Your Happy Hour - Episode 28: Top 10 on Being Young, Wild and Working

Episode Date: June 14, 2024

Happy Friday everyone!Tune in to episode 28 and let’s kickoff June with: Top 10 on Being Young, Wild and WorkingIn this episode, we chat with our lovely summer interns Lilah and Ashley and unpack on topics like: sharing your life at work, dressing the professional part, social event etiquette and the scoop on in-office romances, nailing the world of networking, navigating stress interviews, showcasing your skills and building that authentic resume on the journey of being the professional you!We’ll be here - every Friday - celebrating with you!Connect with us @ friday-feels.co▶ Podcast Chapters00:55 Welcome Summer Interns Lilah & Ashley!02:45 Dress and Express: The professional you!06:20 Less is More: On sharing your life at work…08:28 Speak up! Maxing the summer vibes and management styles12:37 Haywire or Having fun? That office social etiquette…17:36 On matters of the heart: The Office romance - Yay or Nay?21:15 Stress Interviews: Hard-asses and Proving your value28:38 Advice on Starting out …32:19 Strengths for Success: Be open and Resilient33:30 Winning connections authentically42:19 Flying it Solo in the whole new world of networking50:53 Highlighting your Skillset55:28 The Resume: Your Digital Presence and on using AI01:00:43 Final Thoughts, Next week’s Top 10 and Farewell

Happy Friday beautiful people and welcome to your first sip of the weekend. You're tuned into your happy hour friday feels we're celebrating all you working professionals out there doing your crazy craft embracing the beauty of being human and connecting authentically we are host sarge and nicole we're living and working around the world and we're holding space for you keeping it raw and real as we share fresh content with you every week. So follow us on LinkedIn at Friday Feels and Instagram at These Friday Feels for updates throughout the week. In our last episode, we spoke about the top 10 personal questions, which was so much fun. And this week we're joined by our Friday Feels interns, Lila and Ashley. So awesome to have you

guys on this week. For those who are starting on their professional journey, we're continuing the theme of top 10s and we're going to be chatting about the top 10 on being young, wild and working this summer. So all the questions that young professionals have for their new summer internships, we're going to be answering. So let's dive in. summer internships we're going to be answering so let's dive in so very very welcome to the podcast firstly we are so happy to have you guys part of the team it's made such a huge difference in the back end and running things smoothly and it's so great to see instagram actually having a bit more of a presence and all of that so yeah i welcome thank you for joining us today maybe you guys can give us a little a quick intro of you and your favorite Friday feels moments so far this this last week

yeah uh I can start I'm Ashley um I'm the social media intern and thank you so much for having us on here uh yeah I'm from Arizona and I'm a student right now studying communications and entrepreneurship and my favorite Friday Feels moment was probably in a couple weeks ago episodes when Nicole was talking about her favorite kinds of eggs. I really like that. I'm Lila. I'm also a a student I'm from California and I'm studying econ and data science I think oh and I'm also the business development intern I think one of my favorite Friday feels moments was probably when we were shopping for like workaways online and just like getting to know what that was so amazing oh thanks guys yeah it's so great to have you and uh so you guys

have some questions for us uh we haven't really thought about these just like last week we're keeping it very uh surprise filled this month um all about top 10 so yeah shoot let's see how much we can answer or you know what we'd like to share and we'll plead the fifth otherwise yeah sure so I guess our first question was like what should you wear to the office so I think it depends on your industry and also where you are in the world so I remember when I was working in New York I would always wear know, we were kind of trained in school because we went to, you know, I went to a business school. They were very particular about how you present yourself, how your resume is, make sure you send like a please and thank you and always dress professionally. And so when I made a transition from finance into startup world, it was very noticeable.

I would wear even if I tried to dress down, I just wasn't really doing it effectively. Because everybody was wearing like this combination of sweaters and jeans. And like, old man shoes, I want to say. And I totally like I liked it because it was more flexible for me, like some days I could show up in a hoodie. But always when I had client meetings, I would try to have at least like a blazer and some sort of shirt that wasn't a t shirt on. I think it's it's a really interesting trend that's changed. I think they had a recent article where it was kind of like Mark Zuckerberg used to wear t-shirts for everything for quite a long time. And all of a sudden now he's like a fashionista

and definitely has like a stylist. And there was an article and it was like, when did tech in Silicon Valley become cool? Like Bezos is now wearing like designer things. So I think you just kind of have to take the temperature of where you're at. It's not a wrong question to ask, you know, your peers or your managers, depending on some people have a website, and you can kind of see in their pictures, what they choose to wear in the about us, I think that's a really good indicator. So we don't have you dressing down when you should be dressing up. And I had to get rid of a lot of my Brooks Brothers stuff because I just had no use for it and I looked like an oddball in the office yeah I think also I I walked kind of a stint in

corporate um I mentioned this last week I think and yeah that was obviously very much like audit firm you know and you're in high heels and all the women look beautiful and pencil skirts and everything that was great um the interesting thing was you know as I'm sitting like this and I can see the video I can see my tattoo on my on my wrist but I did not feel comfortable to have that open or even have it when I was working there and I think times have changed a little but the moment I moved into fintech and what you were saying so I was, fintech's got like a really cool vibe. You know, you can wear really anything you want. I felt quite comfortable to get a tattoo and show it quite openly.

For me, it's kind of like a part of your expression and your art is what you wear. So I think it just depends on the environment you're in. If you're in a creative agency working with artist managers, no worries. We are cropped up and you know jeans and slacks or whatever but if you're in a corporate environment obviously dress the part and you can take some cues from the people around you but just be yourself be authentic you know if you want to dress colorful do so so yeah great and our next question, how much personal info at work is too much personal info? So I'm a big proponent of less is more with the personal info. But I think that's just from being

in super corporate environments for a while. I mean, I think it's cool to know about people's personal lives. But I think it treads the line of like, you don't want to trauma dump at work. I think that's where it becomes like, oh, you know, my sister did this. And it was so crazy. And I got locked out of the house. And it's like a whole derailment of why you're there. I think that is where it becomes. But again, it's something that you kind of have to feel out with your co workers. I would say though, you know, something that I always tell young professionals is just kind of tread on the side of caution there, you know, with sharing a lot of your business to your co workers, because you never know if it might hurt you for a promotion or for staying on or saying something that, you know, gets goes around the offices like office

gossip, which happens in every office, especially with who your friends are. So I would say definitely make friends, be friendly, you know, choose to share parts of your personal life that you wouldn't mind if their grandmother heard. I think that's a good rule of thumb. Yeah, I can kind of echo what you're saying, and I've always kept things very separate. You know, even if I've gone through a lot of personal challenges, I've never really spoken about those things at work, even though people can see you're going through a tough time, you know, I don't think it's clever to voice those things. But I also want to say be human, you know, I think part of the amazing teams that I've been part of in my journey what made them so incredible

is that they felt a bit like family and that only happens when you do open up your heart you know and not to say you must trauma dump your people but it's more actually just being yourself which means love from your heart you know love from the baby share your life but yeah just I guess there's a there's a line there's a fine line so you'll feel out what that is yeah given that like summer internships can be such a short amount of time how do you like recommend that we kind of make the most of it it's a good question I think just ask a bunch of questions I think ask as many questions as you can and really probably by digging into

the things that you want to learn about in your own time and then bringing that to the table that will help uncover more learning and for everybody involved but there's a lot that you know I guess you we're also discovering this now there's a lot that we know but we don't always know to share it if the opportunity doesn't present itself. I would just say, yeah, use all the moments to gain that experience and also share that. By sharing, you learn something new about the other person too. It's about personal relationship learning as well. I would say I think it's important to also understand your manager's management style.

I think that's a really important question that's gotten me really far is just asking them like, hey, what manager's management style. I think that's a really important question that's gotten me really far is just asking them like, hey, what's your management style? Do you prefer if I, you know, how do you prefer I prioritize these things? Do you prefer I kind of go off and do this work or do you want to see it while I'm working on it? I think that's really helpful

because some people are visual learners. Some people, especially when you're first starting out, you're not really sure. They're not really sure of kind of your abilities. And so you might be a really strong candidate in terms of the interviewing process. But when it comes to actually adapting that to the work, sometimes it's hard for them to see, like, have they used these tools before? Are they confused about something? I'm the type of person, unless I fully understand it, like I might type of person unless I fully understand it like I might look at it I'll come back I'll look at it again and some people just want you to execute they're not you know interested kind of so much in the

process because they're more interested on the execution and so I think just really understanding your manager you know there's a there's a popular belief that people don't quit jobs, they quit managers. And so it's very important that you understand like how to work with your manager in a way that feels good for you and for them. And just voicing that, you know, I've had managers in the past where we spent two hours on a call that was supposed to be one hour, and there's 50 things on the to-do list and actually at the end of that I'm exhausted and I have no idea where to start and so when I do it now I'm really mindful of just telling the people that I work

with hey you know you tell me what you got out of the action items and it does get easier over time so I would say if you're starting out you know that's a question that sometimes you don't want to ask because you don't want to like fail at it but it will help you very get very far in terms of even at the end of it making sure that your manager is pleased with your work because you're not waiting for a three-month review for you to check in and see what you did you know right or wrong it's never too early to do that yeah just to quickly add on there I think you know like you said an internship is really short so you very much in charge of your career and your path and so I think speaking up and saying hey this is what I want to do can you help me with this otherwise you know we don't know so

it's and if it's a great internship experience people will make sure that they can help you with that you know in some way even if it's referring you to someone so but yeah we've definitely seen guests come on in the podcast and as much as an internship is you know you're still learning a lot of people who start jobs uh you know entrepreneurship it's very much the same kind of thing you're also still learning and so they always talk about the fact that they spoke to people about what they were doing what they're wanting to learn and yeah the more you kind of speak that out there then the more people can support you great that's great advice to hear especially since me and lala are like in our internship experience right now yeah tell us tell us what you need

okay and then our next question is how should i act on company off-sites like conferences or social events at work, and how friendly is too friendly? So I've seen this go completely hairwire. And I think this is a really good question because people don't like to tell other people this, but you should not be acting crazy at your conferences or your work parties or your

Christmas parties I think you know when we were talking about this topic earlier in the week we we had you know I was working for a startup and we had a Christmas party and this guy who's super quiet just started going crazy on the dance floor after like pounding drinks, like pulling people on, like doing EDM moves. And it was like, I mean, I'm still shocked that it's been years. It's just, I mean, he didn't really do anything that wrong. But there's just, I've just seen where this has been here like I've seen people get fired after Christmas parties because they were being unprofessional in the sense like oh I'm gonna walk you home and then like they drank too much and they're angry like it can just go haywire so

I would say like if you feel like there's a sense where things are getting kind of out of hand. I've seen people leave earlier than they should because they can see where things are going. And that's just kind of how I've operated in my career. And it's kind of saved me from a lot of things like, oh, did you hear what happened? No, sorry, I wasn't there. I left early. I think, you know, it's always good to have a good time. But that's also why you have friends, you know, that you can kind of go out and have fun with. And again, I would say,

just make it in a way where people can't go back and say, Oh, did you see what Ashley and Lila did at XYZ? If they can, then like, you know, you have a problem, even if it's not a problem for you right now. It could be later on. And there's been so many times where, for example, when I worked at Bitly, a lot of the hires actually came from the ladders, which was my first internship. And some of them I didn't even know, we were there at the same time. And so people do tend to like travel impacts, if you plan on staying on an industry they know a lot about each other i used to go to my friends who was in finance and those were even worse like these people just they would just go buck wild like at their i used to go to my happy hour to start up and then go to a finance happy hour after and it was just like it was like two different worlds so i would say

now the thing is like company off sites and conferences is where people get to let loose I think it's good to socialize and build that camaraderie um but always like keep in mind that you know you want to have a long career in a field um keep that in mind that your reputation precedes you and a lot of referrals go based on personal networks so you wouldn't want it repeated somewhere I wouldn't really do it yeah yeah I'm laughing because I'm thinking back to all the the socials over the different time you know I think it's what you said earlier take the temperature of where you're at you know I. I think WeWork, the archived WeWork, will probably disagree with you.

You know, they were like, have fun, do what you want. So that didn't turn out too well for them. But I think just being yourself, you know, I think it's also a really cool opportunity to show a different side of yourself. Because sometimes in a work context, you know, maybe if there's a dance floor and I'm speaking from personal experience there's a DJ booth and you gravitate towards there and you kind of show a different side of yourself that you wouldn't really show at work that's fun you know and then

people can really relate to you in a different way but I think yeah keep it keep it professional you know that's um alcohol is an interesting drug um i think i use that word in that way because i think if it's used in a social way that's fun you know in that professional context it's really great to share but yeah it really can expose parts of yourself that you have maybe not quite figured out yourself yet. So I'd rather do that on a different occasion, I think. But yeah, just have fun too. I mean, that's what it's there for. A lot of the time, you spend so much time with people at work, you know,

and that becomes like family, that becomes some of the best friends. For me, it's still some of the best friends I have are the friends I've met at work so yeah I think it's a balance everything in moderation that completely makes sense this kind of goes along with that but what are your thoughts on in-office romances yay or nay who came up with this question I think it depends again on your your company size where you are and what's going on I've seen them go really well I've seen them going really well and then I've seen them go really well. I've seen them going really well. And then I've seen them go really not well. But sometimes it does happen a lot because you feel closer to people, you get to see them in different lights. And that's what I really like about the startup

scene. I mean, I'm always talking about it, but it's, it's that you kind of like blend what you really want to do your strengths. then also you know that informality that brings people together and sometimes like I've known people who've gotten married they were in different departments or they got together after one of them left the job so I would say yeah you just kind of err on the side of caution there you know understand what the policies are at your job and you know try as much as you can not to put yourself in a position where if something did shed the light of day that it wouldn't reflect negatively on you and if you know ahead of time that you meet someone and you do like them you want to pursue it whether it's like casually or

not you might want to consider like one of you you know moving your job just so you don't have that conflict of interest and people don't have it as something that kind of informs how you move around at the job like oh you know she's preferred for a promotion because her boyfriend is on this team and his manager said XYZ, things like that. I mean, things get around, especially when you're in a close, tight-knit community, people talk. And there's been many instances where there actually were in-office romances where people were specific about not saying anything because they were scared. So I think you just kind of have to understand what your corporate policies are like and also always make sure that you're

doing your job I think you know a lot of things you can do your job do your job well but um you also have to be mindful of playing by the rules of of your organization anything that you have to say Nicole I agree I agree um yeah I I laugh because I've been on interesting sides of this coin of having relationships with people at work. And I feel like if you can, it's better to have a different kind of space together you know I think that's really nice but if you do that's also cool because you understand each other's space so in some way I think like you said you know you might meet the love of your life there be open to that I'm not one to stand in the in the path of of romance but I think just be careful about you know the one day you're in love and the next thing you are in a conflict and then you still have to walk past each other in the office or you know third party situations happen and you still have to walk past those people and stand in the elevator

with them and so it gets tricky and that's where the office parties also like you say get interesting so I think follow your heart but yeah just keep it professional is all I can say so okay and then our next question tell us about your worst job experience or worst interview experience? I haven't had a bad job experience really. Worst interview experience. This is a weird one. I remember when I was working in corporate at KPMG, I joined on as a financial crime investigator in an internship actually. It was a bit like an audit for three years but in forensic and by the end of it they wanted to interview us to become permanent employees of the company and it was just terrible it was really this horrible experience of like you've been proving yourself for three years already um you know working at a certain level and then you have to

go through rounds of interviews and kind of try to explain why you have value um you know for me that was a terrible interview experience or one that I didn't even really want to go through yeah it was quite a random one so yeah that was mine what about you Saj? I guess I'll speak on my worst interview experience because I guess I'd just rather do that. I've had mostly good job experiences. But the worst interview experience I had was I used to work in the city and I would just apply to all these different things because I wasn't sure what I was, you know, wanted to really do. I knew the job that I found wasn't really what I liked. And so I interviewed at a consulting company, it was an IT consulting company. They did like IT solutions for different clients, very big company. And back then they had something called stress

interviews. And I'm not sure if I've mentioned this on the podcast before, but it was an interesting role because it was global. I was really young. I was for like one year out of school. It was global and it was super exciting. And they made you go through like, I think it was like six rounds in one day and each round had more than one person. So some of them had like five people in them. Some of them had like three. And there used to be this thing in finance which is called stress interviews and they literally try to throw you off to see how you respond in stressful situations which was horrible uh it was it was really bad even though like i said like we we received like

a lot of training from nyu and their business school they had a lot of clubs that would talk to you about this they tell you they tried to prep you but it's just different when you actually have to go through it and you don't know the people on the other side and they had this guy he had traveled all over the world with like international clients and just really impressive career and he was such a hard ass like oh my god this guy was like I almost cried and that was like he was I forgot like they asked us something like oh you know what would you do tell me how you would solve this problem and so I started like going through how I would solve they leave you in a room for like 20 minutes while you sit there and try to solve it like you know how many balls are

in like New York or something and you go through this exercise and I forgot what the question exactly was it wasn't that it was something a little bit more tailored to the job about working internationally between China and New York and what would you do if the client like doesn't like the work that you have or something like that so I started going through my thought process and the guy straight up asked me he was like oh why would you say something like that about like you know Chinese culture are you racist and I was like what no like I didn't say anything in my answer that pointed to racism so it was but they do those things and like it I guess while it was happening I didn't know like I had known these existed but I hadn't gone through one so I just thought the guy was just being rude so I was very much like trying to decide if I want my

real personality to show or if I want like my professional one. And I was like, well, I have to be professional. It's still an interview. And so the guy like went on and on. And I was like, no, I'm sorry that you misheard what I said. That's really not what I intended. Maybe I should clarify, you know, this is what I meant about the culture. I've taken some classes there. I visited Hong Kong. This is what I see in the corporate culture. And I really admire XYZ. And like, I was like, Oh, cause you know, my wife is, you know, Asian. And I was like, that's awesome. I really, you know, I think there's so many things to admire and just kept going. And I remember going through and when I was coming home, I was like, what just happened to me? Like, this was just so insane like is he wasn't that wasn't the

only interview he was in other ones afterwards and you just have to keep going to these interviews after these people are telling you these things and the funny thing was this girl she she called me like the next day and she was like hey we'd really like for you to join the team and I was like what are you serious? Like after all that, like, there's no way like that interview went so bad. And she was like, you know, I just, she really caught me off guard. And I was like, Oh, thank you so much. You know, I would love to hear the feedback from the interviewers, though. And so she was like, you sound like a little surprised and I was like yeah I just

transparently I didn't think it went that well that's the only time I ever interviewed and said oh I definitely don't think it went well and she was like oh yeah he actually had really good feedback about you how you handled yourself and I was just like I was like I'm sorry I ended up declining the offer I was like I don't think I could work in those circumstances. I just I don't think that's a good way to interview people. And I understand that clients can be difficult and demanding. But maybe you should preface that by doing it. So I would say that was a horrible interviewing experience. I mean, it taught me a lot because I remembered it about professionalism. Because now after working with a lot of partners and clients you do see

some people who are just no matter what you do they're not happy with kind of you know how things go and you do have to kind of remind yourself to conduct yourself professionally so yeah that was mine that would be so i hope those don't exist anymore do they teach you guys about stress interviews in school anymore okay i can't imagine that yeah oh my god no i know that in the financial crime investigation world, they do that with you because you have to learn how to interview other people. So they kind of do put you through a bit of a stress environment. But you know that's part of the course, right? It's not just, okay, this is how the interview for general ABC is going. So that's terrible.

Yeah. Hopefully people are been human out there yeah oh my god no I cannot I've never heard of anything like that in school and I cannot imagine that um but yeah I guess like our next question is kind of like what's one a piece of advice you'd give to someone who's like starting out in your fields in our field as entrepreneurs I guess anyone probably starting out you know with their new jobs I would say one would just be you know don't be shy to showcase your strengths and ask for help where needed and also rely on your network and the people at the job to help you along. Sometimes it's hard when you're in a new environment and you're not really sure, you know, how much of yourself to kind of be. You just have to remember you got hired for a reason. They think you're super qualified and you should let your light shine

as much as you can. Sometimes, like I've been in environments where they'll hire three interns at the same time. So you almost feel like you're competing, even though you shouldn't because of kind of the work that they give you or the way they position things. And so I would say that like, you know, whatever your unique strength is, there's a reason why they hired you maybe to compliment the team as well. And if it's not a good environment for you by you kind of being brighter and sharing your views, then you're feeling like it doesn't actually, you know, you're getting penalized for it in some way, or you're getting bad vibes from other people at the company, then that's probably not the best place for you. Which doesn't mean you have to quit right away. But you kind of just

have to take each opportunity for its best strengths, and keep moving. Like maybe you pick up a really good skill for talking to people or networking with people or project management. I don't think there's such thing as your dream career. So if you can pick up little things from each step, you'll eventually find, you know, something that has more more light for you. That's more of an alignment. I think that's great advice. Yeah, I think it's more of an alignment. I think that's great advice. Yeah, I think it's about being the bright and shiny you. You're right, Saj. And I think also don't be scared to have good, blissful boundaries in these environments. I think that often when you're in an internship or an articleship or whatever it is, you know, you take on so much as a person and that because you want to prove yourself but

just remember that you're also human that you're also going through your own experiences that you have something like work-life balance and I think that being able to absorb as much as you can for me that was really one of the best things I learned when I didn't do as many internships, but really when I was in that article ship, sitting next to a manager and seeing how they do something. And the best advice they gave me was, you know, if you can replace this person's role, if you can do what I'm doing now and come with already that package, that's how you're going to climb the ladder you know and so just spending a lot of time with people watching how they work learning how to work faster not being scared to say I don't know how to do that please oh how did you do this quick trick you know I think we're all

very conscious of the things we don't know we always feel like we have to know everything so best advice is and jane said this in one of the very first episodes but uh don't be the smartest person in the room i think keep asking questions yeah then jen work for the dea for like 20 something years great and then the next question in your, what's the most important strength or personality trait someone would need to be successful in your job? I would say being open. Yeah. Just like being open to criticism, being open to ideas, being open to new ways of doing things. I think that's really helpful in terms of, you know, doing something you've never done before yeah I think what came

to mind for me is resilience but I think what lies underneath resilience is really uh understanding of yourself you know it's kind of know thyself self-knowledge so and that that really goes for everything that you do but I think when you're kind of taking on a job a role internship anything yeah I think being able to push through interesting situations and challenges you really get to know yourself and being open like you said such to do that to do actually do that and be okay with learning yeah, I think that's the most valuable thing. It really speaks to authenticity in the end. I guess our next question was kind of like

meeting all of these people who've had successful careers in fields that you want to go into. You obviously want to network and learn from them, but how do you do that without making it seem like false or insincere or just awkward? That's a good question. we genuinely care I think you know when we're approaching people to speak on the podcast or to partner with it's because it's aligned with what we want to do in the world and you know yeah we want to do cool things in the world and so as much as it's it's about

building a business it's really about building a community first and foremost so because Friday Fields was born out of authenticity and vulnerability I guess we keep it like that and yeah we really do want it's not money first it's it's really human first I guess that's that's how I feel about it how about you Saj? Yeah so the number one book that's still like the number one book on this is Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People it's super easy to read but one of his principles is like the most important word to any human is I they're most concerned with themselves and so you can if you understand that you understand a lot in terms of what is you know when you're trying to communicate with them he gives an example where he goes to a dinner party and this woman is there and he asked her like one question to a few questions

about herself and she goes on and on and on about her plans about this about everything else and at the end she introduces him to somebody else and says hey this is dale he's actually like so fascinating and he um is such an interesting person and like good friend like those kind of vibes like she just thought the world of him because he actually expressed interest in her and that's how the human wine kind of works right in some aspects and so I think that you know when we're in school they used to tell us like oh we've tried to find something if you want to reach out to xyz person, like find an affiliation, find what they like, find what their kids like. Do they like talking about their family? Are they part of this club? Do they like eating avocados? Like I had that on my resume at one time because they asked us to put like personal stuff. it's just, it's, and now I see like how it's transcended through time, right? Is I think, you know, Nicole has a good point. If you're being authentic, that's another principle in the book is that you genuinely have to want to know about the person. And some people, like I've went up to

people who are like, you know, had different business models than I did. And I would just be like, how did you do that? Like, what would be your one piece of advice? And sometimes you ask 10 people and nine people suck. They don't tell you anything good. And one person is just really happy that to share their experience because they know what it's like, you know, trying to go through it 10 years ago. So they're just not your people, the other nine, you take what you can from them, and then you keep moving. So I think, you know, if you genuinely really want to know, and sometimes you genuinely don't know, right, you can say like, hey, I think I want to do social media. But I really like planning these events.

Like, you know, do you know anyone that actually plans events? I've had that happen to me when I was interning at Merrill Lynch. They do like a finance internship and you kind of like help them find more clients. And one of the ladies, she was just like, what do you want to do? And I was like, I don't know. You know, like I've just been in finance so long. I don't know what else I would want to do. And I was like, I really was thinking about like wedding planning and event planning. And she was like, okay, one of my clients, I'm going to make an intro to you. And she made an email intro. And I ended up going to visit like a warehouse where it was like this, the guy was a, an event designer and planner, very famous in New York. And I went to the

warehouse, I met with like one of their people that puts on the projects. And it was really cool. You know, she was like, look, if that's really what you think you want. I was like, I think I want to do this. I would love to like talk to somebody in it and do like an informational interview because that was a thing. But people are doing it now. And I've responded to a lot of people who would just come at me like and say, hey, I'm really this I saw you did xyz would you be open to chatting for 30 minutes and it comes out to like really cool you know working professional relationships so if you really genuinely do want to try something out

and do care I would say one it's a numbers game you should reach out to a lot of people because as you know not everyone's your person but when you do find those people they will take you much further in terms of helping you and that is priceless uh one person just uh giving you the information that you need so I would say reach out genuinely but reach out to a lot of people and see what resonates with you yeah and I'm gonna add to that like you know it's exactly what you're saying so as you when you're in the present moment with someone in the room like that person was giving that undivided unconditional love attention when you're really present you can also pick up on other things you know if you're in sales pitch

mode you're not going to pick up if that person's having a bad day or maybe you just want to open up a space for them to talk about something. And then that uncovers a whole networking conversation that, you know, wouldn't have existed if you weren't paying attention to the human in front of you

or even just paying attention to the human inside of you in that moment. You know, maybe there's something that's on your heart. So I want to say be in the flow as well sometimes your intuition will nudge you and say talk to this person about this and you're like oh this is random you know but just do it and see what comes out and sometimes it just makes for amazing conversations we've had some really cool conversations like that come out from people we've spoken to and they just it was the one little mention and then off it goes into a

direction you never know so yeah yeah it's good to hear like from your guys's perspective um that you like want to speak to people and like you guys enjoy it as well that's that definitely makes it a little less scary. But yeah. Yeah. Yeah. People want to, you know, talk about their experiences and here. It's just I think one thing is if you're reaching out to a lot of people, you know, be very direct about what you want and also like being flexible. For example, like if I'm reaching out to someone and I need their help, my calendar is going to be open for them. If they give me like, I try to say like, can you give me two or three slots that work for you? Because it's really annoying when they give you one and you just can't do it. You have like a doctor's appointment that you waited,

you know, five months for and you're like sitting there weighing like, should I move it or not? So I would say like, you know, if you want something from someone, make it really easy for them to say yes. So are you available? You know, next week, I'm available anytime, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, I can meet you wherever I would love to. And genuinely, you know, I used to do that before. And you'd say like, Oh, I'd like to buy you coffee. Most people are not going to take money from like a student or someone who just came out of school. Genuinely, like they used to like, you know, they'll pay for you. And I've been in situations where like I used to only drink lattes and lattes are way more expensive than coffee. And so I would feel really bad about like asking them to pay like six dollars instead of two dollars.

And so I would like either drink the coffee or like, be like, no, no, no. Well, I just want a latte. But I mean, that's all part of being human, right? But I think just showing that effort that they're not putting their time in vain, you know, they hope it's going to help you at least. Then you'll find people who will want, you know, want it's going to help you at least then you'll find people who will want you know want to do it so yeah you should never feel you know embarrassed by asking for expertise because there are just some things you can't read in a book you need someone to tell you

which is why I really like that book by Dale Carnegie because he gives like actual examples of things that have worked and yeah I would say yeah yeah that's great to hear I've taken some networking classes in school and it's just nice to hear like the other perspective outside of like the classroom space yeah yeah um I took one in a communications class in school and it was like so much more fun than my finance classes and I was like oh my god this is a whole new world like people care about this stuff and he I think Dale Carnegie taught for like 30 years public speaking in New York City and it's just very interesting like where that journey took him and I will say if you do reach

out and people don't answer you, there are a lot of books where they have like anecdotal evidence, like you kind of use those as your mentors, if you can't find someone at the job that you're at, or you don't really click with anybody, I would say, that's been a safe way for me to kind of grow and, and learn when you kind of look around and there is nobody like I've been at jobs where I actually didn't like any of the managers. I, you know, I could take some advice from them in terms of how they handle certain things, but I didn't feel comfortable asking them, you know, some of these questions. So I think for the last question, you know, are there any questions that you guys would really, you can like, just throw it out there that you would really,

now that you're going to be within the next one to two years joining like your first corporate gigs like are there like pressing questions that you feel like your friends or anybody has asked that's like people are too scared to ask normally um from what i've heard a lot of it has been the networking like where do I how do I meet people and where do I meet people and it has been like a lot of like embarrassment or nervousness just going up and talking to people when you feel like you might not have different things to bring to the table you're just like asking from them so I like the answers to the last question a lot yeah I think networking is such a big thing and I feel like the events have changed a lot it depends on the event but I know one of the

co-working spaces we chatted to the comment was like oh they're not as fun as they used to be you know um and I think one thing also kind of on the question you guys asked earlier if you're at a networking event just just remember, like, you might feel nervous, but everyone else is kind of feeling that too, you know. And we're all such, you know, weird, awkward humans that we're always wondering what we look like and have I spilt on my white pants and, you know, whatever it is. So just relax. And I guess one of the biggest things you can really do is find someone that looks lonely and go talk to them in the room. That helps a lot. That person will really appreciate it as well.

So you never know who you might meet. You never know who you might actually interact with in that moment. And it's really the same principles apply when you're kind of going out and by yourself socially outside of the working professional environment you know as a human I don't know if you guys have ever done that exercise where you kind of go out by yourself go dancing by yourself go drinking by yourself go to a bar by yourself it's good experience because you're putting yourself in situations where and traveling does that I found you know why else are you in a place? So find something that works for you. You know, this is going to sound quite strange, but when I started going out by myself,

whether that now was socially or whatever, I realized that the smokers are where it's at. You know, they're social. So sometimes I enjoy a cigarette with some wine. And I thought that was a really nice way to break the awkwardness if you're on your own. You don't actually need that. You know, you don't need that kind of vice.

But find that's for you, you know, whether that's whatever it might be. Maybe you want to stand and daydream and feel okay with that and have someone come up to you. So, yeah, just remember we're human. And, yeah, I guess just enjoy that experience you know you never know who you might meet and the love of your life might be at that networking event so yeah i would say always like you know also be prepared and in terms of like if you have a business card or you have something like to follow up with people, we, you know, we did so many interviews. There was actually only a handful of people who said, like, thank you for interviewing.

Here's my information if anything changes. And it actually when other people don't do it, it sticks out a lot. I think that's, you know, always do the basics. You should always just be doing the basics, like show up professional, clean, tidy, you know, and say, please, thank you always ask if you can help be of service to someone else. They mightn't take you up on it, but they appreciate the effort of you actually being mindful that, hey, I do not have that much time. You are asking something of me and you are willing to give something in return. And I think a lot of

times, like I used to go to a lot of networking events by myself because I don't know, I was curious about something. Nobody else wanted to go and I wanted to see what was going on. And I've actually made like lifelong friends from that, like going up to speakers. I found my first internship was like that, you know, where I walked up to the CEO. They used to have this thing in school in the entrepreneurship class

where they would have CEOs come in, speak about their business to a panel. And at the end, they'd say like, if you have any questions, you know, we encourage you to go up to them and speak to them. You know, it's a hall of 100 kids, how are 100 kids going to go up to one speaker and try to stand out in that presence. And so, you know, you do your research beforehand, you know that they're coming on, you try to act it like, hey, I would love to chat. Do you have any other

opportunities? This is what I'm really good at. I would love to explore this. If there's any way I could just be a fly on the wall. People can feel that like excitement and exuberance from you. And it was a lot of follow up, but I ended up interning there. And that opened the door for so many other places by just being persistent and trying to be as genuine as I could. Like, this is really what I want to learn. I've never heard someone come to a school and talk about their job so excitingly. Like when I go in the finance interviews, no one is like, you know, they're talking about like, oh, the 200 year history of Credit Suisse. And like, it just, you know, wasn't exciting for me. And so for me, that was what I could contribute is saying like, Oh my God, I'm so excited about what you talked about. And you, they, you know, when my first internship

was at the ladders, Mark's and Adele run it. And they used to have their like monthly check-ins at a movie theater because it was, that's where they could fit 500 people in New York city. And nobody was using the movie theater during the day and so it was super cool like how how many other friends were getting to go to the movies while they're at work and then they would have popcorn and stuff like that and you'd sit there and they would give their presentation about the goals and things like that and so I think like you know if those things get you excited about it you know share that share that. Share what you can share. Just because you don't have experience doesn't mean you don't have value.

You just have to figure out what, you know, how to translate that to somebody who is in a different, you know, position than you. And another thing I'll say is, like, going directly up. This holds true in so many other circumstances. But, like, going directly up to the speakers or the founders those people tend to be connectors and they like to see people win and so there's been many instances where I was like how did you get into this like speaking at this engagement it's like amazing to see a woman doing this at this age and like all kinds of things and they'd be like you know what you should actually talk to xZ or like, let's chat later.

And that's how you kind of like, you know, build a rapport with someone. So I think those are just some tips for young networking professionals. And also, if you go by yourself, you don't have any dead weight with you. So if you have someone who's super awkward or can't talk to people, you can kind of move around and do what you need to do I went to some thinking like oh this person is a good clutch to kind of have and intro me to other people and they got drunk at the event and was like slurring words and I had to leave early so I was like maybe I should have just went by myself yeah I echo like going by yourself for things is so much fun so much fun you also learn

a lot about yourself in the process so yeah um how about you Lila is there any other questions that kind of come up and pressing I don't think so I also think the biggest things I've heard from people are just like the networking thing I guess one other thing I can think so. I also think the biggest things I've heard from people are just like the networking thing. I guess one other thing I can think of, like, I really like that you said just because you don't have experience doesn't mean you don't have value. I feel like for a lot of us, internships or like our first corporate job or first jobs in a field. So I guess like how can you highlight like any skills that you may have from like either like working, being part of a club, working in a summer job, something temporary that can like help you kind of stand out or get into a field that you might not have experience in? Yeah, I think that's a great question. And I think that really speaks to how you interview as well. People might not know these things if you don't talk about it. So i think don't be scared to show the full you in that spectrum you know we might only ask certain questions in a application process interview process but and i've often found like if you put those things on your resume

you don't have to just put your qualifications experience you know i know mine has like things i love the things i like doing extra you know so give people a full spectrum of who you are and and also don't be scared to put forward what you the ideas you have and say like hey this is what I thought of for xyz I remember when I interviewed at KPMG I went with like a piece of paper that had lots of very colorful drawings on it and I had a vision of how consulting and financial crime could work together on certain things and build like a really good corporate culture and I went into the interview with that you know and it was not part of any questions but I put that in front of the guy and he kind of he was a great leader a bit of a maverick

and he kind of looked at it and he was like, and he remembered it, but I didn't actually think he paid attention. But I showed him something that, you know, was different to what was the normal interview experience and a little bit of insight on who I wanted to be, what I wanted to create in the world. So I think don't be scared to show who you are. This is really what comes for me.

I mean, that's a really great answer. I think it's good to be impression, you know, make an impression. Sometimes there's just so many, you're going through so many things and you have to put yourself in the shoes of the person that's kind of, you know, you're working with or interviewing you is how do I you know it could be something that you helped your cousin with it could be something that you visited you can spin anything as long as you are kind of being genuine about it so let's say you are doing you know business development but after this you decide you know I don't really like this too much I like more of the advertising

you could highlight the work that you're doing, working with the social media team, you can help with the clubs that you've been talking about, I think you just have to find what that is. I mean, there's been times where I've interviewed for public relations and finance and marketing and like all these different things, because I just didn't know, but I tailored it, you know, my experience to each one of those initiatives. And so the other thing, like Nicole said, is like taking what they already have, like coming in and saying, like, this is what I see, you never know if that's a new idea for them, or something they haven't thought about. It's kind of a proactive way for them to see, oh, this person cares, they listened, for them to see, oh, this person cares. They listened. They can follow directions. They're innovative and creative if that's what the job calls for. So I think that, yeah, you definitely.

And another thing is like if you're interviewing and you can't find an internship, because there's a lot of talent out there that doesn't have a home right now, is make use of that time somehow, whatever it is that you want to do. If it's, you know, well, I put together vision boards and I sent it out to 25 companies. I helped my aunt's, you know, social media page while I was off. I volunteered at the shelter. All of that counts as work experience and people are looking like does this person have the translatable skills that I need so they don't have to have the same job from before some industries they care about that but can you do the job and if you can show like hey I did it but I was

volunteering like well why can't she do it for my company then? Because she's, you know, she obviously has that skill set. Yeah, I think that's great. And one last thing, we've seen a few resumes come across our desk now with application process. And I really want to encourage people out there that, you know, most people are extremely visual interpreters of information. So make your resume feel like you. And this is something artists and creatives really understand. You know, if you have a showcase site or a brand

out there in the world, that's your website, your portfolio. You show people, this is who I am, this is what I like, this is what I look like. And I feel like a lot of the resumes maybe some of them have to be a certain standard format of you know the black on white paid one pager but get into Canva and just just design something that feels authentic to you because one that will communicate a lot of the skills that you have maybe you have graphic design skills that people can only pick up from your resume design but it will just feel good to you to put that out in the world and and that might be a great platform for you to showcase what we call in in the creative world really your digital press kits your digital like resume think of it like that you know don't don't be shy to use color you know we don't live

in black and white always. And the last thing I would say, which I wanted to mention earlier, is we all know how to use the AI tools. So do not solely be relying on ChatGPT to answer questions. Because when we download and we compare against everybody else, if you have the same suggestions we know what you used i don't know if your teachers tell you this is cool but like they must have it really bad because just from the submissions that we've gotten i was like how did all these people come

up with the same partnerships i think you know again it's to know your audience sometimes you're just mass applying just to see what hits but when when you do, you know, something that we did when we were hiring for this role, as we said, like, hey, we are founders, we are a small team, we are personally like reviewing these, because I could see the submissions that were coming in. And yeah, we probably could create really good content with just using AI. And I think people are still learning how to use it alongside their own creativity. So I do think that, but you have to kind of push yourself back in there, like your own personal ideas, because otherwise we could hire six other people that can just use the AI tools. And I think that's going to be more and

more important for people of your generation moving into the working world, because there are so many tools that and jobs that are getting eliminated or need to be interpreted by AI in order for you to succeed. For example, we have a we have a AI tool that does meeting notes. And so it captures Fireflies and Otter. They'll capture everything you talked about. And then they'll say like, it auto assumes like the next steps, the action items, the questions that were asked. And sometimes when you get it back, it actually wasn't really what the main point of the meeting

was. And so, for example, last week, we had a conversation at Sapphire Growth Partners and Ricky uses otter and fireflies. And I was like, oh, you know, which one of these do you think is good for us to implement now that we're having like more meetings? And she was like, well, the other day when you were talking about like I was talking about a personal incident and how we like one of the family members got into a car accident we had to call like find a lawyer and like all this other stuff that's the action items it took it was only five minutes of the conversation the rest of the conversation was like 45 minutes about the business and like we were just chatting and so it didn't have a filter for like you know personal, or just fluff or like

informal conversation. And that's where people come in. And so I think you, you have to know how to learn how to utilize AI that makes sense. But for instance, it auto sends out the meeting notes to everybody, no matter what. So like, if I'm relying on that to take all my meeting notes, now when I think about, okay, what were the action items for that, I can't actually use anything from there. I'm literally going back into transcripts. It's like, I should have just took the notes while I was on the phone. So I think you have to keep that in mind for young professionals is that if you're using the AI, everyone else is, there's been

instances where I've literally copy and pasted and been like did you write this chat GPT and I'll be like yes I did so you kind of have to you know utilize what your own personality is and then leverage that with AI I would say becomes very powerful because now you could do 10 things in the same time that it was going to take you yeah chat gpt definitely has a certain voice a certain way of writing something and i think it's really quite awesome that chat gpt knows its own voice its own way and style of writing because it does we see that too you know so i think that's great advice yeah well i think that kind of wraps us up it's been like so much fun chatting with you guys thanks for contributing your your questions and then for helping us

with this conversation hopefully it's been super insightful for you guys as well as our listeners and you know in terms of our final thoughts know, what were your answers to these top 10 questions? Feel free to engage with us on our socials out there. Let us know your thoughts, feels and stories, especially the stories. We love them. We we talk about them all the time on here, but we love hearing from you guys and then sharing them. And remember to tag us using hashtag these Friday feels. And, Nicole, you want to take us into next week and what's in store?

For those who have forgotten, Sunday is Father's Day. So get those gifts sorted if you haven't already. We are doing a very special Dear to Our Hearts conversation episode next week. We're taking a little peek into our inner circle, but we're really excited for this episode. Another top 10 and it should be really interesting. But until next time, that is our mix for today. We have had so much fun mingling with you and we wish you safe travels into your bed, into the night and into this awesome weekend. So see you next week and keep it real.