Aspire with Emma Grede - Aspire with Mellody Hobson: What I Learned From My Business Hero

Episode Date: May 6, 2025

Emma sits down with the number one person she looks up to in business: to Mellody Hobson. As Co-CEO of Ariel Investments—a firm managing over $14 billion in assets—Mellody is a powerhouse whose influence stretches far beyond Wall Street.   She opens up about her early life growing up on the South Side of Chicago, the youngest of six kids raised by a single mother, and how those beginnings shaped her views on money, ambition, and success. Mellody shares her rare career journey—starting as an intern and rising to president in under ten years, all while staying at the same company for over three decades.   Emma and Mellody go deep on what it takes to thrive in male-dominated spaces, why subject matter expertise is the foundation of real leadership, and how negotiating for yourself is non-negotiable. They also talk openly about money trauma, self-worth, and rewriting the financial narratives many of us carry.   Mellody’s story proves you can build a legendary career without chasing every trend—by staying focused, staying prepared, and staying true to yourself. This conversation is full of hard-won wisdom on how to stand out, stay sharp, and lead with purpose. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I am so excited to share my debut book with you or Start With Yourself, which is available now. You might have seen the headlines, you might have seen the social, but this book is exactly what I intended, a conversation that will make you think, and it's a blueprint for anyone who wants success without the toxic positivity. Start with yourself is about self-leadership, because wherever I go, women ask me how I got to where I am. But what you really want to know is how you can get there. So I'm doing what I do best, sharing and navigate keeping what's works for me in the hope that you can borrow from a philosophy that has served me so well. The truth is I'm not an expert. I've just lived it. I've made the mistakes.

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so I can share it with you. Start with yourself. My debut book is available now. Visit emigre.com to purchase the book, also available on Amazon. on, your favorite audio platforms, and all good bookshops. We're the Hartford, with decades of experience ensuring millions of unique small businesses when it comes to your small business insurance. Thank you. One size, absolutely does not fit all. Get a quote or find an agent today at thehartford.com slash small business.

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When you want points that can take you anywhere, any time, it matters where you stay. Hilton, for the stay. Book your spring break now. You must, and I mean this with serious intensity. You have to have a sense of urgency. You have to want to be great. How do you know that, like, you're like, you're like, like, I'm going to stay in Ariel and this is going to be my career.

Like, if I'd have asked you, I don't know, 30 years ago, would you stay in this one place? I knew I would. Would you have had that answer? I knew I would. Vision means conquering fear. Because once you decide to go out on that limb and dangle, there's like nothing to help you. You're like gripping by your hands, by your fingernails. I'm so excited about today's episode of the Aspire podcast because today I'm talking to my ultimate aspiration.

Whenever I'm asked who I look up to in business, I only have one answer, and it's Melody Hobson. Melody is the co-CEO of Aerial Investment, a firm which manages over $14 billion in assets. She was chairwoman at Starbucks and has held board seats at J.P. Morgan, Estée Lauder, and even negotiated the acquisition of DreamWorks Animation. She is someone whose journey is marked by incredible success, but she's also navigated her path with grace and courage and just an unshakable sense. sense of purpose. If you ever wondered what it takes to rise through the ranks, not just to the top, but to redefine what the top can be, their melody is that blueprint. We'll get into her thoughts on

how to get promoted, finding the power in negotiation, and how sometimes being underestimated can be your superpower. We'll talk about money and how she's using her voice and influence to build real ownership, especially for women and people of color. Melody is a true one-of-one, and I am so excited to share this episode. Welcome to the show, Melody Hobson. Melody, thank you so much for being here today. When I think about someone in business who I aspire to, you are number one, number one, number one again. No, come on. No, not come on. You seriously? Yes, seriously. Right. You know this. You see that to everyone. Every time I start, that's my intro. No, I have to tell you, when I decided to do this show, which ultimately the idea is that I get to share the people that I aspire to the most, it was,

number one you and I'm so happy that you're here and we've got a lot of stuff that we're going to talk about today but before we start I really want to understand a little bit more about your childhood and where you come from and I know you grew up on the south side of Chicago I know that you're one of six and you were raised by a single mother but I'd really like to understand a little bit more about how how you were raised and how and where you came from really you know what does that mean in terms of who you are today and how you kind of move through you. through the world. Me knowing your story, I think you'll understand very well. I grew up in Chicago, youngest of six. My siblings are much older than me. So a couple of decades. So interestingly,

I am technically an only child because they say if you have more than five years between yourself and your next sibling, and my next sibling is nine years older than me. My mom was a single mom. She worked extremely hard, but we had a hard existence. And not harder than anyone else's, but our own form of challenges, where despite the effort, we would get evicted. Our phone would get disconnected. Our lights would be turned off. My mom used to borrow gas from the gas station to get me to school. And all of those things created trauma.

I feel like my purpose came from that trauma. And I think my fire, and I said this recently in an interview, was lit by scarcity. There was scarcity. and it made me very, very, very focused and very driven. I mean, very, I could sit for hours and work without even looking up. The focus that I have is extreme. Well, I know that about you. And I think that for so many people, when you come from a place where scarcity is like,

it's there, it never leaves. Like, it's always around the corner. Do you feel like that now? Absolutely. No, I used to have those recurring nightmare dreams. You know, people talk about their dream was they didn't graduate from college or something like that. I still, to this day, I wake. up in the morning and I look up and I speak words of gratitude or say words of gratitude to myself

about the fact that I have a house or an apartment or wherever I am. I cannot tell you how much that resonated me. I mean, I've told you this before. I love that story of Chris Rock who talks about keeping a bag packed in his own house. And I feel a little bit like that. I'm ready for the day someone's like, this is not your life girl. You're like, you know, I'm going to march you out. And so I kind of feel like in my head, I kind of, I will keep a bag packed for the rest of my life. And it's interesting, mine is not the bad pact. Mine is like the account to make sure like you have, you have some back, you know, some backup money in case anything goes wrong. Yeah, so it's not a bag for me, but it's the same concept. It's the same concept.

Being prepared and, you know, having that, not even just emergency mentality, but that mentality that anything can happen, which has proven to be true over and over again in life. Yeah, and so many great ways. But did you always know that you want to. a career in business. I understand that you were watching your siblings. But who was around you and who gave you this idea that you could have this type of career that you're having? No one. No one. In my immediate family, I'm the only one who graduated from college. So they aren't like me. We're very, very different. But as I said, I have nothing but respect and admiration and love for the lens for which they allowed me to form a life for myself or an idea of a life

for myself. In terms of what I was looking at, nothing in person, but I was reading. And so I always told people, I was mentored by people I never met because I was reading about them. And so the reading is what brought me to have the ideas that I have because I didn't have that real life experience. I didn't grow up with any relationships. I didn't grow up with any entrees. I found all those things myself. And then I was a really good student. And what I mean by that is technically a good student at school, but I was a good study. So if I had the opportunity to observe something, I would study it really fast. So I would come here, furniture, how you looked, all sorts of things, and then take pieces of it and say, oh, that makes sense, where I want to do that,

or look at how this was put together. And so that created an opportunity for me. But I really spent a lot of my childhood in the library. I used to go to the library on Saturdays and hang out at the library. And reading what? Like, what were you to? Where? What information were you to ask? Really young? I used to read these biographies. There were these little red books. And they were in my school library at my public school, which is called the Ogden School. And they had a book on every person you could possibly imagine. And my goal was to read all of them. And so I read books on like the most. I mean, I'm like nine, ten, eleven, twelve. And at nine you have a goal. So at nine, you're like, I'm going to read every one of these books.

Well, this was a big deal because I told people this and, you know, sometimes they're a little surprise. I couldn't read until I was in second grade. I really struggled reading, which I can't explain it. No, and I have no issues. I mean, once it clicked, I had a math teacher in high school. He called me the second day girl. He was like, you get everything on the second day.

And then once you have it, it's solid. He used to call me literally in class. He's like, the second day girl. He's like, the second day. I don't know that that's still. true, but there were some years where I was a second day girl. I can almost certainly say you've shed the second day girl thing. So you then, first in the family to graduate from college, you graduate from Princeton. Yes. And you then go straight to aerial investments. Yes. Which is

where you are now. You were an intern, and that is where you've spent your entire career. I have had one job since I graduated from college in 1991. And supposedly in my graduating class of 11 hundred people. I'm the only person who has had the same phone number at work the entire time, literally. Well, because nobody does that these days. I feel like we're almost trained in so much of a way. And I honestly think this about my own stuff because people come and they come for two to three years. It's so unusual that anyone stays even for five or six. So I can imagine for you that even during that tenure, you have done a lot of different things. You don't start as the intern and end up where you are. Now, remember, I'm rooted in a sense of a lack of security. Yes. And moving constantly as a child.

So when you move a lot as a child, what don't you do as an adult? You don't want to move. You want stability. So I never wanted to move. And so I didn't want to move at home. And I didn't want to move at home. And I I didn't want to move. I lived in my first apartment that was 850 square feet for 14 years. You did. I was president of Ariel. I had enough money to buy a really, really nice apartment. What is happening?

And I lived in this 850 square foot apartment. And at one bathroom, I had to, my apartment remodeled. I had to move to the peninsula to get my apartment. And you moved back to the 850 square feet. And they said, get out of it. My bathroom was so small that only one construction work could work in it at a time. Where does that come from? Because I was like...

You wanted to stay where you were at. And I was also like, it's paid for. I'm not living above my means. It's perfectly fine. It was pretty. It was tiny. It had 11, 14 foot ceilings, but tiny. It was the tiniest little apartment.

But it was yours and you owned it. I had shoes in the kitchen. When did you buy that apartment? When I was in 1994? Right. And so I lived there for this long period of time because I really like this idea of just being very, very, very stable.

So the same was true at Ariel. It was very, very stable, but I was constantly challenged with new things. And they always got harder to this day. And I do think there's so much to be said for someone like you. You've done so many things in your career. But how have you been able to architect that career over the last 30 years? What did that look like for you? So one thing that I felt very strongly about, and I told this to a lot of young people,

first of all, and it's very important. My career is anchored in an expertise. I am anchored in finance. And that is very, very important. When I looked at the greats, no matter who they were, from Warren Buffett to Steve Jobs to you name the person, Jamie Diamond, you could look at Walt Disney. You could look at just so many greats.

they did one thing extremely well, and they went deep. And I told people, an expert is someone who knows more and more about less and less. So that's not my quote. It's a quote that I read. So you know more and more about less and less. And so think about it. I said there's a difference between a general practitioner where you just go to the doctor and they're checking you out and brain surgery.

So I wanted to be the brain surgeon of my field. How did you choose finance? because money, I was desperate to understand money as a child. So that's what I mean by my trauma became my purpose. I really wanted to understand very early on how money worked so that I would not repeat the cycles that I was in. And so really it all made a lot of sense to me. Once I got there, and this is really important,

I said, I want to be known for something that I do so well that it distinguishes me. So in finance, one of the things that I do really, really well is I have a great ability to communicate ideas. And I would read the people who could do it very well. And there was a guy who wrote for Barron's magazine, which is a weekly financial magazine named Floyd Norris. He wrote the beginning article every week. He was genius, genius writer. And then I would read Warren Buffett's annual letters, genius, genius, genius, where they would simplify such hard concepts.

Warren Buffett would talk about everyone thinks he's looking for a needle in a haystack. He's like, I own Coca-Cola. I just look for haystacks. So just that idea of like, look for a haystack, not a needle. And so I would read what they would write. And I'd say, well, one, I want to be able to write extremely well about money. And I want to be able to communicate this concept to anyone who could be a bus driver, a CFO, a school teacher. And to do that actually is harder than.

You know, if you are a scientist and you're only speaking to PhDs, you have a common language, you have a lot of jargon. If you're trying to break down that science to everyday people, you have to figure out how to put it in terms that they can understand. And I want it to be able to do it all. And it's not even a question of high, low. It's a question of being clear, concise, and simple about things that can be very hard to explain. And how have you gotten so good at that?

Like, because it's such a difficult thing. And I do, you know, I almost hate what I'm about to say. But I feel like finance is still one of those things. And it doesn't matter if you meet a female founder, female CEO, she will somehow extrapolate herself very, very often and more often than not, from the finance piece. And I find myself and have done earlier in my career saying, you know, the first person I get around me is like the CFO because that's where I'm weak.

And I think the moment I stopped. saying that and I took responsibility for my own learning, for my own understanding, for my dyslexia and not allowing that to be an excuse, I became infinitely more powerful in my own businesses, but also in my own life. So like I just need to understand, like that is so, it's such an incredible thing for me that you are so powerful in finance. So one of the things that I love so much that I will tell you, for years and years, I started off working on television and I worked on Good Morning America for a decade, and then I worked on CBS. As an expert, right?

So you always had your job area and then you would be... I have 17 jobs. Right, yes, but you'll be in the entertainment sphere as Melody Hobson, the expert. And talking about what happened in the world of money. And the great thing about that is you get so few minutes and you must simplify. Right. And so what I would do on my way to the studio, and it would be, you know, four in the morning, five in the morning, I'd sit in the front seat of the black town car and speak to the driver.

And I would run my script by the driver. And I would say to him or her, every single time I say something you don't understand, stop me. And so I used them as my focus group, just the car ride. And I would go over and over and over again. And so that was one way that I would hear. And Diane Sawyer in the beginning, she would call me in the middle of the night. She's like, I've read your script. I don't understand this.

It would be like two in the morning. And she was like, Melody, you have to explain it. I don't understand. And she was the one who always kept pushing me to simplify and explain things in a better way. And then I started to realize the power of that. Because once you could break it down, even that, you know, it's, I think people think someone with jargon is smarter and I actually feel the opposite. Most of the time when people give me acronyms, I say, what does that stand for?

All the time. Do you know how many people can't tell you? what the acronym means. All the time. Yes. Which I think is hilarious. Yes. So it says a lot. It's one of the reasons I don't like acronyms at all. I actually think it's a great lesson because sometimes the fear, I remember when I started in the apparel business, it's all acronyms. And I would stop people constantly and say, what is the AOV? What is the UPT? What is the LTV? And everyone would be like, aren't you embarrassed? You're supposed to be the CEO. And I was like, no, I don't know what I don't know. And again, it can become so, like, fearful for people just to ask the question.

Oh, it's so interesting because I call it confident humility. Yes. I can be confident and have a lot of humility. And I tell people all the time, if I don't know what you are talking about, I'm going to ask 100%. And it's a superpower to simplify. And so you to be able to distill complex ideas into really, really simple, like, you know, simple things that anyone can understand is a super power.

This is my example that I get to people. You have a small child. My daughter's 11. I know you have several children around her same age. Something's wrong with your child. You are with a doctor. A doctor speaks to you only in doctors speak. If it were your child, you'd say, break that down and explain it to me in a way that I can understand.

Because you are not walking out of that office with something wrong with your child without understanding. I said, why do we allow people to do that with us with money? It's significant what you need to know. It could not only affect your life, but the life of your heirs. So you need to ask that follow-up question. I don't know what you're talking about. Just as if someone said, you know, your daughter broke her femur in three places. If you didn't know what femur was, you'd say, what is that?

And they'd say, broken life. Right? So it's the same sort of thing. But I think the simplification of the concepts is the power of it. And that's what I started to see. I was like, wait a minute. If I can simplify this, I actually have more people. who are leaning in because sometimes they actually want to borrow the ideas.

Oh, yeah. And use these ideas in their own way. And then also what it allowed me to do, it forced me to break these things down for myself. I was always kind of say, like, how could I think about this differently? What does this mean? How do I understand it? And if I'm in a boardroom, if I'm in anywhere, I'm just not, I always people know that about me. I will ask if I don't know.

I think questions are the most powerful things you can do. in life. Yes. I prefer questions to statements. Every single time. And I think that all the time, because in any situation that you're in, being able to find that unlocked or something is like, how many great questions can you ask?

It's not about what you already know, because I want to figure out what I don't know in any given situation. And so asking the right questions is what allows you to do that every time. And what amazes me, Emma, smart people who are not curious. Oh, it's the worst. It's a terrible trait just like not being. curious on its own. How about the fact you sit down with someone and by the end of dinner, they haven't asked you

one day? It's unforgivable. I literally, I am like, well, they may be successful for now. Yeah, but how long is it last? Correct. No, curiosity. And honestly, when I think about this type of show and the reason that I wanted to do this is because my life has been so enhanced by being able to sit with people that I find really

interesting and really inspiring. And information, you know, Warren Buffett has this quote that I love, which is, the more you learn, the more you earn. All pay off your home, travel for life, drive a Ferrari. In celebration of the world premiere of the Monopoly Big Board Buckslot Machine by Aristocrat Gaming, Yamava Resort and Casino at San Manuel is giving one person a $1.6 million dream package. The biggest prize in Yamava's history. Club Serrano members can earn daily instant prizes and secure a spot in the finale May 29th.

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While supplies last ends June 30th, terms at AKA.m.m.S. slash college PC. It feels to me that you are always in learning mode. You can't have a career like the one that you've had without consistently learning. And so when you learn that you are this super communicator and you have a way of decision, and simplifying these very complex ideas. How do you know that, like, you're like, I'm going to stay in Ariel and this is going to be my career? Like, if I'd have asked you, I don't know, 30 years ago, would you stay in this one place?

Would you have had that answer? I know I would. I remember being very young. I remember walking into our office one day, and I remember looking at the door and I said, how many times are my going to walk through this door in my life? I knew. I knew.

Part of what I knew was that I was working with great people. someone gave me advice once they said people make really important business decisions for the wrong reasons and they encourage me never to make important business decisions based upon money never and I think so many people do that and I have seen it that you know the person who leaves the job for the extra 10 grand and you're like but this is the better opportunity this is the better person to mentor you this is the way that you're going to actually be exposed to things that you won't see in this other place but it's the tradeoffs that are made that you're made that were they ultimately nickel and dime themselves.

I remember being at Ariel. I remember someone saying to me, they tried to recruit me to another job. I never talked to headhunters or anything like that. This person asked me to come over and they're like, but it's so much bigger than Ariel. And I said, that's what you value. And I said, I'm valuing the experience.

And this experience is giving me a lot of opportunity to grow and learn in ways big and small that are important to me. And did you ever worry, you know, because again, having so many people that like work around me in these companies, did you ever feel overwhelmed or like there were things that you didn't want to take on? Or for you, was it always like, I'm taking that, I'm taking that? Okay, so first of all, we all feel overwhelmed sometimes. And it's, you know, a question of how do you re-anchor yourself to get through it?

And I somehow, I can push through and will myself to do unbelievable things. I cannot describe it to you. I can work, outwork any person. Give me an example. Like when you say that you can push yourself to do unbelievable things, what does that look like? Because I feel like sometimes you could look at somebody like you and think, you know, well, of course, she's like super smart. But it's not just about what you learned and what you've taught yourself. There is something to just sheer work ethic that counts for something.

First of all, it's waking up super early, not making any excuses about all the things I have to get done. it's a lot of travel, a lot of, like, landing in the middle of the night, waking up super early in the morning. I love to hear that because I think that at the point you are in your career, you still have to push through things. Oh, I still have to like do that. Yeah, you still do that. Oh, no, we had that level of work.

We had a big thing a couple weeks ago where I had to get something out very last minute. We started off in Florida. Mm-hmm. We flew to Texas. And then we were flying to San Francisco. This issue came up. We started on Friday at 3.30 in the afternoon. We needed what we needed to get done, which was really hard by Monday morning.

I told my chief of staff, Serena and I was like, we are going to be sitting at the kitchen table for the next two days. So we went all the entire flight from Texas to San Francisco. We work late and tonight in San Francisco. We woke up early, very early. I still went to the gym somehow. And then we, but not always. I mean, this was a bad run. Yeah.

So then we got up, we worked the entire day into the night sitting in the same seat, the entire Saturday, the entire Sunday. But we had to fly to Chicago. We worked in the entire time flying to Chicago. We finished when we landed, when we hit the ground in Chicago, and turned it over to the next person. It was incredibly hard. But I said, we have no choice. And everyone who was behind me waiting for the work, I said, when I hand this off,

to you, you're going to go into this non-sleep mode that I was just in. And you have to deliver on it too? But you've got hours. Wow. You know, you've got to turn this around and we have no choice. So talking of hard things because I think there will be so many people that are sitting there in a corporate career. And I do think to some degree there is a blueprint for getting promoted from moving through

a job in the way you, you know, in the way that you have. So what do you tell people? I mean, because you're on an 11. Do you need everybody else around you to be on an 11? And what is it that people need to do in order to be successful and to be promoted where they're at? Okay, this is going to sound strange. And I'm going to make it hopefully not sound not great. But it's how I think about it.

My mom had six kids. She mothered us all differently. That's just a fact. No siblings have the same parents. No. That is a fact. It's a fact. In my group of people who work directly with me, I understand what they can do and how they can do it.

John Rogers always used to tell me that the World Championship Chicago Bulls that won seven championships, he said, Dennis Rodman rebounds, Steve Kerr shoots threes, Michael is the greatest player of all time. You know, he would go through each player. And he said, but each one is really important. Michael can't play without them. they can't win. So Dennis may be out at night, but everyone makes sure Dennis is on the court so that he can rebound for them. And he's like, so he doesn't have the same rules as everyone else. And so, Melody, you figure it out that you get the best out of each person, but everyone's not going to run the place. But what happens if your aspiration is to operate at the highest level? Like, what are the non-negotiables do you think for people that

want that type of career, what do they need to do? You must, and I mean this with serious intensity. I think you have to care a lot and have a sense of urgency. You have to have a sense of urgency. You have to have to want to be great. You know, I love that book by Jim Collins, Good to Great, and the first line of the book, Good is the enemy of great. Good is the enemy of great.

Plenty of people are happy with good. they say the worst student is the B plus student. Because the B plus student, I was like, it's fine. They're like, the C student aspires for something better. And the A student is just the A student, but the B plus student is, they live in that, that no man's land of it's fine. And so it's almost like the worst situation that you can be in. So if good is the enemy of great, I want the person who wants to be great. But understanding that differential between good and great is really hard.

Do you think you can train people into that, or do you think it has to come from somewhere within themselves? It has to be there. Yeah. Some people just, you know, they come out of the wound with it. Some people don't, but that doesn't make them, they can still be very valuable. They're just going to be a certain kind of player.

And that's what John said. He's like, there are going to be other people. They're just not going to run the place. So you think people have to just work really hard, want to be great, and they need to have a sense of urgency? I think they have to want to be great. Let's start with that. And, you know, some people have to work harder than how.

So I remember going to school with geniuses at Princeton. They didn't have to work as hard as I did. They, you know, sort of like skim the page and got it. And I'm like writing notes and checking, you know, flashcards and doing the whole thing. But, you know, it came easier to them. Some things come easier to me. So I think it's just a function of, of you understanding yourself. And what's so interesting to me, you obviously work in this extremely male-dominated space, right?

And I always think... The opposite of you. They're so on opposite of me. Thank goodness of me. But I always think about this idea of, you know, like, you can't be what you don't see. And did you have women that were around you or mentors in your career? It's just so interesting. Yes, a lot.

I mean, I talked about Diane Sawyer. Yes. Diane Sawyer was so great to me. She saw me on the cover of Working Woman magazine in an article called 30 Under 30. I got the cover with another woman. and I will remember it like it was yesterday because I remember how much I didn't like the suit they made me wear, which was just so bad.

But anyway, I'm on the cover. It wasn't Prada on Prada on Mewi on Gucci O Prada. It was like, you know. We know you in your fashion, which is another thing that I love that you bring to this world because I'm like, well, she ain't sacrificing the outfits. No, it was a casual corner.

Oh, no. Oh, no. Good Lord. For sure. For sure. For sure. So anyway, she saw me in the cover. She had her sister call me. I remember I was going to an event in Chicago. My cell phone rings, and this woman says,

my name is Linda Frankel, and I'm Diane Sawyer's sister, and she saw you in this magazine, and she wants to meet with you. And I'm like, who is this really? That's what I was saying, because I didn't believe it. And ultimately, she's like, no, my name is Linda Frankel, and I'm Diane Sawyer's sister. Do you think you can go meet with her in New York? So go to meet with Diane in New York,

and she says, you know, I thought this story was pretty amazing, and I've never seen anyone like you on television talk about money. and I think you could be great. Wow. And so she asked me, she says, you know, I think you should be on television talking about money. I said, well, I have a job in Chicago.

And she's like, if I make it work on my end, will you make it work on your end? I said, you mean do both? She said, do both. We do this one show. We had these young people come in, and I was young myself, but they were young.

They were pitching business plans or something like that. And I remember there was a woman and she wasn't that buttoned up, and I gave her sort of like very direct feedback on the air. And Diane pulled me aside and she said, and this was so powerful. She said, Melody.

She said, you know when you watch Oprah Winfrey? Now Oprah's like, you know, ah. Right. So I said, yeah. And she's like, you know what happens when she comes out on her show? And she's in the middle of the aisle? Everyone wants to hug her. Everyone.

She said, they want to hug her. And she said, you want to be someone that someone wants to hug. That's not what I saw. Whoa. Feedback. How'd you take that? I was like, wow. She's like, you don't have to.

Did you recognize what she was saying? It felt the truth? Yeah. She's like, that's not what I saw. She's like, you could be honest with someone, but you don't have to hurt their feelings. Well, that's some good advice right now. And I remember, I never, I mean, I tell you the story like it was yesterday.

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I start off in the industry. I'm 22 years old. I don't know anything. I haven't grown up in the home where the stock market has discussed. I didn't major in finance. I majored in international relations and public policy, but I took a lot of math. I thought about being a math major for a little while.

But that when you get to theoretical math in college, you're not even dealing with numbers. And so I'm, I go to work in Arizona, I don't know anything. And one of the first assignments I get is I have to go to this conference in Atlanta by myself. Okay. No, no, it's 22. Yes.

So I'm at this conference about myself. And this is where you're like standing by the bar because you don't know any person in the room. Trying to read name badges. You don't know anything. And so as this conference was going on, people would come out to me. They're like, oh, you're melody. So then the next person, you're melody. And then it's another person, your melody.

And I'm like, what is going on? And then I started to realize, I'm the only one. I'm the only one. So I was like, wait a minute. What if I use this in my favor? So it's like, I'm going to be like Cher or Beyonce. I am not going to even have a last name. That melody with two L's is going to be like, oh, your melody.

I said, I'm going to use this difference to my advantage. It's so interesting that that was your own. first thought. That was my first thought. You were not someone who's like, this is like not for me. You were like, I'm going to use this. No, I was like, wait, if you can stand out then, this is the important thing, not pointing a finger. No, no, God, I love it. I'm not like that. If you can stand out, then have something to say. You better have something to say. Especially in those terms. Then I started to think a lot about, okay, so if you can be a Beyonce or a share in terms of one name individual in an industry. You got to have the skill to back it up.

Right. So, you're going to be a lot. So you. You have to have something. So no inanities. And so you try to find a way. And you don't, you know, this is one of my pet peeves to this day. It's one who comes and talks to you and they, they talk to you about something. And it's like a headline in the Wall Street Journal. It was like, yeah, I read that too.

Yeah. That is not insightful. That is not insightful. We all read that article. That is not. It is not. It's not helpful. So, you know, some people looking for something to say, they state the obvious.

Yeah. I always think of it like nightclub chat. Like, I'm like, please don't nightclub chat me in the middle of the day. It's like uninteresting. It's so, but it's interesting how many people do that. I don't even know what nightclub chat is. I'm waking up at four. I don't know what I've had a lot of time on the other end of four.

Let me tell you. I'm really good at nightclub chat. I just don't like it. You'll have to explain that one to me another time. I will, another time. But that's so interesting to me because, again, from where you came from to have the foresight that you can, first of all, use your differences as, like, this reason to lean in, but that you weren't going to waste it, right? You were going to take

that opportunity and make the connection with somebody actually worth it in those moments. Yes, and going back to your question, which I did not answer, my mom always told me, make yourself indispensable. She was like, make it so people can't live without you. So I did every job that they asked me to do. I never was unhappy about any job because I always thought to myself, I'm learning something here. Did you ever feel like you needed to conform, like you needed to fit in? There's a degree of conformity that exists in my industry that's very important. And I found a way to be original in my conformity.

Explain that to me. So, for example, in the financial services industry, you wear business attire. But mine is different from everyone else's. But it's still business attire. Correct. Because you and I have spoken about this a lot. Like the way you put yourself together, the way that you come in, into a room, and I know that you think that that's very important, and so do I, by the way.

Well, it is because I was walking in as a black woman. So I was already in this sort of no man's land, especially things have changed, but not meaningfully. And so as a result of that, you had to, first of all, that lens of what do they see? Because that's going to affect an opinion before you've even spoken. And I was always very realistic about that. You know, I was, you know, I think we'd like the world to be what we wanted to be, but it's not. It's not. It's not. It's not. So, you know, we could hold on to that idea. And that's what I mean, I conform, but in my own way. And so I was always authentically me.

I think, you know, authenticity is key to success. I've seen people not be authentic. They try to be someone else. Like John Rogers and I, we are co-ceeos of it, Ariel. He's very different for me. I didn't try to be him. That would have been a logical thing. People try to fit a mold.

I'm very different than him. We therefore become complementary and become yen and yang. Absolutely. But that probably would have been an instinct of someone to say, well, this is the model that you're dealing with.

Let me be more like that. Correct. No, but it's very interesting because I do think that at the end of the day, people need to look at you and be comfortable to either let you handle

millions and millions and hundreds of millions of dollars or be around like some huge transaction. And there is a reality as to how you're perceived and, you know, the relationship between those two things, right? Somebody feeling that they can trust you. So first of all, they need to see discipline. Discipline is very, it comes through in lots of ways.

I mean, big and small. My assistant, who is a vice president, because she's so amazing, she constantly, or my chief of staff, before I had email sent, read over my shoulder, are there any typos in this? A typo could kill an opportunity for us. because they think you're half-assed. And my husband always jokes, he's like, she does not like half-assed. He always says, she likes whole-assed. Of course you do.

He's like, she does not like, but they do. But down to that, like, down to talk. So where else does that come in your life? Because I imagine that that can't just be relegated to an email. It's not about perfection, but it's about process. Yes. You want processes that you don't cut corners. That's a, I don't know if you ever knew that from Dave Thomas, who started Wendy's.

No. The hamburgers are square because his grandmother always told them don't cut corners. It also is, you waste less meat by being clear. But, yeah, that I don't cut corners. So if you have a process, you're sending out an important email every time someone reads it. Not sometimes. Every time. Even in my own office, I'll send out something and I'll say, I'm writing alone, no one's here to prove this. So if you see it, I do. No, you don't. Even if you're doing like an internal memo. Oh, there is nothing. worse than sending an email to like 50 people in the office and having 30 people email about you. We have a typo in it. And I'll say, I'm writing a loan. There's no one here to prove this. Oh, but it as a PS. That is very interesting. Just so they know, like I can't see the mistake. But that level of attention to detail, and like you say, it's not about being a perfectionist. It's about process. It's about you essentially ensuring that whatever you do, whatever is a

reflection of you is at the highest possible level that it can be. Because then. And they'll think, well, they must be good investors. Do you see what I mean? Yes. It all comes together. They must be good investors. Oh, they show up. They look a certain way.

They present themselves a certain way. I correct people's grammar in our firm. I do in their, oh, all the time. All the time. Yeah. All the time. I'm like, guys, we can't do this with a client. You know, this grammar is off.

And because I'm thinking, I want them to know how disciplined and how much attention we pay to detail because we are asking them for their money. It could be their pension money. It could be their kids' college education. This really matters to them. And so, therefore, they need to know that we are precise, especially because we invest, we're in a world where there's a lot we can't control. I can't control tariffs.

I can't control the stock market. I can't control what might happen tomorrow. So everything I can control? You must. Correct. That makes a lot of sense. So talk to me a little bit about women and power. I wonder if you've had any instances in your life.

It's like a bliped, getting tense. It's getting tense. Well, because I think it's something that we talk about all the time. Do you feel like there's times in your career where you have been underestimated or overlooked? For sure. Even you? All the time. All the time.

Yes. Underestimation is actually a very good thing. Because I don't say you coming. Yes. You might say that. Give me an example. Do you have an example? I worked at a deal once and I can't get into the specifics of it.

That's all right. But the person on the other side, we're working late at night. We're on this deal. And they're like, wait a minute. Who are you? And I was like, Melanie hops. A melody. Just melody.

So we're working at this deal. And I can tell I'm being totally underwent. because this person is a giant. I'm like this little pipsqueak. And I'm representing someone in this. And it got kind of intense. And so we're working through it, working through it, working through it. At one point, it got very intense. We're in a tight deadline. And the whole thing's getting very, very complicated. And we're all losing it. And so I demanded that everyone go to bed for three hours. I said everyone pencils down. We are so tired where everyone's talking and speaking in tongues. Go to bed. We're all going to go to sleep.

The principal on the other side calls the next morning 6 a.m. And he's like, you know what? I said to my wife, this woman, she's like fighting so hard for this. She's, I need a person like this. So I go into my husband and, you know, I was like, oh, you know, he's like, I need a melody. And he's like, he's trying to hire you. I was like, no. He's like, yes, he is.

And I thought that was so interesting. And I was like, I had been underestimated this whole time. And then I could see him turn into, yeah. He's like, she's fighting so hard. He got it. And it was one of those things where I knew at that moment, I was like, he totally gets it. He totally gets it.

Totally. And he was like, you are formidable. But it didn't start off that way. I think he thought, like, this is just going to be a piece of cake. Yeah, I bet you thought it was going to be a piece of cake. And I remember saying to him, I said, you know, I won't ever ask you for anything that I actually don't need. Could you try to do the same?

Oh, wow. That's a powerful negotiation tactic. I mean, I said, and then if you do that, I will believe you. Yeah. And I will work to do everything. How many times in deals do people just ask for things they don't need? No, I said, if you really need it, that's really smart.

I said, if we don't have any time. So if you call me and say you need it, I believe you. Yeah. But I need you to believe me too. That's amazing. Talk to me a bit about negotiation because you're clearly like an incredible negotiator. And I think it's a place where people have a really hard time advocating for themselves. But you started off as an intern.

And now you're clearly, you know, you're an owner in the firm, you have skin in the game. How do people advocate for themselves and get what they need? Well, I want to make sure you understand. I always had go-toes to give me a lot of great advice. There were forks in the road along the way. And I went to really smart people. I am never too proud to ask for help. As I say, just like the song, I'm not too proud to beg. I'm not. You still do that now at this point in your career? Oh, constant. Me too. I'm a constant. I'll find a lot of people everywhere. And there were some forks in the road that were around self-advocacy that were very, very monumental.

And one was when I was about 40 years old and a friend called me and he said, you know, Melody, you're 40. Are you staying at Ariel or are you going to do something else? I said, well, why are you asking that? And he's like, you can't switch when you're 50. So he's like, so if you're going to stay there, then this has to really be meaningful. You have to know what this is, what you're going to own, you know, etc., etc. What a great friend.

And so he was like, you really should have the talk with John Rogers about that, not in a threatening way, but just sort of say, I need to know. If you're going to stay, get this all sorted out. Yeah, and get what you need out. Yeah, get it all sorted out. Why do you think that people, because I know, like, there's such a, we still has such kind of, you know, inequality when it comes to this gender pay gas. And again, you know, women find it very, very difficult to go in and to advocate for themselves. what do you, why do you think that is and what do you think we can do better to make sure that we do get what we deserve? I think most women are real team players. We're loyal and we're team

players and we expect good things to happen to us. And we don't necessarily understand. I think I've been naive at times, so I'm not saying this in any condescending way. You just think it's going to work out and sometimes you have to ask and put people on the spot. I think that if I were giving advice about had to advocate because I've had people come to me and I've had them do it the right way and do it the wrong way. So I can tell you the wrong way is when you really don't know what you're talking about and you have overstated your significance or your value. That's the biggest thing. That is a killer. The person never looks at you the same way. Never. Yeah. And you can't hook it back. That's the problem. Exactly. Because once you put that out into the universe, it's there. It exists between

the two of you and there's no walking. So then you just think, like, well, you just don't know anything. Yes. And so then you think, well, how valuable could you be? You, like, go into a whole spin in your head, right? So if you are asking, make sure you have good information. And good information for you is, well, it's like an understanding of what you bring to that organization or what the job is worth? Got it.

What the, you know, because there's nothing worse than the person who's asking for something that, like, literally doesn't exist. Totally. I found those people. Yeah. They're like, you know, oh, I want to be your chief of staff and I want to make $500,000. You're not going to happen. Now where. Yes.

You know what I mean? So it's like, if you can get that job, go get it. Yeah, I wish you well. Yeah. You know, it's like that kind of thing. But it is also the thing where you say, know what the real value is of the job, and then know what you contributed. You know, I've done these things.

And again, I'm back to questions versus statements. What do you think I could be doing better or more in order to advance myself in the ways that, help me achieve my own long-term goals. Then you have to have someone give it back to you of this, that be as concrete as possible, so that you know what you're working towards, but then you have to be able to accept the feedback. And this is the part that gets really gnarly.

Because some people, when you give them the feedback, and you're like, this, this and this, they start arguing with you. It's not the time. It's not the time. So at least at the very minimum, you go and let it sort of wash over you. Take the feedback, come back in a couple of months, having digested what you've been told and hopefully, you know, playing out what you've been told.

You might actually disagree. Yes. You might. Or you might learn something in the process, but you don't react in the moment. I think that's when the negotiations break down very fast because you end up sounding very defensive. So if you can dispute the idea, not in a gotcha, because I've had those people, 30 pages back. You're like, if you did your job this well. you'd be getting what you are for.

I've never gotten 30 pages on anything else that I've asked you about, but I get 30 pages on your job performance. That is another killer. Yeah, it's another killer. Do you feel like I've heard you talk a little bit about your personal history and where you came from and having trauma that's connected to money? And so, again, like this idea of how you overcome your fear with money at this point, you know, you've written an incredible children's book that's,

all about, it's called priceless facts about money, which I love and I bought immediately for my own children. But I'm kind of interested in how you think about your relationship to money now and how, like, how do you speak to the people within your organization about that? It's evolved. So Warren Buffett says do the job you would do if you didn't need a job. That's what I do. So I don't work for money. And I don't see that casually or in a dispassionate way. I like doing well. But that's not what drives me today. It drove me very much when I was 22.

So things can evolve over time. That was the thing that I needed and wanted was financial security. Now that I do believe financial security has been achieved, I want to make sure Ariel is successful. And so the way I talked to about my team is I always say, I want them to exceed their own expectations. that's my job. I want our clients to feel that we've exceeded their expectations. That's my job. So I talk about money through that. I'm good. And I want them to feel that same way the people who work with me. And so I always told them I work for our clients and I work for each of them. I literally work for them. And I told them, you work for each other and you work for me. And so we have to know that our job affects someone's kid going to college, their mortgage payment, all of those things. I take that very, very, very, very, very seriously. Just as I take the fact that we're fiduciaries for our client's money, and it's that pension funds, as I said, that college education and the life. And I'm such a huge believer in mindset, and yet I'm like completely allergic to toxic positivity.

I feel like there's so much of that around. And I wonder what makes you uniquely able to do what you do. Like, what do you think it is inside of you that makes you so successful and so able to see around the corners and have such clarity around what it is that you're doing. So I've always felt that I was on a quest to grow and learn and be better. And every day I'm trying to just eke out a little bit more that it will make me better or learn something new. I told the story of when I first started working at Ariel, I was John's sidekick. And I would just follow up on everything he wanted me to do.

And I remember having this real moment of just like concern that I said, what if I'm just a great order taker? I'm really good at executing, but I have no vision. How do I get vision? And so I went through all of these exercises try to force myself to have vision. I would take too long to explain to you.

I'm not going to ask you what you did. But it was a lot. And I started to say, I want to be able to try to have vision. Then I realized vision means conquering fear. Because once you decide to go out on that land and dangle, there's like nothing to help you. You're like gripping by your hands, by your fingernails.

George always says to me, he says, you know, you are a person who when you are confronted by a brick wall, you look for loose bricks. He's like, you start looking, where's the brick loose? So there's something about the fear and the willingness to confront hard that I think has made me, you know, uniquely me. But I talk to myself in my head and I get strength from others. I really use other people as my friends in my head to get me through. Do you think that's one of the case to your success? Oh, they have no idea how close I am to them. Interesting. I said that about the Pope the other day. Did you? The Pope is a friend in my head. He was. And I kept thinking, like, in terms of people with global voices, he was one of the few people where a leader who could speak and globally had it

breakthrough. And it broke through around kindness and goodness. Never sharp, never disparaging. And I had, like, that meant something to me. And I was like, wow, he does that in such an amazing way. He never seems petty. Wow. That's, I mean. And I literally, in my head, I would read his headlines or read what he said. And I'm like, how do you aspire to that? How can you get a little bit of that? How does he get that kind of agency in the world? And his agency is not because he's Pope, because there are other popes that weren't as significant. But his comes through a very specific lens of caring about people. And so there are a lot of times where I use a person, again, I don't know. I talk about Lewis Hamilton, who's like my little brother. He's an narcissist man.

Lewis never quits. So when I feel I'm on the edge, I want to stop, the pain is there, the tired, all those things. I literally just keep saying to myself, Lewis would not quit. Who else is a person not for you in your life? Michelle Obama in my head. I'm like, she's done hard things. And she is so studied. Someone told me a story about how when she was doing her book tour every single night, every single night she'd come. back to her room and debrief with the entire team about what she could have done better every single time. Wow. Every single time.

Do you invite that kind of criticism in your life? Yes. Of course, I want it. But the thing is, you know, you get to a certain stage where people don't want to give it to you. Oh, yeah. And I have always surrounded myself with truth.

George will give it to me. There is no chaser. There's nothing. I know what that feels like. I married a Swedish man, so I get the straightforward critique. every day. Yeah. Literally. No sides. No dilution. The whining. He's supposed to be able to, you took the job. You know, it's like there's not even a, and you know, there's no error of anything. You might give me a hug.

But yeah, there are a lot of people that I happen in my life where they give it to me straight, which I also think has helped me. I remember being like 25 years old and I said, I want to be intellectually honest with myself. Oh, that's a big one. And I was like, that's going to take some work. That's going to take out of what. ourselves into believing and making excuses and having reasons. And I was like, I want to hold myself accountable. When it works both ways, doesn't it? It's like you can talk yourself in or out of anything every day. And so I said, to make it a habit, be accountable.

Yeah. You know, no excuses. Literally no excuses. No excuses. You either did or you didn't. Yeah. And you can't. Well, I was tired.

I was this. I was that. You either did or you didn't. Do or do not. There is no try. You either did or you didn't. So intellectual honesty forced me. To be really clear about when I was not great, when I was not treating someone well.

There were times I would be speaking the words and saying in my head, you're being such a jerk. In my head. Sounds like you're that person for yourself, a hell of a lot. I would like, why are you speaking to this person like this? You're being such a jerk. Wow. Be intellectually honest. Or it wasn't your best job.

Yeah. It wasn't your best work. We didn't get the account because you just didn't. do that well that day instead of making so many big excuses. And I feel like that is a muscle because that is something that you have to practice. Like that level of honesty, so few people have it. If I take one thing away today from our conversation, that will be it. Just increasing that level of intellectual honesty because I think it's very, very hard to get there. I live on group chats. I did not hit the family group chat. I would never do that to you. But my girlfriend group chat,

I did hit up. And the question that they wanted to ask you was about difficult conversations and how you learn to get comfortable with having difficult conversations at work. How have you done that? I know what I want to know. I don't want to have people bullshit me. I really want to know. And I think a lot of times we don't tell people what they need to know to make them better. Now the question is, how do you do it in a way that you don't have to be? I remember Dick Parsons. I was on the board of Estee Lauder with him for years and years. I once asked him for feedback. And I said, Dick, be brutally honest with me.

He said, I'll be honest, but I don't need to be brutal. And so I do think that I always want to know. And so I believe people want to know what I've learned is everyone doesn't. But I still think it's my job to try to give the feedback that will be in the best interest of the firm, all of us. That's a great answer. All right. We're going to move to Rapid Fire. And the first thing you do when you wake up in the morning place, look at my phone.

I just need to make sure the world is still, markets overseas are going on. What are you getting from that at the moment? Oh, there's a fire, fire, fire. No, you know. This unrelaxing way in the world to wake up. I know, but I do. You're straight in. I have to, I'm on the West Coast.

The East Coast might be up. They are. Because at 7 a.m. A lot has happened. And so I look at my phone first. Okay. Fair enough. And the last thing you do before you go to bed?

The last thing I do before I go to bed is I go into my daughter's room and tell her to go to bed and hug her again. She won't go to sleep. Go to sleep. What are you currently aspiring for in your business life? I want my sports fund to work and I want Ariel to be successful. It's always the same. I just want us to get better at what we do. I don't have any sort of new thing that I have to do.

Well, I mean, project level, which is your sports fund, I mean, when I heard about that, I actually think you were the first person and then after you said it, it's just come up over and over and over again. And I saw the amazing panel that you did with. Women's sports. Yeah, I mean, the idea that you are taking charge of women's sports, because I think that we're all obsessed with women's sports right now. But it's still, again, it's a man's game. The teams are owned by the men and the, you know, the whole thing is about. And I know you will.

Like there's just no doubt. So good for you. I'm excited for you. What are you aspiring for in your personal life? My daughter to turn out okay. That's my only job. Like that one feels mission critical, existential. It feels like if I don't do that well, I have failed that everything.

And I know she's counting on me. So everything else is a backseat to that. And it feels more important every day. It's different when they're four and when they're 11. And everything feels different. So in my personal life, I want her to, I don't want to damage her. Yeah. No, I totally understand that.

I think an 11-year-old now is like a 14, 15-year-old, and they don't need you less the older they get. They actually need you more and more, which is, I think that, you know, as a mother of four right now, I'm learning that because you kind of feel like, oh, the baby phase is over. And I'm like, no, no, no, this is the hard. part. This is the part where they really need you. It's kind of amazing. Tell me, what is a book that's changed your life? Wow, there have been so many. I love the book, Buffett, the Making of the American Capitalist by Roger Lewenstein. That's my favorite business book. I love the book,

Grette. And more recently, Angela's so good. And more recently, I love the book, Unreasonable Hospitality. Oh, I never read that. By Will Goddara about, it's about a restaurant. I love that book. That one really, really. I'm really, it is so good. Really? I'm so glad you mentioned. Unreasonable hospitality. I will get it.

Okay. What is something that you valued when you were starting out that you don't now? I think I had a perception of people's accomplishments that I valued in a way that I don't value today.

What I mean by that is not to belittle their accomplishments, but I care more about heart and soul than titles or money or influence. And so I value people who care about other people. I always valued it, but I would spend so much time reading about the greats and what made them great and all of those things. Now I want to understand what makes a person, a good person. That's a fantastic answer. What is something that you value now, that you didn't back then?

I have a much different perspective on life. One of our colleagues died last week. One of our colleagues died last week, so I'm very raw. I'm so sorry. Yeah, he had a heart attack at 50. Oh, wow. And you just, it is a very, very, very, very hard thing. And so the fragility and the fact that at any moment, I had not ever experienced that of someone I love just dying one day out of nowhere. It just has been very, very, very sobering. Yeah, it'll rock you to your core. Yeah. It's going to It took me a while to get over it. Yeah. Well, Melody, I was so unbelievably grateful for you being here and taking the time on a Saturday of my days. So, happy to be here. But actually, even more now, because I know that it's so difficult and it speaks to so much your strength and your character and just the type of person

that you are that once you said you'd come that after the week and what you've been through this week, that you would come and turn up for me. So I'm super, super grateful. And so happy to spend this, you know, a couple of hours having the chat. And I feel like so many people will get so much from just seeing you, first of all, but also from your very, very wise words. So I'm super grateful. Well, you're a bright light and we are all watching and we're in the glow basking. And I'm so very happy for you and all that you're accomplishing and all that you will still do, which is a lot. Thank you. Means the most coming from you. Thank you, my dear. If you're loving this podcast, be sure to click follow on your favorite listening platform.

While you're there, give us a review and a five-star rating and share an episode you loved with a friend. We'll be so grateful. Aspire with Emagreed is presented by Odyssey. I'm your host, Emma Greed. Our executive producers are Corrine Gilliard Fisher, Derek Brown and me. Our executive producers from Odyssey are Maddie Sprung Kaiser, Leah Reese Dennis and Jenna Weiss Bice Berman. Justine Dom is our senior producer. Our producer is Kristen Torres.

Sound design and engineering by Bill Shorts. Angela Paluso is our Booker, original music by Charles Black. Video production by Evan Cox and Kurt Courtney. Social media by Olivia Holman. Special thanks go to Brittany Smith, Sydney Ford, my teams at Jones Works and W&E,

Moora Curran, Josephina Francis, Hillary Schuff, Eric Donnelly, Kate Hutchinson Rose, Tim Meecole, Sean Cherry, and Lauren Vieira. If you have questions for me, you can DM me at Aspire with Emma Greed. Greed is spelled G-R-E-D-E-D-E. That's Aspire, A-S-P-I-R-A with me, Emma Greed. Or you can submit a question to me on my website, emigreed.me. Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes.

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