Young and Profiting with Hala Taha - Stacey Vanek Smith: Machiavelli in the Workplace | E164

Episode Date: April 4, 2022

A couple of years ago, Stacey Smith found out that a male colleague in a similar role was making $20k more than she was. In the fashion of any true reporter, Stacey started researching the gender gap in the workplace, exploring everything from why women make less money to why there are fewer women in leadership roles. In this episode, Hala and Stacey talk about sexism in the workplace, the gender pay gap, Stacey’s book Machiavelli for Women, unconscious bias in the workplace, Machiavelli’s princes, mentorship, the Cinderella syndrome, negotiation advice, and more.   Topics Include: - Sexism in the workplace and the gender pay gap today - Why isn’t this changing? - Conflicting views of women leaders  - Hot boxing in the corporate world and what happens to women in this world  - Unconscious biases and their reverberations   - History of Machiavelli and his princes  - Takeaways from Machiavelli - Cringy advice in Machiavelli for Women  - Growing career after having a child - Advice for men and mentorship in the workplace  - Key observations that Machiavelli made about human nature that are true today - Definition of power and Machiavelli's power principle  - Cinderella syndrome  - Advice on negotiation and asking for women  - Fake it till you make it  - Birds of a confident feather  - The easy ask - Advice for women and men  - And other topics… Stacey Vanek Smith is the co-host of NPR's The Indicator from Planet Money. She's also a correspondent for Planet Money, where she covers business and economics.  Before coming to NPR, Stacey worked for Marketplace, where she was a correspondent and fill-in host. At Marketplace, Smith was part of a collaboration with The New York Times, where she explored the relationship between money and marriage. She was also part of Marketplace's live shows, where she produced a series of pieces on getting her data mined. Her work has appeared on All things Considered, Consider This, Morning Edition, Up First, Weekend All Things Considered, It’s Been A Minute, with Sam Sanders, How I Built This, and Rough Translation, as well as in Time Magazine, The New York Times, The Awl and People Magazine. Stacey earned her bachelor's degree in comparative literature and creative writing from Princeton University. She also holds a master's in broadcast journalism from Columbia University. Sponsored By: 99 Designs - Head to 99designs.com/YAP to learn more and get $30 off your first design contest! Sandland Sleep - Go to sandlandsleep.com and use the promo code YAP15 ThirdLove - Upgrade your bra today and get 20% off your first order today at thirdlove.com/yap ExpressVPN - Visit my exclusive link ExpressVPN.com/yap and get 3 extra months free WRKOUT - Visit wrkout.com/yap to book a FREE Session with a world-class trainer and get 30% off your first TWO MONTHS with code YAP Resources Mentioned: Stacey on NPR: https://www.npr.org/people/350888943/stacey-vanek-smith  Machiavelli For Women by Stacey Smith: https://www.staceyvaneksmith.com/book  Harvard University’s Implicit Association Test (IAT): https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/education.html  Women Don’t Ask by Linda Babcock: https://www.amazon.com/Women-Dont-Ask-Negotiation-Gender/dp/0691210535  Stacey’s Website: https://www.staceyvaneksmith.com/  Stacey’s Podcast: https://www.staceyvaneksmith.com/audio Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/staceyvaneksmith/ Stacey’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/svaneksmith  Stacey’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stacey-vanek-smith-4171ab13/  Connect with Young and Profiting: YAP’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/youngandprofiting/     Hala’s Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/htaha/     Hala’s Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/yapwithhala/     Clubhouse: https://www.clubhouse.com/@halataha   Website: https://www.youngandprofiting.com/  Text Me via @SlickText: https://youngandprofiting.co/TextHala Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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$0 delivery fee and percentage off discounts subject to older minimums and participating scores. Join Uba One and Save. Zero Dollar Delivery and Percentage Off Discount Subjects to Old Minimums and Participating Source. Taxes and other fee still apply. You're listening to YAP, Young and Profiting Podcast. A place where you can listen, learn, and profit. Welcome to the show. I'm your host, Halla Taha, and on Young and Profiting Podcast, we investigate a new topic each week and

interview some of the brightest minds in the world. My goal is to turn their wisdom into actionable advice that you can use in your everyday life, no matter your age, profession or industry. There's no fluff on this podcast and that's on purpose. I'm here to uncover value from my guests by doing the proper research and asking the right questions. If you're new to the show, we've chatted with the likes of XFBI agents, real estate moguls, self-made billionaires, CEOs, and bestselling authors.

Our subject matter ranges from enhancing productivity, had to gain influence, the art of entrepreneurship, and more. If you're smart and like to continually improve yourself, hit the subscribe button, because you'll love it here at Young & Profiting Podcast. This week on YAP, we're chatting with Stacey Vanick Smith. Stacey is the co-host of NPR's The Indicator from Planet Money, and she recently wrote Machiavelli for Women, a book about

how women can apply Machiavelli's principles to their work lives to finally break the glass ceiling once and for all. Stacey's own experience with the gender pay gap inspired her to learn about the uphill battle women face in the working world. What Stacey found out is that while women's struggles in the workplace are hot topic, not much has changed. Women are still paid less than their male counterparts in occupy fewer leadership positions. So Stacy wanted to find out how we could make true progress. And she found her answer in an unlikely place.

The writings and musings of the Renaissance diplomat, author and philosopher, Nikolo Machiavelli. Now, even though Stacy's book is focused on women, the interview has insight that's relevant to both men and women, and the type of men that listen to young and profiting podcasts are the type that are looking to empower women in the workplace and make positive changes. The first step towards change is awareness and knowledge, so please, don't shy away from this episode if you're a man.

I know more than half of my listeners are male, and once in a while I do a woman's focused episode, only when I know it will be relevant and helpful to both men and women. In this episode, Stacy and I talk about how Machiavelli's teachings can be applied to marginalized groups in the workforce and discuss the realities of the gender pay gap. We also covered the repercussions of unconscious bias, the role men can play as allies and mentors, the Cinderella syndrome, negotiation tips allies and mentors, the Cinderella Syndrome, negotiation tips, and so much more. If you're a woman looking to get fair pay or a promotion, or a man wondering how you can be an ally to your female colleagues, this episode is for you.

Hey Stacy, welcome to Young & Profiting Podcast. Thank you, I'm really excited to be here, thanks for having me. Like guys, I'm super happy to be talking with you today. You are the co-host of NPRs, the indicator from Planet Money, and you're also an author. You just wrote your first book, Mocka Valley for Women. And I think a great way to warm up this conversation is to take it way back to early in your career where you witnessed and experienced a lot of sexism in the workplace yourself. And in one case, you found out that you were being paid a quarter less than a male colleague

who had fewer years of experience. So let's start off there. Can you tell us about that time in your life? Yeah, this was kind of mid-career. So I've been working for a little while. And I went into a job and I negotiated really hard into the job I thought. So I thought, I really thought I had like,

it had been a real struggle. It had been like kind of an unpleasant negotiation that had dragged on for many days. But you know, I sort of thought like, yes, I'm in the arena, like a gladiator. And so I got, I got the salary that I thought was like, was pretty good. And you know, I'd really fought for it.

So I felt very good about it. And then through a couple of various accidents, things being left on the printer type of accidents, I found out that not... So the first thing I found out was that my colleague was getting basically the same amount, a couple of years fewer experience than I did was making like $20,000 more than I was. And like I couldn't believe it. I felt so, oh my God, I still, I mean,

I can still, like I still feel those emotions coming up even now as I'm talking about it. And then I found out this is so embarrassing. I don't think I put this in the book. Then I found out that for the position that I had because they had like little salary bands for different positions, I was being paid the lowest possible amount like for my position. Like I couldn't have gotten paid lower. And at this point, I had like many, many, many years of experience. And I was just, oh, that was a terrible, terrible, like, couple weeks of my life

when I was kind of dealing with this and digesting it. Whew, yes. Yeah, that must have impacted you significantly in terms of like, you wanting to make a change and helping potentially other women not be in that situation. because a lot of the time, it's just knowledge, lack of knowledge, lack of knowing what other people are getting paid and people are really secretive about salaries, especially in the corporate world. It's sort of like this unspoken role that you can't ask anybody about it and can't slack anybody about it.

And you're just stuck kind of blind hoping that you got paid the market rate. So it's super interesting. And we're definitely going to talk about negotiation tactics. But first I want to talk about why this women in the workplace topic is more pertinent than ever. A lot of people think that it's kind of like we're past this and that gender equality is no longer a problem and it's 2022 and women are just equal. Why is that wrong?

I know you have a lot of experience and have done a lot of research on this. No, people have asked me that. There isn't like, first of all, like gender kind of over and second of all, like you know, like we're kind of on to other things. And what I would say to that is that the data shows us that that is in fact definitely not the case. In fact, the whole reason that I wanted to write this book had to do with data. So I've been covering business

in economics for almost 20 years. And you know, when you're on the same beat like that, the same story comes up again and again, sometimes you end up covering the same thing. So I had done a story and when you were a woman covering business and economics, you end up doing a story on the gender pay gap like every year. So I was doing my annual gender pay gap story and I was talking to this economist, this really brilliant woman, Dr. Francine Blau, and she is like really dug into the number. So the pay gap is that women make about 80 cents on the dollar compared to men for black women at 63 cents and for Latino women, it is 55 cents.

So within the gender pay gap, there are some huge gaps as well. And Dr. Blau was talking me through it and she just tossed off this remark. She was like, well, you know, these numbers haven't really moved in 20 years. And I was like, what? Because you know, I'd been covering the economy for not even that long.

And I'd seen so much change, so much transformation, so much new businesses getting started. Women earning more law degrees than men, almost as many medical degrees, more and more business degrees. I think women start 40% of the businesses in the US now. And I was like, how has that been stuck? And then I started looking into it. And all these things have been stuck.

For the last 10 years, CEOs are 80% male and 90% white. Those numbers have actually gotten slightly worse. I don't even know how this pops up. Oh, yeah. I know. And then there's this number called the labor force participation rate to get super, super geeky. Would you just the share of women who are in the workforce?

That number hasn't moved in 10 years either. So something is stuck. And there was like pretty steady progress made since the 50s, as far as women getting into the workforce, breaking into new fields, earning more money, all those things. And then it just kind of, in the last 20 years, but really, really in the last decade, just kind of froze. And during the pandemic, of course, all sorts of these issues came to a head. And we went backwards a little bit.

We lost like 30 years of progress, as far as women in the workforce during the pandemic. That's gotten a little better. But still, I think you're absolutely right. It seems like these issues should be resolved. It's like, we please deal with the next thing, but they're not resolved. I think there's a lot of stuff buried in there, including racism, including a lot of other different kinds of marginalized workers. Yeah.

I think that's all wrapped in there. Yeah, so women are in the workforce more than before, like more lawyers, more doctors, more women who are in IT, for example, but they're not in leadership positions, right? That's the key. They're not rising up to be the CEO. They're not given funding for their companies. They're not given that leadership. So why is that?

I mean, we had me too movement. You'd think that that actually would help, but it seemed like it actually hurt us. So what went wrong? Well, that is like the many million dollar question. I think that's right at the heart of it, right? Because you're absolutely right. Women are breaking into all these fields.

Women start 40% of the businesses and yet get 2% of the venture capital available. So women are there, but they're not rising through the ranks the way that you'd hope. And it, I mean, the part that really got me back to the store I was just talking earlier was it's not getting better, really. I mean, in many ways it is getting better,

but in some ways it's just not. So what's happening? I think there are a bunch of things happening. One big one that I think we've seen during the pandemic is child and family care. Women still do the lion share of child care and housework. And a lot of times that partly for that reason, when one will prioritize flexibility in their jobs. And so if there's a job, what often happens, if you get made career and above, is the jobs kind of bifurcate to jobs that have more flexibility, but maybe earn less, have a smaller potential, and jobs that have less flexibility,

but have a steeper trajectory into management positions and things like that. So you'll see this with law partners, right? Or in medical school becoming a certain kind of a surgeon. So and women will often prioritize flexibility and that will often mean that they are not on a track to become a CEO or an executive. Also becoming a manager is just a lot more complicated for women.

All kinds of things come up. Women have a harder time managing. They're looked at more critically. They are way less likely to get management positions. And a lot of that has to do with how we are sort of the conflicting views of women leaders. There's like a big disconnect in our brains because there are the expectations that we have. And these are unconscious biases, the way like I have them Even the most among us have these inside of ourselves. It's part of why this is such a difficult problem to solve

We have our expectations as far as what makes a good woman and our expectations as far as what makes a good leader and those two things Are not the same things they're at odds And so what happens when women get into leadership positions is if they display a lot of sort of traditionally feminine qualities or sort of feminine expectations, they're nurturing modest, kind, warm, supportive, don't grab credit. They will be really well liked, but they're not gonna get very far.

They're not gonna be seen as leadership material. If they display a lot of leadership qualities, they're not going to get very far. They're not going to be seen as leadership material. If they display a lot of leadership qualities, they're strong. They grab credit. They don't care too much what other people think. They're not afraid to speak up. They might get leadership positions, but people will not like them. And that becomes a big deal for upper echelon leadership positions, right? You see this a lot of times in female politicians where people sort of hate them on a level

that is like not quite in line with like any actual facts. It's like, oh, I disagree with this person on policy. My Hillary Clinton was like so hated. So hate it. So hate, just the eye or you know, when it wasn't like, oh, I don't think she has great policies. It was like, she's the worst in Elizabeth Warren too. I think got a lot of that.

So it's often like, so this is the issue that I think often will hold women back from leadership positions. Also the flexibility thing is a big one. And we saw that really, really came to light during the pandemic, I think. Yeah. So since we're on this topic, let's like dig deep on it. So you talked about this concept called hot boxing, which I think you just alluded to, right? Tell us what hot boxing is in the corporate world and what happens to women who are in that situation.

Yes, this is a baseball term that I only learned because I was shockingly terrible at baseball, but hot boxing, this happened to me one time, which is how I know about the term, is on a T-Balt team. When you have someone running between bases, and let's say you're running between second and third base, and someone throws the third base in the ball. So you turn back to go to second base, and you're running back to second base, but the third base in the third base in the ball. So the second base in the now has the ball. So you turned

around back to third, and the second base in the third base in the ball. So you're basically running between these two bases. You're not technically out, but you're not going to win. And for me, that metaphor kept coming into my mind, which is why I ended up using it, plus I was like, it's a book called Machiavelli for Women. We probably need some baseball metaphors in here. But I think it happens between leadership qualities and, quote, unquote, feminine qualities. And it is just a really, really difficult thing. Women run into this all the time when they're asking for raises.

There's often backlash. There are feelings of, and again, really difficult thing. Women run into this all the time when they're asking for raises. There's often backlash. There are feelings of, and again, these are unconscious. It's people who are often extremely well-meaning, progressive people, but they're like, wow, who does she think she is? That's a little greedy. Whereas if a guy asks for more, even if he doesn't get it, often there will be a case of,

like, you know, what good for him for asking? We're not giving him a raise, but good for him for asking. So women are in this difficult situation where if you sort of behave in a way that will sort of the traditional ways that move you along in a company that get you more money, that get you higher positions, you'll run into issues of backlash and people not liking you. And that is, that is real consequences. And then if you sort of are more sort of likable

and traditionally feminine, you're not gonna get anywhere in the workplace past a certain point. So I thought the baseball metaphor was apt in this case. Yeah, it's like kind of like your trap. Like there's no forward movement for a long, long, long time. So I was in the situation. I used to work at Disney streaming services now in an entrepreneur.

I quit my job about a year ago, 60 employees, everything's going great, but I was in Disney and I had gotten recruited there. I had done very well in my career previously. I got promoted five times and I got to Disney and I felt like stagnant. Like there was no way I would ever become an executive, ever get in the C-suite and I was like, there's nowhere to go. You know what I mean? It was a boy's cup.

So I do see which is not considering how huge that company is. You should have been seeing a million opportunities. Exactly. But I did it because to your point, I was high enough that was where the ceiling was. You know what I mean? It's like I could feel it. Like there was just nowhere to go. It was like the next stage was a six year old white man.

There was no way I was gonna take his job. You know what I mean? So it was like that kind of a stuck feeling. And so I do see what you mean. Like that middle management is where you could kind of get stuck as a woman. So talk to us about why male qualities are aligned with leadership and why feminine qualities are kind of the opposite and what we could do about that in the workplace as

women. I mean, I think it's just our ideas, our old ingrained ideas of what a leader looks like, how a leader acts. And these are just like cultural stories, right? I mean, and those stories can change, we change our stories all the time. looks like how a leader acts. And these are just like cultural stories, right? I mean, and those stories can change. We change our stories all the time. But those are very powerful.

Those stories that underlie a lot of these things. It's like, you think leader, maybe images of general pattern or the godfather or whatever come into your mind. It's probably not like a young black woman. That's probably not the image that comes into your mind when you think leader, even if you wish it were. And these are just these are deeply deeply ingrained. Actually Harvard University has this great unconscious bias test you can take online where it has you click on things really fast. And I took

one in the middle of writing this book thinking like, well, this isn't even fair because I'm thinking about these issues and reading all these studies. And I just failed. I was so mortified at the own, my own unconscious biases, but they're just in our heads. Like what a woman should be. We absorb some through movies and TV and stories and just the world that we see around us. You know, kids are like little sponges and so are we.

And this just has these reverberations when we get into a company. And it affects our decisions in all kinds of ways. I had a boss who I was used to say, like, I trust my gut. I trust my gut. And I've thought about that so many times because I think our guts are messing us up because that's where a lot of that bias. I was like, I don't know. I just feel like Ralph would be, I don't know, he just seems like he'd be a better manager. You know, a lot of things are probably going into that gut feeling, which is why a lot of ways to get around these unconscious biases are often like sort of more strict processes, right?

Like, well, the person we hire for this job has to have these qualifications, like to get gut feelings out of it because I think a lot of our unconscious biases are in our gut feelings. And so when you take it out of that, out of the realm of feelings and into the realm of facts, and take a motion out of it a little bit, which is, I mean, Machiavelli is like big advocate of that, right? Get your feelings out of the way and sort of look at things in a more concrete way. That's where a lot of biases start to go away. That's a great way to start to address these problems. But there

was a great study that Dr. Claudia Golden did from Harvard, she's an amazing researcher and economist, but it was for orchestras. So there was a big problem in orchestras where most of the people getting the parts were men. And it's very, very competitive, the orchestra world. And her idea was to put up a screen so that people would audition behind a screen and you couldn't see what the person looked like. And it think it increased the number of women getting hired by 250%. But it was just a way, it was just like a simple thing to take that thing off the table. And once it was off the table, you know, people could rise or fall in their merits, which

is what we all want. We want people to be able to rise and fall in their merits. Yeah. So one more question about leadership as a female and a male. What happens when women do display leadership qualities? Talk about how that kind of backfires for some women. People, there's just sort of this feeling of like who does she think she is.

And that is a very powerful feeling. People have more complaints about female leaders. Their leadership is questioned more often. I mean, I've seen this anecdotally in the workplace a bunch of times. A man will make a decision that people sort of wonder about, and that's one thing. And if a woman makes a decision that people question, it's like, well, is she confident?

Why is she here? There's always this underlying feeling of competence. And in fact, the reason that I liked Machiavelli for my book so much was that the premise of his book, he said there are two kinds of princes. There's the inheriting prince and the conquering prince. The conquering prince is like just taking over a new land. He said for the inheriting prince and the conquering prince. The conquering prince is like just taken over a new land. He says, for the inheriting prince, things are pretty easy. Everybody knows who he is. He's the status quo. Everybody's like, oh, that guy. Yeah, he's the leader. For a conquering prince, he says, and Machiavile says, for him, things are pretty easy. And for him to lose his power, he really, really estimates up. Now, he says, for conquering prince, difficulties abound.

He's new to this land. People are like, what is he doing here? Why are we following this guy's rules? Who is he? Who does he think he is? And I feel like that's such a great proxy for women or other marginalized workers in the workplace. Like, we're in the workplace, in all the fields.

But our power, our place there is being questioned all the time. So I think that's a lot of what's going on. It's just like people, it's nothing concrete. I think that's why I can be so difficult to address. It's people saying like, I mean, no one said to you at Disney, you can't go past this point. You're never going to replace the six-year-old white guy.

It's just this feeling that you got, and I think that feeling was probably true. It was like, but you were getting it in a million different ways from million little things. You just knew there is a ceiling here. I need to strike out on my own. A lot of people probably would not have been that courageous because it takes a lot of guts

to jump into the unknown like that, darkness and dragons and everything. So a lot of guts to like jump into the unknown like that darkness and dragons and everything So a lot of people would have just been like okay. This is probably as far as I can get and I think that is a really Distribute but you know and nothing is spoken nothing's explicit. They would never say that 100% yeah, nobody said that So you're totally right. I'd love to switch gears and kind of, well, not really switch gears. Let's talk about Maca Valley for women. So that's your new book. It was inspired by Maca Valley's The Prince that was written in the 16th century by Italian diplomat and political theorist Nicolo Maca Valley. And it was originally intended as an instruction guide

for new princes and royals. So the book is super infamous now, lots of politicians and powerful leaders kind of swear by it. But from my understanding, it really wasn't that well received back in the day like it is now. So can you take us through a little history lesson and tell us about Maca Valley and the prince? Oh, yes. It's very unlike people. I think the most common question I get about the book is like why on earth did you pick Machiavelli? Like was he like secretly a feminist and the no he was not anywhere nothing like a feminist. He was essentially so this was back before Italy was one country it was a bunch of little city states and

Machiavelli was basically like the secretary of state for Florence and Florence was in important city like Leonardo da Vinci was there that Florence. And Florence was an important city, like Leonardo da Vinci was there, that it was sort of an important, the Mediches were there, it was a big banking center, but they didn't have an army and they were pretty little. Meanwhile, so they just didn't have a lot to fight with. So Machiavelli had to like wheel and deal

with all these people. There was a time of great war. Everyone's always invading each other. Lots of bloodshed. So Machiavelli was always just using his wits to try to protect little Florence. And he loved it. He was really good at it. His co-workers loved him.

He was a little bit of a stretch for the job. Like he didn't come from the right family. He didn't come from a good family. But somehow he got the job and was very smart and loved it. And then the meditches took over the city again. So basically there was a power shift. And Machiavelli lost his job. He was thrown in prison and tortured.

All of this stuff was taken away. And then he was kind of kicked out of town. And it was from there that he wrote the prints. He was an exile. And he wrote the prints to the guy who had done all this stuff to him, taken over Lorenzo Dometici. He wrote, you know, in the beginning of the prince, I remember when I read it, being so confused because it's this weird apology in the beginning. It's like, dear Lorenzo Dometici, like, you're amazing, you're the best. Like, if you even have time to read my

crappy thoughts, here they are. And I was like, this is this book about like power that, like it just seemed so amazing to me, but he was basically hoping that he would put these amazing ideas forth, and Lorenzo Dometici would read this book and be like, you know what, we're hiring this guy back. I don't care if he worked for the other regime, he's so brilliant.

But that didn't happen. People read the book and, you know, Machiavellous whole premise basically was, and I think the reason that it's infamous and the reason that it's timeless are the same reason, which is that he sort of removes emotion and morality from things. It's totally tactical, like a chess board.

So he's looking at everything, it's like, okay, you wanna get here, what are the different ways to get here? What's in your way? All of this. And when you take away morality and you take away emotion, it does make it timeless, right? Because Moral shift and laws shift and things like that. But it also makes it kind of chilling, right? Like, there's one point in the book when he says, you know, if you wrong someone, you should probably kill them so that they're not hanging around hating you and plotting against you. And like, that's probably like solid tactical advice,

but it's also like not, you know, so anyway, the Catholic church freaked out when they saw this and they basically threatened to excommunicate anyone who owned the book. So that was very hard on sales, probably. And poor Mark, I think Mark Yveli was just completely shocked at how infamous his book became. I mean, he was just sort of, I mean, he lost everything,

and then I think he lost even more. He was like this wretched soul. I think he just thought, like, oh, I'm gonna write this smart book and it's gonna be this hot take. And then he basically got himself 16th century canceled, you know, I mean, he really was. That's so interesting and you look, you would think that he was so successful when he was live, but turns out like he really wasn't and it wasn't until after he died, people appreciated

his work or something, right? Yeah, no, that's really true. I think he, you know, he came back a little bit like as time passed, he got some jobs again and he started writing some plays and some poetry and he got back a little bit of his status but nothing like he'd had. And yeah, he died in his 50s and I think he was pretty convinced that I think he would be shocked if he knew that people still read his work.

Yeah, it's pretty incredible. So you read his book a hundred times, you obviously took a liking to it. So what would you say in his defense? I mean, he gets kind of a bad rap. What would you say in his defense? I would say that he, I find his advice incredibly valuable

because he just looks at things with very, very clarity. And for something like exclusion and discrimination in the workplace, or even just like unfair behavior in the workplace, which everyone experiences, someone getting favoritism or getting unfairly passed over all that stuff, it can be a very emotional experience. And that emotion, in certain cases, can give you energy, right? Like anger can kind of energize you to act. But in a lot of cases, it just, it makes it really hard to figure out what to do. It clouds your judgment, it takes all your energy away. It causes you to make strange decisions or act in ways that you feel weird

about later. And I think Machiavelli's essential advice is just very, very smart. I mean, he was dealing with a lot of tumult and a lot of violence and a lot of crazy emotions and alliances when he was alive. And I think he developed just a very keen wit, like he could clearly see through emotions and all the sort of theater that happens. see through emotions and all the sort of theater that happens. And the workplace is hopefully not as violent as that, but there's a lot of stuff going on, right? People's vanity, people's pride. People have all kinds of reasons for promoting and supporting or demoting and not supporting the people that around them.

And I think the ability to look at things in a very clear-eyed way, there's just a lot of wisdom there. I mean, some of the advice, like I said, is kind of like shocking and chilling. But I liked that Machiavelli was like, not afraid of uncomfortable advice. And I really tried to follow that in my book, too. There was a lot of advice that I gave that I tried to follow that in my book too. There was a lot of advice that I gave that I didn't like to give, but I liked the Machiavelli had that courage and I liked that he was like, this isn't great, but it's how humans operate. Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. Young and profitors, do you have a brilliant business idea but you don't know how to move forward with it? Going into debt for a four-year degree isn't the only path to success.

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that in your own words, you say, like you're giving some cringy advice, but it's for a good reason because it's gonna change progress for women in the workplace. So give us some examples of some of that advice. I can give you like a mildly cringey one and a super cringey one.

So the mildly cringey one comes back to the first thing that we talked about, which is when I found out that my coworker was making $20,000 more than I was. I freaked out, started to cry, went into my bosses off. I mean, it's like I did everything wrong, looking back, everything wrong. And he was like, well, what do you want?

And I didn't even know, because I didn't even thought it through. I just cried, and said how upset I was, and how unfair this was. And I did end up getting a raise, but like, I just, I really have a lot of regret about every part of how I handled that situation. Although I was right, you know,

I was right to be upset for sure. The advice that I would give now is like think about what you want. Now I have all this information, which is very powerful. I know that there's this money on the table for this job and I know I have like a little bit of an edge because there's like some guilt, right? So okay, what do I want? How can I move forward? What should I ask for like to strategize a little bit of an edge because there's like some guilt, right? So, okay, what do I want?

How can I move forward? What should I ask for, like to strategize a little bit? One of the pieces of advice in the book is not to, I mean, it was very emotionally satisfying for me to march in there and be like, this is wrong, how dare you, this is sexism. I would not counsel myself to do that now.

I'm like, don't make him feel bad. That's not gonna to be helpful. There's something a little cringy about that, right? Where it's like, don't make the person who is basically treating you in a discriminatory way, feel bad about discriminating against you, make them feel good and then ask them for something. I mean, that is essentially the advice I give in the book

where I'm like, go in, paint a picture of the future. You want with this company how excited you are, say, like, I know this is a really fair place. So, you know, and I know what this company pays for this job. I know what my colleagues are making. So I think a salary of X is more comfortable. So I'm basically saying, like, don't call your boss out onto the carpet. Yeah.

Take your motions out, play the game. Yes. And there is something that I don't like about that. You know, I mean, you should be able to go and be like, what the hell is this? Like, why are you paying this guy more? You know this is unfair. You know, just to call it out. It's like justice.

I don't think that's necessarily the smartest way to get what you want. So I don't give, I advise against that, but I don't feel great about it. That, you know, you're basically appeasing the person who messed up, which isn't my favorite. But then there's like the super cringy advice, which was really hard for me to give.

I was in the most shocking research that I found when I was doing the book, was around motherhood. So I don't have kids, and I didn't, I just didn't understand how bad the discriminations against mothers is the pay gap between women without children and women with children is larger than the gender pay gap. When women have kids, like this just this raft of discrimination comes, like what their work is looked at more critically, their paid less, their opportunities for promotion basically

dissolve to almost nothing. And a lot of women, the year's following having a child, will drop out of the workforce because of this. A lot of women who have the option to, the financial option to drop out will drop out. And so I was looking at, okay, great, like, what are some solutions for this? And the solutions, like, made me feel like a monster. Like, one of them is to check in before you go on maternity leave and basically act like you're going on a business trip. Be like, great, well, I'll be back in May and I'll hope to pick up the Jones project when I'm back.

And really establish that you are coming back and that you're serious about your job. That's not so bad. The other one is to not talk about your child. When you get back, don't talk about the fact you're gonna have a child. Don't talk about your child or show pictures of your child or mention that you were up all night with your child

because, I mean, this is terrible advice, right? I mean, you've had a baby, you've brought a creature into the world, you should be yelling it from the rooftops, but it can cause people to sort of slot you into this stereotype. So that was one of the advice I gave the other piece of advice from others is when you get back from maternity leave.

And this is of course at a moment when the baby's not sleeping and you're trying to figure out child care and all this stuff is going on in your life, like big life things to basically work as if you have no baby, just like work as hard as you can, right? When you get back because people are poised to slot you into this mommy track or take you off

of important projects or I mean it's like a very critical time. So those are pieces of advice I gave that really made me cringe and that I did not like giving at all. Yeah, but it's in their best interest to follow that advice if they want to grow their careers. So I have a lot of male listeners and I feel like a lot of males listening in, I feel really terrible hearing that like women have to think this way or women have to hide the fact that they have a child so they don't get treated

differently. What would you say to them if they want to help, if they want to get involved? What would you say to the men listening in? I think being an ally is such a powerful thing. I mean, obviously this conversation that we're having isn't a very useful conversation if there are no men at the table. We need everybody at the table. Also, the workplace is not easy for anyone. It is a hard, like careers are hard.

Their challenging life is hard and challenging. And some of the most inspiring stories that I heard in the book did come from men basically stepping forward to be allies for women. In one case, and this is, I think, something that people can really do, there was a woman who was at a company and there was a man who started as an intern and then it was promoted to her level. She was just starting out and she said he was doing this great job, and she really liked him,

but then he got promoted past her. And she wasn't sure what was going on, but she's like, I'm gonna work so hard that I'm gonna get promoted to his level. And it just wasn't happening, it wasn't happening. And he came to her at one point and said, you do really awesome work.

I think this work place isn't fair. Let me tell you what my experience has been. And he walked her through. He was totally open with how much money he'd been offered initially, what he was making, that they had just come to him with this promotion. And that information, I mean, the reason negotiation can be so hard is, you know,

what economists will call asymmetrical information, right? The companies that everybody makes, you know what nobody makes. And this guy basically single-handedly made the playing field even. She went to her boss with this infer armed with this information and was able to eventually get a promotion and a raise. But the fact that he was so open for no reason other than he was just being a good person is huge. I would say like even in meetings, often women will get talked over. This is

a much bigger problem for women of color. They'll get talked over. Their ideas will be forgotten, ignored or stolen. Something really small. Oh, Patrice's idea is great. That's a great idea. Or like, oh, yeah, I agree. We should do that. And we should, for this and this reason, or to get to acknowledge credit for someone in a meeting to tell them you think an idea is really great. Like those things, especially in public, can be very, very powerful. And, you know, just to reach out to people

who are doing good work, who seem to be struggling, especially now, I feel like a lot of us are so siloed if you're working from home. It can be a very isolating experience just to reach out a little bit, and to be aware that you have, listen, we all have unfair advantages and unfair disadvantage.

It's nothing to be ashamed of. It's not anybody's fault, but to realize maybe some of the power that you do have, and to like use it to help people, I think. I mean, one of my friends who's an economist who loves data was trying to figure out what to ask for when she was asking for a raise, so she was doing all this research to figure out what other people made. And I'm quoting her.

I just started reaching out to random white guys on LinkedIn who worked at similar companies asking them what they made. And she said she had an over an 80% response rate of men who are getting back to her who would talk to their colleagues and gather data for her to give her data. And she said people seemed so excited to help. And I think just even that openness is so valuable, so important and we'll help make a workplace

that will be good for everybody. Because discrimination isn't good for men either. You get incompetent people into leadership positions. Man, that trickles down and affects everybody. Yeah, 100%. And there's so many good men out there who want to be an ally, who want to make change happen. So this actually reminded me of something in your book when you talked about mentors. And you said that it was pretty hard for women to get mentors. And a lot of the people who are in these high level positions who you want to be mentored by are men. And these men are actually afraid of mentoring women because they just, you know, don't want

to walk that fine line, so to speak, because they're afraid of being accused of sexual harassment or whatever it may be. And when I was in corporate, I felt very hindered by the fact that I felt like no males wanted to be my mentor, especially as like a young sort of like attractive woman. It was very intimidating for men to want to be my mentor. They always just like kind of weren't interested. Actually, my first male mentor was like this year, Jordan Harbinger is my, he's like a very popular podcast or he's my mentor and I talk to him every day.

That's the first male mentor I ever had in my life. And so I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. That is such an important point. And this is especially important in fields where there aren't a lot of women in powerful positions. I think it's hard for everybody, right? I feel like, and I've heard this directly from men who are like, I don't want a mentor or a woman

because I don't want people looking at me kind of like with their eyebrow rays, like why does he like taking the pretty young thing out to coffee? Oh, I mean, I think one thing is to just, if you see someone whose work is great, I would just encourage, or someone who you want to mentor, someone reaches out to you, be open to it.

And I would say, what I recommend in the book and I guess what I would also recommend to men, is just think about what boundaries you can put around that that will make it comfortable. Like maybe you guys always meet for coffee in public, maybe it's just Zoom or the phone. It doesn't have to be in a weird gray area. And of course, a lot of mentorships traditionally

have been in kind of a gray area. I know so many women in journalism and broadcasts, myself included that have had, there's like a mentor, it's like a little flirty or whatever it is, even if, you know, nothing explicitly happens, but there's sort of like, there's like a gray area there. Like I feel like that has, maybe, doesn't have to,

but I would like to acknowledge that that is just something that's kind of often in the fabric of these relationships. But I think it can be really problematic in perception and in reality, so, you know, just draw boundaries around them. So, like, for women, I suggest, like, meet for coffee, like, even meet in the office in Starbucks. I mean, there's literally nothing sexy about Starbucks in the afternoon.

So, you can just go to Starbucks or go somewhere that's not chart, like maybe instead of going for a drink or something. But that is a huge issue. I mean, because mentorship is probably the most powerful thing. People ask me, what's the one thing I can do at work to really help people and move the needle? And I would say it's mentoring.

Because it's so, especially a lot of times like a lot of women or people of color other marginalized workers will start out in a field, and they'll leave, because they just don't feel welcome or they don't see a place for themselves. And I think mentoring someone can make a path for somebody. I mean, I think it can be so powerful, like just saying, like, that was a great idea in that meeting. I mean, that is probably, you know, that could be something someone remembers in 15 years because of those initial moments when someone's trying to see a path for themselves I mean think of yourself at Disney you did not see a path

If one of the six-year-old white men had reached out to you and been like you know what like that was an amazing idea I really think you have a future here. You might not have left I mean, it's probably a good thing that you. I really think you have a future here. You might not have left. I mean, it's probably a good thing that you did leave. And now you have to. Awesome. You're 100% true. I never thought I was going to leave corporate

before I was at Disney. I always thought I would just become a CMO or the CEO of whatever company I was at and just stay there for years. So you're right. If somebody did take me under their wing, but nobody did that. So I was like, I'm out.

And I'm sure a lot of the reason was that, well, she's like a young, lovely woman and I don't want to raise any eyebrows and I just don't want to get into all that or whatever, and if you'd been a guy, it might have been really different. 100% and in fact, there was a lot of male colleagues who were getting kind of like treated like the pet

to the executive. So I definitely see that taking place. So let's go back to Maca Valley because you're an expert on his work and it's pretty interesting that his work is still relevant 500 years later in this modern world. So I'd love to understand some key observation that Maca Valley made about human nature that still hold true today. Yes, actually, this was like one of the funny things that like, it's very obvious,

but it like sort of blew my mind when I thought of how much has changed in 500 years. Like they didn't have electricity or the combustion engine, the light bulb, airplane travel, antibiotics. Like all this stuff has changed, but people are are the same. All the observations he made, I'm like, oh yeah.

Maki Valley is a little cynical about people. Kriyantite was writing this book at a very difficult time for himself, so little cynicism was warranted. But he does have some just very clever pieces of advice. One, this one is a little bit of a silver lining Maki Valley. It's not quite as dark, but one thing he said was, if you ask someone, you should not hesitate to ask someone for a favor, because when you ask someone for a favor, they feel as indebted

to you as if they had taken a favor from you, which as someone who has trouble asking for favors or asking people to do things for me or book promotions a lot of reaching out to people for favors. So I was thinking about that a lot at the time and that really struck me. And I thought it through. And I was like, he's right because when someone comes to you for a favor, it makes you feel powerful and connected. And like you're on the right path, you know, like people are coming to you for advice and help, and it makes sense you'd feel grateful to them for that feeling and want to have that feeling again,

and feel indebted to someone for making you feel good. So that was such a smart insight. Another insight that Machiavelli gives, I'm giving all the really positive ones, but he says a good prince will always stand up for those less powerful than he is to a greater authority and the reason being that you're not gonna be the backlash you get

from the greater authority isn't gonna be that big of a deal. And the gratitude that you will get from the people you are standing up for is very powerful. And I think that's true. I mean, I was thinking of very early on in my career, Kyra's doll, as a matter of fact, a marketplace. I was just a there underling,

something happened at the company. I can't remember what happened, but somehow I was in trouble for something that I had done at Marketplace. And Kyra's doll went to the boss and was like, I was, and was just like, you need to leave her alone about this. And I found out about it through a third party.

He had no reason to intervene on my behalf at all. And he just did. And I found out about it from somebody else. And I still remember that. Every time someone brings Kai up to me, my brain goes there first. I was just like, loyal for it, like ride or die, because of that moment. You moment, I was so,

it moved me so much that someone would stand up for me at a moment that it wasn't advantageous to them. So just like thinking through something like that, I was, when I read that from Occupial, I was like, he's right, that is powerful. I mean, it's been almost 20 years and I think still think about that with Kai. I'm like, Kai Ristall, that guy's a good guy.

He stood up for me when there was no reason to do that. And it probably politically didn't cost him very much. And the boss probably thought, oh, he's a good guy. He's standing up on behalf of his little puny production assistant. And meanwhile, it was a very powerful thing for me. So those are a couple of pieces of just very smart mocky-velling advice. And oh, you know one that is still interesting,

I didn't include this in the book, but it was very interesting. He said, basically the person who helps another person gain power is ruined, which I thought was really interesting. The idea being that if you put, and I feel like this is often something women will do, which is like, well, I don't think I can go for this position myself,

but I'm gonna help Ralph go for it. Like I'm gonna become the power behind the throne, essentially, right? And I think it's very, women often get roped into supporting roles a lot of times. The reason Monkie Belly thought that this was a dangerous thing was he's like the person who you helped get into power is always gonna be a little freaked out by you

because they know how important you are and they're gonna be worried that you see through them and also like what they're gonna be able to do without you. So they're never gonna support you, they're never gonna want you to leave or promote you into a greater position. And I thought that was very interesting too. Just looking at media,

of that's the world that, of course, I'm the most familiar with, and just seeing people who helped other people get like big fancy jobs, and what happened to them. It just looked a very smart observation, I thought. Yeah, it is. I feel like I've seen that happen a lot too.

So let's talk about the definition of power because I think this is pretty interesting. Talk just about your definition of power and Machavale's power principle. Well, this was one of the first things I did. Of course, this is just like the most public radio thing I could do. I was like, I have to look up the etymology of the word power, like a middle school essay, but it was actually very useful. I almost didn't put it in the book because I was like, this is like one of those bad wedding speeches where someone's like, Webster's Dictionary Defines Marriage, but it was very useful to me.

So power comes from the French player, which means to be able. And that was a really important moment for me in the book because the idea of just power, like crushing people, bending them to your will, making oceans of money, that just didn't, I didn't really connect with that. Like I don't want those things for myself. And I feel like most people probably don't also.

I mean, you know, there are the Vladimir Putin's of the world, but most of us are not like that, I mean, you know, there are the Vladimir Putin's of the world, but most of us are not like that, I don't think. But the idea of to be able to want power to give yourself, to have agency, to be able to do what you want in the workplace, to rise on your merits in the workplace, to be able to do the work you want to do. That definition of power I could really connect with. That felt important. That felt like something that I think most of us do want.

Is that agency, that ability to, I wanna see what I can do, I wanna do my best work, I wanna be in an arena where I'm inspired and creating at the top of my game. And so that is why I included it, because I thought that was a really, for me, it was like a little bit of a revelation as far as what power was. I'd never really put that much thought into it, which is weird because all I've been doing is covering business and

economics. And if there is a field in this world that is more obsessed with power than business and economics, I've never encountered it. But you know, if that felt really, I connected with that a lot. Something else that I found super interesting in your book that I never heard encountered it, but you know, if that felt really that I connected with that a lot. Something else that I found super interesting in your book that I never heard of before, I think you might have coined the phrase the Cinderella syndrome. I would love for you to talk about that analogy and share that little story with us. I felt like, you know, I've been talking about a prince and so it was time to like invoke a princess. So the Cinderella syndrome is something that happens to women often at the beginning

of their careers. So it's like before a first promotion and something that I've certainly observed but is also been documented in research is that men will often be promoted based on their potential and women will be promoted based on what they've produced. So women get, they get slowed down in promotions and this really slows them down, especially early on. And what happens is there's this, you know, there's people have their gut feelings, right?

It's like, I don't know if she's really ready for this role. And so the Cinderella syndrome, it comes from the story of Cinderella. There's this one moment in the fairy tale where Cinderella wants to go to the ball. And she asks, and of course the stepmother Has her two step-doters that she needs to marry off and Cinderella is much cuter than the two step-doters And she does not want Cinderella going to the ball

So Cinderella's like, oh, can I go to the ball and the stepmother does not tell her no She says of course you can go I just need you to clean the banisters and polish all the silver and mothalon and scrub the floor and clean the hearth and all those things. So Cinderella's like, okay, I'm gonna do it. And she gets to work on all this stuff. And I felt like this is exactly what happens

to women in the workplace or to anyone in the workplace who's in a situation where there's no advancement really in sight. People aren't gonna say like you at Disney, they're not gonna be like listen, you're never getting a promotion. This is as high as you can go. Instead they're like, hmm, we're not sure you're ready for that, but why don't you do these 80 things we need you to do? A lot of them maybe not the most desirable tasks, right?

Women often will get stuck in with what the wonderful researcher Jones, you Williams calls office housework. But we're just gonna need you to do all this stuff and then maybe we'll consider you for a promotion. And I feel like that can be a real trap in the workplace for women and for any worker where you really don't have a path forward but no one's gonna say that. Instead, they're gonna be like,

oh, we need you to do these 80 really useful things and then we'll talk about what you want. And that's a very dangerous trap. What would Machiavelli say to anybody who has an evil stepmother, telling them to do more work and dangling the carrot in front of their face? I cannot even now pretend to speak from Akiavelli. He was much smarter in the ways of human nature than I am. But I imagine, let's see, what advice would I give? Okay, evil stepmother, I would advise like figure out what you want out of the situation, right? And then figure out like what the stepmother wants. In the

case of Cinderella, what she should have realized is that the setmother does not want her to go to the ball under any circumstances, because she's going to pull focus away from her two horrible step-daughters. And so anything she lays out is going to be an impossibility. So in that case, I would maybe not ask the setmother and just go, because you have to realize that her motivations are going to be in direct direct contradiction to what Cinderella wants to do and that no amount of it's she's not going to be she's not the kind of person who's going to be like well we did make a deal.

So it's in the name evil. You've got to you've got to pay attention to these things. So yeah, and then I would say like in that case, because Cinderella for some reason doesn't seem to have that much power in the household, you've got to like sneak off, you've got to use subterfuge. We'll be right back after a quick break from our sponsors. Hear that sound, young and profitors. You should know that sound by now, but in case you don't, that's the sound of another sale on Shopify. Shopify is the commerce platform that's revolutionizing millions of businesses worldwide. Whether you sell edgy t-shirts or offer an educational course like me, Shopify simplifies selling online and in person so you can focus on successfully growing your business. Shopify is packed with industry-leading tools that are ready to ignite your growth, give

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I remember immediately implementing what she taught me in the interview in my company and the marketing efforts that we were doing. And as a marketer, I really, really respect. All Kelly has done. All Kelly has built. In the corporate world, Kelly secured seven promotions in just eight years, but she didn't just stop there. She was working in nine to five. And at the same time, she built her eight-figure company as a side hustle and eventually took it and made her full-time hustle. And her strategic business goals led her to win the prestigious Inc. 500 award

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but things have settled a bit and I'm really focused on revamping and improving our company culture. I have 16 employees, so it's a lot of people to try to rally and motivate. And I recently had best selling author Kim Scott on the show. And after previewing her content in our conversation, I just knew I had to take her class on master class,

tackle the hard conversations with radical candor to really absorb all she has to offer. And now I'm using her radical candor method every day with my team to give in solicit feedback, to cultivate a more inclusive culture, and to empower them with my honesty. And I can see my team to give in solicit feedback, to cultivate a more inclusive culture, and to empower them with my honesty. And I can see my team feeling more motivated and energized already. They are really receptive to this framework, and I'm so happy because I really needed

this class. With Masterclass, you can learn from the best to become your best, anytime, anywhere, and at your own pace. And we all know that profiting in life doesn't just mean thriving in business. With Masterclass, you can brush up on your art skills or your cooking skills or even your modeling skills. With over 180 classes from a range of world-class instructors, that thing you've always wanted to do better is just a few clicks away.

On Masterclass, you'll find courses from many app- Apple All-Star guests like Chris Voss and Daniel Pink. I've been taking their sales and negotiation classes and I've been feeling like a real shark lately. I've totally leveled up my sales skills. How much would it cost you to take a one-on-one class from the world's best? A lot. But with Masterclass annual memberships, it just cost you $10 a month. I have to say the most surprising thing about masterclass since I started this incredible journey on the platform is the value for the quality of classes, instructors. The platform itself is beautiful. The videos are super high quality.

You can't beat it. Gain new skills and as little as 10 minutes on your phone, your computer, tablet, smart TV, and my personal favorite way to learn is their audio mode to listen on the go. That way, I can multitask while I learn. Get unlimited access to every class and right now, as the app listener, you can get 15% off when you go to masterclass.com-profiting. That's masterclass.com-profiting for 15% off an annual membership masterclass.com slash profiting. So let's talk about negotiation advice for women. So I was actually listening to an interview with you

where you said that this book was really inspired from you getting some bad negotiation advice. And that really triggered you to kind of look into good negotiation advice. And that's kind of how you re-stumbled upon Machiavelli's work. So talk to us about that bad negotiation advice and some good advice that women can follow in terms of negotiation. Yes. Well, I sort of alluded to this earlier, but I had been really bad at negotiation, like, epically bad. And the worst part was I was trying, wasn't like I wasn't trying. I was really trying.

All my negotiations always just went so badly. There was just all this bad feeling in the end and I almost never got much from my pains. It was like all the downside and none of the upside and I sort of kept slogging in thinking like, well, this is the way. And so I would read all these negotiation books that were like, you need to demand your worst. You need to firmly, you know, you need to make them name the number first.

You need to challenge their premises. You need to be ready to walk away. All of these things. And it just, it not only didn't work at like completely backfired. Negotiations did not go well. And when I was researching the book, I remember thinking, I feel like there's all the, often this emphasis is not like, well, women don't negotiate, which is actually true. Women I think negotiate one time for every five times a man negotiates.

I think the reason for that, though, and I just kept thinking like, yeah, but when I negotiate it never works. And I think there, the, what I was hitting up against was that if I negotiate and if like Ralph negotiates and we use the same tactics, they're just going to be taken very differently. When women go into it like a situation like when women behave in sort of an adversarial or a confrontational way, they are seen in a much more, and which I was 100% doing, they're seen in a much more, and which I was 100% doing, they're seen in a much more critical light than if men do it.

If men do it, it's like, well, good for him. He's trying to get his. And if I do it, it's like, whoa, who do she think she is? Like, people feel angry. And you know, it's not like they mean to. It's not like, well, she's a woman and women don't deserve to get paid as much.

It's just an innate response that comes up. It goes back to that like women's qualities don't align to leader quality. It's the same thing. It's like you're going against your feminine energy, basically, when you negotiate. Yes. Yes. That is exactly exactly what it is. And so people, I would come away with this.

People would come away from that feeling like, God, she's really pushy. Who does she think she is? And I would come away being like, I did all, she's really pushy. Who do she think she is? And I would come away being like, I did all the things in the book, I don't understand. Even other women feel that way. Oh yes, yes. In fact, in what really interesting moment in the book, I was interviewing this woman who works in academia

and overseas a lot of people. And she said when women, she noticed that when women would come to her asking for a raise, she would get mad at them in a way that she wouldn't when men asked her for a raise. And she was horrified at this. She was like, what is wrong with me? I mean, she considered herself a big champion of women in the workplace, but she recognized that when men would ask her for a raise, even if let's say she didn't give it to anyone or gave it to everyone, she would come away feeling like the woman was like a little arrogant or pushy and grabby.

And with the guy, it would be like, oh yeah, he asked for a raise. I said no. There was none of that kind of bad feeling. So then I started looking at a lot of books written specifically for women, Dr. Linda Babcock at Carnegie Mellon, has some great advice. She has a book called Women Don't Ask.

She's done some really great research. And just also approached a lot of researchers about, well, then what do you do, right? Like if asking for something is gonna make people not like you do not ask, do you ask and be not liked? Like it felt like this sort of impossible bind. But there are some ways around and through, which I was very excited to find out.

One of the big ones, and the main one I recommend is to just avoid at all costs the sort of mono-amano situation. Like avoid anything adversarial, which seems impossible, right? It's like it's a negotiation. You want $100,000. They only want to pay you 80 end of story.

Like if they pay you 100, you win. If they pay you 80, they win. But instead to focus on a more collaborative approach, because truly, ideally in a workplace, they are also giving you a lot. Like I feel like I do a lot of work for NPR, and I've given them a lot of great work and years, but they've given me a lot too, is the truth.

They've given me a really important platform. I get a lot out of that job too. So to go and acknowledging that and say, you know what, I am really so excited to be here. I love working for this company because of XY and Z reason. I'm especially excited about this project. I'm actually interested. I can really see a future for myself leading one of these teams.

I'm really excited to talk about that as it develops in the future. I have done a lot of market research. I know what this company typically pays for the work I'm doing and what other companies, similar companies pay for the work I'm doing. I also know that my productivity is up 15% over last year and I'm the most productive member of my team. So I think a salary of $110,000 would be more appropriate than the 80 that I'm getting paid. What do you think? So there's a lot happening there, right?

One is you've painted a picture of a future. You're very positive. You know, one thing you can say is like, I know this company is really fair and that fairness and equity is very important to this company. So that's part of why I'm asking, I think a salary of X is appropriate.

You're saying lots of positive things. Like, I know you want to do the right thing. I love this company. I'm so excited about a future here, but it's also really important for me to feel like I'm being valued properly. Also there's a lot of facts in there. And remember, like we talked before about getting away from emotions where a lot of discrimination is ending to facts. And that's so true in negotiations, too, I think. You reach out to a lot of people, find out what you should be making. And in a lot of cases, the women I spoke with said name your number first, because it's so often

happens. And this is a little controversy. I have to figure out what's right for you. And it can mean you leave money on the table, but so often women or their marginalized workers will get low bald, that it can be hard to come back from that. It's like, you go in and you're thinking $100,000 and they say 70, and it's like suddenly you're clawing your way back to it, which is exactly what happened to me, by the way, when I clawed and clawed for days to get paid the lowest possible salary I could get paid. Oh my God, I know. It's embarrassing. So I think, you know, you bring those facts in, you know, market research.

It's not emotional. It's like, well, listen, I'm just looking at the numbers. I know, you know, you bring those facts in, you know, market research. It's not emotional. It's like, well, listen, I'm just looking at the numbers. I know what you pay for this work. So it's taking it out of emotional. You're painting a positive future. It's not antagonistic. Yeah. And just so my listeners can help remember this, especially if you're a woman and you're

gearing up for negotiation, think about future together instead of facing off. So take a future together approach rather than being aggressive and instead of facing off. So take a future together approach rather than being aggressive and kind of facing off with your counterpart. Yeah, it's sort of the opposite of like, if you don't pay me this all quit, it's like, look at this beautiful future we would have together.

I will need to get paid X to be a part of this beautiful future. Yeah, it does kind of stink that we can't just be authentic. I know, I know, no, you're right. I mean, you should be able to go and be like, dude, why are you paying Ralph $100,000? I know what you're paying for this job.

Like pay me properly. Yeah, but again, we have to play the game. It is what it is. So as we wrap up this interview, I thought a fun way we could end is with a quick fire segment. So you say that confidence is more valuable than confidence in the workplace. Let's start off with that.

Why do you think confidence is so important? And then we can do a rapid fire segment on some of Maka Valley's lessons related to this. Ooh, okay, I love rapid fire. I'm also a little nervous about it. So confidence, all the studies show confidence is probably one of the most powerful things in the workplace correlated to how happy you are, how much you get paid, how fast you

get promoted, how much people like you, people like leaders that are more confident, all of these things. I think the reason it's so powerful is that value, the value of a person or a worker or the work itself is a story. Like it's just a story. And confidence is a story. I mean, the reason women get paid less, the reason that black women get paid less and black men get paid less,

it's just a story of how much their work is worth, which is also part of why it's so painful when you realize you're getting paid less. And confidence is also a story. It's the story of like, I'm really awesome. And we operate on stories. Our whole economy operates on stories, but we as humans operate on collective stories. And if your story is like, I am amazing. And everyone's like, wow, he's amazing. I mean, there's also

like arrogance, which is a little different. But true confidence is just a deep knowing of self-worth. And that is infectious. People believe you. You know, that's, you know, and of course it's tricky, right? It's not like I don't wanna be confident. It's like I wanted to be cool in junior high, but all the wanting to be cool did not make it happen. But there are ways to fake confidence. That's a great segue to our quick fire segment.

So one of Machoveli's lessons is to fake it till you make it. How can we do that? One big thing you can do is to take action. Confident people act on people who aren't confident waffles. So speak up in the meeting, ask for a raise, take action. That is something that is very confident. Another thing you can do is aim a little higher than what your goal is. So confident people expect a lot for themselves. So you can pretend that you're confident by asking for more than you think you can get

as far as resources, money, time off, deadline, space, like ask for something that feels nuts to you. That's a way to fake it till you make it. And how about birds of a confident feather? Yes, that's very powerful. So the people we hang around influence us a lot. So if you are around someone who's always like, oh, I can't, even a really lovely person,

but who's just like, oh, I'm never gonna get this. I would ask for a raise, but I feel like I'm gonna get fired. That's not great to be around if you're trying to to change your confidence level. You want to be around people who are confident, people who boost your confidence, and that can be very helpful too,

because you can just get little tips and also just be in that energy, that confident energy. It's helpful. Okay, and the last one related to this, tell us about the easy ask. Well, this is like just starting small. This is the idea that confidence is a muscle that you can build.

So, you know, if you're like, there's no way I can go into my boss's office and say, like, listen, I need another assistant. Like, it's just not happening. Well, maybe when you're in Starbucks, you can be like, hey, can you please fill my coffee all the way up? Or ask, you know, can I have an extra week for a deadline? I would like to take an extra week of vacation, start asking for things, start small.

You can start really, really small, but just kind of get that little muscle going, get used to asking for things, get used to that little tension, get used to the vulnerability of asking for stuff. Just start to build that up, start small. Yeah. As we wrap up this interview, I'd love to hear any sort of advice that you have for women and men in the workplace you want to improve all of this that we talked about today.

Well, I would have to say, and this is really a wonderful thing to be able to say. So there is a lot of just messed up stuff happening in our economy right now. It has been a really hard couple of years. But in all my almost 20 years of reporting, I've never seen a moment where workers have more power than they do right now. It is amazing.

And not only power, I feel like there's this openness from companies because we've all had to find new ways of doing things and so many workarounds, workarounds for our workarounds, that I feel like there's this openness to new ways of thinking about things and doing things. And I think this is a moment when you can craft not just asking for more money, which I absolutely think you can, but to figure out a work situation that's going to be, make you happy, help you to grow in the ways you want to grow.

I feel like this is a moment when you can kind of be creative and also when workers are really kind of coming together with each other and saying like there's an awareness of some of the issues in the workplace and an awareness of like coming together to solve them. So I actually think this is a really special time for the workforce. It's hard. I mean, it's also an incredibly hard time. I don't want to diminish that. But I think this is a really exciting moment to start re-imagining your career, pushing for what you want, thinking about how,

I think you can like almost write your own ticket a little like much more than you ever could before. You know, if you think like, oh, I could never be a law partner because I could never put in those hours I'm gonna have a family. Well, is there a way that you could do both? Like, well, I could never be a law partner, because I could never put in those hours. I want to have a family. Well, is there a way that you could do both? Like, well, I guess I could work crazy hours three days a week

if I could have two days off. You know, maybe there's a way. And I feel like companies are very open to that. And that feels exciting. That it feels like a moment of great change. Yeah. I'm glad that you're optimistic. That makes me feel happy,

because you've got a lot of experience in this space. Well, Stacy, this was such a wonderful interview. We always end with a couple of the same questions for all of our guests. So what is one actionable thing our listeners can do today to become more profitable tomorrow? Start asking other people in your company how much they make. I would say start those conversations because getting that information out there, find out how much you can be asking for, yes. And what is your secret to profiting in life? My answer to this has changed a lot actually recently. I think just because of all the things that we've been through, to profiting in life, I would just say to try to enjoy the things around you that you can enjoy in this moment. I mean, that's not exactly revolutionary advice, but I think I have gotten better and had to learn how to sort of adapt and enjoy whatever little benefits this moment has to offer,

because I think it can be so easy to focus on and there's just a lot of hard and difficult things to focus on Just to be like well, you know, I it's kind of great that I'm home and talking to you for my room closet because you know I can you know I can go on like a walk in the park and I can meet my friend for coffee and You know as much as I miss my colleagues and being able to use an actual professional radio studio You know, this has a lot of advantages too. So I think I've, and that is not a natural mindset for me. I think I tend to focus on everything that's wrong naturally, but I think I've changed that.

And in fact, I would, that's almost a good negotiation tactic too to focus on all the things you like about a company and why you want to move forward there. I think I've, Machiavelli has made me into more of an optimist. That's very strange, but I think that's true. Wow, see for interest staying. And it's just like, it's about being grateful in the moment. That's basically what you're saying.

Like be grateful in the moment, no matter, like look at the silver lining. So I love that. And where can our listeners go find more about you and what you do and where can they find your book, Maka Valley for Women? Yes, well, NPR, I'm still doing all kinds of business radio stuff on NPR. So NPR.org, you can look at my name and all the articles that I do come up.

Also I have a website, stcvanicsmith.com, which has all the information about the book. And yeah, I mean, the books available, everywhere books are available. And yeah, I think that's it. Amazing. So I'll definitely stick all those links in the show notes. Thank you so much for this awesome conversation. Thank you. It was really such a pleasure. Thanks for having me. What an eye-opening episode with Stacey.

A lot of us assume that because we're all aware of the gender pay gap and discrimination in the workplace, that that means progress is being made. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Women still struggle to get into leadership positions and are still being paid less than their male counterparts. And there's so much we can take away from this episode. One thing right off the bat is that these tips take practice. Even Stacey, who's an expert in workplace negotiating, wants struggled with standing up for herself. The more you practice negotiation

and asking for what you want, the easier it will become. The idea of the easy ask is a great place to start. For a lot of women and people in general, asking for anything can be really difficult. Confidence and negotiation is like a muscle you can build up. Before you go asking for a $20,000 raise, start by practicing the small things, like an extended deadline, or like asking to take a vacation. This will help you gain the confidence you need and understand how to approach these situations when it matters the most. And what do you do when it's time for the big ask? Remember to approach with positivity and preparation. Let your company know that you enjoy working there and that you'd like to be a part of their bright future.

Ease them into understanding that you are a valuable player and deserve to be compensated fairly. Negotiation isn't an argument. It's a conversation that you get to steer. Be prepared, be positive, and be open to hearing your counterpart out as well. When we talk about preparation, this means doing market research. If you're a woman, have conversations with the men in your industry and your coworkers about what they're being paid. If you know you're accurate

salary range, you can use that to get paid fairly for your work. This is a great tactic for men too. And this brings me to another point, the importance of allyship and mentorship for male colleagues. Allyship doesn't always have to be a grand gesture, even a small gesture like listening and supporting a female coworker during a meeting can make a huge impact. But if you want to go above and beyond, have an open conversation about salary with another woman, or become a mentor. This is an awesome way to help. Women and men need to work together to make these changes happen.

Now, I have to say, as a young woman who was in corporate for over seven years, I often felt like I was at an extreme disadvantage because executive men would never want to be my mentor. I would reach out to them and let them know that I really would like them to be my mentor. Because I was a woman, a young woman, and honestly an attractive woman at that, I felt like these men never wanted to be my mentors because they thought that it would look weird, and so they just avoided me. I saw a lot of these men that were my co-workers and colleagues get mentors from the executive leaders who were mostly males, and I was out. And I have to say that

is one of the reasons why I ended up leaving corporate and starting my own company. Because I felt like I actually didn't have anybody who was going to elevate me and bring me up and you really need that type of person when you're trying to move up and corporate. And so if you're a male executive out there, I want you to take heed to my story. I was a young woman and corporate really hoping for a male mentor and never got that opportunity. I never had any male leaders take me under their wing. And I really want you to think about women in your workplace who really deserve to be mentored and who might not be getting the opportunities just because they're a woman and you're a man. So let's think

outside of the box. Let's keep it non-sexual, non-romantic, and just realize that we're all people looking to make a difference in the world, and we're here to support each other. And I can't think of better people to start these changes than my awesome, young and profiting listeners. So I'd love to hear from you guys. DM me on Instagram or Twitter at YappwithHalla or find me on LinkedIn by searching Halata. And lastly, I have some exciting news. There's a new way to get in touch with me You can now text me directly and join my app text community powered by slick text All you have to do is text the keyword YAPYAP to my short code 28046

You'll receive text from me updates on the podcast and exclusive YAP content like giveaways and discounts. Again, text the word app to my short code 28046. And if you like this episode, be sure to leave us a five-star review on your favorite podcast platform or share it with a friend. Share this episode with a friend so we can get the word out so we can break the glass ceiling once and for all. As always, thanks for listening to Young and Profiting Podcast and thanks so much to my app team. I'll see you next time. Mrs. Hala, signing off. Are you looking for ways to be happier, healthier, more productive, and more creative? I'm Gretchen Rubin, the number one best-selling author

of the Happiness Project. And every week, we share ideas and practical solutions on the Happier with Gretchen Rubin podcast. My co-host and Happiness Guinea Pig is my sister Elizabeth Kraft. That's me, Elizabeth Kraft, a TV writer and producer in Hollywood. Join us as we explore fresh insights from cutting-edge science, ancient wisdom, pop culture, and our own experiences

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