Young and Profiting with Hala Taha - Nicole Kalil: Overcome Imposter Syndrome and Become Confident in 60 Minutes | Leadership | E193

Episode Date: October 24, 2022

Thought leaders everywhere talk about the importance of being confident, but rarely do they explain how to develop true confidence that does not rely on external validation and praise. What steps can we take to develop true self-confidence? Nicole Kalil is known as the “Leadership and Confidence Sherpa.” She hosts a top 2% podcast called ‘This Is Woman’s Work’ that helps women develop trust and confidence within themselves and develop healthy partnerships along the way. She’s also the author of Validation Is For Parking, which reveals how to develop internal trust and reclaim confidence.  In this episode, Nicole breaks down what confidence truly is and why trusting yourself is a vital component of confidence. Her and Hala talk about how to redirect your thoughts to shed your need for validation and how to manage your head trash in a more uplifting, productive way. Additionally, they dig into the discrepancy in confidence between genders and how we can eliminate gender expectations by encouraging authenticity.  Topics Include: - Learning coaching from her dad - Serving as Development Officer - Choosing confidence over competence  - The ‘Confidence Con’ - Validation addiction  - What is true confidence?  - Counteracting comparison and judgment - Managing our ‘head trash’ - Making up a better story  - Breaking trust with yourself - Masculinity and femininity in the workplace - Starting Woman’s Work  - How does Nicole advocate for women? - Eliminating gender expectations  - Confidence in relationships  - Confidence is a muscle  - Some dangers of humility  - Feel-good folder - And other topics… Nicole Kalil is an in-demand keynote speaker, leadership strategist, and respected coach with a passion for developing confidence and eliminating gender expectations. As a former Fortune 100 employee, she has coached hundreds of women in business, which gave her insight on what is and isn’t serving women and leaders within an organization. Her podcast, ‘This Is Woman’s Work,’ gives people actionable advice on strengthening confidence and changing the way we define ‘woman’s work.’  Nicole released her first book, Validation Is For Parking: How Women Can Beat the Confidence Con, on October 4, 2022, which serves as a guide for building internal trust, reclaiming confidence, eliminating the need for external validation, and breaking free from limiting beliefs.  Resources Mentioned: ‘This Is Woman’s Work’ Podcast: https://nicolekalil.com/podcast  Nicole’s Book, Validation Is For Parking: https://nicolekalil.com/book  Nicole’s Website: https://nicolekalil.com/  Nicole’s LinkedIn: https://nicolekalil.com/  Nicole’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nicolemkalil/?hl=en  Nicole’s Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nicolemkalil/  Sponsored By:  Swag.com - Go to swag.com/yap and get 10% off your order Sabio - Visit sabio.la/YAP for a $1,000 scholarship towards the cost of their bootcamp at Sabio! Shopify - Sign up for a free trial at shopify.com/profiting ClickUp - Sign up today at ClickUp.com and use code yap to get 15% off! More About Young and Profiting Download Transcripts - youngandprofiting.com   Get Sponsorship Deals - youngandprofiting.com/sponsorships Leave a Review -  ratethispodcast.com/yap Watch Videos - youtube.com/c/YoungandProfiting Follow Hala Taha LinkedIn - linkedin.com/in/htaha/ Instagram - instagram.com/yapwithhala/ TikTok - tiktok.com/@yapwithhala Twitter - twitter.com/yapwithhala Learn more about YAP Media Agency Services - yapmedia.io/ Join Hala's LinkedIn Masterclass - yapmedia.io/course

I had spent so much energy trying to look the part of a confident and successful person. It was always something I needed to do or achieve or prove. And so at the height of my professional success of this Fortune 100 company, I felt like I was playing a part. So many of us have become addicted to this external thing, whether it be validation, whether it be income, whether it be a certain number on the scale. and then we crave more of it, and then we become junkies for the thing. If we need validation, if we need compliments, if we need successes in order to trust ourselves, then it's not confidence at all. What is up Young and Profiters?

You're listening to Yap Young and Profiting Podcasts where we interview the brightest minds in the world and turn their wisdom into actionable advice that you can use in your daily life. I'm your host, Halataha, aka the podcast princess. Thanks for listening and get ready to listen, learn, and profit. Hey, Nicole, welcome to Young and Profiting Podcast. Hala, thank you so much for having me. It is an absolute privilege to be here. I'm very excited for this conversation.

You're one of my clients and my team absolutely loves you. So I can't wait to get to this conversation. To introduce you to my Yapam, Nicole Khalil, is a speaker, respected coach, and the host of This Is Women's Work podcast. You're also known as the Leadership and Confidence Sherpa. Nicole is also the author of the new book, Validation is for Parking. It's out now, and she shares actionable steps to build and sustain the confidence required to accomplish your dreams. So before we dive deep into the theme of today's episode, that's leadership and confidence,

I wanted to spend some time on your story and where it all started. So, Nicole, you say that coaching's in your blood. I learned that your father was a soccer coach. So talk to us about the experiences you had growing up as a child and a young adult that then influenced your career as a coach today. Yeah. So I can remember first memories being on soccer fields and watching my dad coach young men, young women.

And this is just the environment I grew up in. I loved the idea of supporting people, helping people to achieve their goals. I loved watching teams work together. I loved watching people achieve their potential, potential that they didn't even really know that they had when they first walked on the field in that case. And I just fell in love with it. I'm also the child of two immigrants. So my dad is from Mexico. My mom is from Germany. And so as a first generation American, it was really impactful to see the difference that my dad was making, not just in the players, not just in the team, but in the community and in the people that came and the fans and all of that

stuff. And it just inspired me. We have very similar personalities. It's just been an obvious outcome from my upbringing that I would land in coaching, in leadership, in team environment. Yeah, that's very cool. It's so funny. As I'm learning more about you, I realize how much we have in common. Like my dad's also my hero, the guy who inspired me to go on with my career. So very cool. Moving on to the theme of today's podcast, that's confidence. You are a total expert in confidence. And you say that oftentimes people hire the most confident leader over the most competent leader. So I thought that would be a fun place to start. Why is confidence valued more than competency in the workplace in your experience?

Simply what it comes down to is it's about trust. Confidence is when you trust yourself firmly and boldly. And so if you think about listening to somebody or following somebody or being mentored by somebody, you're always going to choose to follow the person who trusts themselves over everything. So I equate it to like if you dropped me in the middle of the forest and I was with previous ranger who knew all the compass and the weight and they were like, gosh, I don't know where we are. I don't know how to get out of here. And I had my best friend who is directionally challenged and she said, I know exactly where we are and exactly where to go to get out of here, I'm going to follow the person who trusts themselves the most,

even over the most competent person, which research supports. We will always follow the most confident person in the room over the most competent, which may not necessarily be good news, but it is good to know. Yeah, and it makes sense because you think about people always say, everybody follows the loudest person in the room, because that person is usually the most confident. They're willing to speak up. and so people end up listening to them.

So it totally makes sense. So let's talk about your story. I was reading your book and the very first three words in the book is you've been conned. And that was actually talking about yourself. At the height of your corporate career, you were admired by so many people. You were this big boss babe at your company. And inside you actually felt like a fraud who was living in constant fear of being found out. So I'd love for you to talk to us about this thing you call the con.

Confidence con and how you snapped out of it. Yeah. So for me, it was really that disconnect from how it looked from the outside looking in versus how it felt on the inside. And I had spent so much energy trying to look the part of a confident and successful person. And in doing so, I put all of my value and all of my worth in external things. I kept thinking, if I achieve this goal, then I'll feel confident. If I earn this level of income, then I'll feel confident. If I get the promotion or whatever, you fill in the blank, it was always something I needed to do or achieve or prove that was going to, you know, trigger my confidence. And unfortunately, it doesn't work.

And we know this. Ultimately, our confidence isn't outside of us. No one or nothing externally is holding on to our confidence for us. And so because I had put so much weight and so much value on our confidence, all of that. I had become completely disconnected from myself. And so at the height of my professional success at this Fortune 100 company, I felt like I was playing a part. I was playing this Oscar-worthy performance of my life, but I hadn't even thought to put myself in the leading role. And it was that feeling of being a fraud, this feeling that I was conning everyone around me,

that had me begin to do the research, test out things, observe, experience, what confidence really is and how we actually build it. And that just became my life's work. So I think it's true for a lot of us. Our purpose stems from our pain. And I often say it became obsessed with confidence because I had none of it. Yeah. I want you to go a level deeper now. I really want you to tell us, What were you feeling like on the inside? What did you look like on the outside? And then what was actually going like on behind closed doors? So first, I was incredibly lonely. Like I would spend all weekend waiting for Monday morning to arrive so that I could have purpose and value again. I looked the part of the successful independent woman. I had the designer clothes. I'd bought my second home by the time I was 30. I drove the nice car. I checked all. all the exterior boxes, but I had an above average spending problem to go along with my above average income. I was dating all the wrong guys, like for all the wrong reasons. I was trying to

prove myself. Like I figured if I could find somebody who would choose me or who would love me, then I would feel worthy and valued. And so I unfortunately spent far too many years chasing the feeling with someone else or something else. And it just served to make me feel emptier and lonelier and just more confused. Yeah. I think that this really goes hand in hand with a concept that you called validation addiction. So I'd love for you to define validation addiction and how it relates to this confidence concept. Yeah. So let me say for the record, I am not saying that validation or compliments or achievement or success is a bad thing. All of those things feel great.

There's nothing wrong with them. What I'm trying to say is to separate validation from our confidence. Confidence is something that is a precursor to our achievements, a precursor to compliments and validation and all of that. if we need validation, if we need compliments, if we need successes in order to trust ourselves, then it's not confidence at all. In fact, I would argue where true confidence, the true magic happens is during the times where we have fear or doubt or have experienced failure or made mistakes on our journey to achievement, on our journey to success. That's where real confidence

really matters because that's when it's hardest to trust ourselves. Super easy to trust ourselves when everything's going according to plan, when every box is being checked. I think so many of us have become addicted to this external thing, whether it be validation, whether it be income, whether it be a certain number on the scale. We become addicted to the thing because when we get it, it feels good momentarily, but it's a temporary thing. And then it goes away and then we need more of it. And then we crave more of it. And then we become junkies for the thing. And my point that I'm really trying to make is that that isn't confidence. Confidence is trusting yourself firmly and boldly. And it's much easier to trust ourselves when things are going according to plan. But it's really

magical and deep and true when we choose to trust ourselves during those harder parts. During the periods of time in our life, we were not getting the validation, where we're not getting the achievement where we're not getting the result that we might be looking for. Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. At Yap, we have a super unique company culture. We're all about obsessive excellence. We even call ourselves scrappy hustlers. And I'm really picky when it comes to my employees.

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Learn more at quickbooks.com slash money. Again, that's quickbooks.com slash money. Terms apply. Money movement services are provided by Intuit Payments Incorporated, licensed as a money transmitter by the New York State Department of Financial Services. Let's talk about what confidence is versus what confidence is not. So in your book, you say that the word confidence evolved from the Latin noun Confidentia, which means full trust.

So I thought that was really interesting. We're talking a lot about trust right now. So what is your definition of confidence? And what would you say confidence is versus what it's not? Yeah. So, I mean, you hit the nail in the head. If you look at the etymology of the word, the root of the word, it's about trusting ourselves. So when we have confidence is when we are choosing to trust ourselves firmly and boldly.

Confidence is a choice and a skill. So it's something we can develop literally any time we want. It's also something we can choose any time we want, which I think is great news. I define confidence is when you know who you are, own who you're not. and choose to embrace all of it. So let me say that again. Confidence is when you know who you are. There's a measure of self-awareness.

You own who you not. You understand what's not meant for you. You're letting go of perfection or the need to do it all, have it all and be it all. And you choose to embrace all of it. You embrace yourself. But it's simplest form.

It's about trusting yourself. So that's what confidence is. What it's not is, is confidence is not a feeling. I think sometimes we think, if we have it as a feeling, It's like either I woke up confident today and I can go do that thing or I didn't and I shouldn't. So there's that expression, fake it till you make it.

I'm not a big fan of doing anything that requires us faking it because we're basically asking ourselves to be inauthentic. I say choose it until you become it. Choose confidence minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day until the feeling catches up. Confidence is also not the same as being attractive or being happy or being successful. Again, nothing wrong with any of those things. But I think the messaging that we're constantly getting is if you buy this product, then you'll feel confident. If you look a certain way, then you'll be confident. If you succeed a certain level, then you'll be confident. Those are different things. Being attractive, being successful, being happy, all great feelings. I wish them all for you. But it is not the same thing as being confident. And I think that word is being thrown around a little bit too much. I love that definition. And explanation. And I have to say that if confidence was easy, everyone would be confident. There's lots of things that derail us that make it really hard to be confident for one, social

media and comparing and just the way that our society is run right now. It's just so easy to become incompetent because there's so much out there to compare yourself to you. So let's talk about what is wrong with today's society in terms of why validation addiction is such a thing, especially in 2022. Yeah, well, I think you hit the nail on the head. Social media just made it so much easier and so much more accessible to compare ourselves to other people.

And the problem, too, is we're not comparing apples to apples. We're comparing apples to airplanes. And what I mean by that is, like, we are looking at somebody's highlight moments, their best bits, their greatest achievements, because that's what they're showing us on social media. And we have the audacity to compare that to our everyday normal behind the scenes life. What's really challenging is there's a quote that I love, never compare your behind the

scenes to somebody else's highlight real. And I think that's what we are experiencing on social media. And so I know comparison and judgment existed many, many years ago, but I think social media is one thing that we can point to while there's great benefits, it's just made it, unfortunately a little bit too easy to compare those behind the scenes to somebody else's highlight real. Yeah. So what do you suggest that we do in terms of counteracting this validation addiction and stopping comparison and judgment? And we'll get into some other derailment factors in a bit. But with those two, what do you suggest we do to overcome it?

Yeah. So I've identified five confidence builders and you could choose any one of them. And we can dig into any one of them a little bit deeper. But I'll share with you what they are. So the first confidence builder is action. Action builds confidence. There's no ifs, ands, or buts about it. You can't think or hope or fingers and toes cross your way into confidence. You act your way into confidence. So action builds confidence. The second confidence builder is failure, mistakes, fear, doubt, missteps, whatever you want to call it. It's navigating through the harder, more uncomfortable parts of our life and choosing to trust ourselves anyway. Giving ourselves grace on the journey is the third confidence builder. It's how we speak to ourselves about ourselves. So this

could be a good one in the social media space. If your brain starts saying, what is wrong with me? Why am I not where this person is? Why is this person achieving what I want to achieve? And then we go into beat up mode. That's a really good time to just be like gentle, gentle, gentle, like to ourselves or replace that thought with a more productive, more empowered thought that serves us better because we're making it all up anyway. So we might as well make up something that supports us. Like, I'm not there yet, but that's motivation to me. If that person can do it, I know I can do it too. Yeah. The fourth confidence builder we've talked about a little bit is choosing confidence. Again, so when you're on social media and the comparison and judgment game starts going on in your brain, stop it. Choose confidence. Choose to

trust yourself. Choose it over and over and over until the feeling gets up. And then finally, there's so much that we can be doing to build our internal trust in ourselves. So if the problem is seeking confidence externally, the antidote is building it internally. And there are lots of ways to do this, keeping our commitments, communicating healthy boundaries, standing up for ourselves, speaking our truth. There are so many things. But the simplest way to do this is think about how do you build trust with the people in your life? How do they build trust with you? And therein lies the answer, your unique answer of how you're probably going to build trust within yourself. Apply those things to yourself and focus that energy on the things that you can control and

the work that you can do internally to trust yourself more. And the answer isn't necessarily not being on social media or not comparing yourself, but to choose to trust yourself in the face of that, I think, is the opportunity. Yeah. I love what you're saying. You're basically saying, like, when you see something and you notice these feelings of insecurity, like step back and, like, kind of talk yourself out of it. You talk about different confidence derailers, barriers that prevent us from having confidence. And one of them is head trash. So I feel like this is all sort of related. So talk to us about head trash. The other ones are perfectionism. And then we went over the other ones, judgment comparison. And overthinking is one we didn't.

talk about either. Yeah, so overthinking is a big one, and I'll just touch on this quickly. Overthinking is problematic to our confidence because overthinking leads to inaction, and inaction leads to regrets. So talk to any successful person, any confident person, anybody at the later stages of their life and ask them about their biggest regrets, they're almost always going to tell you about the things they didn't do, not the things they did. So overthinking is problematic because it prevents us from being in action and action-built confidence. Yeah, head trash is. is a big one. This is the things we say to ourself about ourselves in our own mind. They're very rarely kind and very rarely true, right? Things like I'm not good enough or I'm too much or I'm,

you know, whatever, fill in the blank. We all have our version of the things that we say to ourselves about ourselves. And we just need to be mindful that we would never say those things to somebody that we love. We would never say it to a spouse or a partner or a best friend or a child and we should first and foremost to be somebody that we love. So we probably shouldn't be saying those things to ourself. Name it and replace it with something more empowered and more productive. And that takes practice because we're so used to that voice in our head and we interact with it as if it's true, as if it is right or that it knows what it's talking about.

And the reality is head trash is the bully of confidence. That's what I think about that voice in our head. and we should probably stop bullying ourselves if we have any hope of trusting ourselves and showing up confidently in our lives. And by the way, it's like all of that is felt by other people. If you walk into a room and in your head, you're like, I don't belong here, I'm small, I'm not smart enough,

I'm this, I'm that. Whatever you're thinking in your head, people are going to think that about you because that's what you're projecting vibrational. I know this is a little woo-woo, but I truly believe, that. Like before I go into any conversation, any sales call, I literally try to pump myself up, even with lies. I learned this from Marisapir. She says, tell yourself a better lie.

When you're talking, your self-talk, tell yourself a better lie. You could be telling yourself one lie that's not true, that's negative about yourself, or you could be telling a lie like, I'm the best seller in the world, which is clearly not true. But if you tell yourself that lie, you'll come with that feeling of confidence. A hundred percent. Our brain, believes the stories we tell it, right? And so I think the version of it that I say is make up a better story. So you're making up a story anyway. I might as well make up a better one, one that serves you, one that supports you, one that's more productive and empowered and helps you get into the direction of what really matters. Yeah. Let's talk about people

pleasing. This is something else that you talked about in your book that I thought was super interesting. So many of us get in the habit of working to please everyone but ourselves, we think that making other people happy is going to make us feel good, is going to benefit us. People will start doing favors for us. We'd rather be likable than rock the boat or cause commotion,

especially women, I have to say. And so I want to understand why you think we have to choose ourselves over people pleasing in order to become confident. Yes. So there is a little bit of a gender component of this. We do see women falling into the people-pleasing trap a little bit more than their male counterparts.

I'm not saying that men don't do this or won't do this, but I'm just, there is usually that kind of difference. I want to be up front helping people, making the people you love feel good and happy. There's nothing wrong with that. It's when you say yes, when you actually mean no, that is problematic. Because again, if confidence is about trusting yourself and you say a yes when you mean a no, you are not honoring yourself. You are breaking trust with yourself.

and that is the problem. So I've been joking around with myself this year that if it's not a hell yes, it's a no. And really trying to pay attention to, what am I excited about? What lights me up? Where are my unique abilities and purposes going to be supported and achieved?

And if it doesn't fall on that, then it's at least a not yet because I fall under that trap. I have a tendency to be self-sacrificing. I have a tendency to want to please, please improve myself to others. And it wasn't until I recognized the damage I was doing to the trust in myself when I said yes, but meant no, that it became obvious to me that I had to do something about it. Yeah, this is so interesting to me. So I remember, I used to work in corporate.

Now I'm an entrepreneur like you. And I was always a bossy girl. And I always did really well at work, super productive, had my shit together, you know. And I would be very opinionated because I had had the experiences and was very knowledgeable and was like kind of top of my field that I would speak up. And I look very young and I'm a petite woman. And I would get a lot of things like in my reviews like, hey, you're aggressive or you're bossy. Everybody like, you know, people think you're a bossy or you need to be nicer to people. But I was very nice. I. I was just acting like a man. And so I want to understand your thoughts about this in terms of women because it goes

along with the people pleasing thing. It's like very hard to be likable if you want to like be at the top as a woman. I found that like nobody liked me. Like, you know what I mean? Because it's like, it's like, but a man who acted exactly like me was liked. So I'd love to hear thoughts on this. Again, we have so many similarities. And I can share that I experienced the exact same thing.

Well, so a couple of thoughts. First, naturally, I have some characteristics that are ascribed to be more masculine. I'm very decisive. I'm blunt into my communication. I'm very results-oriented. These are things that are true about me, but tend to be thought of as more masculine. Now, when I got into my professional environment and the field of finance is still very male-dominated, what I ended up doing, and I'm not sure if you did this as well,

I over-rotated on all of my masculine qualities, and I shoved aside and undervalued all of my feminine ones because the environment that I was in did the same thing. And I want to be really clear, I am not talking about women versus men. I'm talking about things that we ascribe to be more masculine or feminine. So I think this is problematic for all of us. If I am a CEO who happens to be a man, I might not feel comfortable accessing some of the more feminine qualities like vulnerability or transparency or listening or empathy. And I think that that's really problematic in all of our working environments. We want people to show up as their authentic best selves with their unique abilities and their gifts and all of their talents. But I think what happens for all of us is that we corporate and business environments, we all have their.

the tendency to overrotate on that masculine and undervalue and push aside the feminine. So that's one thing. The other thing I want to say is it relates to confidence is there are some emotions that I think are more available to specific gender. So I'll give the example as a woman. It's not as available for me to be angry. When I'm angry, people have judgments about that or perceptions about that, especially in the working environment, where a male counterpart could feel, act and say in the exact same tone, in the exact same volume, what I would, and not face the same consequences. But the flip side is also true. Sadness is not an available emotion for a lot of men.

And so if a man, for example, were to cry at work, I'm not saying it'd be welcomed if a woman did it, but if a woman did it, it would be a little bit more acceptable than if a man did it. And here's where it's problematic as it relates to our confidence. When we don't allow people their normal, true, authentic emotions, we create environments where they separate from their trust a little bit every time. Because what we're saying is the way you feel isn't right. And how do I trust myself if I authentically feel angry as an example. Like if somebody came and punched me in the face as I was walking down the street, I would feel angry. That's a normal human emotion. But if I'm not allowed to feel that way, then that has me question myself. It has me question my feelings. It

has me question whether or not I can trust what's coming up for me. And I think that's problematic for all of us. Yeah, 100%. I find this stuff so interesting. I have a lot more questions about this. But Before we get into that, I want to talk about the business decision of you becoming an entrepreneur. So you eventually step down from your cushy position to focus on what you were truly passionate about. You started this company called Women's Work. And so what I want to understand is what gave you that push to start your company? And I didn't find it in my research. I wanted to understand, did you start it as a side hustle or did you just like jump into entrepreneurship?

Great question. A little bit of both. I did not start it as a side hustle. I knew it was going to be my business and my 100% and I wanted to replace the income I left, which was pretty substantial within two years and all the stuff. Having said that, I did create a transition plan. For six months, I started working less at Northwestern Mutual and more in my business. So it was like four days a week at NM and one day a week on my business. And then over time, it ended up being one day week at NM and four days a week in my business. And after six months, I was full-fledged in. And I'm really

grateful that I was able to create that transition plan and had the support of the people. And it was a win-win. They weren't ready to lose me fully. So, oh, wow. What a unique way to start a business. I've never really heard of that where, like, you work together with your employee to transition off and become an entrepreneur. That's great. I love that you did it in such a smart way. because too many people believe this lie that just like overnight, you could become an entrepreneur and become rich and they're quitting their jobs without thinking about it. So I love that you took it slow like that. What was the trigger that got you to kind of decide that you were going to start this company? Yeah. So I would say there were two big things. Number one, I became much more passionate about working with the women in my company. And the work that I did was so big and so there was so much to do that it didn't allow. for me to do that passion work as much as I would have liked. And there was a need for it across the finance industry, not just within my company. There's such an opportunity for women to choose to be in finance, to succeed in that industry, to get into leadership. And so it became about a

bigger mission. The other thing is, in full transparency, it became obvious to me that I wasn't going to get the role, income, and opportunity that I wanted as quickly as I wanted if I stayed. I'd been doing a lot of work on my own confidence and learning about confidence, and it just became obvious to me that I needed to trust myself and go make it happen for me. I wanted to put the decision making, the risk, and all the action in my own hands and not run the risk of somebody else deciding for. me. A lot of times people think about position where you have a salary or whatever is not very risky. To me, that's very risky. Somebody else is deciding the trajectory of my career, the income

that I make and the opportunities that are available to me. I didn't want that. I wanted to decide those things. Yeah, I'm like vigorously nodding my head because those are like some of the exact same reasons why I left Disney. I remember just thinking, well, I could stay here and definitely become very, very successful, but it's going to take 20 years. I feel like the amount of success that I had less two years would have taken 20 years to achieve in corporate as a woman, my size, and who looks like me and as a minority and all those things. So I totally agree there. So let's talk about what you do at women's work that also is related to men. We were just talking about men sort of loosely.

And so from my understanding, women's work advocates for women, but not at the expense of men. So I'd love to understand more about that. That's exactly right. And that's exactly what I say. And it's important for me. I don't hate men. I don't blame men. I don't shame men. It ultimately came down to strategy and a business owner to a certain extent. Of course, passion and all of that. So I have a daughter. So advocating for women became more important once I had her. But on top of that, the available resources for professional women are so limited compared to the available. resources for professional men. I don't know if the stat holds true today, but as of a year ago, 92% of all business books were written by men. And so I also experienced that most of the mentors, most of the managers, most of the people in leadership roles are also men. And so we are learning a lot about what it is to be professional, what it is to be professionally successful from men. And I'm not saying that's a problem, but as a woman moving through a corporate environment,

a professional environment, entrepreneurship, running a successful business, there are nuances and there are differences that nobody was teaching me and that I couldn't figure out other than the hard way. And so I really wanted to be that resource. I wanted to provide that information. I wanted to celebrate the differences, the nuances. and I wanted to, for all of us, to have the opportunity to leverage the power of the feminine in addition to the power of the masculine in all aspects of our life. I didn't want men to feel like they couldn't be sad or vulnerable anymore. And I didn't want women to think that the only way they could be successful was to put on

the masculine shield and try to act like one of the guys. from my understanding, confidence levels and confidence varies whether you're a man or a woman. So men tend to overestimate their capabilities, while women tend to underestimate their capabilities. And this is problematic when it comes to like applying for jobs or negotiating higher salaries and all those things. So I'd love to understand what we need to know, both from the employee side and the employer side, in terms of how women and men kind of over and undercompensate. Again, great question. I think women over-rotate towards competence and men over-rotate towards confidence.

And the available opportunity, the best opportunity for all of us is to choose confidence while we develop competence. And so what happens is when women enter the workforce, a lot of times they're spending so much energy trying to become competent. They're getting all the designations. They're doing all the trainings. is they're doing all the research, and they show up less confident, and they will apply for less or raise their hands for less or take on less risks because they're waiting to feel ready. They're focused on building the competencies, and once they feel they've done that, then they'll take the risks.

Whereas men are overriding, rotating towards confidence. They trust themselves. They'll apply or go for something or, or, or, or, or, or, or, or, you know, and, you know, go for that promotion or change jobs, even if they only meet 40 to 60 percent of the qualifications, they have more of the, I'll figure it out as I go. Now, what we do notice is sometimes as men overrotate on confidence, they undervalue competence. So they may not show up to the trainings or get the designations or focus on education at the same level as their female counterparts. And I think the opportunities for both of us to learn from each other, to choose.

confidence while developing your competence. And then the last thing I want to say is there does appear to be a gender impact on confidence. Research shows that little girls and little boys have about the same measure of confidence until early elementary years, about age seven to age nine. And then we start seeing a separation. And it gets further and further separated. And so what's important to know is that young women and young men are entering their working years, entering the workforce with a gap in confidence. And it's not until about age 50 where we meet back in the middle in our 50s. And in their 60s, oddly, it appears women gain more confidence than their male counterparts. And so if you are a leader in a firm or in a corporate environment, it's just

important to know, generally speaking, I'm not speaking for every human, not every woman or not every man, but generally speaking, women are showing up to work with less confidence than their male counterparts. And so the best thing that we can be doing is investing and encouraging and supporting them developing that confidence within themselves. We'll be right back after a quick break from our sponsors. Happy New Year, Yap gang. I just love the unique energy of the new year. It's all about fresh starts. And fresh starts not only feel possible, but also feel encouraged. And if you've been thinking about starting a business, this is your sign. There's no better time than right now. 2026 can be the year that you build something that is truly yours, the year where you take control

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It makes doing business so much easier. Make this the year where no opportunity and no customer slips away. Try Quo for free, plus get 20% off your first six months when you go to Quo.com slash profiting. That's QUO.com slash profiting. Quo, no missed calls, no missed customers. This is so, so interesting. And so much of what you're saying like reminds me of what some of my other interviews, past interviews have said. So I just interviewed this guy, Arthur Brooks. And so he taught me about something called fluid

intelligence and crystallized intelligence. This is kind of going off tangent for a second, but it's pretty interesting. So fluid intelligence is like when you're really creative, innovative, it starts to decline in your late 30s. And crystallized intelligence starts to increase after your 40, 50, and beyond. and basically crystallized intelligence is like having wisdom. And he basically says there's two curves of success and a lot of people miss their second curve of success. And that's because they're in their 40s, 50s, they're trying to compete with the younger guys

and stay in this fluid intelligence mode when really they should be teaching others and serving others. And I feel like women naturally do that. And that's probably why women in their 60s and beyond are more confident is because they've been on that wave of trying to give back serving others, and maybe that kind of plays into their natural abilities more.

So it's just very interesting for, it kind of just correlates to what I just learned. So I thought that was just so interesting. Absolutely. And it's fascinating. I'm definitely going to do more digging into that. But that completely jibes with everything that I know and have learned as it relates to confidence.

Yeah, cool. So let's talk about gender expectations. You were just alluding to this, the big part of your work is to eliminate these gender expectations. So I'd love to understand what are a few examples or some common ones that we should know about? I think generally speaking, what's happened is there's been so many advancements for and with women. And we've made a lot of progress. But inevitably what's happened is things have just been added.

The available opportunities and options have been added, not replaced or adjusted. So as an example, a few gender expectations. for women, that we desire and want to have children, that we desire and want to have, get married, that we desire and want to run our household and drop off our children and pick them up and volunteer for the PTA and cook all of our healthy meals and organize all of the birthday parties. And while doing that, also work a full-time job, elevate ourselves to the C-suite, manage and lead a team or run a business. or all of that.

And it's just, frankly, too much for any one human. And so there are also gender expectations for men and for all the other genders, but let's say for men as an example, there's the gender expectation that you'll provide, that you will be physically strong, that you will be stoic in the face of pain or adversity, that you will achieve professional success, that you will work really, really hard, grit, grind, and all that stuff. And so, again, I am not suggesting that any of those things are wrong. I'm just saying if there is a man out there who's like, you know, that doesn't speak to me. That's not the life I want. That's not what success looks like for me, that they should be able to live their truth and authentically

without being put in a box. Same thing for women. So in our household, my husband and I, my husband is Uber successful. He runs finance company and just crushes it. He does all of the grocery shopping and all of the cooking in our household. He also shares drop-offs and pickups for school.

And I love that he does that. We have this amazing partnership that I'm so incredibly proud of. But here's what I know. People are always infatuated with how much he helps out at home. People are like, oh, you're so lucky that he does drop-offs and pick-ups. Oh, my gosh, it's incredible that you have somebody that cooks. Nobody ever says that stuff to him, right? Nobody's ever congratulated him that his wife does half the drop-off. So anything, I think sometimes people judge me or concern that I'm not involved enough or committed enough. And trust me, I'm thoroughly engaged in our daughter's life. This is just an example of gender expectations that I just, I don't believe they're serving any of us. And what I fundamentally stand for is that we all get to show up as our best and authentic selves and live our truth without being shoved into a box just because of the packaging we happen to come in. Yeah. I feel like the work that you're doing is so important, especially as we move forward in the future, especially as more women are expected to work and provide half the household.

income, things got to give at some point. You know, it can't just be everything on the woman's back. Since we're talking about relationships and you're talking about your incredible partnership with your husband, I'd love to understand how you think personal relationships impact your confidence. Yeah, so great question. I often say this. I think I even say it in the book. I want to be really clear that marrying my husband did not give me confidence. Becoming confident is what allowed for us to find each other. If I hadn't been working on my confidence, if I hadn't been doing the work to build internal trust, I would have literally never seen him. Like, he could have been in the same room as me, and I would have beeline to the most emotionally unavailable worst partner

potential in the room, because before I started working on my confidence, that was my type. And so because I worked on my confidence, I was able to see him. And because I'd worked on my confidence, he was attracted to me. I don't think he would have been that impressed with me if he would have met me a few years before. Jay is a very confident human. I experience him that way. I've learned a lot by observing him and by being with him. And he encourages me to trust myself. He's an incredibly supportive partner. And I hope he feels I'm the same. It would answer the question, we support each other's confidence. We encourage each other's confidence.

We value each other's confidence. But neither of us are giving it to each other. Yeah. I love that. And I think about some bad relationships that I was in the past and the things that they would say to me. And it's so hard to be your best version of yourself. I somehow, I feel like moved past it and was doing amazing things even well.

was going on because I believed in myself so much to your point, right? That inner trust of myself. Mine was so strong that even though I had somebody negative around me didn't impact me, but that's not the same for everyone, right? And so who you surround yourself really matters. And you want to be, especially your life, like your partner, your romantic partner, the person you probably spend the most time with, you want somebody who's going to build you up, believe in you, want to support you, believes in equal gender roles and everything like that. that because that was a big issue with me. I think like my ex-boyfriend, he wanted me to be a housewife, but also contribute to half, but he didn't want to help with anything. And it's just a

nightmare when you're really trying to make it. Yeah, I had an ex tell me once that I would never find somebody who would love me the way I was because I was too career-oriented and too ambitious. So I like you, any confidence I did have, I directed towards my professional life. And so, So I looked at the part of the successful woman in that professional environment where my insane lack of confidence played out the most obviously was in my dating relationships. All right. So let's go back to something that my friend, Heather Monaghan, who's also your friend. She's the person that introduced us.

Shout out to Heather Monaghan, one of my best friends and mentor. She is known as the confidence creator, another expert in confidence. And she always tells me that confidence is like a muscle. She's drilled this into my head. Confidence is like a muscle, holla. She'd always tell me. So talk to me about that. Do you still work on your confidence today?

Or would you say that your confidence is unshakable? Heather is dead on. And I always listen to everything that Heather says. So yeah, she's right. Confidence is a muscle. And just like a muscle, if you're not using it, if you're not working it, if you're not building it, it will go away.

atrophy. To answer your question directly, I am always working on my confidence. I don't believe anybody arrives at confidence, plants a flag, and is like, who, I'm done. This is not something you arrive to. It's an ongoing journey that we will all be on for the course of our life. And my confidence ebbs and flows. And when I say that, what I mean is sometimes it's just easier for me to choose confidence. Sometimes it's just easier for me to be confident. Sometimes it's really a struggle and I have to do the work. I have to choose it minute by minute, sometimes second by second. It always pays off. I'm always glad that I did. But yeah, I see it as a journey. I see it as a muscle. And I think anybody who says they're 100% confident, 100% of the time is either a narcissist and I don't, I'm not trying to

say that flippantly. Like that's a real mental condition. or they lack extreme self-awareness, or they're telling you what they think you want to hear, because I don't think that that's a real thing. I don't think anybody is 100% confident, 100% of time, which means we all get to work on it. So it's funny that you say this. The other day, I was, like,

I always do like an outro at the end of every podcast. So, like, for you, I'll do one in a couple weeks and, like, reflect back on the conversation. And I don't remember which interview it was, but I was going on a rant about how I was anti-humble. And I did some definition of humble. It means to be small, low to the ground. And I was just doing some thinking. And I was like, I felt like there was too many people that I knew that were so afraid of looking not humble that they never talked about their accomplishments.

They never like not bragged about themselves, but they never even told people what their accomplishments were. Like, for example, they have a business. They won't post about it on social media. because to them that's so arrogant, that's so cocky. Or like they won an award. They don't post about it or tell anyone. And to me, I just feel like people who get ahead are the people that are willing to put themselves out there and have the confidence to do that. And so I went on a rant saying how I was anti-humble and that this whole culture

of wanting to be humble is really hurting everyone. And it's like the people who are really outgoing are winning because they're not afraid to put themselves out there. but then everybody else is so afraid of being looked at as not humble. So I know you have some thoughts about this. So I'd love to hear them. Yeah. So first,

as it relates to confidence, because I always bring it back to that, is confidence is not whether or not you are an extrovert or introvert or whether you put yourself out there or don't or whether you celebrate an achievement or don't. Like confidence is not having to compare yourself to anyone at all. Arrogance is when somebody has to be less than you in order for you to be successful or big or whatever. So in my book, I say this. One of the ways I

believe that we build trust within ourselves is to be our own hype person. We need to celebrate our successes. We need to acknowledge them in order to build trust. We should be able to put it out there. I think where we need to be careful is if all we care about when we put something out there is what somebody else's response is going to be, then we're probably not coming from confidence or from being humble. We're coming from wanting to prove ourselves or what everybody else thinks, external validation and all of that. Yeah, validation addiction again, yeah. Exactly. So I had to unwrap and unravel a lot of old beliefs that really just frankly didn't work for me anymore and recognize that my opportunities to choose confidence. I'm putting myself out there so that the right

people, my people can find me. It's the only way they're going to find me. I got to put myself out there. I got to put the real me out there. Some people aren't going to like it. Some people aren't going to choose it. That's okay. If I'm not putting myself out there, like, how can I find my people? How are they going to find me? Exactly. How are you going to teach others? So this is what I was saying in my little rant, I was saying, if you put yourself out there in a way that teaches other people and inspires other people and motivates other people, you are doing a service to the world. And people will, I know that even on my profile, some people will be like, you're always bragging. And I'm like, I'm not bragging. I'm a minority woman entrepreneur. There's very little of us. And I'm not afraid to tell you about my

accomplishedism. I'm sorry, you can't handle it. Like, you know what I mean? And there's just one out of thousands of people. And you got to ignore those haters, right? Overcome those villains. And just keep pushing because it's it's not your problem that they can't handle your confidence. I have a quote real quick. Yeah, just behind me that I think will reinforce what you're saying and I look at it every single day. It says you will be too much for some people. Those aren't your people. And I think that's just to remind you are not meant for everyone. And 99% of the population of the United States could think you're a complete hack. Think you're ridiculous, not like anything. you have to say and you could still be a multi-billionaire. There is so many people out there,

so much opportunity, so much abundance. I think the best way any of us can achieve the level of success, the impact, the income, all of those things is by being authentic, by putting it out there, by saying who we are and then letting the right people get attracted to it. And like you said, ignoring everybody else. could not agree more. All right. So some actionable advice as we close out this interview. I learned that you have something called a feel good folder that you use when confidence falters. I'd love to hear about that. Yeah. So my feel good folder is part of my recovery plan. A recovery plan is like a list of things that give you energy, remind you what's important, motivate you, because we all have crappy days.

And when the shit hits the fan, none of us feel like doing anything productive or getting into action towards what matters. I don't know about you. When I have a bad day, I feel like drinking a glass, and by glass, I mean, bottle of wine. I don't feel like going and working on what I need to be working on. And so this recovery plan reminds me what's important, motivates me, and helps get me back into action towards what matters faster than I would if left to my own devices. So this feel good folder is one of the items on my recovery plan. And what it is is anytime somebody sends me a note, or emails me or sends a message of the work that I did and how it impacted them or how it helped them or bettered them, I save it and I put it in my feel good folder. And so when I'm having one

of those crappy days, I love this. I literally could pull it out right now. I pull it out. Yeah, go for it. Yeah. Okay. So it's right here in my desk. It's the first thing. No, no, no. It's right here. These are the written ones. But I have a folder on my desktop anytime I'm an So I have like a couple of these. But basically when I don't feel like it anymore, all I have to do is open my feel good folder, read those notes. And it reminds me that I matter, that the work that I do matters, that it is necessary. And that motivates me. That excites me to get back into action when again, if left to my own devices, I'd be curled up in the fetal position on the couch drinking wine. I love that. It's such a great thing to do. Every time somebody gives you a compliment, take a screen. drop it in a folder. It's so easy to do. One more actionable piece of advice before we go and I ask you our last two questions of today's interview. You have this little hack called the three F word approach to success and achievement. And F is spelled EFF. I love this. I think it's really

memorable. I'd love to share it with my Yap fam. Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, everybody loves a good F word. So if you say F word, it gets people's attention. But it's like you said, EFF. So in my coaching work, I began to realize that there are basically three of these EFF words that trigger results and achievement and success. One of the EFF words we all know, it's effort. It's hard work. It's the grit. It's the first and last out, just doing whatever it takes. And I am a huge fan of effort. And it is one of those things that I have a tendency to overrotate. on. And I find in our cultures, there isn't a problem we don't try to solve by saying do more. So we all know the effort thing. But the other two are really impactful. The second EFF word is

effectiveness. It's skill. It's how well you do what you do. It's the ratios, the results, the conversion rates, whatever you want to call it. It's the way that you can tell of what you're doing is effective. So I could call 100 people and ask if they want to work with me. And that's a lot of effort. And if 20% of them say yes, great. But if I can focus on effectiveness and get that percentage up to 30 or 40%, then I don't have to work any harder to get almost double the results. And then that leads to the third EFF word, and that's efficiency. That's creating systems, processes, templates, delegation, doing more and less time, or doing the same with better results. Whatever it is, I think if you combine those three EF, F words, those three F words for success,

you are unstoppable, put in the effort, be effective, work on the skill, be great at what you do, and look for opportunities for efficiency. to me, that's the magic bullet for success. I love that. The F words, effort, effectiveness, efficiency. So great, Nicole. That's such a great hack. All right.

So we ask a couple questions at the end of every app interview. We do some fun things with them at the end of the year. So the first question is, what is one actionable thing that our young improfitors can do today to become more profiting tomorrow? Oh, gosh, that's a really good question. I would make sure you have a clear, clear vision statement and then think about the action plans that it takes to get to that vision

statement. I think far too often we have one or the other, but we're not marrying both. Like we have the goals, we have the vision, or we know what we need to do today. But to the extent that you can connect the two and have it so clear in your mind how one is going to lead to the other, I think that's the best recipe for success. 100%. Whenever I feel like my team is going in circles or nothing's getting done, I'm like, where's the plan? A goal without a plan is just a dream. Nothing ever happens. Even if you have good intentions, you need a plan. So I love that. What is your secret to profiting in life? To trust myself. Choose confidence over and over and over again. To keep trusting myself, to keep listening

to that internal voice, that internal knowing, to keep honoring who I am and what I believe. I'm meant here, you know, meant to do while I'm here on this earth. I firmly believe we all have worth. We all have value. We all have purpose. And our opportunity, and it doesn't necessarily mean one purpose, but our opportunity is to trust in that. And so that's what I'm working on doing every single day. And I love how you've made a career out of your passion. It is truly inspiring. Nicole, you have a new book out. It's called Validation is Only for Parking. Where can everybody go find your book. Yeah. So at Nicolecollal.com is the best place to find everything. And there's a book section. And of course, it's available on Amazon or Barnes & Noble or whatever, wherever you buy books.

Amazing. And you have a podcast as well. What is that called again? It's called This is Woman's Work. I will say 12% of my listeners are men. And I am forever grateful to the men who show up to listen to a podcast called This Is Woman's Work. But one of my favorite compliments is that this content is good for everybody. I mean, same with me. Everyone's like, young and profiting, I'm not young. I'm like, it's for all ages. So don't worry about it. Awesome, Nicole. This is such a great conversation. Thank you so much for coming on Young and Profiting podcast. Thank you so much, Hala. You are an A plus host. Their research and the questions. And I just am such a big fan of you and appreciate so much the opportunity to get to work with you in this way.

Well, yeah, bam, that's a wrap. Nicole Khalil is wonderful. and her and I have so much in common that it made for a really nice conversation. And I absolutely love her outlook on confidence and gender roles. And the first concept I want to recap today and dive deep on is the confidence con. Everywhere you look, you're told that if you do this, if you buy that or if you get to some point other than where you are now, then you'll feel confident. Nicole calls this the false equation and she thinks that it is total trash. it's the basis of the entire confidence con.

What we've been told over and over is that if X happens, then you'll feel confident. And X could be a million things. It could be getting to a specific weight goal or getting to a certain level of income or marrying the person of your dreams. The list is endless, but it doesn't matter what X you choose because that formula simply won't work. This equation tells you that in order to be confident, you first have to do something. You have to get something.

and then someone or something needs to come along and validate it. It is complete and utter bull crap, but we've been conned for so long that a lot of us operate from this false equation on the regular. And so if that equation doesn't work, then what does? Nicole says the answer is, when I'm confident, I have a higher probability of X. What's great about this formula is that even if X doesn't happen, you can still be confident.

It's not a chicken or egg question because what comes first is clear. If you're confident, you'll then have a higher probability of attracting and choosing your dream partner because you always show up as yourself when you're with them. When you're confident, you're more likely to raise your hand and advocate for yourself and bring your unique talents and gifts to your career. So you're more likely to get that promotion and get that income level that you're looking for. And if you're confident, you're more likely to take risks necessary for achieving the success that will allow you to buy that fancy car or that big house.

This is all obvious and logical when we think about it, but it goes directly against all the lies that we've internalized over time. And this is especially true for women. And I know many of my listeners are men, but I do want to take a moment to talk to my lady young improfitors. There are some of you out there. And as a woman, you have every right to be especially confused about confidence. Religion, culture, business, media, advertising, education, the entertainment world.

All these influences send the message in every possible way about what it is to be a good woman and how easy it is to be a bad woman. Who I am, who you are as a woman, has likely been defined by everyone but you. And let's look at work for an example. For a long time, it wasn't even socially acceptable for a married woman to work.

And it was also expected for women to get married young and to have children. So the structures and expectations of work cultures were designed for and by men. And even though times have changed and women make half of the labor force, companies are still disproportionately led by men. And 92% of business books are also written by men.

Most of what we learn about business, we learn from men. And yet women are still expected to somehow thrive in the workplace. And there is a lot of problems with that. But Nicole believes that confidence is the answer. And she defines confidence as knowing who you are, owning who you're not, and choosing to embrace all of it. Confidence is about trusting yourself firmly and boldly. And if confidence is about trust, then it begs the question of how we build trust within

ourselves. And in her book, Validation for Parking, Nicole outlines five confidence derailers that can destroy your confidence and destroy your trust within yourself. And they are perfectionism, head trash, or talking negatively to yourself, overthinking, comparison and judgment, seeking confidence externally, right? And so I'll leave you with this, Yap, fam. Get to action.

I just listed five things that can derail your confidence and your trust in yourself. One of those probably triggered you as this is the one that I need to work on, right? Perfectionism, head trash, overthinking, comparison and judgment and seeking confidence externally.

For me, seeking confidence externally is definitely the one that I need to work on. Whether you're a lady young improfiter or a fellow young improfiter, choose the derailer that affects you the most and get proactive, learn how to defeat it and get into motion by Nicole's book or just Google how to get better at those things and get a tip or two and work on it. There's no use in waiting because no one is coming to hand you your confidence. You can't think your way into it. You have to

do. The time is to act now. Who would you be if you had more confidence? What risks would you take? What decisions would you make? What dreams would you chase? It's time to find out the answers to those questions, yeah, fam. Start working on building your confidence. Thanks so much for listening to this amazing episode of Young and Profiting Podcasts featuring Nicole Career. Again, her new book, Validation for Parking is out now. We're going to stick that link in the show notes. And if you guys enjoy the show, make sure you drop us a five-star review on your favorite podcast platform. That's the number one way to thank us here on Young and Profiting Podcast. You guys can also find us on YouTube. We've been doing an excellent job managing our YouTube channel lately. Check out all of our videos on there.

You guys can also find me on Instagram and TikTok at Yap with Hala. I'm on LinkedIn. You can search for my name, Halitaha. You can't miss me on there. And big thanks to my amazing Yap production team. You guys have been doing an incredible job lately. I'm so thankful for all your help. And see you next time, guys.

This is your host, Halataha, signing off.