stantec and so within that employee resource group was an opportunity for women to come together and encourage each other, engage in conversation and empower each other. And their journey has led to having men as allies as part of that conversation and so they had to get comfortable with what they wanted to talk about and then they sort of invited everyone in.

And laying that groundwork then created the opportunity for individuals that are part of the LGBTQ community to put their hands up and say, we actually want to have an employee resource group. We want to kind of talk about what our experience is at the organization and they led and put these teams together and we call them Pride at Stantec and those are now growing and so there’s no way our small team can run all of these employee resource groups and in actual reality they’re called employee resource groups because they’re employee-led but it’s empowering the individuals who are leading those chapters, we call them chapters, to feel that they are doing impactful work and they just take it over.

And so that’s how you create allies. You have a conversation with them and you figure out where their little spark is and you just help grow it.

Jamie: I just want to draw out some distinctions in the stories that you shared. One of the things that I coach people to do, almost always in every negotiation workshop, is to think through the benefit, the potential that you’re presenting your counterpart with. What is the ultimate outcome, the end benefit?

And I think you articulated that so beautifully right now because you had the conversation, because you listened to their heart, to their passions, what they really care about, you were able to impact the change that is bigger than yourself with these employee resource groups, so I just want to acknowledge that was really beautifully articulated.

Erin: Well thank you, yeah, and it’s been working out really well and yeah, it’s a really simple thing where we say the end goal is building a culture of inclusion. We haven’t talked about culture at all. I could go on for another half an hour about culture, but this is ultimately what I believe we’re trying to do, is create this environment that people want to come to work and do their best work.

Jamie: Yeah. Would you share with us the Confidence Retreat?

Erin: Yes, absolutely. So, I’m happy to report we just released the dates for Confidence Retreat 2.0 that will be happening next January, but this again came from an idea with a friend of mine sitting down and talking about a retreat or a conference or something. We just wanted to sort of get away from our day jobs and get away for a weekend and engage with other really amazing women to talk about our careers and how can we sort of amplify what we’re doing.

And I would say most of our participants are sort of at a place in their careers where they think they’ve figured out what they want and their lives are really busy and we get kind of caught up in it all and so this idea of going away for a weekend is a retreat to say we’re putting our phones away, we’re coming to a safe space, we can have any conversations we want to have over the weekend and really sort of focusing the conversation around how can we continue to grow our careers but understanding how that fits into our life as well.

And so you know, that conversation started last, I think, January or February and we put it out to the world and said this is what we’re thinking of and a bunch of people said that sounds fantastic, and so we brought 40 amazing women to the Jasper Park Lodge in the mountains here in Alberta which is a beautiful, beautiful spot. If anyone hasn’t been there, I encourage you to go, it’s just amazing.

And we came together and we talked about each other and we talked about resiliency and how we can each show up in the work that we do and, listen, at the end of the day, it was an opportunity to get to know some really amazing people and their stories help empower our own stories and so we had amazing feedback and people want to come back,  so we’re starting to plan the next one that’s gonna happen next January, January 17th-20th, 2019 and it’s really exciting to say that out loud.

Jamie: Yeah! It sounds like a great opportunity for women who, like you said, high-performing, successful women who want to level up in this intimate, beautiful setting.

It sounds so glamorous to me! Even though I’m not a fan of cold. I imagine it’s very, very cold up there in January but if you don’t mind the cold and if you love being in this beautiful location with 40 other amazing women, it sounds like an amazing opportunity.

So, where can people learn more about Works for Women as well as the Confidence Retreat?

Erin: Absolutely. So, for Works for Women you can find us at www.worksforwomen.org and when you go on our website you can sign up for our monthly challenges to get more information on a regular basis.

And then, for the Confidence Retreat, it has been pretty intimate and you can actually find us on Instagram at @thecretreat and information on there with our email address, you can always email us if you are interested in finding out when we actually release the date for registration and we would love to see people come from all over the world to do experience the Confidence Retreat.

And certainly we are inside for most of it, so we actually had pretty beautiful weather and we all came in our comfortable and cozy clothes to share a weekend together, so it was really, really beautiful and you can see some of the photos from this past year’s retreat on our Instagram account.

Jamie: Alright, I’ll link it in the podcast episode notes.

Erin: Perfect, thank you!

Jamie: Yeah. So, I just have one last question for you. It’s random, what is your favorite color and why?

Erin: So, I love this question and my default answer has always been blue because I think blue is just a beautiful color but recently I can’t even remember how this sort of came up, but you know what? I love rose gold and so maybe that’s not a standard answer, but I love rose gold, it makes me happy, it makes me smile when I see anything in rose gold and that’s always my sort of default choice if it is in the color spectrum to choose from in whatever I’m buying, so yeah, rose gold!

Jamie: Excellent, it’s like a combination of two really nice, really beautiful colors, rose and gold.

Erin: Yes, yes!

Jamie: Erin, this has been such a pleasure and a privilege. I love learning and hearing from you every single time. It’s really inspiring and I feel that your work is making a big impact in the world and so thank you for that.

Erin: Thank you. Thank you very much.

Jamie: Alright, well, have a [audio dropped]

Erin: Thanks, Jamie, take care.

Jamie: Bye!

Yes Lives in the Land of No

We are often afraid of asking for what we want because we dread hearing no. What if we operated under the assumption that “yes lives in the land of no?” I share some of my deepest fears, recent client successes and misses that demonstrate that yes, “yes lives in the land of no.”

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to episode number 24. This is Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

How are you?

How have you been?

Today I want to talk about how YES lives in the land of NO. I love that.

I got that quote from this great book that I am re-reading. It’s called The Prosperous Coach, written by Rich Litvin and Steve Chandler, and it’s all about enrolling coaching clients. So if you are a coach and if you are listening to this, I highly, highly recommend it.

I think it’s so relevant to remember that yes lives in the land of NO for our negotiation strategy because negotiation is simply a conversation with the intention of reaching an agreement where everyone has the right to say NO. And you’ve had that right to say NO ever since you were, what, two years old if you are verbal?

So take your current age - I’m 36, so I’m gonna take two from my age, so for 34 years I have enjoyed the right to say NO. I continue to enjoy the right to say NO. And for 34 years, I’ve engaged in countless small, big conversations with the intention of reaching an agreement where I had the right to say NO.

And it’s the same for you.

In other words, we’ve negotiated most of our lives. Ever since we’ve been able to say that word, NO, because negotiation requires your autonomous decision-making process.

In other words, negotiated agreement is one where everyone involved in the negotiation has considered all the reasons they’d say NO to something.

They’ve considered all their objections.

And in that process, either because of their objections or in spite of their objections, they have arrived at YES. YES, let’s proceed with this particular agreement.

I think it’s really important to remember that because we live in a culture where we are uncomfortable with objections. It’s almost counterintuitive to think through that we have to listen for objections because in our culture we tend to listen for agreement.

You listen to somebody speak at a conference and they’re saying something that you totally agree with and you’re like yes, yes, this is it! And you love it, you’re nodding your head and you write down what they’re saying because you love listening and agree.

Negotiation can be uncomfortable because we have to listen through their objections, address them and help the other side get to a decision and we’d like them to get to a YES, usually, right?

So I see this problem of the discomfort around YES, the discomfort around NO, play out in my business in two ways.

It creates this fantasy because we think of YES and NO as binary. We think of YES and NO as either/or not that YES lives in the land of NO.

So one way this impacts my business is that sometimes I get afraid of doing something really, really well. It’s a very subconscious level of fear. I have this fantasy that if I provide a solution, if I give an offer to my audience, give one freebie webinar, write one spectacular email and then I’ll be just overwhelmed with so many YESes, so many clients will come knocking down my door that I wouldn’t know how to handle this level of success.

There will be too many YESes, and what will I do? They’ll find out that I’m not good enough and it’ll be a total failure.

So there’s this, at a deep level, a fear of success or a fear of too many YESes.

Or there are the other times where I fear getting one stinging rejection and that fear of getting one stinging rejection holds me back from making my ask as boldly and confidently as I know that I could.

And I know that with my clients sometimes this fear of rejection, fear of hearing NO holds them back from speaking up, showing up and having their say.

So you think there’s gonna be either too many YESes - well, I say, I have experienced the fear of too many YESes.

Hasn’t happened yet, though.

Or that there’s gonna be this one stinging NO that’s going to hurt me so much that I would not be able to recover and function.

So this trap happens when I think of YES and NO as binary, as either/or.  But when I consider the truth that YES lives in the land of NO, it sheds light on my negative, limiting beliefs. It helps me see that yeah, I can deal with YESes, I can deal with NOs.

In fact, because YES lives in the land of NO, I should seek out NOs and in the process of seeking out NOs, I can get the YESes.

I also want to tie this back to negotiation strategy, because I know a lot of people that are listening to this, you’re interested in how do I negotiate better? How do I negotiate my salary better, right? And I have spoken in the past of the key strategy of anchoring high and anchoring first.

I think this strategy has sometimes gotten misunderstood by my audience, by people who read my content, so I want to clarify that. I want to clarify that in this strategy of anchoring high and anchoring first, yes, the YES lives in the land of NO. It involves both YES and NO.

Let me clarify. So, anchoring first and anchoring high means, first of all, you want to understand what your target number is. You want to decide on it.

So if you are gunning for a position and you decide I’d be really happy with $100,000. I’m making $80,000 right now and so I would love to make $100,000 in my next job. That’s your target number and you have done your research, you’ve spoken to people in the industry, you’ve done some online research and you know that the going market rate ranges. It’s around $90k to $100k plus.

So once you have done your research and you have prepared your value statements that you can demonstrate your benefit to your potential employer, you can articulate that you are somebody who can help solve their problems and you are somebody who can hit the ground running by contributing value to the company’s bottom line. Once you have done that level of preparation, now let’s talk about your anchor number.

In other words, at this point, you have your target number, what you really want, and you also have prepared your why statement. Why you want what you want.

Okay, so you’d be happy at $100k, but you know that this is a negotiation and that employers are incentivized to hire the best candidate for the least amount of money. It’s not because they are evil. It’s not because they’re anything else. It’s because that’s how good businesses are run. So it’s in their interest to hire for the least amount of money and it’s in your interest to present your case as to why you deserve the high end of the range.

So if you want $100,000, don’t ask for $100,000. Instead, go to your anchor number, go a step or two higher, so ask for $115,000. So when, during the interview process, you’re asked what is your desired salary range, I would suggest to my client in this specific case to go ahead and anchor first and anchor high. “I’d be really happy at $115,000.”

You’re telling them what you want.

This strategy doesn’t just assume that just because you asked for your anchor number that it will be given to you automagically.

It assumes that this will invite the other side to a more in-depth conversation.

So, to be more specific, if the other side says, “You know, that’s a little bit higher than what we had budgeted. Could we talk about other ways to make this work?”, that is an invitation to a brainstorming conversation.

What else do you want? Are there non-monetary terms? Do you want a bigger title? Do you want more PTO? Do you want more face-time with the CEO?

In other words, how can we make this work so that you get what you want, closer to your target number and also sweeten the deal so that you accept this job offer sooner rather than later?

Now, this is an ideal situation, of course. It doesn’t always go that way, I have learned.

I just recently spoke with a client who unfortunately had a negotiation go...not so well. I didn’t coach her through this negotiation, she sought me out after it all went down.

She had assumed that the art of anchoring high and anchoring first is to really, really go extremely high and she did not anticipate the NO. She did not anticipate the objections.

What had happened was she was in a role making about $50,000 and she looked up the role that she wants to have and in that research, she found out that the going market rate is $75,000, which is 50% higher than her current salary.

So she brought this research to the negotiation with her supervisor and she asked for $75,000. She asked for a 50% salary increase.

And the response was a loud and clear NO.

$75k is, she was told, the salary that somebody receives at levels two or three levels higher than she. So they made it clear to her that no, this is not something that we can do. You will get a salary increase but this is not possible and it’s because, in our eyes, you are not a director. You do not have the title of director. We’re not giving you the title of director. So, no, that’s out of the question.

And so, if I had the opportunity to coach her through this, I would have done a few things, which is to advise her to find out what is a reasonable salary range for the role that she is going to be in.

Remember, she was being promoted, just not at a director level. So I would have advised her to do more research so that she could have anchored at a more reasonably ambitious mark.

Also, another thing I would have advised her to do after this juncture, after hearing the initial NO, is not to go to bargaining mode.

Not to say, “Okay well, if $75k doesn’t work, let’s go to $72k. Does that work?”  No. Don’t do that. Obviously, there’s been a mismatch of perception. This NO gave her a lot of information that at this particular employer, that $75,000 range is what somebody who would be two or three levels higher than she would make.

I would have suggested that she just get curious.

She obviously hadn’t done enough preparation, enough research to make a reasonably ambitious ask, but this is also an opportunity to get curious and find out, “Okay, well, you know what? I’m really glad you told me that. I obviously didn’t do enough research. I’d like to find out what is a reasonable salary range for the role I’m going into and I’m also curious. What can I do to set myself up for that director, senior management track? Because I’d love to be contributing at a higher level and also, at the same time, I’d love to be making more money and so, I’d love to know what are you looking for in terms of people who get hired at that level? I’d love to know how I can bridge that gap.”

And so this could have turned into a great conversation that could have generated advice, mentorship, and better understanding.

But I was told by her that unfortunately, this is not what had happened.

It’s so painful to get that initial NO because in our society and culture we have the tendency to attach our ego to our jobs, our salaries, to YESes, not NOs.

What would be possible if we didn’t attach our ego to the outcome?

What if we didn’t attach our ego to that number?

It’s just a number.

And I can hear your eyes rolling as I say this.

Jamie, you don’t understand. That’s easy for you to say because you’re a coach. I need this job. I need this money. I need to be respected. I need to be heard.

I feel so disrespected. I feel so undervalued. You don’t understand. I really need the negotiation to go well so that I can prove myself.

To which I want to share this gem of a quote from one of my favorite negotiation books, it’s called Start With No. It’s written by Jim Camp and I think it’s relevant because when we operate under the assumption that YES lives in the land of NO and when we welcome NOs and welcome YESes equally, we need to lose our neediness. So, I’ll read from this book:

“Today, in the twenty-first century, we’re not needy. We’re just not, but we nevertheless still hear people say, “I need this jacket.” Or “I need to make this call.” Or “I need this job.” Or “I need to talk to you.” Or “I need this deal.” We use the word 'need' much too casually.

The only things we truly need are the basics of physical survival - air, water, food, clothing, shelter - and everyone reading this book already has these.”

And I would add, everyone listening to this podcast, as well.

“We also need the basics of intellectual and emotional well-being - love, family, friendship, satisfying work, hobbies, faith - each reader has his or her own list here. But it’s a short list and it does not - or should not - include the $500 jacket or the $100,000 car, because there are other jackets and cars. It should not include this particular job or sale or deal, because there are other jobs and sales and deals.”

So, what I take away from this quote is that when we lose our neediness, we open ourselves up to abundance. And when we open ourselves up to the fact that YES lives in the land of NO and yes, there may be more NOs than YESes in that land of NO, so much can be possible.

What if we aim for NOs?

What if we aim to listen for the NO and for the objection and to really understand why people say NO to our ask?

What could happen?

I have a client who recently flipped a NO into a YES and in the process negotiated a $15,000 salary increase.

She had a contact with her dream job company. It’s one of the largest online websites in a particular field, I’ll say, for job search and she had one contact, a friend who worked there, so she reached out to her contact, her friend, and she got information about the work culture and through that connection she got inspired to apply for a position with that job through a recruiter.

So she applied and she went through the initial phase of that process, but then she was rejected after that first round, I think it was a phone interview, because they said, “Oh, you know, you’re not quite what we’re looking for, so oh, sorry, we’re not gonna proceed with you.”

So, she was told NO.

But she didn’t let this NO discourage her. She didn’t let this NO get to her ego and create stories about how this isn’t gonna work out for her or that anything would work out for her. Instead, she was open.

And the recruiter said, “Well, we’re not gonna proceed with you, however, if you would like an informal interview, informational interview with one of the hiring managers here since you are particularly interested in this particular job, we can set that up for you.” And she said yes. She said yes to the offer for an informal interview after she was rejected for the job.

And then she did the thing that most people don’t do. She actually followed up on that offer, even though she was rejected. She connected with the hiring manager.

The hiring manager gave her a tour of the office and at the end of this conversation, the hiring manager said, “Hey, would you like a job here?” To which she had to say, “Well, you know, actually I did apply and I was turned down.”

But because she was optimistic, because she followed through, because she showed up in person, the hiring manager said, “Well, you know, we could take that job that you were turned down for, bring it down a notch in terms of hierarchy and see if that will work.”

And so that’s what she did, she was initially applying for a managerial position and then she interviewed again through that hiring manager connection for an assistant manager position and she got that job. And in the process she anchored, she framed for benefit and she increased her salary by $15,000. So, for her, YES lived in the land of NO. I love that story.

So, I just want to wrap this up with this: in your negotiation journey, you’re going to get a NO. You’re going to get NOs. And that’s a good thing. Because it means that you asked. It means that you’re gaining experience.

And when you get that NO, don’t get furious, just get curious. Try to understand why people said no. Listen for objections. And if you listen long enough to their objections and if you try to really understand their objections from their point of view, you have the opportunity to flip that NO into a YES like my client did.

So, I wish you many YESes and I wish you as many NOs, because YES lives in the land of NO. Thank you, and I’ll talk to you soon!

Big Embarrassing Mistake and Pitfalls of Assumptions

Last month I was in Japan to give a workshop and I made a terrible mistake that had me feeling mortified and embarrassed. 

In this podcast I share the dirt: what happened, how I recovered, and what I learned from the experience. 

Assumptions have the power to undermine our communication, negotiation, and leadership. 

What are three dangerous assumptions that bully us silent and compromise our results? How can we shine light on our cognitive blindspots so that we show up powerfully without making assumptions?

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to episode number 23. This is Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I’m your host and coach, Jamie Lee.

Yep! You’re born to thrive.

Yes, you are.

And in order to thrive, you need to ask for what you desire. That requires leadership. That requires negotiation. And that’s what we talk about here on this podcast.

Today, I am going to eat some humble pie.

What I mean by that is I have a rather embarrassing mistake that I recently made that I would like to share with you. And I made this embarrassing mistake due to some assumptions and so let’s also have a chat about some assumptions we make and how those assumptions may be undermining our negotiation and leadership success.

Finally, I want to invite you to a powerful coaching experience with me because I want to dispel some of the assumptions, I want to question the assumptions and also help you shine some light on some potential blind spots that you may have so that you can have a breakthrough.

So, it’s been awhile since I’ve been on this podcast. It’s been about two weeks, and it’s because I was traveling in Singapore where I have family now. I’m not originally from Singapore, I’m actually from South Korea, but now that we live in a global age, I now have a family in Singapore.

It’s great! It was really hot but it was also beautiful. And Japan, I visited, I lived in Japan 15 years ago as a junior year abroad student and so I speak a little bit of Japanese, I’m familiar with Japanese culture and it was so wonderful to be back and be immersed in it and eat delicious food and see the beautiful sights. Highly, highly recommend.

And I gave a workshop, but I made a mistake. I made what you would call a classic facepalm mistake.

So, here’s what happened. It’s Sunday. It’s May 20th. It’s 4:30 in the afternoon. It’s warm, it’s bright, it’s a beautiful day in Tokyo and I’m on my way to facilitate a workshop for the Japan Smith College Alumnae club.

I’m feeling really great.

I’m feeling really awesome.

I had just landed in Tokyo that morning after a red-eye flight from Singapore and I had intentionally booked a hotel that was within walking distance of the workshop venue because I intended to get there on time and to my surprise, once you download a Google Maps app while you have wi-fi connectivity on your iPhone, the app will store a local cache version of that route.

So that means the blue dot that you follow when you try to navigate using Google Maps App? It will still work when you have your phone on airplane mode, which I did to save money. I didn’t want to spend an exorbitant amount of money on international roaming charges while I was traveling in Asia.

And so, I’m feeling great. I just checked into the hotel at 3:00 in the afternoon after a red-eye flight, showered, got dressed, I’m walking in this beautiful Tokyo city and my Google Maps app is working! I’m following the blue dot to my venue by foot.

It’s 4:30. I’m thinking I’m gonna get there half an hour early because I’m thinking the workshop starts at 5:00.

And when I get there, to the venue, much to my surprise, everyone - everyone who signed up, everyone who organized - they’re there.

They’re waiting for me.

It turned out they had been waiting a very long time.

And no, it’s not because the Japanese are hyper-punctual, it’s because I had made a terrible mistake. The workshop was scheduled to start at hour 1500 in military time, which is 3:00 in civil or what we use here in the United States.

And I misread it. I misread 1500 military time for 5:00 pm.

It’s so embarrassing. Without realizing it, I had acted from an assumption of false consensus. It’s just a fancy word that means that I was acting out of bias. Cognitive bias. I’m thinking that my interpretation or misinterpretation of time is how everyone else has interpreted the schedule.

And based on this unquestioned thinking, my brain overlooked the obvious and the explicit, because hour 15 was communicated to me in email and yeah, I read it and I thought it was 5:00 pm.

It’s inexcusable. It’s my brain being lazy, thinking out of convenience and habit and I acted out of that blind spot.

I was mortified. I get there and everyone is there. So graciously, still waiting after an hour and a half in delay.

I was shocked.

I apologized.

I know some Japanese, so I apologized in Japanese to these gracious, patient, amazing women who are also bilingual. I said, “Moshi wake arimasen!” It’s the polite way of saying “I’m sorry.”

And standing in front of my audience and organizers, I now had a choice. I could indulge in my feelings of shame and ineptitude. Oh my God, Oh my God, how stupid can I be?!

Or I could do my best given the circumstances and given the last 30 minutes remaining out of two hours that were allotted for this workshop.

So I just dove right in.

I didn’t have a choice.

I went straight into the key points.

I tried to manage, just put down the feelings of shame and ineptitude. I’ll deal with it later when I get back to my hotel room.

And you know what? In spite of my blunder, my huge embarrassing blunder, the event went well and I think that really speaks to the caliber of the women who came to this workshop.

And we had a rich, hour-long discussion because the organizer so graciously allowed us to extend the workshop by another half-hour and we had a discussion on communication best practices for leaders. How do we show up as leaders in our day to day communication? How do we engage with curiosity, with genuine curiosity? How do we really listen, not just passive-aggressively listen, not just listen for our turn to speak, but really listen and hear our counterparts? And how do we give acknowledgment for who people are and not just what people do?

Thinking back on this experience, I’m back home in New York City, I’m very grateful. I feel very humbled. Very humbled. I had made a terrible assumption and I didn’t even know it.

Assumptions have the power to sabotage our results. And I think I gave you a very vivid example of how that’s possible. But it’s especially the case when we communicate with other people, when we negotiate, when we lead other people.

We all have our blind spots. We make wrong assumptions and there are holes in our research, holes in our knowledge, and sometimes these are the unknown unknowns that we don’t know until we find out through something going wrong.

If you aren’t aware of these assumptions, they have the potential to derail your negotiation outcomes. At Wharton, which is a business school at the University of Pennsylvania, there is a professor there, Richard Shell who says there are three types of assumptions that can really negatively impact your negotiation.

So, I wanted to share those three negative assumptions with you and share how I see examples of that in my client work and in my interactions with workshop attendees and then I want to tell you about some positive assumptions I make and then finally, invite you to a powerful coaching experience.

So the three types of assumptions that can negatively impact your negotiations according to Wharton professor Richard Shell are:

Number one: Assuming that a high level of conflict exists where there necessarily is not one in the negotiation.

Number two: Assuming that everybody thinks the same way. I made this mistake. I assumed that everybody thinks - or to be more precise, doesn’t think - the way I didn’t think.

Number three: Overestimating the other party’s power and/or underestimating your own.

Oof. Yeah. That’s a big one.

So, how do I see this in my work? I often see that these dangerous assumptions hold us back from speaking up, from engaging, from braving difficult conversations.

Take, for example, number one: assuming that a high level of conflict exists where there necessarily is not one. Let me give you an example. Earlier this week, I conducted a short and informal survey of women attorneys whom I will be speaking to next week about negotiation and I asked them some simple questions.

How do you engage in negotiation? What’s holding you back?

And 65% of the women who answered this survey said that they manage to negotiate, they don’t really like it, but they do it when they absolutely have to. About the same number of people said that the biggest barrier to their desired negotiation outcome is the fear of gender blowback.

The fear of negative feedback.

The fear of being rejected.

The fear of being judged as aggressive, as greedy.

It was very interesting to me that people didn’t say limited resources, people didn’t say I don’t have an open channel with people who make those decisions, people didn’t say I don’t know what to ask for.

So many people - about 65% of the people - said that it’s the fear of being judged, of being called something that is deemed unfeminine and therefore undesirable. It’s unfortunate that we still struggle with this gender stereotype and yet, we do.

What this informed me, what I make out of this data, is that probably the same amount of people who manage to negotiate when they absolutely have to, they are missing out on opportunities to speak up. They are not recognizing that they do have a voice and that they can ask for what they want because they are waiting until they absolutely have to.

And why? Because they assume that there is going to be conflict and this assumption of conflict creates fear that creates resistance that creates avoidance.

We often assume the worst in people when we are anxious about a high stakes conversation. And I am including myself. I am also working through this myself. But why don’t we assume the best? Why don’t we assume that people do want to hear from us, people do want to help us, and that people do want to see us happy, succeeding and thriving and have an open, honest conversation with us?

Why not?

Why not?

Number two: assuming that everybody thinks the same way. A lot of people I know, a lot of high-achieving, high-performing people that I know and talk with and consult and coach have assumptions that people should behave, that people should react, that people should speak in ways that they would.

But not everyone does. In fact, hardly anyone does because, let’s face it, other people are out of our control. The only thing that we can control is ourselves, our own behaviors, our own actions, our own words.

And also, since we’re talking about gender stereotypes and gender bias, I think it’s so dangerous when we have internalized negative opinions about women who compete, about women who promote themselves, women who speak with a loud voice and advocate for what they want and then assume that everyone else thinks the same way.

We project our gender bias on other people thereby perpetuating the bias. I’m going to quote my negotiation mentor, Lisa Gates, who’s co-founder of She Negotiates, who has said that “The place where gender bias is most deeply and secretly lodged is inside ourselves.”

And so when we fear that other people have negative opinions of self-advocating women, we get even more afraid. We get even more silent. Less brave.

So, the next one kind of feeds right into this, the third dangerous assumption is overestimating people’s power and/or underestimating our own power.

All these assumptions, they go hand in hand, right? When you assume that a high level of conflict exists, when you assume that everybody thinks the same way and when you let these assumptions hold you back from taking a stand, being courageous, taking action, we can easily overestimate that other people have more power.

Power that exists outside of us.

Power that we don’t have.

And when we think we don’t have power, we feel small, we feel like victims.

We feel miserable.

The thing about power, however, is that there is more than just one type of power. A lot of people mistake power as simply dominant power or power that you may exert over other people when you are in a sort of commanding control type of situation, and you exert control and authority over a group of people.

And almost always, we associate masculine qualities. If you look up the word commander or leader it’ll say oh, he is the kind of man who will lead this team to this success that we want! And that’s unfortunate, but that’s not the only kind of power that exists.

I think the real power is in ourselves because we have the power to choose our thinking. We have the power to influence our own emotions and that means we have the power to take inspired action and when we take inspired action we generate positive results, not just for us, but for the world.

And that is the kind of power that I want to ignite in the people that I coach. That is the kind of power that I am interested in helping to develop and grow.

I also make positive assumptions, so I’m not going to make an a-s-s out of m-e. I will state my assumptions about the kind of people who are interested in this specific type of power that I’m talking about which is your autonomy.

I think the people who are interested in my content, I think people who are interested in working with me are the kind of people who want to make a positive impact in the world.

And for this type of people, it’s not just about money. It’s not just about more dominant type of power. Although you love money and you love exerting influence, you love money and you love influence because it can be used to fuel the positive change that you want to create.

Yeah, I’m talking about you!

I think you want to negotiate a bigger life that’s defined by purpose, meaning, and joy.

And if that is true, then I make another assumption: that you want to brave the discomfort of advocating for your value so you can take ownership of your dreams. So you can step into the leadership that you dream of and speak up for what you believe in and that’s because that’s how change starts.

And so if that is true, then I also assume that you want to make a conscious and empowered choice in your thoughts and actions. That’s where the magic is because as I said earlier, thoughts generate feelings that generate action that generate results.

And so if that is you, I want to invite you to a powerful coaching experience with me.

I am making some time available in my schedule to speak with my audience one-on-one, for free, for 90 minutes.

Why? Because I am grateful to have this privilege to reach you. Because I am looking to connect with my audience in a deeper way. And I think the best way to dispel any negative assumptions that are holding us back is to really listen and to be engaged in one long conversation at a time.

And in 90 minutes, we can address whatever challenge you’re facing right now that’s holding you back from showing up, communicating with authenticity, and negotiating as a leader.

So, if you are interested, email me at jamie@jamieleecoach.com and let me know who you are, what you do, what you’d like to talk about. It’s jamie@jamieleecoach.com and once I read your email and I feel that there is a fit for your needs and that I can support you, I will reply with a calendar link for you to book a 90-minute, powerful coaching experience with me.

All I ask is that you show up, on time, to the call once it’s scheduled, and be open to a life-changing experience.

This might sound too good to be true, but it’s not a gimmick. I don’t have any gotchas. I’m not gonna sell you on a program. And no, you don’t have to have a salary negotiation for us to talk about.

This is real. I am already doing this and I’d like to offer this to my valued podcast listeners because I am growing small but with a lot of intention and a deep desire to contribute real value.

So, this week I coached a feminist leader, one of the women who came to my workshop in Japan. I coached her, and she is working to empower young high school girls so that they can make informed decisions about how they want to live their lives and she wants them to be happier and more fulfilled as a result. I love that.

This morning, I coached a UX designer and she’s helping to realize the visions of mission-driven organizations by improving their websites so that these mission-driven organizations can serve people and in this process the designer, the UX designer, she is creating joy.

So, I’m seeking to connect with people like that.

People who value excellence. People who value service. People who desire to make a positive impact. People who tend to lean on the introverted side and tend to think really deep. Those are my people.

And so if that is you, if you are listening to this and you’re like, yeah, that is me! If you are interested in talking with me, I’m giving you an open invitation to have a really long, deep, powerful conversation with me.

Email me at jamie@jamieleecoach.com. My intention is to demonstrate that I can help by helping you. So, I look forward to hearing from you and talk to you soon!

Interview with Leadership and Negotiation Expert Selena Rezvani: How to Negotiate Meeting Culture

Selena Rezvani is a highly sought-after expert on leadership and negotiation who promotes a more female-friendly workplace culture through her award-winning writing and speaking engagements. 

If you've ever been told no, if you've ever been cut off at a work meeting, and if you want to close the gender and racial wage gap, you won't want to miss this podcast interview. 

We discussed: 

- How you can leverage the power of cognitive dissonance to flip a “No” around 

- How tiny, everyday way of negotiating meeting culture can have a huge impact on your career 

- What remains the biggest barrier for women to be heard and respected at meetings 

...and so much more. 

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Full Episode Transcript

Jamie:  Hello, Selena!

Selena: Hi, Jamie. How are you?

Jamie: I’m doing awesome. How are you doing?

Selena: Great, great! Are you having a good week?

Jamie: Yes, I’m having a really wonderful week. How about you?

Selena: Good! Yeah, we haven’t spoken since you’ve kind of branched off on your own, so congratulations!

Jamie: Thank you so much. I just want to say thank you for taking the time to share your wisdom and your expertise on my podcast.

Selena: My pleasure.

Jamie: I’m all about leadership, I’m all about negotiation and you’ve been doing this longer and you’ve written an award-winning book called Pushback that I and many of my peers have read, so again I really appreciate you taking the time on this beautiful day.

Selena: It is beautiful, isn’t it? Finally!

Jamie: Yeah, finally it is. Well, let’s get started.

Selena: Sure.

Jamie: I’d love to hear your personal experience. I’d love to hear about a negotiation in your life or career that had the biggest impact on you.

Selena: For sure. I’ll tell you about one that happened to me in early days. As a teenager, like a lot of kids, I dreamed about going to college, but I knew that was going to be kind of a hardship for my parents. I’m the youngest of four, after all, so I knew that was not gonna be an easy process, but I bounced along, optimistic that that would happen and life kind of had other plans.

I lost my father very suddenly in my teenage years, and aside from just the devastation of that, financially, it became really hard for us as a family and when it came time for college, my wonderful mom who made miracles happen, she said, “Honey, I can just swing everything with the financial aid package you’re getting this year,” (my first year), and I loved that year at college, that first year.

I received my financial aid package for the second year, and to my very shocked upset, it was almost like half as much, despite having a really strong year at school and my mom sat me down and she said, “Selena, I just can’t swing it this time.” And I knew in that moment that the only thing that was going to drive an outcome that might change the situation was gonna be me.

And so I wrote a very long, rambling appeal to the financial aid office at NYU and I was so delighted when they changed my financial aid package to make it doable for my family, not just for that sophomore year, but for the next three years, so that I could finish.

Jamie: Yeah, you asked. You made a bold and vulnerable ask, it sounds like.

Selena: Yeah, you know, so often I find with my clients and in my own life learning to become a more bold negotiator, you get even a whiff of no or here’s how it is, here’s what we can do, and it’s so, so easy to kind of slink away feeling like, well, that must be how it is. That is the final limit. That is the bottom line. And it’s so rare that it actually is the bottom line or the final word.

Jamie: That’s a really inspiring story and I love that you started with a no, right? They were like, “No, this is how much you’re gonna get,” and you were like, “Wait, no! Let’s negotiate. Let me ask you something.”

Selena: Yeah, and I mean there are so many nos you’re going to get in life, and that’s a lesson I wish I had learned earlier as a young person. It’s not if you’re gonna get the no, it’s when. So what are you gonna do? How will you be ready? How will you pivot or who will you engage? What will you do when that happens, not if it happens?

Jamie: Right, right. And what you shared with us is that there’s still room for conversation. You can still ask again.

Selena: Yeah, in fact, I would actually say that the odds are stacked in your favor. Often when you’ve been told no, there’s a cognitive dissonance, a psychological factor that makes it hard to say no to the same person over and over again. So, I would actually say when you’ve been told no, you can almost see it as A) corrective information to change your pitch a little bit or do something slightly different, but B) ask again. It’s very uncomfortable to say no to somebody three times in a row.

Jamie: That’s interesting. That leads me to my next question. I know that a lot of your work is centered around research, and I’m curious to know what are some of the most interesting research findings that you’ve come across on women’s leadership.

Selena: Yeah, well there are so many. This is one of my favorite arenas, I think you know, just to really see the future when it comes to the experience of working women. I’ll tell you one thing I’m really interested in right now, and it’s a tiny, everyday way that we negotiate at work, and it’s negotiating meeting culture.

So, this is an area I’m particularly interested in because you’re an expert at this Jamie, you know that so often people focus on the kind of major pitch or the once a year professional development meeting, but it really is this everyday skill, and you know, you think about meetings, many of us spend hours on end in meetings.

They signal what’s important to a company, what we meet about. Once we’re there, we’re negotiating to make a point in a meeting, we’re negotiating to stand up for our point or somebody else’s when it’s being attacked. We negotiate to try to change the minds of folks if there’s a popular direction we don’t agree with. I think one of the major things that’s almost rampant in workplace culture is around interrupting and I think women need to negotiate that. I think that is an everyday negotiation.

Jamie: Absolutely.

Selena: Yeah. You look at that research, and it almost, it really pains me to say this, but one research point that came out of Journal of Language and Social Psychology - that’s the kind of premier journal - said men and women are both likelier to interrupt when they’re talking to a woman than when they’re talking to a man, so the sex of the interrupter is less of a strong force on interruptions but it’s more the sex of who’s being interrupted.

We are all more likely to interrupt a woman and that’s really a shame because there’s other data that when it comes to groups being most productive and strong, they are most likely to share airtime equally. This is kind of the kindergarten lesson all of us learned, which is take your turn, you know, wait your turn. So, that conversational turn-taking serves teams better and yet interruptions happen to the point where there’s multiple apps, things like Gender Timer.

Jamie: Really?

Selena: Yeah, just to promote this awareness in workplaces. It shows who’s speaking the most, who’s dominating the airspace. There’s even an app, a newer one, called Woman Interrupted. Really! There’s an app for that. It shows that it happens more than we think.

Jamie: It’s almost painful, because it brings back, for me, memories of being an analyst at this financial firm and my manager would ask me to prepare documents to present at the meeting and whenever I would get one word in, I would say, “Okay, this shows…” and then he would immediately cut me off and he would just run the meeting. And I remember it was like that every single time. I would put together the documents, I would say, “Okay, this is…” and then he would cut me off every single time.

Selena: Wow. At least you can say he’s predictable, but wow. I would go so far as to say it can feel dehumanizing, it can feel almost humiliating to be cut off. And it’s even worse, I think when you find your own self saying by default, “Oh, please, go ahead,” without even thinking. I know I’ve done that myself without even noticing I’m doing it. I yield at points and will say, “Oh, please, go ahead.”

Jamie: Yeah. I’ve done it many times.

Selena: Right. And there’s solutions to this and I talk to women about it and men alike because I think they’re part of this just as much, but I think one of the first things is, first of all, having allies in the room who will say something like, “So and so just said that,” or, “The way you’re speaking is making me uncomfortable.” Or encouraging women to say, “Stop interrupting me.” If you are the woman interrupted, I think negotiating that is quite an art. You can keep talking. So one method is keep talking as if you didn’t hear the interruption.

Jamie: Right.

Selena: Truly. Another is to do what I do with my 5-year-old twins, which is just as you would with a child, say to the interrupter “One moment,” while you continue talking or, “I’m not done,” and continue the point you were making. You can kind of shift in your chair. I have done this and seen it have an effect. You’re kind of making your body bigger or showing some physical discomfort and a change and continue speaking a little bit louder. Whatever you do, don’t ask, “Can I finish speaking?”

Jamie: Yeah. So don’t look for permission. Don’t yield. Have your say.

Selena: Have your say. Absolutely. I mean, there is something so programmed and so deep in many of us that women should really accommodate and avoid things that feel escalating or somehow less communal behaviors and it’s up to each of us to kind of change that programming by disrupting it. I think that’s one of the best ways.

Jamie. Yeah, my mentor, Lisa Gates, she says you have to interrupt interruption.

Selena: Absolutely. That’s a perfect way to think of it. Because what will keep it going is that polite dance, the polite but frustrated dance of, “Sure, go ahead,” “Sure, jump in here. What I was saying wasn’t that important anyway.”

Jamie: Yeah. That’s really important and I’m kind of pained to self-reflect and think about have there been times where I’ve thoughtlessly interrupted other women? And probably so, because I did have women reporting to me in my career and I probably did it unconsciously.

Selena: Yeah, I mean, listen, I think it takes a big person, to say that, first of all, and to do that kind of reflection but I think we all do it to an extent. I mentioned that I had twins earlier, they’re a boy and a girl and I’m in this line of work of trying to improve workplaces, to make them more gender equal, to empower women and I correct myself sometimes, too. I correct myself.

I notice if I say, “Can somebody come help me set the dinner table,” if my son kind of is dismissive or distracted, I’ve noticed in the past that I’m a little bit more lenient with that then when my daughter is like, “Well, I want to play more.” As though she should, for some reason, be more communal and be more helpful. I mean, we all have this programming to overcome and it’s so deep it’s almost invisible.

Jamie: Yes. So it takes a lot of mindfulness and practice.

Selena: It does, and sadly I think a lot of organizations today, like you can do the once a year training or the once a year town hall to raise awareness, but it’s not enough for any of us. None of us can have biases continually disrupted and to be reminded consistently if we’re just doing something very, very occasionally to interrupt it. So I think how you weave it into your culture, how you weave it into your life so that it’s an ongoing discussion item.

Jamie: Like a meeting, which happens on a recurring basis every week and so every week you have that opportunity to initiate a brief conversation, to have your say, to speak up, to ask for what you want. I think that’s what you’re saying and I think it’s so important.

Selena: If it’s not part of the company’s operating norms to divvy airtime, to not interrupt, it’s one of the most basic things all organizations can do, that all meeting organizers can do to change the status quo.

Jamie: Yeah. And I can see how that will have a spillover effect into how you are evaluated, how you are perceived by the leaders and the decision makers when they go to think about okay, who’s gonna get promoted, who’s gonna get that plum assignment. The person who speaks up, the person who takes up as much airtime during meetings is probably going to be top of mind, just because they’ve been seen and heard more often than the people who have not.

Selena: You’re a hundred percent right, and I’ll never forget a story that a CEO shared on a panel that I was on, and she said, “We were interviewing for a position. We had one candidate who we knew of but had a reservation or two about and another candidate who looked great on paper but that nobody knew, nobody had really heard them speak.” Who do you think got the job? The flawed but known person. Not the possibly incredible but quiet person and that’s very illustrative I think of the workplace today.

Jamie: Yeah. So, moving on, I’m curious to know what three pieces of advice you have for women who do want to close their wage gaps.

Selena: Yeah, that’s so important, and thank you for asking that question and the first thing I would say is talk to people who don’t look like you about what you make. At one of my first consulting jobs - I grew up in management consulting - I did this. I talked about what I made with my peers, but guess who I talked to. I talked to my two best friends, and they were an African American woman and a Chinese American woman. So, do you think that what the three of us made was really representative of the entire band or level where we sat? Heck no!

According to research, all three of us were probably underpaid, but I used their information as my anchors and to inform what I should be making. I shouldn’t have done that. I needed to talk to white men and men of color. I needed to really get out there, to diversify who I was seeking information from, and I think that’s so important.

I often will say to women, if you feel uncomfortable doing this, bring along a little give. So you can diffuse some of the tension by saying like, “Oh, I have an industry salary report. I’d love to send it to you and share what I learned.” Bring some sort of third party gift if you feel funny asking out of the blue.

You can also ask people things like, “Where do you hope to be?” You don’t even have to ask the question of, “What did you come in at when you joined the company?” but “Where do you hope to be at performance review time or bonus time?” A second thing I think is really important, and I just ran a workshop where some of the women said this made a difference, is shift your mindset from taker in a negotiation to giver.

Jamie: I like that. Tell me more.

Selena: So, this is kind of remembering the oxygen mask phenomenon in the plane. It’s realizing that the more you negotiate for yourself, the more responsibility you have, the more money you make, the more license you have to drive decisions within your organization, the more you can give opportunities to other people, for example. The more you can nominate that very worthy person to lead a division or lead a department. The more you can give to charity. There’s so many ways you can think about this. The more you can do for your family.

And I think that’s important. I think that resonates with a lot of women, that I’m not just like taking for the heck of it when I negotiate. I’m actually looking to make a bigger impact in the world and wow, I can do that if I have more say-so and more money in the bank.

A third thing I would say is, we all kind of know that if you make your ask more communal, it will help you in a negotiation and that’s certainly in line with gender stereotypes that we know.

But I would add one more thing that I think a lot of women have success with and it’s counterintuitive. It’s bringing some humor into negotiations. And I say that because I think a lot of the blowback we get is because of this trope of you’re a strident, demanding woman asking for whatever it is. I think when you have a sense of humor, even one playful, funny comment like, “Research shows that when I ask you for what I’m about to ask you, you’re gonna like me less.” I mean, really, like, diffuse the tension,  even call out the absurdity that a woman asking is gonna make her a little less likable.

Jamie: It’s also calling out the elephant in the room at the same time. It kind of makes them step back and think, “Oh, hmm, interesting.”

Selena: Exactly! It does kind of undress and humanize the conversation a little bit and people have even done this in funny ways with contentious group negotiations.

I read one example where somebody started the meeting knowing this group had a kind of negative history by saying, “Look, I’m gonna be part Oprah, part Dr. Phil, part Jerry Springer today and I hope none of you throw any chairs.” It was a way to diffuse the tension, it was a way to inject some levity and maybe even remind people, is it worth it to get so carried away or so combative? So I think that was really effective. I do think it can help.

There’s also some newer research that shows humor is seen as a form of intelligence by people when they use it “appropriately” so not too extreme in form.

Jamie: Yeah, I love it, because it’s a way of strengthening the bond between you and the other side. We do know when there is a strong bond, you’re, I read, about four times more likely to get what you want.

Selena: Yeah, it makes complete sense that the same reasons you would do small talk or rapport build,  you know that you would also have the occasional laugh.

Jamie: Right, and that makes people relax and just be at ease. If you’re more at ease, you’re being creative, you’re being more forthcoming and that will help you negotiate better, absolutely.

I want to add to your idea of coming to the negotiation table as a giver. I also think it’s helpful to think about how you can give more creative solutions, more value. If you are negotiating for a raise or a promotion, I think you do want to say, “I am committed to bringing more value, and this is how: X, Y, and Z.”  So that way, you’re giving.

Selena: Yeah, I think that’s really smart. It’s really almost like reframing from “Can I have this?” to “Here’s a value proposition.”

Jamie: That’s right, yeah.

Selena: I like your point a lot. You know that that leads to more yes answers than just the “Can I have…?” for my own sake.

Jamie: Yeah, instead of “Can I have…?” be like, “Alright. I want to do more for you, how can we make this work?”

Selena: Exactly.

Jamie: Yeah.

Selena: You stole my line!

Jamie: It’s everyone’s line. So, I’m curious to know from you, you are an expert on negotiation, leadership, on creating more female-friendly workplaces and from that place, what does the word thrive mean to you? What does it look like?

Selena: You know I think it’s very simple. For me, it’s about having a voice. And maybe that’s why I’m so interested in meeting culture, what I was bringing up earlier about interruptions and being talked over or feeling shushed in life. I think a lot of women have felt shushed in their life in some way or another. I have.

And so, I feel incredibly lucky to have been able to write columns about the experience of working women, to write books, to have the agency to say my say-so, to have that self-expression. I tell my kids the same thing. I encourage them, “You can do whatever you want as a grown-up in your career but make sure you have a voice. Have a say in what matters to you. Steer the conversation. Use your articulation to shine a light on something that people aren’t seeing.” That is such a gift, and it’s one I will never stop appreciating.

I had a job early in my career and it was at the kind of firm where anything you said outside of the firm in a blog or in an interview like this needed to be checked by about twelve PR people and sometimes massaged before it could be put out there in the world. I could not stand that and I couldn’t live that way and so I think that’s really important to have a voice and use it.

Jamie: I love it. I have to say throughout all this time I’ve just been nodding my head. You just can’t see me, but I’m like, “Yep. Exactly!”

Selena: I love it. The vigorous nodding. I’m feeling it, Jamie, I’m feeling it.

Jamie: Yeah. So, just one quick personal question: What’s your favorite color and why?

Selena: Yeah. This has not changed in my entire life, but purple. And I really love the dark, kind of almost the color of an eggplant. That’s my favorite kind. Mysterious.

Jamie. Nice. Okay, cool. So where can people learn more about what you do and your work with Be Leaderly?

Selena: Yeah. Beleaderly.com is a great place to find us and we’re also on Facebook and Twitter, on Instagram, we have lots of lively dialogue and share as many super usable tips as we can, so please join us on those and we can continue the conversation!

Jamie: Yeah, this was a really valuable conversation. I love the tips about how to interrupt interruptions at a meeting so you can have your say and use your voice so you can thrive! I love that!

Selena: Well, thank you so much. I hope we get to do this again, Jamie, it was awesome.

Jamie: Same here. Thank you so much for your time, your expertise and your voice.

Selena: Thank you.

Jamie: Okay. Bye-bye.

Selena: Bye.

Questioning: It's Unfair I Bungled My Salary Negotiation

In the book The Prosperous Coach, Rich Litvin says, "One advantage of me spending so much of my own life feeling powerless is that I now quickly see how powerful people are." 

Same here. 

In this episode, I share my experience bungling a salary negotiation that left me feeling powerless and resentful. 

I question my own negative beliefs that held me back from speaking up and asking for what I wanted. 

If you've ever felt small, powerless, and resentful at work, you'll want to check this out.

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to the twenty-first episode of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. Twenty-first! I love that. It means we’re legal now!

My name is Jamie Lee. I work as a coach and you can learn more about my services on jamieleecoach.com.

I believe that we’re all born to thrive. I believe that negotiation skills are leadership skills, and I’m curious to know: How are you thriving today?

Today I’m thriving because books are magic.

This book that I’m reading right now, The Prosperous Coach by Steve Chandler and Rich Litvin, it’s rocking my world and if you are somebody who’s interested in becoming a coach or who is a coach who wants to become a prosperous coach, I highly, highly recommend it.

There is a quote in this book that really inspired me and resonated with me. The quote is:

“One advantage of me spending so much of my own life feeling powerless is that I now quickly see how powerful people are. This is something we can all do. Your client is the god of their world because they create their own world. They don’t even know it.”

I love this quote because it totally resonates. I think it’s 100% true. For me, I see that yeah, earlier in my life I had long periods where I felt very powerless.

One of those times when I felt powerless was definitely ten years ago when I bungled my salary negotiation and ended up earning fifty percent of the going market rate - fifty percent - as a hedge fund analyst.

Now when I think about it, I can’t help but laugh because of all the mistakes I made and I think this experience inspired me to do the work that I do now because I’m like, wow, how could I have made so many mistakes, so many obvious mistakes?

So, at that time I was pivoting from a career in procurement. I used to buy steel plates and copper plates for a heavy industries company and then after that, I was buying shipping boxes and cartons for a beauty company. And then one day a colleague of mine told me that if I post my resume on Craigslist, that could be another way to get a job.

It sounds pretty crazy now, I know. I mean, I would not do this. I would not advise anyone to do this.

But back then I was naïve and I thought, “Oh, let me give this a try.”  So I did. I posted my resume on Craigslist and then I got a call from a hedge fund that was looking for somebody who was multilingual. I speak Japanese and Korean and English so they wanted me to come in for an interview for an analyst position. I was a qualitative analyst, meaning I was just reading a bunch of research and news and data all day long as a hedge fund analyst.

In any case, this is how I bungled my salary negotiation, okay?

Number one, I didn’t do any research.

I don’t know, I just didn’t think about it. I went to Wikipedia, I read one entry on what a hedge fund does and I’m like okay, that’s enough.

Number two, I didn’t ask anyone in my network. I didn’t reach out to the alums from my school who are in the finance industry to ask them for advice around how to negotiate my salary.

I was just ill-prepared. I was completely unprepared for this conversation and the hedge fund manager, basically, he came to me and he said, “Okay, well we’re ready to make an offer. What is your minimum salary requirement?”

And at that time I was making $43,000 as an entry-level buyer for a beauty startup, and I thought, “Well, I was making 43, so I should make at least 50, right, in the next job? But I’m sure they’re gonna offer me more. They’re a hedge fund, I mean, maybe my minimum is 50, but they’re gonna give me more.”

That was my unarticulated thought.

Oh, boy.

Can you guess what happened?

Yes, $50,000 became my starting salary and he said, “Take it or leave it. There is no room for negotiation. This is it.” And so, you know what I did? I took it.

And then a year into that job - a year into that job, that’s how long it took for me to realize how big a mistake I had made - I read a research report on the average going salaries for hedge fund analysts and I see that it’s $100,000.

When I found out that I was making 50% of the going market rate, I felt powerless.

I felt small.

I felt resentful.

And eventually, as a result of that and some other things, I ended up quitting after two years, and I ended up taking an unpaid internship with a women-focused angel investment fund and this internship eventually changed my life.

Since then, I’ve learned a few things and some of the key things that I’ve learned are:

Number one: That real power is inside of me not outside of me. I think so many of us, including me, we mistake that power lies in other people outside of us.

Number two: I abdicate that power when I blame other people for how I feel. I learned that I am responsible for my own feelings. That’s called emotional maturity.

Number three: I learned that feelings are not actually irrational. They don’t just come out of the ether. They’re not meaningless.

Because thinking generates feelings.

And feelings generate actions.

Actions generate results.

And I’m not just pulling this out of the air, there’s been a lot of research that shows that people make decisions based on how they feel. Everyone is biased in their thinking and that bias is your belief or your repeated thinking pattern.

So, thinking generates feelings. Feelings generate actions. Actions generate results.

So, what the hell was I thinking back then ten years ago when I completely bungled my salary negotiation?

And that question led me to revisit some old resentments that I harbored towards my former boss at the hedge fund. I’ve had many, many, countless thoughts - some very colorful - about him and that situation at the hedge fund, but two really stick out as the thorniest:

Number one: It’s unfair he paid me 50% of the going market rate.

Number two: I want him to pay me respect.

So when I entertain these thorny thoughts, I feel like a victim. I feel tightness in my gut and a collapsed feeling in my chest. If I just entertain that thought again right now, that feeling comes back. And the situation feels hopeless.

And the brain is hard-wired for stories, so it goes on overdrive making up stories about the past and future and then I see images of all the other times people treated me unfairly, how my life is so unfair. And I also see images of the future about how I’ll never succeed.

It’s madness.

And I recognize that I have the power to stop that thinking pattern.

I have the power to get back to reality as it really is, not as it should be or as I imagine that it was. To get back to this reality, I have to slow down.

My process is that I write my negative thoughts, my negative stories, my negative beliefs on paper and then I question them. I consider the facts that my hijacked brain completely overlooks.

For example, let’s consider the facts of this situation.

My starting salary was my minimum salary requirement. I pulled a number out of the air and it turned out that was 50% of the going market rate.

Here’s another fact: I took that job. I said yes. I consented to that salary even though I was disappointed with the offer because I was afraid I’d be even more disappointed if I didn’t take the job.

And here’s another fact: once I found out about the going market rate, I did not communicate. I did not try to negotiate for more because I was afraid of not having a job. Mind you, this was a year after the 2008 financial crisis.

Here’s one more fact: I didn’t respect my boss. Truth be told, I feared him and mostly I tried to avoid him.

So you might be thinking, “Jamie, don’t be so hard on yourself!” A lot of people have told me that, especially early in my life, and it might sound like I’m being harsh on me.

The truth is, when I question my thoughts, I feel liberated. And I see how powerful I really am in creating the results in my life by entertaining thoughts that generate feelings that generate actions that generate results. And I see that I have the choice of not believing negative thoughts, not having them.

And I can see that without this negative thought, the negative story that I need him to respect me and it was unfair, I see that I’m actually doing well. That I am free. I am free to make choices in my life, and in fact, I am grateful for the experience. It gave me a valuable lesson in life and work and negotiations. And in fact, truth be told, I have written about how I’ve bungled my salary on LinkedIn and it’s on the Muse and I’m talking about it again. The experience was instructive.

Ironically, the inversions of my negative thoughts are actually closer to the truth. The truth being I gave the fund 50% of my commitment and focus. I held back on expressing myself out of fear. I held back on speaking up. I held back on negotiating. That was my part.

Here’s another truth: I want me to give me respect. I want me to respect myself. I also want to earn people’s respect. I don’t want it handed to me by people that I don’t respect, like my boss.

When you consider the truth, it just makes me feel almost giddy and I feel compassion for my younger self.

Look, I’m not condoning the practice of underpaying people, no matter how inexperienced they are, as I was ten years ago. The point I’m making, again and again, is that I have the power to choose my thinking. I have the power to choose my action. Choices that generate results. We all do.

And this is what I see in my clients, as Rich Litvin said, I have experienced feeling powerless and that helps me see how powerful people really are. How powerful my clients are, especially when they feel that they don’t have power.

I work as a negotiation and leadership coach. This is really important because negotiating, leading the conversation, influencing people, these are all acts of power.

The power to question negative thoughts that hold you back.

The power to see yourself with agency to change perspectives and results.

The power to engage in conversation with other people as their colleagues, not adversaries.

You do have the power, so what will you do with it?

Yeah, I’m really asking you. What will you do with it?

This has been such a joy for me to revisit the feeling of powerlessness, revisit that feeling of resentment and see that no, actually, we are really powerful.

And on that note, I am leaving on vacation at the end of this week and in the meantime, I wish you a wonderful week, and if you want to learn more about my services, come check out jamieleecoach.com. Talk to you soon!

Three Scripts for Sidestepping Illegal Salary Question

The good news: Local governments (CA, OR, MA, DE, Philadelphia, and NYC) are taking the lead in banning salary history question ("What did you make in your last job?") that perpetuates the gender wage gap. 

The bad news: Bad hiring practices still dominate most of the country.

Check out the podcast for three concrete strategies and scripts for sidestepping the dreaded question so you can get paid for your value, not for an irrelevant past.

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Full Episode Transcript

Hello! Welcome to Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I am your host, Jamie Lee. I am a leadership and negotiation coach and you can go to jamieleecoach.com for more information.

I’m curious. How are you thriving today?

Yesterday, my dear older sister gave birth to a baby boy. So, yesterday afternoon I had the mind-boggling privilege of holding a twelve-hour old newborn infant. I don’t think it’s very often you get to do something like that, and it was amazing.

I immediately fell in love. Immediately.

He is pure perfection. And yes, you can call me Auntie Jamie now. Well, at least he can.

I was holding him in my arms and I was counting his ten little perfect fingers, ten little perfect toes, and I also saw he had his full capacity to emote, his full capacity to express himself, to wail, to get our attention, which meant he had his full capacity to engage the people around him, his full capacity to enrapture grown adults who were all just goo-goo gah-gahing, and all of us head over heels in love with this newborn infant.

And I had the thought, “Here is a little fella who is truly born to thrive.”

He’s got everything he needs. He’s exactly who he needs to be and he is thriving.

He is loved.

He is connected.

Today I was walking around the streets here in New York City, and of course, we have this incredible diversity of people: old, young, white, black, brown, yellow, all colors of the rainbow. And I thought, “Wow. All these people around me with their incredible diversity, we were all once a tiny little, perfect newborn baby.”

We were all born to thrive.

So, that’s how I’m thriving today.

Today I have three scripts for you that you may want to either bookmark or share with somebody who is in the process of looking for a new job or negotiating a salary.

The thing is, it’s three scripts to sidestep an illegal or ill-advised question.

And that question is: What did you make at your last job?

It’s the attempt that employers make to peg your future earnings to your past history instead of your potential to contribute and add value.

Now, it makes sense from the perspective of hiring managers and employers. It may make sense to ask this question because it is in their best interest. They are incentivized to hire the best talent for as little money as possible. It’s good business, right?

And so if you ask this question - What were you making in the last job? - and you were making something that is under market rate, then they might attempt to just pay you either an increment more than what you were making or at the same rate so that they can hire the best talent for as little money as possible.

And you see the problem here is that this perpetuates the gender wage gap.

We know from numerous studies and research that women tend not to ask as much as men do and that men tend to be rewarded with salary increases, raises, and promotions more often than women without them asking, and that when women do ask, we tend to encounter gender blowback or feedback that we’re being bossy, intimidating, aggressive, etc., which are considered unfeminine, therefore unbecoming attributes.

So, you know what? I’ll just say it. It’s not fair.

It’s not fair for employers to ask this question, What were you making in your last job?

It perpetuates the gender wage gap. It shows this intent to pay you for, not what you’re truly worth, but for your past history, which is irrelevant to your future potential and your ability to add value.

Here’s the good news. This ill-advised question is becoming illegal in several places around the country. Particularly coastal states and cities. So, if you live in Oregon, if you live in California, if you live in Massachusetts, if you live in New York City, if you live in Philadelphia, and if you live in Delaware, this question - What did you make in your last job?- is illegal for employers at both public and private companies to ask you as part of their hiring process.

So, that’s the good news. That laws are being passed to really make an impact on closing the gender wage gap. This is great.

However, the bad news is that bad hiring practices still dominate most of the country.

So, if you don’t live in New York City, if you don’t live in Philadelphia, if you don’t live in Delaware, Massachusetts, Oregon, California or we should add Puerto Rico where it’s also illegal, it’s still very much legal for employers to ask this question, even though it is ill-advised.

It gives them the upper hand and it gives them the opportunity to peg your future earnings to an irrelevant past.

So, here’s what you can do when you are asked to reveal salary history in these other places where the questions are not yet illegal:

First, you can redirect the flow of conversation. Remember, negotiation is simply a conversation with the intention of reaching agreement. So, redirect the flow.

You can say, “You know, before we talk salary, I’d like to establish that this is going to be a good fit for both sides. Would you tell me more about your expectations and how you measure the success of this position?”

Alternatively, you can pivot or redirect the flow of the conversation by saying, “You know, I first want to establish that this is going to be a good mutual fit,” and ask different questions.

You can ask, “What are some of the challenges you expect the person in this position to face?” and this question gets them to share information that’s going to really help you better understand what this position is going to be like.

Another really good question you can ask is, “Thinking back to the people you’ve seen do this work previously, what differentiated the ones who were really good from the ones who were really great at it?” I like this question a lot because then it gets people to really tell you how you can excel in this position and then you can see for yourself whether you are a good fit.

Or, you can also ask, “What’s your timeline for next steps?” “Whom should I speak with after this conversation so that I can establish that this is going to be a good mutual fit?”

So, those are some questions you can ask to redirect the flow of conversation instead of answering this salary history question.

But, of course, some employers will insist or they’ll tell you that you can’t move forward in the process unless you answer that question, in which case another thing that you can do is that you can turn the table around and give some advice.

Here’s the script:

“Did you know that local governments and companies like Amazon are banning that very question because it perpetuates the gender wage gap? You know, I’m trying to look out for you, and it may be in your best interest to reconsider asking that question as part of your hiring process, especially if you want to continue to attract high-quality candidates who care about pay equity and social justice issues.”

I think this script will work really well to your advantage if you can be in control of your tone. If you feel angry and resentful and your voice becomes abrasive or defensive or accusatory, it’ll sound really different.

Take for example:

“HEY! Did you know that local governments and companies like Amazon are banning that very question you asked?!” The subtext there is: Hey, what is wrong with you? Don’t be stupid!

So, yes, it’s a script that can work, but I think it does require more self-management.

Here’s a third script, or third strategy:

Instead of answering a question by sharing your salary history, anchor with your salary expectation.

And if you’ve been listening to my podcast, you would know that anchoring is one of the key strategies for negotiation success. It makes good use of our very common cognitive bias of leaning towards the first piece of reasonable information that enters the conversation.

In other words, if you get to tell them first what you want, you’re more likely to get something that is very close to what you want.

So, to anchor, you might say something like, “You know, I’m looking to be paid x amount of dollars, which is the high end of the going market rate according to my research, and that’s because my unique background, my skill sets, and strengths can help your company meet its goals and objectives.”

What you’re doing is you’re tying your number to how they will benefit from your potential to create value, which has nothing to do with your past salary history.

So there you have it. You have three core strategies.

• You can redirect the flow of conversation by saying something along the lines of, “You know, before we talk about money, I first want to make sure that this is going to be a good fit and I have some questions for you.”

• Number two, you can turn the table around and give some advice. “Hey, did you know that that question is becoming illegal? You might want to reconsider asking that question. I’m looking out for your best interest here.”

• Number three, anchoring with your salary expectation, not history. “I’m looking to be paid x amount of dollars, and that’s because of my unique strengths, my skill sets, my background and my potential to add value to your organization.

If you want to learn more about the strategies, feel free to check out my previous podcast episodes.

I did one that addressed the three most frequently asked questions around salary negotiation and I most recently did an interview with Katrina Jones, who is an HR, diversity and inclusion expert, who explained how leading tech companies like Vimeo establish their compensation philosophy and the work and the research that goes into putting together an offer.

The bottom line in that interview was that if you are getting an offer, you have the upper hand because they really want you to say yes.

So, in conclusion, next time you’re asked an illegal or ill-advised question, remember, you do have the power to redirect, to inform and to anchor for what you want.

And remember that if they’re talking to you, that means you have something they want. They want your skills, they want your contributions, they want your unique blend of strengths and experiences and background and education.

You have leverage and you can thrive.

Thank you!

If you’d like to learn more about my negotiation and leadership coaching services, please come check out jamieleecoach.com. Talk to you soon!

Katrina Jones: Negotiation Secrets from HR, Diversity & Inclusion Expert

Katrina Jones is an accomplished HR executive and fierce champion for diversity, equality and inclusion. She currently serves as the Director of People & Inclusion at Vimeo and is also an adjunct faculty at NYU Wagner.

In this interview, Katrina shares: What do employers think about when they put together an offer to a candidate? What are some of the best salary benchmarking resources? What should women who want to close their wage gaps do? What sets apart the people who excel at negotiating and leading at work? She shares insider's insights, scripts, and timeless strategies for getting what you want and getting ahead at work.

Follow Katrina on Twitter: @Katrina_HRM

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Full Episode Transcript

Jamie:  Hello! Welcome to the eighteenth episode of Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I am your host, Jamie Lee. I believe that negotiation skills are leadership skills and that we’re all born to thrive.

And we can thrive when we learn from each other and when we brave that uncomfortable ask. And it’s often about salary, isn’t it?

So, today I have a very special guest. My guest is Katrina Jones, who is an accomplished HR executive and fierce champion for diversity, equality, and inclusion. She currently serves as the Director of People and Inclusion at Vimeo, and she is also an adjunct faculty at NYU Wagner.

She is an expert on pay negotiation because she is the person who puts together these offer packages for candidates that she hires at companies like Vimeo and I thought it would be really great to hear about salary negotiation from the perspective of somebody who works in HR, somebody who is an advocate for diversity, equality, and inclusion.

Both of us being women of color, I think this is going to be a really great conversation. So, I hope that you gain valuable insight and that it helps you get bolder, braver and better paid. Enjoy.

Katrina: Hi, Jamie.

Jamie: Hi, Katrina! How are you?

Katrina: I’m well, how are you?

Jamie: I’m doing excellent. Thanks so much for joining us on this podcast. I’ve not had an HR expert on the podcast to talk about negotiation, so this is really interesting for me, and I think it will be really interesting and helpful for our listeners.

So, would you share some insights as an HR expert on how employers like Vimeo put together a compensation package? I’m really interested in learning about the thought process that goes into putting together an offer.

Katrina: Absolutely! I’m really grateful for the opportunity to join your podcast and to be part of it and have this conversation - an important conversation - about compensation.

For Vimeo, we first set by defining our compensation philosophy, which is something that happens outside of the recruiting process and extending an offer. We aim to be competitive with what the market is paying out across roles, and we know that we’re recruiting against the likes of a Facebook, a Google and other local tech companies in Silicon Alley, so we do need to be competitive.

So, we will conduct market research to know what a particular role pays for or what the median range, what the pay range is for a particular role. So we’ll do that research. We have a budget, of course, that salaries are built into, and so at that point, we’ll get into negotiations as part of an offer, potentially.

And we do make the best offer possible. So, our goal is not to put people into a position where there’s a ton of negotiation, but the goal is to make sure that it’s a really great offer that will close the deal because ultimately when you’ve gotten to the point of offer, we just want to hire you. We really want to bring you on board, and we will work to get to the yes. So, that’s something that’s important to think about.

And of course, as part of our offer - and offers vary - so, offers can include equity, they can include, of course, we have great benefits, our health benefits, as well as other insurance benefits and what we offer, our unlimited vacation, which is a fantastic benefit and really cool company and great company culture as well, with an amazing CEO who’s a woman of color. So, these are all things that - there’s the salary piece, and there are the intangibles as well. I should say salary and overall compensation.

Jamie: Yeah. So, it’s really good to know that from the HR perspective, you really want to get that yes.

Katrina: Yes, absolutely!

Jamie: And also, that you’re not just thinking about the salary component, you’re thinking about making a really compelling offer with the intangibles and the benefits and the culture. So, I guess for people who are getting prepared or thinking about, oh, how do I negotiate an offer, you have to really think about the whole picture.

Katrina: Yeah. Absolutely. And for a lot of companies, tech companies, in particular, depending upon the level of the role, there is often an option for equity, which is incredibly important and I would encourage people to ask for that or negotiate for that. At the minimum, ask whether or not equity is a part of the package, but that can certainly sweeten the deal.

But for anybody who’s going through a recruiting process, know that once you get to the offer, the employer, the organization, the hiring manager on the other side really just wants you to say yes.

Jamie: Yeah. So, in a sense, people do have leverage when they’ve been offered a job.

Katrina: Yes! Yeah, you definitely do have leverage. And I can say this from personal experience, where I’ve been able to negotiate my base salary based on what I brought to the table, what I bring to the table as an HR and diversity and inclusion practitioner, and say “That figure is great, I appreciate the offer,” or “Thank you for the offer. I’m really excited about the opportunity. In terms of base salary, this is what I had in mind based on these reasons why.”

Jamie: Yeah. And I appreciate that, because that’s the same script I offer to people and it almost always starts with that appreciation and enthusiasm, because it might sound like just soft language, but it’s really important to communicate that no, you really are excited, and you do feel enthusiasm for what the company is doing. Otherwise, you don’t really have a reason to be talking.

Katrina: Right. I was just going to say, I am totally, wholeheartedly in agreement with you that that language is important to say thank you and to be enthusiastic about the offer that you’ve been presented with, and then pivot to that next part of the conversation, which is “This is what I was thinking of,” or “This is the number I would like us to get to, that I’m hopeful we can get to.”

Jamie: Right. Speaking of numbers, I’m really fascinated by the research that practitioners like yourself would do to put together an offer, because a lot of my clients, they go to Payscale.com, Salary.com, Glassdoor.com, and depending on what they type into that search box, they might get a completely different number.

You just change the title or change the geographic data, and the range can be really astronomical, and that can lead to confusion as to what is the going market rate. So, what is the level of research that you do when you put together an offer?

Katrina: Yeah, so we are, and most companies have access to research, so there are companies out there, compensation companies and other compensation consulting companies and other talent consulting companies that what they do is they benchmark salary data. So, we have a compendium of annual data that we have access to with salary ranges for certain positions.

And this is fairly common, I would say, across industries. I’ve worked in the law firm industry before, and we similarly had research from a company called Towers Watson that we would access when evaluating compensation. So, there are companies like Towers Watson, other companies out there, that they solicit data from companies, they benchmark and then they turn around and then sell that data to a broad range of companies.

Jamie: Yeah. So, in your opinion, do Glassdoor, Payscale, Salary.com, do they even come close?

Katrina: It’s very mixed. My recommendation is those are great resources at least to access and to get a sense of what the range would be.

I would also encourage people to reach out to recruiters if they have any recruiters that they have personal or professional connections to, and just ask them about what the salary range is and salary ranges are for roles that they’re recruiting for. That can be a great predictor of what’s the range, what should you ask for, and will get you closer to what is the range for a company of x size, versus a company of y size, or in this sector versus another sector.

And I think that’s what makes it difficult to really accurately pull data. What you’re getting from Salary.com or from Payscale can be across a multitude of industries, including, for example, the hospital and health industries, other industries and so that is definitely not an apples to apples comparison.

Jamie: Yeah.

Katrina: Another site that’s really great that I also encourage people to visit is Fairygodboss.com. So, Fairygodboss is designed for women, specifically, that aggregates and publishes reviews and information on company salaries offered to the site, and it’s aggregated by company, so you can actually look for a specific company and start just looking at some of the ranges, and it’s all pulled from real reviews that are out there by women working at these different companies.

Jamie: Thank you for sharing that. I also know that Fairygodboss, they have data on company culture, work-life balance, as well as maternity leave policies. Like, which companies actually have paid maternity leave, etc. Information that’s really helpful for women in particular.

Katrina: Yes. I find it to be helpful, I think, for people in that they have a comprehensive - and some of this actually vetted with the companies directly, so that they have given their permission to publish what they offer across their benefits from maternity or parental leave and beyond, and I find that those are pieces of information that are really hard to get during that process to understand, in addition to salary, because you should think about that as well, what will you be paying for health insurance, for instance, or what kind of leave is offered? If you are asking for one salary, but your health insurance premium is $30,000 annually, that can make a dent into your salary and may or may not change what you negotiate for.

Jamie: Okay. There’s a lot to think about. It’s always good to know that these are specific things you can look out for and that there are great resources available. So what advice do you have for women who want to close their wage gaps?

Katrina: So, that’s a great question, and the advice that I would give to women is to ask for more, to always ask for more. When you are negotiating a salary for an initial offer, always ask for more money. The worst that the organization will do is hold firm and say no, but chances are it may be that you’re able to negotiate for more money, it could be for more benefits, it could be for increased equity. Everything is on the table when you’re at that final offer.

Jamie: Because they want your yes!

Katrina: Yeah. They want your yes. They want to close the deal. By the time you’ve gotten to final offer stage, they are just waiting to send you that welcome packet and they are eager to welcome you into the company. So, you do have real leverage there.

I would also encourage women to ask for and to meet with their managers to meet at least a couple of times a year to talk about their career path and talk about what opportunities are out there for them. So, internally, just being very intentional about how you grow your career within a company, looking for those other opportunities. If you’ve had a really great quarter or a great couple of quarters, asking for perhaps a spot bonus, and I think what comes with that is also doing some research to understand what compensation opportunities are out there, and what does the company offer.

Do they provide spot bonuses? Are bonuses purely on a year-end basis or part of the review process? But you never know until you ask, and once the ask is out there, again, the worst thing that they can do is say no. But, what they might do, and what often happens is they come back with at least a timeline of when you could have your salary reviewed for an increase or really advocate for yourself for that year-end bonus.

Jamie: I love that you’re tying in the fact that you have to be strategic about the development of your career. It’s not just about money, but what kind of assignments are you asking for, and then from there, once you have contributed value, then you have an even better case for the money that you want.

Katrina: Absolutely. That is incredibly important, that you are able to - I always encourage people to be specific and to share some data about what have you done. Have you increased market value? Have you increased page views or site clicks or whatever you’re working on? Have you decreased a budget or filled a budget gap? Being able to translate that into, this is what I’ve saved the company in terms of money that I’ve saved the company or this is how I have increased the company’s value.

Jamie: Right, right. That’s something that I discussed in this earlier webinar I gave about how it’s really important to quantify your value. Yes, you are valuable and you need to be able to express it in quantified terms, right? The x percentage in increase in revenue, number of clients served, customer satisfaction rating went up, that’s quantifiable.  So, thank you for reminding us of that very important career strategy.

Katrina: Absolutely. And if I can just share one more piece of advice, I know there are some people who are kind of journeywomen and who will move around to different companies, different organizations, and some people who might stay in one spot and they have tremendous career opportunities and great visibility and great relationships and lots of other things that make them stay on with a company for quite some time, and that is great.

And I would also encourage you to even write out, periodically, for what else is out there in the market (in relation to your position). That can also be a great way to benchmark against the desired skills in the market. Also, if you can find out information that way about salary or other benefits that are being offered so you can continue to remain competitive in your career as a professional and of course from a compensation standpoint. You have access to that information.

Jamie: Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. So, I’m curious to know, since I imagine you do deal with a lot of salary negotiation, do you see a pattern between people who are vocal, people who are proactive about asking for more money, more hot jobs, great opportunities and those who actually lead?

Katrina: That’s such a great question! I can’t generalize, but I do see some people forcefully advocating for themselves and really holding firm, and I don’t know that it’s explicitly split by gender, say, that men advocate more forcefully for themselves versus women, or personality type, but where I find that people are successful is people that really understand the business, understand how the business makes their money and can speak to that, understand the value that they bring to the organization and can tie all of those things together.

Jamie: Oh, wow, that’s a really good point. You really need to understand how the business operates, how the business makes money, and what is the impact of your work on the operations.

Katrina: Yeah, how does your work contribute to that?

Jamie: Yeah, tie it all together so you can paint the full picture. Okay, thank you, yeah, that’s a really good one. And so do you see that those who can see the full picture of how the business operates and how their contribution impacts the business, do you see that those people tend to be leaders?

Katrina: I do. Because they have a holistic view of the business versus just looking at their part, and I think what is challenging sometimes is we get very heads down and can be siloed in these roles, but to look up and to understand what products do we produce, or what services, or who are our huge clients, how long have they been clients?

But really just understanding more deeply about the business, and that is something I think is something that everybody should do, and I have seen incredibly brilliant women who are business-minded and think about organizational health in that way and think about the business in that way, and then think about their careers in that way in terms of let me think about where I sit in this big picture.

Jamie: Nice, nice. So, one more question for you. As you know, my podcast is called Born to Thrive because I believe we are all born to thrive, no matter our gender, creed, sexual orientation. What does the word thrive mean to you?

Katrina: You know, it’s so funny that you ask. So, thrive is one of my absolute favorite words, and I’m always positioning things in terms of how can we thrive? How can we help, especially as an HR practitioner and diversity practitioner, how can I help people thrive? And it has so many meanings for me. For me, it means just traveling along joyously on that journey of life. That there are peaks and there are valleys, and it’s how do I maintain during those moments where I’ve hit a valley. How do I persist through?

Because the journey is a mix of overwhelming, incredibly joyous moments and it’s a mix of moments of sadness and tough times, right? But it is about how do you get through? So, when I think about thrive and what that word means to me, I think about grit and resiliency and how you push through til you get to the next mountaintop. The next high peak.

Jamie: Love it. Where can people learn more about you and what you do?

Katrina: So, I have a Twitter account and I’m incredibly active on Twitter. I share lots of news within the HR and diversity and inclusion discipline, and also speak about a lot of the current stuff that’s happening across businesses. So, you can find me on Twitter, my hashtag is @Katrina_HRM and then of course on LinkedIn. You can find me on LinkedIn and click my profile and definitely connect with me on LinkedIn. I love connecting with new people and follow me on Twitter as well and you can read all of my musings on a variety of things.

Jamie: That’s how we met! I met you on Twitter and then we connected on LinkedIn.

Katrina: Yes! Yeah, social media, that’s a whole other conversation, but I am a huge proponent of social media and the value of connecting virtually and what those connections can bring. It really does expand your network tremendously, and I’ve been able to connect with so many amazing people including yourself, and so many other people and I learn so much, so it’s just fantastic.

Jamie: Thank you. So, Katrina, what I’m taking away from this conversation is that when somebody gets an offer from a great company like Vimeo, they really do have leverage, because they want your yes, and you don’t have to be afraid to ask for more, of course, within reason, right?

Another thing is that it really helps to be able to see the full picture. That was a really good takeaway for me. So, thank you so much, Katrina for your valuable time, for sharing your great insights from within the trenches and I’ll be sure to let everyone know where they can find you on Twitter and LinkedIn.

Katrina: Okay, awesome! Thank you. And thank you again for having me. I’ve really enjoyed being a part of the podcast and look forward to connecting with your audience.

Jamie: Awesome. Have a great day, Katrina! Thank you.

Katrina: You too.

Why We Need to Talk About the "F" Word in Negotiation

“How you feel doesn’t matter.” “Women are emotional and therefore make terrible negotiators.” “Your feelings are a weakness.” These are all myths that undermine our humanity and undermine our potential for negotiation success.

To feel is to be human. To have emotional intelligence is to have a secret weapon in a negotiation.

I explain the importance of feelings in negotiation and invite you to join me for a free teleclass on using advanced emotional intelligence for negotiation success. 

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Full Episode Transcript: 

Hello, welcome to episode seventeen. This is Born to Thrive with Jamie Lee. I am your host Jamie Lee. I work as a leadership and negotiation coach for women on the rise. I believe that negotiation skills are leadership skills and that we need to talk about the "F" word in negotiation. 

No, I'm not talking about the four-letter "F" word. I'm talking about feelings. Yes. 

You all have heard this... 
"How you feel doesn't matter. Be strong, and don't back down. No matter what." 
"Whatever you do at the negotiation, don't get emotional. Just focus on the numbers." 
Here's another one: "Women are emotional. Men are rational thinkers and make better negotiators." 
Or how about this one: "Your feelings are a weakness." 

These are all false. Every single one of them. 

Pushing feelings away is like trying to swim underwater without taking breaths. You’ll go five minutes before drowning or popping out of the water, gasping for air. 

Likewise, how you feel can make or break your negotiation. That's why, on Thursday April 26, I'm hosting a free tele-class on how to use advanced emotional intelligence for negotiation success. To register, go to this link. 

Don’t take my word for it. Take MIT professor Jared R. Curhan’s. 

In their research, he and his colleagues at MIT Sloan School of Management and UC Berkeley found that four things are most important to negotiators: 

• Their feelings about potential outcomes
• Their feelings about themselves in the negotiation 
• Their feelings about the negotiation process
• Their feelings about their relationship with the other negotiator 

When you feel optimistic about outcomes, confident about yourself, happy about the process, and connected with the other negotiator, negotiating is like a walk in the park. 

When you feel resentful that you don’t have more, insecure about your ability to negotiate, fearful of the process, or angry at the other negotiator, negotiating can be like chewing glass. 

It can be painful. 

It can feel like things are out of control. 

It can be tempting to react by making demands, running out, or starting a fight, which I promise you will backfire. 

Here’s what I want to offer. 

Feelings are not irrational or irrelevant. 

Feelings are generated by your thoughts. 

You have the power to generate new thoughts. 

That means you have the power to deal with negative emotions and generate positive emotions, so you can bring your full capacity for problem-solving, creativity, and leadership to the table. 

So when it comes to negotiating, you have the choice. You can either chew glass or take a walk in the park. 

So my question to you is: Which do you prefer? 

In conclusion, contrary to popular misconception, emotions rule in negotiation.

Smart negotiators prepare a logical case. Masterful negotiators use advanced emotional intelligence to connect with their counterparts in a meaningful way to create durable agreements that unlock benefit for both sides of the table. 

If you'd like to learn more, I invite you to join the free tele-class on Thursday, April 26. Click here to register.