Erin Braxton (00:01)

Should you stay in corporate or should you go?

speaker-1 (00:04)

you

Erin Braxton (00:05)

How do you find the right job? What kind of research do you do? How do you not allow these people to trample all over your time and your energy and your nerves? What are you supposed to learn when you get to corporate? Should you have your own thing? These are questions that have come up. These are answers that we have been given by either myself or guests that I've had.

on the podcast over the first 62 episodes of its existence. And we've got a really good library of information from amazing black women to help you navigate this journey. So today we're looking back at some of the best career advice that we've heard over the life of the podcast. Before we get into it,

Welcome to the Coffee No Cream podcast. My name is Erin Braxton, and I'm the host of Coffee No Cream. Here on Coffee No Cream, we are unapologetically dedicated to Black women and we share what I like to call Coffee No Cream moments of things that happen to us black women in business and in life. Before we get into it though, guys, I want to ask that you please like, please share, please subscribe to the podcast. And we've got a Facebook group. The link is below. We've got almost 2,000 free educational resources from higher educational resources.

institutions, free courses to help you level up if that's what you want to do. And that that's it. So let's get into this summer rewind on just the best career advice that we've heard. See you over there.

Rhonda Joy McLean (01:50)

Sometimes this is not nice to say, but sometimes black people are pitted again each against each other at work just to keep you out of the mix so that when the real deal goes down, you over there fighting. You don't you you're not even gonna get the the half a million dollar project 'cause you over here trying to fight over the the two thousand dollar thing that doesn't matter. I learned that in the law firm, where I was the first black woman attorney. and I will confess that sometimes I got in my own way. I overthought

I worked too hard, not smart. That's another Marsha thing. So I would say first, what is the context? Is it worth it to you to try to get it straight? Can you talk to the person? Can you I mean I'm not saying you have to, you may not feel that you can. I've done it. It's not easy. Again, Elaine's point, step outside your comfort zone. But where I have, it's almost always led to the point of higher sta

higher understanding. So instead of me against you, Aaron or Elaine, can it be Elaine, Aaron, and Rhonda against what is this that's happening inside this place? Is it the place? Are they really saying on their website that they want black people here, but then they treat us like they don't want black people here? Because you know, you ask somewhere in your notes to us how can you find out about the culture? Well I do, I run this is where networking comes. I pull in all my favorites. Almost all of my jobs across a 50 year career have come through other people.

Of all colors and all ages. People that I've interned with, people that I've been on boards with, people that have seen me work out in the community, and inside the job mentors and sponsors. But I feel like it's worth it to assess the situation and try to figure out if you are seeing it properly. Sometimes you just are. I've had people come and cry on my couch, yes, it is a horrible situation, and yes, I'll help you get out.

I've helped people get other jobs within the same company because they were being treated like crap by people. Sometimes black, sometimes not, sometimes other women, sometimes not. but I find that more often than not, there may be more to the story. And so I try to see if I can get to the bottom of it. And then you and your right to think about generationally, my stepson who's 35, he might he might not want to go to the man. He's like, Well, shoot, if they can't appreciate what I bring to the table.

I'm gonna either build my own table or go to somebody else's table. And when he has done that, sometimes those very people that were acting up come to woo. And then it's too late. He's like, okay, you know, you lost your chance. What I the last thing I will say about this is what I love about as horrible as this time is, this is the real America. I'm sorry. This is the one that I knew. And this is the one that we've been trying to make live up to their what they say.

in the constitution and all that. There's some real good people of all colors and of all ages. I agree with Elaine that your team, your success team, should be as diverse as possible because to me that's how your life will become rich and full. It'll lead to your next opportunities, whether it's clients for your business, Aaron, whether it's, you know, a way to make money to send our children to school, whatever it is. I welcome the different thoughts

that the next generations have about work. Because with AI and with global leadership teams, which we also talk about in our book, work ain't what it was. Work has has become something else. And so you have to decide, do I even want to do this at all? If so, here's some ways you can do it. If I don't, then we say, well here's some things ways you can get ready to do your own thing, like you're already doing successfully. But all of that I think we need in order to evolve.

It can't be like it was. We have to make something new and better.

Celeste Warren (05:42)

Do your homework first of all. and look into organizations to find out what they're about. Don't just do the superficial stuff. Go on their website, s look at look at who that who represents them, read the articles, go into their financials, go into their philanthropic activities.

Go into their ESG activities, go into their diversity inclusion activities, find out about the organization you're gonna be going into. Find out some people who who have been in that organization, either currently or in the past. Talk to them, but do your homework. Because every organization is not the same. And every or within an organization, every part of that organization is not the same. There are cultures and then there are microcultures as well.

Right. The thing that you need to ready yourself with is what do you have to offer? What do you have to offer that that organization needs? Because it's a it's a it's a two-way thing. The way the labor market is right now, there is there has been a you know, we always heard that term a war for talent. But no more is that very, very alive than right now, because this generation, generation Z

and the generation alpha after them, they have choices. You know, when we were in school, when we were young coming up, it was you gotta go to college in my household, being a PK, you know, it wasn't are you gonna go to college, it was what college are you going to go to. Then

Erin Braxton (07:24)

Not an okay.

Celeste Warren (07:25)

it yeah, it wasn't an option. And and then it was okay, well what are you gonna do to progress your career? And there wasn't a lot of options.

for us back then. Because if you didn't go to school, then you were at home and you were doing this or doing that. You could you couldn't even be a teacher you know back then. And so now this generation that's coming up and that's that's already in the workforce to s to a large degree, but they have choices. They can say, Okay, yeah, I I I like this company, I don't like that company. I you know, I'd rather go to that nonprofit. I like their ideals are aligned to what I'd like

to do and what I believe in. Or I'm just gonna go out on my own. I know, you know, Carol is is opening up her own firm. I'm gonna go head over there and work for her. It's just a three person sort of outfit, but I'm gonna learn a lot, etc. So they have choice and and by the way, how many of us had ever heard of an influencer back in the day, right? We just didn't hear about a lot of these things. They just weren't prevalent. So they have choices. And so for corporations

Global corporations, the war for talent is real. It's very, very real. And so you know, what I would tell young black women is know your value, know your worth, know what skills and capabilities and experience that you have that are gonna add value to that organization. And then when when you decide that pick the right organization that's right for you for the time that you are in, and then

you know, go into that organization. And just like you said, Aaron, if it's not working out, then you have choices. You can go to another organization, you can go out on your own. But experience is really, really important. The more life experiences and professional experiences that you can get in the variety of different avenues and venues and organizations, the better off you'll be to chart your own path in the future.

Erin Braxton (09:32)

Absolutely. Tell us, you know, you know, more about how to find that organization that you feel like is a cultural fit. Yeah.

Celeste Warren (09:42)

So one of the things that we talk about looking at the board of directors so you in all this information this information is online. Looking at your their board of directors, what do they look like? Do you see anyone that looks like you? Mm. Do you and then even beyond that, the people that don't look like you, where are they from? What are some of their accomplishments in the organizations that they came from? Mm. Another thing,

know, I talked about the philanthropic, where do they spend their money? 'Cause you put your money where your mouth is, right? where do they contribute to a better society? What are those things that they can that they do? And then another thing too, when you look at their business and their financials

They're customers.

Do they just appeal to a certain demographic? Or do they reach out across a a a a variety of customer segmentation, variety of of identities in their customers to understand what's getting in the way of them being able to enjoy their product or their service? So they going into different communities and what are they doing? How are they how are they doing that outreach? or just a a few things too, because it's so it's not just the

ESG and philanthropic philanthropic, but in their business, how do they fundamentally look at their customer base? And and are they really making sure that everybody can experience their products? Or do do they just, you know, really just focus on a certain majority population? Mm-hmm. and then like I said, really important to to sort of as best you can

lift up the hood a little bit and see what's in there as far as the engine. And the best way to do that is to talk to people who know people who work in that organization. Either did work in it now, you know, or have in the past, because they can tell you and give you insights. And and talk don't touch talk to one person. Talk to several people because one person's experience may not be another person's experience.

And so those are just a few of the things that I that I would say do. And it and if you get an interview and you go in, listen to what they're saying. And when they ask you at the end of the interview, any questions that you have for me, have your questions ready. Ask them about the culture. Ask them about representation. Ask them about where they their philanthropic ac activities. ask them what type of a management style do they do they have.

you know, ask all of those questions because you want to understand is this the right place for me, or am I going to have to assimilate or act in a certain way that isn't really me? And that's really important because you're there too many hours to be acting like somebody else. Right. You'll be exhausted at the end of the day.

Erin Braxton (12:53)

You need to shift your mindset from tactical, task-oriented execution to value thinking when it comes to what it is you do for a living. A lot of us are very drilled into I do this, this, and this. These are the things that I do. Because remember, I've talked about this, you're at work.

This is the bubble, and your job and what you do is inside of the bubble. Mind you, that bubble, that job, was created without you in mind. But because you've worked that job, because you have experience, you know more than just the tasks. What you bring to the table is more than just task, task, task, task. Right? So

You need to switch or shift into what value it is you bring. This is relevant whether or not you're gonna get another job. This is relevant if you're gonna go at it alone, but you need to know the value that you bring to anything that it is you're going to be doing because the money lies in the value. Tasks are just tasks. The job was created to get tasks completed.

Not with you in mind, not with what you bring to the table. All right. A real good way to help you figure out the value of what it is you do is to use AI. I'm telling you, I I talk to Claude, I talk to ChatGPT. And when I say talk to, I I talk on my phone. So I have the app on my phone, I open the chat, I tap the mic, and I talk to it.

And plain language. You don't need to know like special prompts, special way to say it. Talk the way you talk and just keep talking to it to get what you need to get out of it. You know, people will tell you, well, I don't know how to ask it this. I I don't know what to say. Just talk to it like you would talk to me, like you would talk to your friends, and and talk about.

The tasks that you do at work. Ask it. Say, I want to figure out the value I provide as opposed to just telling somebody the tasks that I perform. Okay. Tell it. I just want to know the value I provide. So I'm going to give you what it is I do on my job every day. I'm going to give you the tasks. I'm going to give you my job description. I'm going to tell you what I do, what I perform, how I do it. And

I want you to help me come up with some value that I bring to a job. Just just use AI and you will be s amazed. For me, I know that I can build a website. What you need to sell something, you need to sell your products, you need to sell digital products, tangible products. you're selling your courses. you need a membership. You need this, you need that. I can do all of that.

All right. But what I was able to do when I used AI to help me kind of expound and and figure out what the true value is of what I was doing was determined that no, Aaron, you don't just do these tasks, but you're able to bring value. Why? Because you can save an organization money by eliminating bottlenecks. You can save an organization time. You can

Create more efficiency in an organization. You can marry and merge systems together to make processes more simple. Do you see what I'm saying? So tasks, value. We can be so close to it and we can downplay it so much because we have been conditioned to do so that we don't understand how.

Amazing we are. We don't realize the scale and the level of brilliance that we bring to the table. That's all I'm trying to get you guys to understand. Black women have been treated in such a way and handled in such a way, and we've talked about this that they discount you. So we don't, we don't say, look at me, I'm I'm I did this amazing thing, you know? And again,

We're there for a reason, but we need to understand how important it is for us to be there. And when when it's not being shown us how important it is for us to be there, we need to take our value and ourselves and walk over to the place that does value what we do, that does appreciate what we bring to the table.

Natasha Williams (18:09)

I think that a lot of us black people, we have a scarcity mindset. And one of the things I always tell my children is that the thing is that we need to focus on ourselves because these people are learning from you. All those people hanging out in your booth from Victoria's Secret, they're coming to find out what the hell is going on. What is Erin doing? Yeah.

And we don't think of ourselves like that. We think, do you know what? I need to fit into that space. No, they want to know what's going on with you. My father-in-law used to say to me all the time, the only reason why you should go to work, Natasha, is to find out what the hell is going on in that place and get the fuck out. Yeah. Just find out how it works. Use their systems.

and get out and do your own thing. And I find that so many of us are so scared of just getting out and do those things. My brothers and sisters, most of them work for the government. And I see what's happening in America with all the layoffs because we were told go and work for the government, go and work for, go and get a council job, go and get a civil service job.

because those are the safe jobs. And now think everyone's looking around like, my God, those jobs are going. What are we going to do? I've always been of the notion to just build your skills from when you're young. Cause I started my first business when I was about 17 years old. All of a sudden I'm an IT networker, installing networks into people's houses. Cause I taught myself.

Yeah, yeah, everyone was like, you're crazy. You're absolutely crazy. But I used to work two days a week and I did it for 10 years. Two days a week. All of my brothers and sisters were like, no, just get a steady job, steady pension, steady, steady. There's something wrong with you. We always knew as you were growing up, there's something wrong with you. They've all said it because I'm saying I'm striking out on my own. I encourage my children to do the same.

One is at university, my daughter's at university right now. I'm helping her set up her own clothing line. She has been stylish from day one, so do that. I'm not even into fashion, but you know. Learn the business skills. I say to them, learn the business skills, get the right type of support around you. Find out what you can get from university or your networks and get it done.

Erin Braxton (21:02)

Okay, I propose this. You're on a job, you're getting a paycheck, you may might think your job is you. It defines you, right? Because you're you thought, you know, I got this job, this is where I'm gonna be, and I'm gonna make this money, and you know, I can work to get moved up. And all of your confidence is rooted in that position, right? Until they they they don't respond to you the way you thought they were gonna respond to you. That

can only get to you if you're putting all of your eggs in this basket, if your confidence is based on what these people think of you. If your confidence is based on the v the validation of your coworkers, of your supervisors or whatever, that's false confidence. That's a false sense of confidence. If you're over here and you're in motion, building, doing your thing,

Then that doesn't affect you so much. What do I mean by being in motion? Confidence to me is not about, you know, I speak confidently, I stand straight, I, you know, I do all these things because I'm a confident person, right? Confidence comes from actually doing something. And once you do that thing, or try to do that thing, or or or or just a little nudge, right? You start to.

You start to gain the proof that you're able to do that thing. Okay. So when I say you're in motion, you're over here doing your own thing outside of work, right? Like say, I have this side hustle that I'm doing, right? And I'm just gonna try. I'm just gonna try. And you start working on the side hustle like a little bit at a at a time, and you're in motion, you're in motion, you're in motion. And then you have a little win, right? Okay, proof that, okay, the side hustle.

actually worked a little bit. I made a little money off of the side hustle. So you keep going. You're moving. You're moving. You're in motion. You're in motion. And then you make more money. And then you make more money. And then you make more money. Okay. So you're building your confidence in that thing. And even though at your day job they might not be validating you, who cares? Because you're over here working on something else. You're in motion.

What if you're in motion over here and you're not working on a side hustle? You decide, you know what? I got a few extra thousand dollars. I'm just gonna start to learn how to trade. I'm gonna get into trading. I'm gonna start swing trading, or I'm gonna start, you know, doing some kind of trading. There's so many different types of trading, but just suppose you're gonna start doing that and leveling up your finances. You learn.

You take a course, you get with some some guru trader. All of a sudden, you've turned that $2,000 into $4,000. And you've turned that $4,000 into $8,000. And so it goes. So you're building your confidence. You're in motion. You're not just sitting around waiting on this paycheck. You're doing something. And what did I say before? That there's nothing that gives you more confidence than having money in the bank, right? So these people.

That you're relying on that are chipping away at your confidence all the time in

speaker-1 (24:37)

Getting

Erin Braxton (24:37)

your head. They can't get into your head, really, because you've got shit going on over here. You don't care about that bullshit over there because you're working on some shit over here. You're building your finances. Maybe your motion over there, you're moving, you're moving, you're working on your resume. Maybe your motion is you're moving and moving and moving and you're working on networking.

You're working on things. You're constantly doing something. You're moving and moving and moving. And you're working on your relationships over here, personal relationships. And they're so strong that you just, you know, you realize that this is just a job. This doesn't define who you are. And the love and attention and and all of that that you get from your friends and your family and your loved ones. That's the motion that makes you happy. And fuck those people, right?

Motion can be anything, guys, is what I'm saying. What happens when we're on these jobs and we get this false sense of confidence when they give us this title? What does that title mean? When they promote somebody to some middle management supervisor role and they didn't promote you, who cares? Okay, those people are tied to that thing, right? And all of their validation and everything is tied into that job.

And I promise you, if the floor drops out from beneath them and they lose that job today, you're gonna be better prepared because you've been over here in motion, doing your own shit, doing your own thing. So it doesn't matter. When you have other things going on, you have less time to worry about that stuff. This might be just a means to an end. This is temporary, right? Don't look at the job as a forever thing.

We look at it like we've arrived. This is it. This is gonna carry us through to retirement. It is not. What do you want? So probably over the last fifteen years, I have really started to fuse this question into my coachings, again, speaking, just in general conversations. And if I had to guess at how many people couldn't give me a clear answer, I'd say about 95%. So okay, I'm sorry, go keep going. No, no, no. I was just gonna say

They can't clearly articulate this is what I want w out of my work. And I'm talking about work, you know, your vocation or whatever. And I always think if you don't know what you want, then how would you recognize it when you see it? Or how do you know where to put your efforts so that you get it? So what I have found most people out here, they're reactive, they're very tactical about their career, they're not strategic at all.

And I'm going, this is why you're not getting what you want, because you're just, well, you know, they offer me the job and they're gonna pay me a little more money, so I took it. And I tell people, most of my corporate career I did recruiting. I was a recruiting leader. And I know how to pimp you. I come to you with a little bit larger title. That's the reality. That's how pimp. I give

Pamela Buchanan M.D. (27:43)

Yeah, yeah.

Erin Braxton (27:44)

you a little bit larger title. Uh-huh. I offer you more money. And the overwhelming majority of people will fight to take it.

And they never stop and ask, is this in alignment with what I want? So they keep taking assignment after assignment like that. And then they look up fifteen, twenty, twenty five, thirty years down the road and they're miserable or what I call their bored, burned out, or frustrated. And I'm going, Well, let's talk about why. You've

speaker-1 (28:12)

Mm.

Erin Braxton (28:13)

been going down a path that wasn't even what you wanted. What we need to do is we need to look at you.

Because what most people don't do is slow down enough to really examine themselves. What works for me? What doesn't work for me? What am I good at? What am I not good at? And the exercises through s a number of them, I'm asking questions. Cause I'm getting a lot of times I'm taking them back. Because what I have seen over the years is oftentimes what people end up wanting to do was either something they wanted to do in high school or college.

Or they were doing it in their early career. But what happened, they started doing it. Either it didn't pay enough money then, so they switched. Or I met this cute guy. and we fell in love. we got married. we got two kids. we just bought a house. Well, now we gotta relocate. And so life starts happening. And they get further and further and further away from what it was they really wanted to the point where either they have forgotten.

Because they haven't thought about it in so long or they never took the time to answer the question. If you're giving somebody access to you twenty-four seven, that prevents you from doing a lot of the shit that you need to get done. To your clients, to your job, it's just like the mall. The mall closes at nine. You can't go to the mall at midnight. It is understood that you work from this hour to this hour. Unless it's an emergency, they shouldn't have access to you. If

Somebody at your job or your client or somebody has access to you outside of those hours, it's because you've given them access to you. You haven't taught them that you don't respond outside of business hours. You know, when you are a single woman and you don't have children, a lot of times, and I've had this experience and I've said this, people will feel like they have access to your free time because why not? You don't have a man, you don't have kids, you can't.

leave because you want to leave. You can leave when you have children to go pick up from daycare. That's acceptable. But if you you just want to leave because you're tired and you want to leave, it's less accepted. All right. So people have all sorts of reasons for feeling like they should have access to you. But it's up to you to nip that shit in the butt so that they know this is what I'm about. This is how I work. This is when I work. All right.

Now, if you work in a different type of environment, which we'll talk about later, that's another story. But from the onset, from the beginning of the relationship, you need to establish that. Do not engage outside of business hours. If it is expected because they have made that requirement clear to you prior to coming on board or working with them, or you know, they're extenuating circumstances, that's a different story. But if you make yourself available to

people and you're not consistent, they will continue to trample over your your boundaries when it comes to accessing your time. Not being available 247 is a way to protect your health, your mind, just your well-being. It's not just about I just don't want to be available. You need your own time to refresh, reboot, restart, get away from the job.

Pamela Buchanan M.D. (31:37)

You that pandemic took a lot out of me. Here's h here's here's the perspective. when you work in an ER and the the one I work, you know, maybe once every few months I'll pronounce somebody dead, and it will affect me, you know. But think about I'll have one shift during the pandemic where five people die. That was probably one of the worst shifts. Yeah. And so you're processing that you and when somebody dies, the way I process it and the way I think about it, I wonder.

Did I do everything I could do? Mm-hmm. Okay, was this my fault? Did I remember? And I go through the whole thing. Did I remember to do all the things? And during COVID, it was so fast. It's like, you know, did I remember? And, you know, then you go back Monday night quarterbacking, going like, they changed the the guidelines now. And if I would have done what they said, it you know, all these things. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Emotionally taxing.

And I was I got burnt out.

And I was like, I'd rather do anything. I really was looking at buying a Chick-fil-A. I would rather make chicken sandwiches all day. Right. Right. Until I thought I did I couldn't make enough money out of Chick-fil-A. But I to to sustain my lifestyle. And then I bought another franchise, a mental health franchise. And I thought that was gonna be the answer. That thing almost bankrupted me because that's when I learned how insurance sucked. And how, you know, it the the sh at one point one of the insurance companies was two hundred thousand dollars in arrears with me. So like

They owe me that from services rendered by the people who I employed. And so I'm having to cover payroll without getting paid. Yeah. So then I realized that wasn't gonna be it. So, you know, am I really an entrepreneur? Can I do it? I had to get out of that situation. but that situation brought me to doing a TEDx. I did a TEDx because the marketer who worked with the franchise said you'd be really good at that. I never thought about it. I did that TEDx. It went over well and people were like, You should be speaking. Mm-hmm. And then I said, Okay, let me figure this out.

And so right after that I began to figure it out. I got a speaking coach. I invested in you know, learning what you need to be a speaker, get in a guide, and I think that's the number one mistake people make, they don't get somebody to show them the way. and then I learned how do you even go about getting speaking geeks? And then once you speak, people ask, Do you consult? And I'm like, What is that? 'Cause 'cause all consulting is is long form speaking or a workshop, you know. Just drawing it out and making a framework. So I figured that out too.

And before you know it, it's a full blown business. And what I did was I reverse engineered. I was like, you know, if I'm gonna make enough money to replace my income as a doctor, what will it take? 'Cause I started to see, you know, once you start speaking, how much are these people paying? So when you do virtual talks, they pay two or three thousand dollars. I'm like, two or three thousand dollars to sit down and talk with you like I'm talking with you for an hour, I'll take it. Yeah. And then because I'd done the TEDx, I found out that the floor for my

long form like keynote speeches was like ten thousand. Mm-hmm. And so I got a few of those. And as you get better and as you get high remarks, you can raise your prices. And before you know it, I was like this is replacing my income and the average ER doctor makes, you know, at least three or four hundred thousand a year. And from there, you just keep growing. As you as you meet a certain level in the one thing, then you meet people. You get in this room, you get in that room. It's a process.

And so I I had the pleasure of getting to the room with these other physicians, a room I would have never been in had I not started climbing in these different circles. And they were like, you know, we have this group and to be in this group it was expensive, forty thousand dollars. I was afraid to join it, but I joined it. These people, it blew my mind. They teach how to make non clinical income through digital tech consulting. And that would be that was the the unlocking of the key that makes this my first seven figure year.

Wow. And so and so just that is is how it goes. And and it's like it's a process. And people will tell you all the glory about, I wanted this. But nobody talks about the losses. Because here's the thing. If you're an entrepreneur, you will lose way more than you win. Absolutely. You you will lose you will lose a lot and you might lose everything before you win. You know. I I don't think you know, the commander in chief is a good example, but he's had a lot of bankruptcies. He's had mo

He's had mostly losses. But that's a different whole breed because he's got the complexion for the connection. You know what I mean? Yep, yep, yep. But but for us regular folks, you will have like for instance, my process for getting conferences, sending out cold emails and LinkedIn requests, I probably get a hundred no's or a hundred no responses. And this month, you know, that but that's the cadence. I commit to sending those out. Because it's a numbers game. And this month, it's like

Things come home to roost. Where, you know, one week in this one last week, three speaking engagements, and I think the total is gonna be around thirty thousand for all of those combined. Yeah, yeah. And and and a workshop and a Forbes somebody wrote me up in a Forbes article. And that's that's just all from being consistent on LinkedIn. I feel like LinkedIn is the best place to grow on a social media platform if you're doing a business.

Also it's not as social media yeah driven as the other ones because I don't enjoy social media. I actually hate it. And so that's that's my entrepreneurial journey. I just would say my my my thought process is I think that you should not depend on the job. I think we all should have some type of side hustle. Right? So so 'cause you see how they drop these three hundred thousand.

Erin Braxton (37:18)

The second shift is you're gonna shift from silence to strategic visibility. Okay, silence, you're shifting to strategic visibility. Now we talked about LinkedIn. A lot of people are hesitant to get on LinkedIn because they feel like if they're more visible, their job is gonna know they're looking for another position elsewhere.

Or they can't talk about what it is they want to do other than their job. Let me read a comment that we got, and I think a lot of you guys will probably relate to it. Someone writes, I would love to go on LinkedIn for my side hustle, but I do not want my current workplace to know what I am doing yet. I feel like I am cutting off a really helpful avenue. I get it. I get it. And strategically,

one would be a little silly to go on to LinkedIn and tout another business or talk about something else they're working on when they still have another job. It just depends on the job that you have. You know, I know some people's jobs know what it is they're doing and they don't care, but you know where you work. So if this is for you, this is a sis if this is your situation, this is what I want you to do.

I don't want you to shy away from LinkedIn. You still need to utilize LinkedIn for everything it can do for you, but you don't necessarily need to talk about your private LLC page or some private business that you're trying to start. The goal of LinkedIn or putting yourself out there is to make contacts so people can become aware of who you are.

So say you work for Acme Financial Services and you have a LinkedIn profile, there's nothing wrong with you going out there and talking about financial services, things that aren't confidential, things that you're okay to discuss, things that show the way you think, how you think, show your brilliance, show how you solve problems. There's no there's nothing wrong with that.

Hell, your your company, Acme Financial Services, probably has a LinkedIn page. They're putting out articles, they're putting out news, they're putting out posts, and you're to do the same thing. Strategically, though, you're gonna be talking about the company in which you work. Maybe not, maybe around the subject matter to show that you're an expert in your thinking. You make the contacts, you leave the company.

You still have the contacts. The contacts don't go away just because you left. So, yeah, maybe you're not making the exact contacts for your new business that you want to do. Or maybe you want to go at it alone and do the same sort of thing, but you just want to do it for somebody else, or you just want to do it for yourself. You're still making contacts. You don't lose those contacts just because you left that job. Be strategic about that thing.

Okay, be smart about it. But I would I would encourage you to utilize LinkedIn or whatever platform if you want to. You have to be careful on some of these social platforms because you know they're watching you. But if it's for business, just talk about what you're currently doing. Make connections. Because what you don't want to have happen is you don't want to leave your job or get laid off, let go, whatever.

And you're just behind. You have no connections. You don't want to start when you need the connections. You want to start that now. You want to make that shift now. Silence, strategic visibility. Don't wait on that. Okay. It's it's it's imperative because there's nothing like needing work, needing to connect, needing a job, and you don't have any connections. You haven't been doing shit for the last, you know, how many of our years you've had this job.

And now you're out here in limbo because you haven't done anything. So, guys, that was it. Those were some of the really strong moments and and and advice that we've we've heard on the podcast. Some come from me, some come from my guests, but I think we've had some amazing conversations. Again, the links to the episodes are below. If you haven't seen them already, you should check them out in full.

Because if I've highlighted them here on the summer rewind, they are worth a watch in full. Thank you so much for watching. We've got one more summer re rewind coming, and then I am back with new episodes in September. So thank you, thank you, thank you so much for for holding it down while I am off and and coming up with new amazing content for you guys, new episodes and crafting more for the coffee no cream community.

And I will see you in the next video.