Your Happy Hour - Episode 7: Don’t Micromanage Me

Episode Date: January 19, 2024

Happy Friday everyone! Tune in to episode 7 and let’s chat about: Don’t Micromanage Me.What is your management style and how are you navigating the do’s and don’t conversations?In this episode Jenn Sanchez, former colleague, DEA agent of 29 years and incredible financial crime investigator shares with us some of her incredible stories & advice! We hear directly from the woman who’s career highlights include: taking down AlphaBay in Thailand and locking up drug traffickers in Mexico. In this episode we discuss: the mentors that guide you to your gut-sense, walking alongside your wing (wo)man, the importance of sitting at bigger tables and her undercover stint as a soccer mom (yes, you read that right!). We’ll be here - every Friday - celebrating with you!Connect with us @ friday-feels.co▶ Podcast Chapters01:10 - Welcome Jenn!04:15 - Jenn’s Take on Tell Me What To Do05:35 - Look Both Ways: Mentors Who Guide You to Your Gut-Sense12:45 - Walk Alongside Your Wing (Wo)man15:26 - Have the Chops to Say No16:15 - Sit at Bigger Tables19:15 - An Inside Story: All About the Benjamins Baby22:44 - Leave the Toxic Boss24:23 - Jack Ma and Be the Mama Bear27:44 - The Undercover Soccer Mom31:22 - Have the Honest Human Conversations39:37 - Navigating Corporate: Just ask! You can’t embarrass me44:08 - Jenn’s Best Professional Advice49:06 - A Look Back: 10 Years Ago49:36 - A Step Forward: 1 year From Now 52:35 - Final Question and Farewell!

Happy Friday beautiful people and hello to you all out there tuning in for your first sip of the weekend. you're tuned in to your happy hour with friday feels we're celebrating all you working professionals out there doing your crazy craft embracing the beauty of being human and connecting authentically and we are host sergeant nicole and we're living and working around the world holding space for you and keeping it raw and real as we share fresh content with you every week. Follow us on LinkedIn at Friday Feels and Instagram at These Friday Feels for updates throughout the week. In our last episode we discussed our new theme, tell me what to do and for the rest of the month we're exploring this topic and today we have a very very special guest joining us to take this even further into a very important aspect of this theme.

We're speaking to Jane Sanchez, former colleague, incredible investigator and wonderful human who has walked an incredibly interesting journey from being a special DEA, special agent, investigator and an accredited diplomat leading the U.S. Embassy in Thailand, and working in leading teams in the banking and cryptocurrency industries. And now working as a consultant in the financial crime space, her work has been profiled in Wired, Texas Observer, and Follow the Money, and even some media productions that are to come. Welcome, Jen. It's so, so wonderful to have you join us today. We are super, super excited. And we know this episode is going to have so many views because anyone who knows you knows that your story is incredible,

both professionally and as a human, just in general. So I'm super excited. Where are you? You're welcome. Where are you dialing in from? And tell us a little bit about what you've been up to and why this topic is important to you as a working professional. Oh, wow. Thank you. Thank you guys for that kind introduction. And two of my favorite people to have worked with in the last couple of years. Thank you for having me. So right now I'm in Virginia. I'm a little bit of a vagabond. I have a place in Michigan, a place in Texas, and I go between the three. Hopefully next being a little bit of a cyber nomad. We'll see where that takes

me here in the next little bit. I am working for Guidepost right now and it's an amazing company that helps people get out of this situation they may be in if they're not compliance ready. So that's been basically my marching orders at this point, is to help people along their path of getting compliance ready, specifically in the crypto space. And I've enjoyed it thus far. And we'll see what the future brings. But yeah, prior to that, I had a little bit of a stint with the U.S. government for maybe about 30 years. And I'm glad to be out of that now.

But while I was in it, it was 100 percent. And I really enjoyed it and wouldn't have changed anything. Not a day, not a day. I think it's pretty much of a blessing when you can say you never really went to work a day in your life. And I was granted that for over 30 years, almost 35, 34 total. So that was really cool. And now, you know, again, hopefully translating that into our clients and helping them navigate, whether it's IRS knocking at the door or DEA or something else unwanted and putting them in a space where they can fix it. And that's kind of what I did was fix things and make things better, hopefully.

So tell us what this topic means to you. Tell me what to do without micromanaging me. You know, I was really blessed that when I started into the game, especially my supervisors, not as when we were coming out of U.S. Customs and I was coming out of being on a boat crew and going into DEA, all of my upper supervisors that I had, Foster Joe and Fred Ball are still with us today. Some of my supervisors aren't anymore, like Thomas Burton. These guys were all former Vietnam vets. They'd been in the fire, right? They had, you know, been through the rivers of Mekong, been fired upon and napalmed and all of the things that happen when you, you know, go to war, especially in Asia. And so I expected when I walked in with them, for them to be very misogynistic and, you know, and were going to tell me the way it was. And

they were complete 180 degrees off of that. They were very patient. They had been through the fire, like I said before. So they, unless somebody was bleeding, they weren't getting excited. And they, I can remember Foster, we were coming out. We had this mansion that we had in the task force because we had seized a mansion off of these drug traffickers that we were sitting in. And there was about 30 of us in the task force. And I came out of the mansion one afternoon and they were like, Foster's been hit. So he had gotten about a mile and a half down the road.

And somebody came out and T-boated him. Put the G-ride basically on L. And I come running up on him, and he comes walking out, and he shakes himself off, and he goes, make sure you look both ways before you see an intersection. I'm like, what the? I mean, he was just cool, right? And so these guys not only looked at me as, I think, somewhat of a

protection level, they were, you know, kind of the dad type types, they also really didn't, they wanted to see me successful, and they clearly would lay out their expectation, and they were also in the game of making you better. So I would be, I'd be questioning what I was thinking. I'm a farm girl from the Midwest. What is it that I'm going to do or not do? And Foster would look at me and go, for a girl that's never been in the street, you got more gut sense than anybody I know. And I was like, really? And he was like, yeah, your inner gut tells you when something's before it happens. I've watched you, and you can do this.

And those little, and, you know, again, you get with all of these men, and there's this misogynistic, sexual overtone, stuff like that. And there was none of it. And they were very much those mentors that made me better. And so, again, if you were like that, I had a tendency to gravitate toward you anyway. And I was just blessed that, you know, early on in my career, I was surrounded by that instead of maybe something else. And it made me better, I think.

And it also gave me a perspective. Unless you're bleeding out, you know um there's really not too much to get excited with your car might be in and out but he walked away and brushed the glass out of his hair right you know and uh or out of his hat at the time and i was just like yeah you know those are those are those moments where you're like okay this is this is this is a learning curve and i'm gonna be better for this. Yeah. Last week we kind of spoke about this. Tell me what to do as a, I wouldn't say a negative thing,

but it's like when you're inviting in someone to instruct you how to live your life or, you know, how you might be giving away your power in a certain situation. But I think it's really wonderful that you're framing this in a way that tell me what to do is such a positive thing when you are in a space like that, that people can encourage you, can support you and can guide you. And then to hear that is so encouraging as well in the working place. Fred had this expectation. People had walked in and gone like, just do your work, DEA, right? This is the day of Kiki Camarena and Larkos. This is full-on, big-time narcotics trafficking in South Texas.

That's just on the cusp of coming into where it's really becoming dangerous. They're still gentlemen dopers, but it's still, it's still, it's all out there. And Fred came in and said, I have this expectation. I want you guys to target these three groups of individuals. One was basically the Gulf Cartel, a guy by the name of Carrillo that was there. The standing sheriffs that was there, we knew he was a corrupt. And then a particular, it was a business, but it was a car business called M&T Motors. And he said, I want all three of these guys.

Help me get there. And sure enough, within the two to three years that Fred was there as I was there at D.A. McAllen, we hit all three. And because he laid out, you know, our intelligence tells us these things are going on. Make this happen for us, guys. And when you give me, until this day, if you give me clear parameters on what it is you Texas, and he had a call to this local 7-Eleven. And it was a trunk of a car, and there was stuff coming out the trunk of the car. He'd drive by it. He was, again, local PD, you know, every day.

He drove by it for two, three days. Finally, he said, I'm going to pop the trunk. The son to Emmett T. Motors was in the trunk of the car. And he had to go and find out where he had been killed in the Las Palmas Hotel. And, you know, we knew from that information that the family was into the narcotics business. I mean, it was just common knowledge in the area. So he wasn't asking us to look at stuff that wasn't true or wasn't an issue or any of that. He was laying out clear parameters on stuff that we knew was a big deal.

This happened to be that my husband was involved in it, and he was a boyfriend at the time. But it was really interesting. I found that to be, again, you know, even working for Nicole, every morning we'd get up at 8 a.m. Nobody could get me out of fucking bed at 8 o'clock in the morning, except Nicole. I am not a morning person.

But, yep, hear this girl? of South Africa got me up every morning during the week at 8 8 30 in the morning to get on call to find out what we were doing we knew every day we had this discussion and then we did what we needed to do right you know this cue was working right this seemed wrong this these were the things that were happening that looked like the same individual maybe was part of a syndicate, and it was an issue, and I, although I didn't always love it, right, you know, no matter what supervisor I was dealing with, whether it was Detroit, or whether it was Texas, or wherever, Chicago, Texas or wherever, Chicago or even overseas, I didn't always like what they had to say. But if you gave me the parameter, then I knew what you expected.

And I also, you know, as a manager coming out of DEA, I think it's unusual when people expect you. As much as Nicole checked in with us, she also didn't micromanage us. And when I say that, she let us handle the cues. She didn't come back around. She didn't question us. If we explained to her something was going on, she trusted what we were saying was the truth. And that's important too. I think that you have to assume people know their business to some degree if they're walking alongside you and they're your wingman, right? It doesn't matter what the title is, they're really your wingman. You're trying to do all of this together.

And again, I think it's management style. I would think I'm more like, you're an adult. If you need any help, come talk to me, but do what you got to do. And again, I don't, I knew supervisors that when they did stand on top of me, it was because they had an issue with their self-confidence and what they could do or couldn't do. Or they were such assholes when they were doing A, B, and C that they thought everybody else was doing what they were doing, right? You know, I figured, let's all be adults here. And I, you know, that's kind of my management style. I just want to set the record straight here.

For me, it was two, three o'clock in the afternoon. I'm sorry. It was. It was. It was. set the record straight here for me it was uh two three o'clock in the afternoon and so yeah i'm sorry it was it was you know it was it was you're gonna get to the end of the day right you know and you don't know what's going on right you know i i completely get why we had to do it and uh and again you know I came from overseas. My last duty station before coming into D.C. was overseas. And we were exactly 12 hours difference in Thailand. And people would want to talk to you at 3 o'clock in the afternoon.

That was 3 o'clock at night. Or 3 o'clock in the morning, right? So obviously we tried to figure out how to accommodate some of that stuff. And from time to time, I woke up at 3 in the morning and took a call. Because you've got to do what you've got to do, right? But Nicole, she was amazing. And just her voice alone, just waking up to me. But in case you were wondering, sometimes when we were both dark in the morning,

it was because I was just still laying in bed going, do I have to function this morning? This is all during COVID too, right? Yeah. I would like to say I'm a little better about that today, but at the time I was like, oh my God, she's getting me up at eight in the morning. Oh, I really, I miss, like you mentioned the word wingman and I really miss working next year as a wingwoman. And I think that's such a beautiful way of explaining teamwork as well. And I'm curious, Jane, like, have you, when you experienced the opposite, like you said, someone standing in your head and micromanaging you and telling you what to do, like, how did you handle those situations? How did you tell the person, you know, don't tell me what to to do or was it not that kind of situation at the end you know I had the chops to be able to tell you no and turn around walk away right you know I was that I was that much of a pain in the ass if you said you can't do that I'd be like well I'll take a picture and watch me because yeah. Yeah, I'm going to do just...

Because if I made a commitment to something, then it was because I wanted to say it was sitting in the right space. And it was going to be the right way to do it. So if you told me no, you better have an explanation that makes perfect sense to me. Otherwise, I was going to come back around and show you something different. And again, that was towards the end of the career. During the beginning of the career, I think there was just a lot of listening. Was it Michael Dell says, um, well, I think that if you want to grow, sit at bigger tables and spend time with smarter people.

And I was lucky enough that I wanted to be around people that were smarter than me. And absorbing all that, I knew they were smarter than me. And actually, as I've gotten older, I still seek out the room where I'm the lowest common denominator, because I want to, you know, it's not at this point that I need to take in all of this new stuff. It's, I just really am curious. And I think that's probably, again, going back to being brought up in a way, which, aren't you curious? Aren't you trying to figure that, you know, doesn't that seem fascinating to you? And when I was young, it was just I was curious. I didn't know anything about it and wanted to learn.

As I got older, I still wanted to be around the smartest people in the room, like Nicole and Saj. And so I guess that's kind of where, when I was young, it was firearms instructor, good tactical. Am I the epitome of your tactical chick i mean you know when i was younger yeah for sure i mean i was in good shape i'll feed you your ass i'll you know blow you up whatever needs to be done right but it was more of a curiosity on how to do this and not hurt somebody when it doesn't they don't have to be hurt, right?

So that's, you know, learning the firearms, being able to be in armor and take that thing all apart, put it back together. You know, I'd do that in a gun store. I'd go look at a gun. I'd take it apart and then put it back together. And they'd be like, what the hell does that mean? I'd do it just for fun to watch their face, right? You know? Take that thing all apart, look at it and then you know

it was a new model and i put it back ahead to them they'd be like what the hell just happened right so yeah because she looks like a soccer mom what what the hell is she doing with it you know being able to do that and so some of that was just fun it's just you know learning it and um i think that's what kept me sane too is learning something a little bit new all the time and then that's what took me into the financial realm you know I had done again the firearms the sexy stuff you know the the corner dope deal the pharmacist that was slinging pills whatever the situation was I was always and then you know what was next and when I figured out the money was the issue when it clicked to me on that that's when I knew I had something that would take me into

my gray hair day eight days right you know where it would make more sense and it was really the um more the corruption the public corruption and then the financial stuff that, okay, that's the driving factor. And I hadn't really thought about it before. We always had a saying, people smuggle dope. Dope doesn't smuggle dope. Well, there's a whole other level there where people are financing it. And people are, you know, it's all about the Benjamin's baby, right?

And I even heard that throughout the years, right? But it wasn't until I was doing pharmacy work and I'd walked in. We had a pharmacy that we let open up for the first 15 minutes. I think I've told Nick this story. I let it open up. We let it open up for 15 minutes before we walked in and shut it down, took their DEA number, counted all of their pills, and proved that they were slinging literally millions and millions of oxy and hydrocodone to just people that were walking in with a $200 script and prescription.

If I say script, I hope everybody understands. And they would go to these fake doctors, basically, these physician assistants, and get these scripts, and they'd walk in into fake doctors basically these physician assistants and get these scripts and they'd walk in into this pharmacy and get them get them filled and it was always the same thing it was hydrocodone the drink and xanax so it was you know the cough syrup and xanax it was the same thing they'd all come in they'd get that same prescription everybody everybody everybody you're talking about 20 people in the waiting room and they're all getting the same prescription what is the likelihood of that in a pharmacy right right? We let it open for 15 minutes. We walk in, shut everything

down. And I look at the ticker tape on the register. And in that 15 minutes, they took to $2,500 in cash. 15 minutes. Who makes $2,500 in 15 minutes? It was, you know, the light went on at that point for me. I was like, ah, this is what it's really all about. It's not about the Xanax, the cough syrup, the hydroconone. It's really about what's going through this cash register in 15 minutes. So that's how that, you know, the money portion came into my view as far as something that I wanted to trace. And then we took $2,000 out of that pharmacist's account.

$2 million, I'm sorry, $2,000. $2 million out of his account. Two million, I'm sorry, two thousand, two million out of his account. And he had it when they did the search warrant, he had stuff stuffed in his like in his closet, in his pockets of his jacket. He had, you know, thousands of dollars and shoe boxes and things. And I was like, oh, man, this this now I understand. Now I understand. It's so awesome to kind of hear you talk candidly about your working experience right because you transitioned over from being in the agency over to corporate life and it's nice to hear what made

you take over but hearing you actually explain it this way a lot of people might be able to relate in a way like they're looking for mentors they're looking for rooms where they can grow in. They're looking for, you know, I've heard that saying before, where if you're the smartest person in the room, find another room. And I think a lot of people living corporate life might not be able to get a real glimpse of what it's like to work for a government agency and still have those feelings, right? And still be able to thrive. I mean, I know you've worked on some really big things. I don't know how to say it, but like big cases or big exposes, you know, in Thailand and all over the world. And I think it

gives a lot of people hope too, right? That if someone, you know, so many years ago could have, right? That if someone, you know, so many years ago could have, there's a saying, right? It's people don't leave toxic workplaces, they leave toxic bosses. And I think that really holds true for something like the agency where, you know, you hear a lot of, you have preconceived notions. I mean, I walked into this with preconceived notions. If I didn't hear you speak on how open it was, how much authority you were given, how much free will, I might never have read that somewhere or really understood what that looked like. So I think it's awesome that you shed light on what it's like for someone like you. Like you mentioned, not to play into stereotypes, know you might be a soccer mom if you saw you walking down the street to know that you've been through this uh jack ma of alibaba says that when you're

in your 20s find yourself a good boss follow a good boss right and and a good company when you're in 30 or 40s or 40s maybe do something like Nick's doing. Do something you really want to do. Make that change and then try that out as to what it is you want to do. When you're in 40s and you're 50s, do exactly what you're good at. And I was blessed at that point when I was with DEA. I ended up being really good at the money stuff, and they let me free reign. I mean, they let me indict Mexican governors. They let me, you know, literally take, like, millions and millions of dollars in properties and planes and cars, anything that I, you know,

if I set my sights to, we're going to take that, they let me do it, right? And then they say, you know, Jack Moss said, in your 50s and 60s, mentor. And that's what I was blessed with when I first walked into DEA, is I had those mentors that were in their 50s that were really looking. They had taken that turn, and they were really looking to take care of everybody, not just Jennifer Sanchez, but everybody that was involved in their groups. And then he says, when you're 65, enjoy your grandchildren,

which is going to be exactly my intention. But you're exactly right in that, you know, I feel like at this point, I'm probably more in a mentor stage. And I was lucky enough to have, like, Stellan that I was working with that I really enjoyed. And he took that on. And my greatest concern is when you're in that mentor stage is that you're not talking down to somebody or making them feel inferior or, you know, they're giving.

Again, I'm this farm girl that's got no law enforcement background. I'm thinking I'm going to be a veterinarian when I go to college, you know, and then I get into these criminal justice courses because I can't pass the labs in biology to get through to be a vet, right? You know, math is not Jennifer, believe it or not, math is not Jennifer Strong soon. And then I find this place where the mama bear sits, right? And so you made an interesting comment about soccer mom. I was soccer mom. I literally put the career on hold for 10 years so that baby, I could be the, you know, a lot of people in the agency, they start to rise, and they go into a GS position, and they go into what we call associate, special agent, charge,

and I didn't do that. I decided for 10 years that I was going to throttle back and be mom, and I was lucky to be put into our polygraph unit for 10 years. And you get to talk to people, so that was a fun situation. Talk them out of their panties, as we would say. You know that you did this, but you're going to do this anyway.

You're going to tell me anyway about it. And I did that for 10 years and it allowed me to be mom. I was soccer mom. I was the soccer mom. I went to second grade and had little kids sitting on mom. I was the soccer mom. I went to, you know, second grade and had little kids sitting on my lap and was reading them books and, you know, did that at my lunchtime instead of, you know, looking for the next drug deal. And it hurt to some degree. I think, you

know, you're kind of disappointed that I didn't walk out maybe in a higher management position. But at the end of the day, when I watched my baby girl come talk to me about, Mom, I've got this case, and I need help on this, and what do you think? My son-in-law the other day, he's with Secret Service. He said, Mom, what do you think about this? And I said, he's a money mule. And I said, he's moving third-party money for a fee. Darling, go look that up. Where is it? The statute. He goes, yeah, that is.

And I think there's a five- to ten-year charge on this. It's a felony, too, right? He goes, okay, all right. You know, that's the, you know. Then I know it was worth throttling back. It really was. For me, personally, it was worth throttling back and being mom for ten years. And I did undercover as a soccer mom with the pharmacy stuff.

I did. I'd walk in and I'd be like, oh, I've got a hangnail. Can you give me oxycodone? They'd be like, sure. Do I look like a cop? Do I look like a cop? No. So they're writing me scripts for Asking Kono

because, you know, supposedly I've got a hangnail. Right? You know? They're never going to believe Jennifer Sanchez was undercover. I love these stories, Jane. I love how you blended your worlds. Everyone's

kind of trying to do, but then it's okay. Talk about work-life balance i'd be at the soccer beats with sars literally like handfuls of sars right you know when i was and i'd be reading over the sars and and and over the top of her and then you know reading through the sars and trying to put put a case together with that. And one time I walked out and I left it on a bench. And I was like, oh, shit. Would I run back in and gather them all up and put them in a walk-off?

I'm like, oh, man. I think I passed the five-year statute of limitations, so I'm okay. I'm telling a story. But, man, it freaked me out. I was like, oh, man, they're going to have my ass if they find out that I, you know. I just, you know, you just did what you had to do. And long and short of it, I was lucky enough. And I had, again, supervisors that were very, you know, really good about if I had to leave at 3 o'clock because I had a wrestling meet that I needed to be to, I was there, right?

And the next day I might work till 9 o'clock at night, but it was just depending on, you know, what needed to be done. I think that's such a nice kind of segue into saying, you know, sometimes when you have management that tells you what to do they don't always give you that kind of freedom right and it's like we're talking about micromanagement things so having people in your life like a mentor or manager who is able to give you the framework to kind of live the life and I think we're a bit more so maybe now with remote working in that world I think through this weird experience that we had a few years ago, people are a bit more accommodating of other people's lives.

But I think it's really nice to hear that, that you even had that grace, that space to be a mom, space to have flexibility, have freedom. But I think it also comes with, obviously, the accountability. Like you're always good at your job, right? And you deliver.

So have you ever felt like, maybe were you ever in the flip side of that conversation where you had to tell someone what to do and how did you like not micromanage them you know give them that space to again you know been lucky enough to be surrounded by those that I trusted. And they were up front with me on what they were doing and how they were doing it. And I think there's a level of trust that you build with somebody where they're going to tell you exactly, you know, like, really, I'm not going to lie to you and tell you I'm working when I'm not, right? I'm at the soccer, I'm at the football game with my kid or, you know, whatever the situation is. And I was lucky enough just to be able to create that trust where somebody would tell me exactly, honestly, what was going on. And then let me lie for you.

Let me lie for you to the bosses. I'm going to take care of you, you know. And again, I think that's kind of that mama, mama thing. mama thing. I had a situation when I was in Detroit where I had somebody that worked for us that she'd come in. This was me when I was at my end of my career in Washington, D.C. She'd come in to help us write contracts. And we didn't get along, not even in the slightest. And one of my issues with her was, especially as we were starting to get in COVID and stuff I explained to her that the janitor is as important as the CEO I really honestly believe that because what is that janitor doing they're keeping you clean and safe you know

people don't walk in walk into the bathrooms of businesses anymore and then walk out with typhoid or something that makes them sick, right? Because people clean these bathrooms and they make these things safe for you. And I was trying to explain to her, she goes, well, they're not as important. I said, they are. They all are running this business. And we had a really nice sit-down conversation. I don't know if she ever kind of really believed in what I was saying. And I really didn't care, to tell you the truth, after it was all said and done. What I cared about is that when we were finished, we both felt like

we'd been treated like human, you know, human and not disrespected. She ended up not staying with us, unfortunately. You know, we couldn't get past a certain level. But it was important to me that she walk out and feel like I hadn't disrespected her and that, you know, my view was a certain view and her view was her certain view and we were going to respect each other on that. She had a different, you know, and we were going to respect each other on that. She had a different, you know, she had a different view of how she had been raised and I couldn't change that. And she couldn't probably change me. So it was like two dogs in a alley.

And sometimes you can't get around it. But I do believe that she could never turn around and tell everybody, somebody that I treated her disrespectfully. I think that's at the end of the day, probably one of the more important things. And that sets forth the reputation. You know, did you,

did you hurt somebody to where they're bad mouthing you all the way around? And I can say as a manager, I didn't, I felt like I never did that to anybody. So again, how you approach it. I think it's important word approach, you know, it's kind of what we were talking about last week and the intention behind something, the, and you know, you can feel that energy from,

and I think that's, we were saying also, you know, like when someone tells you what to do, you know when it's coming from a good place or a bad place and then you also are able to kind of look at it from your own reactionary perspective and how are you taking it and what does it say about you you know so i think that's really important for people listening you know if you're struggling with a situation where where someone might be telling you what to do, listening to what Jane has been saying, that's such an amazing opportunity to have a sit down, how you approach that, have an honest conversation. I think that's great advice for people.

I don't think people are having these heart-to-heart real conversations anymore. And maybe they are and people are just not talking about it, but I think that's wonderful. I also, we always had a standing saying, yeah, I can be fed a lot of shit if you're nice to me about it. Really, you know. If you're spooning it to me like very gently, you know, instead of, you know, whacking me on the backside,

then I'm probably going to take a good portion of it. Be nice. Just be nice. Just be nice. There's no reason to come back around. Does that make you feel good? And I think in law enforcement, you do have a sect. I want to say it's very small.

But you do have a sect of people that were bullied as kids, that are now getting, you know, retribution, that are not going to show you how that, you know, what it's going to be. And we do deal with that. And when you deal with somebody like that, you can just know right off the bat. And my way of dealing with it was just to try to stay as far away from them as possible. Not go into their group, not do cases with them, try to limit my involvement with them as much. You can see that. You can smell that.

But I believe that 90% of us were trying to do God's work. Again, I'll go back and just be nice. Be nice. Does that really do anything for you to be ugly? Yeah. Does it help your soul? And my mom says, what does it cost you to be nice? And some days I'm like, it costs me a lot, mom.

You don't know these people. Yeah. But I think a lot of what you're talking about is like kind of avoiding the politics, avoiding the bad energies and also having the support system at work where you could be your authentic self. Right. You could say this is what I'm doing and I'm getting my work done, but I'm doing it at different times. And I feel like so much of that is lost. I mean, I don't know what your feeling is, you know, having worked in corporate for a little while and what the difference is. But as someone who's only worked in corporate, I find, you know, that's why this podcast is really important for us to launch is

working for all these companies working with different personalities. I mean, I've been working for like 14 years. And the first company that I joined was some of the best. I mean, I've been working for like 14 years and the first company that I joined was some of the best. I mean, people there were like family to me where you could have these honest conversations. You could say like, I didn't get a time to do this or this is when I'm doing something else. And I really attribute it to the boss that I had and also the people that were hired at that company. And Luno was the second place I would say where I really met people like that. And that's why so much of us still keep in contact. And we know if we reach out, people will just share, right? What are you doing? What's

going on? What are your resources? How's it going? And so I think that's really important, right? At a different company, maybe with different colleagues that might not work. And so I think that it's really important to kind of, to hear you say that, right? That you were given these opportunities because somebody created the space for you to feel comfortable to do what you had to do. And you kind of gravitating towards those personalities and staying away from some of the other ones. Because, you know, I think the micromanagement aspect, a lot of these people, like Nicole talked about, you have to kind of see where they're coming from or why is it that they, do they feel like you can't do your job? Do

they feel like they can do your job better than you? Do they feel like they need a kick from their ego? And I've had my fair share, not fair share, but I've had a few people that I've worked with that I was like, okay, well, why are you harping on like all these really little things? What about the big thing that we're kind of going after? And I think that, you know, it doesn't matter what industry and what kind of firm you're working for or working with. If your team members are like that, you know, there was an article about like people working in toxic workplaces and it's like, do you try to enact change where you are? Do you just kind of stay away from it? How do you deal with it? Do you force yourself to try to have a one-on-one conversation? And that's usually the first step,

right? Is, hey, we're both human. We're both here for a reason. We're both trying to get this done. How do we kind of get this done? And so it's nice to hear that, like, I mean, with any job that comes with different things that you have to deal with, that you actively chose, you know, your family and community within your organization. Has that been different for you in corporate life? No. I've actually found corporate to be a lot easier. And when I say that, you know, if you've got a raid at 6 in the morning, you've got to be up by 3. You've got to be across town. You've got to have all your gear. If you don't show up on site at, you know, 5.15, all geared up and ready for battle,

then you've got a problem. They're going to, like, mentally put you, you know, watching the cars in the back. And you don't want to be that person, right? You want to be, I want to be number three in the stack. I want to go through the door. And I didn't have a choice. If the judge said you're going to have a hearing

or you're going to have trial from this date to this date, you're not telling a federal judge no. You're going to be there, and you're going to be prepared, or the judge is going to put you in contempt. You're going to see the backsides of some bars, and you're going to be sitting in an orange jumpsuit. So how is it that you want this to go? And some of that stuff I think was,

it was just ingrained. So that when I walked into corporate life, it's like, wait a minute, if I don't make this meeting at five, today I had a situation where we had two meetings stacked amongst each other and we couldn't make a first one. I would have never been able to explain that.

I wouldn't have ever been able to explain that to a federal judge why I didn't walk into his courtroom when he asked me to do that. And it's, to me, a lot easier to actually navigate. Because the other stuff was just there was no room for it's going to happen. And you're either on or you're off pick one and uh so more so with credit swiss it was a little bit harder in that um if you're telling if you tell people i don't understand this help me help me understand uh because it's not it's not something that I've done before. Again, my famous Excel.

All right, how do I sort this sheet? Michelle Hadley was her name. She was like, Jennifer, let me show you. Just ask. You know, have the, at this point in my, you cannot embarrass me. I can embarrass you, I bet you. But you probably can't embarrass me. Right? embarrass you, I bet you, but you probably can't embarrass me, right? You know, I get up in the room.

I'm in DA. I get up in the middle of a room at one of those 5 o'clock in the morning things. I get up and my gun slides out of my holster and literally bounces down. There's 300 people. literally bounces down the there's 300 people it's in a it's in an auditorium and it's literally like bouncing down the middle of the the middle of the um walkway and I'm like Jesus Christ again it's that old dark 30 in the morning I'm like oh man I just brought all this attention on to me and DEA right the embarrassment factor that is like through the roof if you're telling me that you don't like this because it's not the I's not dotted and the T's not crossed,

I'm probably not going to get too excited about that. Just not going to. Just not going to. Because my gut is really bounced down in the middle of it, you know, in a situation where there's 300 people looking at me, and I'm like, okay, this is embarrassing. This other thing is not embarrassing. I'm going to ask the question, how do I do this? You're not going to embarrass me. You're just not. You're probably not going to get there at this point. The stakes are a little lower. Yeah, they're a lot lower. A lot lower, you know.

I was at an interview, and it was kind of an undercover thing here. And they asked me, what's your management style? And I said, if you're not bleeding, I'm not excited. And it really goes back to being a kid, you know. We're going to make this work. We're going to figure this out. And I've been where they've been bleeding bleeding and we've had to deal with it so you're probably no we're not gonna get excited here we're gonna be fine thank you for sharing all of that jen i just love like absorbing

everything that you're saying you know like a don't I miss my daily dose of jet I am curious like um what do you feel has been like the best professional advice that you've received as as a as a working person it was from my mom and I'll tell you this quick story. So Alejandro's coming on to DEA and he actually get married. We go up to Chicago together. I get pregnant and he's finishing out his last years of college. When I met Alejandro, he didn't have a credit hour. And he put it all aside, stopped being a cop, and went into college full time. And, you know, that's a big throttle back from being the guy that finds the guy in the back of the, you know, in the trunk and works the homicide case to, no, I'm just going to be an average student and I'm going to follow this chick up to Chicago and hang with her up there, right? He did a huge throttle back. And he had called me in as an intern while I was at DEA in Chicago. Yes, there was nepotism in DEA, too.

And he was our intern for a little bit in our technical operations group. And I had had a new boss. And they had figured out that they had kind of had on the internship a little longer than they should have. And they figured that they were going to have to let him go. So I get on. I've got a new boss. His name was Perry. And I was on the phone with my old boss.

And at the time, there was, you know, cell phones were given to somebody who was special. Not everybody had a cell phone. And what you would do is you'd call BASE and tell BASE to switch you into some other phone, you know, their home phone or whatever. So I call BASE and I say, switch me into my old supervisor. They switched me into Lou, but in the meantime, they three-way me into the new supervisor.

switched me into Lou but in the meantime they three-way me into the new supervisor and me and my old supervisor old supervisor are bad-mouthing my new supervisor and he's three-wayed in and we don't know it and basically we get into Perry doesn't have a clue you know my husband is really you know really smart he's going to do a b and c we're going to get into you know he's going to stay an intern we're going to i mean we lay it all out and we call him everything just it's just it's just a terrible conversation but it's happening and he's listening bass calls me a little later and says and i'm i'm sure there was a particular bass operator that i didn't necessarily get along with and i'm sure that he had something to do with more than that than whatever. And Lou calls me.

He tells me, hey, Perry just heard every word we said. The base operator three-way to us in. And I was just beside myself. I'm crying. I've screwed up my husband's possible DEA career. And he went on to DEA and did 30 plus years. But at the time, I'm losing it. I've screwed up my husband's possible DEA career. And he went on to DEA and did 30 plus years. But at the time, I'm losing it. I've screwed up everything.

I've disrespected my new boss. I have screwed up my husband's work life. I am melting down, crying, crying, crying. I'm just a mess. I call my mom to tell her everything's happening. And she says, listen, Jen. Today today it feels like the world's biggest thing. Tomorrow, it's going to be a little less. A month from now, you're going to joke about it.

A year from now, it'll never have happened. Relax. Give it time. Just don't react. Give it time. And it did I went in sat down with Perry said Perry you know I done fucked up there's no other way there's no other way to explain what happened here I disrespected you I'm so sorry please be kind Alejandro and I was lucky enough Perry was it was it was a really good man and was a kind individual. And he forgave me. We got along

great. I worked for him for the next year. And, you know, he'd come to me with stuff. I'd go to him with stuff. And he never held that against me, you know, because he knew it was one of those things where agents talk amongst each other and they talk shit. And that he was just part of being part of that cycle. And Alejandro, like I said, came out with us. He was with us for 30 years. But at the time when it was happening, man, I was beside myself. Absolutely beside myself. And I took that, my mom's advice.

And whenever something was really melting down around me, I was like, okay, today it sucks. The next day it's going to be better. It's going to look completely different a month from now. And a year from now, it'll have never been an issue. But you got to go through it. And that's probably the best work advice I ever got. It was from my mom. I love that.

That's so true. Time is a weird construct. It helps us in our human world. And I feel like that's kind of a really nice gem of the week for us to take forward. So any other gems we want to share before we kind of wrap up? One of the questions you guys had was, what did you see yourself doing 10 years ago? I definitely saw myself in the banking community. ago. I definitely saw myself in the banking community. That's when I started off. And so, like I said, the money portion of it. But you asked me, what do I think I'm going to do from a year from now? And honestly, a year from now, I thought I'd be drinking wine and hanging out with

Nicole still in New York. That's just changed a little bit, right? As I will hopefully here shortly be drinking wine and hang out with Nicole in France. So I'm looking forward to that day. We can have a little Friday feels. Amen. Yeah. I could, um, and again, I just encourage everybody, you know, age is a construct. I've been really lucky to have been blessed with, you know, working with somebody like Nicole and absorbing off of her and her intelligence level and so forth. so forth and sage you know you getting excited about your building and flipping and all of that stuff again you know growing up in that in that arena and just uh take something off of somebody every day and and get in a room where people are smarter than you and don't and don't don't be don't be afraid to not be necessarily the smartest one in the room thank you for sharing that with our audience I think there's very few people

that you can have all these different conversations with right like you said like the the mom Jen the working Jen the all the different personalities that you have and I have to say I've seen quite a few of them and I really enjoyed it so thank you so much for being the human that you are and I do not say that lightly I feel like sometimes we have guests on here and I'm like about to cry on them this is one of them but we I really yeah like I really do appreciate it I think you were the first person when I was at Luno where I was randomly matched up to somebody where they would have like the random networking. Yeah, the coffee breaks, right? And it was just so nice to just talk to you and then hear about all your experiences. And we really, you know, everyone that I know that has met you is like so thoroughly impressed with the way that you speak about

yourself and the way that you conduct yourself and share. And I think it's so important. Not everybody has a Jen in their life or in their company that would have this experience and also share, right? What you went through and what you've endured, what you've built, what you've created. And if you can do more of that, I'm sure more of the world would love to hear and hear about all your crazy escapades, like taking down Alpha Bay that people can read about. But it's nice to hear you in this light. And it's nice to hear, you know,

how you've become the woman that you have by having people support you. So thank you for sharing. Thank you. Thank you, guys. thank you for sharing thank you thank you guys thank you for having me we're gonna have to have you again at some point because they're just too many stories to share so but i guess as a final thought to our audience out there you know think about what does this tell me what to do mean to you we've shed some light on two different sides of this story

and you know how are you handling it when someone's trying to micromanage you or to guide you and what is the best advice that you've maybe received in dealing with these kind of situations yeah and we'd love to hear from you so please share your thoughts on this topic by engaging with us on linkedin Friday Feels and on Instagram at These Friday Feels. And remember to tag us using hashtag These Friday Feels to share your stories. You can work with us or potentially have us broadcast Friday Feels from your space. So check out our website or you can reach out to us via email at hello at friday-feels.co. And next week, we'll be continuing this theme.

So tell me what to do and how to set your own direction. What does it mean to embark on a new journey where you're calling all the shots? But until next time, that is our mix for today. And we've had so much fun mingling with you. And we wish you safe travels into your bed into the night and into this awesome weekend see you next week keep it real