Jamie Lee: (00:01)
Welcome to negotiate your career growth. I'm Jamie Lee and I teach you how to blend the best of negotiation strategies with feminist coaching. So you get promoted and better paid without burning bridges or burning out in the process. Let's get started.
Jamie Lee: (00:15)
Hello, welcome to episode one of negotiate your career podcast. Here's my intention for this podcast. And before I go there, let me tell you a little bit about myself. I'm a big fan of self-help books, personal development content, the things that walk you through step by step on how to do new things, or how to think differently about doing certain things that you so that you actually do take new action that creates a new result for you in your life, in your career. And that is my intention for this podcast that you wouldn't just passively consume this information, but that you would take action. Test the tips and the strategies that I offer here. Test them out for yourself. See what happens. See if they help you get bolder, braver and better paid, because that is what this is all about. And for that reason, I want to share with you a little bit about who I am, why you should listen, tell you about my core coaching philosophy, which is that self advocacy is an act of service and some actionable tips for you to test out.
Jamie Lee: (01:27)
So let's get started. I am an executive coach for smart women who hate office politics. I help them get promoted and better paid without throwing anyone under the bus. And people ask me, Jamie, how'd you get started in doing something like that. And I have two answers. Number one, I feel like I have had a lifetime training in this. And number two, there was this one sentence that I heard 11 years ago that changed everything for me and got me in this journey. So let's start with the lifetime training. I am a south Korean immigrant. I came to United States with my mom, my two other sisters, uh, 33 years ago, I was seven years old. So you can do the math. I'm 40 years old now. And long story short. When we came to America, my mom ended up raising the three of us, three daughters, all by herself as a single parent who even now, still today speaks broken English.
Jamie Lee: (02:32)
And throughout my childhood, when I was a latchkey immigrant kid, growing up in New Jersey, my mom was telling me, Jamie, you gotta speak up. You gotta be brave. You gotta ask for what you want. And I would roll my eyes to the high heavens and I'm like, no, mom, I just wanna get along. I just wanna be liked. I don't wanna be called a, B I T C H. I would resist my mother's coaching. It wasn't until I got into the working world and found out she was absolutely right. I found out early in my career that I was making about half of what people normally make in this role. At that time I was working in finance and I was, I found out I was making 50% of the going market range. And I realized my mom was right. I have to speak up.
Jamie Lee: (03:27)
I have to be brave. I have to ask for what I want. And so, in a sense, that realization help me become my mother . I now encourage all of my clients. I'm encouraging you to speak up, be brave, ask for what you want. Because as Chester Karrass once said, you don't get what you deserve. You get what you ask for. And I think that was the intention. That was what my mom was trying to teach me from a very young age. You don't get what you deserve. You get what you ask for. You have to negotiate for what you want. And then there was this one sentence that I heard 11 years ago, that changed everything. So after I found out that I was making about half of going market range in that finance job, I later pivoted my career and I started working for tech startups here in New York city and I was eager to make new friends.
Jamie Lee: (04:28)
So one night I invited bunch of my working girlfriends over to my place for cocktails and per usual, one friend was complaining about her boyfriend. He's not treating her the way she wants to be treated. Another girlfriend was complaining about her work. She felt underappreciated. She felt like, you know, she wasn't getting paid what she was worth, but at the same time she felt, oh, it's just so much work to get a new job. And a third friend, somebody that I look up to, somebody who became a very successful entrepreneur, uh, very ambitious driven career woman. She turns to the friend who is complaining about her work. And she says, you know, if you ask, well, there's always room in the budget for more. She said, if you ask, well, there's always room in the budget for more. That was a big light bulb moment for me, I had an aha moment.
Jamie Lee: (05:29)
It was in that moment. I knew in my bones that she was absolutely right. If you know how to ask, well, there's always room in the budget for more. It always seemed like there were some people who knew how to say the right things to advance their career, even if they weren't the highest performing, even if they weren't the hardest working. And that was the secret, they just knew how to ask well. And I knew in that moment that this, this was the conversation I wanted to be part of. I wanted to be part of fostering the conversation, helping women get equipped with the skill to asking better the skill to asking more effectively so that they can get promoted, get better paid without burning out in the process. From there, I started organizing meetups organizing workshops because I realized the part of the problem is that we just don't have as much practice.
Jamie Lee: (06:29)
Women just have not been socialized to negotiate, to, to actively engage in conversations that drive their career forward. And so I thought, well, what can I do? I can just create some safe space, uh, for women to come together and practice asking for what they want. And so that's how I got started. And from there, I got really interested in learning more about mutual benefit negotiation, leadership, communication coaching, and the more I studied, the more passionate I became about teaching these skills to as many women as possible. And once I started, uh, organizing these workshops and learning about it, I started getting invited to speak and train working women at amazing organizations. And you could come check out my website, JamieLeecoach.com/results to read about the organizations I have worked with and the individual clients I have worked with. And in this process, I realized that self-advocacy when you ask, well, you create more room in the budget because it is an act of service.
Jamie Lee: (07:44)
Self-advocacy when done well is an act of service. Because when you speak up for you, when you set boundaries, when you say no to the things you really don't wanna do, and you say yes, only to the things you truly want to do. And when you align your growth with the goals of the company, with the interests of your employer, you help them help you. And what serves you in your career and in your growth serves others. Because when you are set up for success, you help create more success for others, right? When you are set up for success, you help create more success for others. And that is why self-advocacy is an act of service. In other words, when my friend said, when you ask, well, there's always room in the budget for more it's because asking well means you are addressing what's most important to the other side.
Jamie Lee: (08:41)
You're asking in a smart way, in a smart and savvy way and asking, well means you are telling them your employer or potential employer how you getting what you want helps them get what they want. But when I teach this concept to my client at first, they're almost incredulous. They look at me wide eyed. They're like, what, what is this crazy concept? That self-advocacy is an act of service. And that makes sense, because as people who are socialized as women, we have been taught, we have been programmed to deprioritize ourselves, to think of serving our needs as somehow selfish and somehow being selfish. This way is bad. Something that we shouldn't do, and that we should always discount ourselves, meaning discount our value, discount the value that we're bringing, discount how much potential we have to add value and help drive the needs of our organization.
Jamie Lee: (09:53)
Employer to somehow think that our work is, um, the good things that we're able to accomplish through our work sort of fell into our lap, or it was because other circumstances, because other people not because our, because of our intuition, our intellects, and our dedication. And I think this is especially true for people of marginalized identities, people of color. We have been taught to think that we don't have value and that we have to keep proving ourselves to be safe, to be like, okay, to be seen as acceptable. I used to think that I have to exceed expectations, be better than perfect, just to be like, okay, just for people to be like, oh, she can stay. And so when we're in that mindset, we don't see self-advocacy as an act of service, we might consider self-advocacy as almost something dangerous because we risk our reputation. We risk the relationship. We risk being okay. Being accepted as if we're not in control of our careers as if we're not the ones creating the value. So in other words, what I'm saying is that we end up becoming biased against ourselves against the value against the potential that we have from that place. We think, oh, I shouldn't make waves. I shouldn't rock the boat. I should be grateful. I shouldn't be selfish. I shouldn't speak up because if I do they'll think I'm being aggressive difficult, or they won't like me.
Jamie Lee: (11:38)
So from that place, what so many of us do is we end up overcommitting overworking under communicating our wants and wins. In other words, we don't advocate for ourselves, which results in not getting promoted or getting passed over for promotions, or Underearning your potential and burning out in the process. And sometimes I've, I've had this happen in my career and I've seen this happen for other women, too. What happens is that we end up burning bridges because we're just so fed up. We're just so resentful that we didn't get acknowledged while doing hard work overworking. Overcommitting I've so been there, let's just pause and notice that thinking self-advocacy is selfish and something that you shouldn't do is, uh, an effect of patriarchal conditioning, but also thinking self-advocacy is selfish is something I shouldn't do leads to doing disservice to yourself. And when you do disservice to yourself, this serves no one.
Jamie Lee: (12:47)
I hope I have sufficiently dissuaded you from thinking about self-advocacy as something that is selfish, something that you shouldn't do to sure. Self-advocacy may be selfish, but it could also be an act of service because when you serve yourself, you set yourself up for success. And when you're set up for success, you help create bigger success for you, your team, your organization, your loved ones, people that matter your desire matters. Your voice matters. Your time, energy and focus absolutely matters because that is the engine that creates more value in your career. That creates more value for your employer. So before I talk about three specific examples of how you can implement this in your career, I think you gotta get clear on two specific things because you matter, right, what we're doing here is we are unwinding patriarchy in our brain. We are unbias ourselves, so that we're not thinking against ourselves, we're thinking for ourselves.
Jamie Lee: (13:56)
And in order to do that, we have to get clear on what we want and why. And number two, we wanna get clear on what is most important to the decision makers, to the organization as a whole. You wanna get curious, listen, and find out so that you can ask really well. Remember, my friend said, when you ask, well, there's always room in the budget for more. Your self-advocacy is an act of service. When you do these three things, number one, get clear and say no with grace. Number two, tell them how your promotion, your growth helped propelled the growth of the organization. And number three, showcase your win. So let me give you some specific examples. Number one, say no with grace. I was coaching this client last week, who, who was thinking about a major career change. When I asked her, why do you wanna make this change?
Jamie Lee: (14:58)
She said, she's really afraid of burning out where she is. So I asked her, why are you afraid of burning out where you are? You are already on a promotion track, what's wrong? And it turned out that she wasn't saying no to extra requests requests from her manager for more time, more attention, more project work that she was not enjoying. So I coached her to, okay, of course you can pursue the growth you want. It's your decision to make. But I think right now you are not recognizing that self-advocacy speaking of for you and saying no is an act of service. It is actually disservice to not tell your boss that you are doing work, that you don't want to be doing. What you can be telling her is, Hey, I appreciate you reaching out and thinking of me for these projects. I appreciate you thinking that I can do all of this, but the truth of the matter is my plate is full.
Jamie Lee: (16:02)
I'd be happy to revisit this. Or we can have a conversation right now about priorities. Let's, let's think through what is most important. So I know what to tackle first. And I like to let you know, I like to have a discussion with you about exactly the kind of projects I want to be assigned to and projects. I'd rather not, because I think that's gonna help make this more fruitful, more productive for both sides. So when she does that, she's going to be speaking up for herself. She's gonna be setting boundaries. She's gonna be protecting her time, energy, and focus, and she's gonna be managing up really well. She's gonna help the manager become an even more effective manager. She's gonna help the manager help her. So that's number one, get clear on what you want. Say no with grace, stop. Overcommitting stop overworking because that's not serving anyone.
Jamie Lee: (17:02)
Okay. Number two, tell them how, what you want. Your growth helps them achieve their growth. So this is, I did this with another client who wants to get promoted inside a media company, and she was preparing for her performance review. So here's what we did. We made a list of the reasons why she's a great candidate for that promotion to senior directorship. Uh, I'm just gonna make stuff up right now on the spot. Let's say you are also gunning for a promotion. I want you to sit down and make a list of why you are a great candidate for that promotion. Maybe it's strategic initiatives that you have in mind that you are leading and that you want to do as senior director or VP. It's because of your leadership skills because of your communication skills. And maybe also, because of expertise you have in your specific domain.
Jamie Lee: (17:59)
I have another client who is a subject matter expert in, um, AI, right? So that's another reason why she's a great candidate for the VP role. Okay? Now that you have made a list of why you are a great candidate for that promotion, I want you to now go back to the list and brainstorm how each of these things addresses the top concerns of your organization. How does your strategic initiative help the company achieve its revenue targets? How are your leadership skills going to come into play to help reduce overhead costs or increase productivity within the team? How is it going? How is your expertise in the subject matter? Whether it's AI or branding, marketing, whatever, how is it going to help drive the number one priority of your company right now, make that list. Think about how your boss is going to need to deliver this to their boss, right?
Jamie Lee: (19:05)
To the decision makers and make sure you think it through and come prepare to address those specific talking points. When you do this well, my clients have their bosses thanking them, and you can do this too. And all it takes is just some extra preparation time thinking through what am I offering and why does it matter for the goals and the priorities of decision makers or the organization as a whole, your bosses will be like, thank you. This is helpful. I'm so grateful that you did this work. You have made my job easier. I can go to bat for you. I know what you want. I know how to advocate on your behalf to my manager. Thank you. Your self-advocacy is an act of service. Okay? Number three, showcase your wins consistently. When we think self-advocacy is selfish and something we shouldn't do. We also look down and judge talking about our wins and we judge it as bragging and it's arrogant.
Jamie Lee: (20:14)
It's something we shouldn't do. It's oh, bad. I used to think this way. And then I noticed that people who were speaking up and showcasing their wins sharing their wins and successes were getting noticed, were getting shortlisted for promotions and getting ahead faster, right? Keeping your head down and doing good work is not enough because unless you showcase those wins and you tell them how your win is helping to drive the number one priority of your organization, or what's most important to your decision maker, unless you're making that connection and making it really explicit to them, they're just gonna be busy doing their work. They're just gonna the decision makers, the man managers, they're just gonna be occupied with, with looking good to their managers, right? They're they're not gonna notice the great work you do, unless you bring it to their attention. One of my clients is an engineer.
Jamie Lee: (21:14)
She used to be the only engineer in an all male engineering group. And she encountered this bias, not just from herself, but from her manager, thinking that she wasn't technical enough. And when she really thought about it, she realized no, actually my technical skills are up to snuff. I think it's more likely that he has some unconscious bias because he's not used to seeing a woman have technical skills. He's not used to thinking about women being technically adept. And so with this in mind, we came up with a strategy of like, we're just going to consistently and persistently showcase our technical wins. And we are going to do this by telling our boss, telling, sharing with the team, maybe in a public slack channel or in, uh, a weekly standup, Hey, this is the technical solution I came up with. And this isn't just about me.
Jamie Lee: (22:19)
This isn't just about me tooting my horn. No, I'm sharing this with you because this achievement, this solution is going to help us achieve the priority of getting our projects completed on time. Okay? So here's the framework. I'm just gonna repeat it. Here's what I'm showcasing. I did X and this will help us, the organization, the team achieve our priority of Y uh, let me give you another example. One of my clients, uh, I mentioned earlier works in AI. So she is sharing her insights in the quarterly business review that goes out to the entire organization of thousands of people. So what she's doing is, Hey, this is the solution. These are the, these are the, um, applications that we are working on. And this is how it's going to impact the business results. This is how it's going to drive revenue growth, right? So again, self-advocacy showcasing your wins is an act of service because now more people get to learn about you and the work that you do, the value you are adding and how it is driving company, goal goals.
Jamie Lee: (23:43)
And this helps decision makers make better decisions. This helps people who are around you and who are learning about the work. You do become more aware, become more knowledgeable about what is possible, what solutions are being worked on. Okay. So let's recap. You don't get what you deserve. You get what you ask for. And when you ask, well, there is always room in the budget for more, the best way to ask well is to see your self-advocacy as an act of service. When my clients implement this philosophy, they start looking forward or they reduce their anxiety. They feel less nervous. They're less afraid that what they're asking for is selfish and greedy. They're they're like, yeah, this is a no brainer. I look forward to having this conversation with my boss. I look forward to better understanding how I can serve the priorities of the organization and advance my career growth.
Jamie Lee: (24:46)
And my clients get promoted. They get better paid and they get thanked by their bosses by speaking up and advocating for their growth. This is possible for you too. My wish is that you would test out these strategies, the communication framework that I shared with you on this podcast, put them into action. And let me know how it goes. Come check out. Jamie Lee, coach.com. I have a freebie, ebook where I teach you how to ask for a pay raise using this framework. And I would also appreciate it, if you would leave a five star review, I look forward to speaking with you again very soon.