Salary Negotiation for Job Seekers with Emily K. Frank

Jamie Lee  0:00  
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. You're invited to join me at leadership lab for women of the global majority. But before I tell you more about that, let me tell you a quick story. Over the weekend, I got up super early like 545 to do an early morning hike along the Palisades, which is a clifftop Park in New Jersey. I live in New York City, I'm on the east side of the Hudson River. And on the west side of the same river is the Palisades in New Jersey. So I got up around, like I said, 545, and got on the subway rode it for like an hour to go to George Washington Bridge, which is the bridge that connects York to New Jersey, right by the Palisades. So it's Saturday morning, I'm on the subway platform, I'm kind of sleepy. And I'm just noticing that at 7am on Saturday, basically, everyone, except for the three of us crazy lunatic, runners and hikers who got up early to go to a trail run except for the three of us, everyone else around us, our bodies of color, brown, or black people, working immigrants. And in that moment, I had a jolt of recognition. I recognize I realized that some of those folks could have easily been my mom and my dad. South Korean immigrants who used to commute seven days a week to run a gift shop in Queens when I was a latchkey kid in New Jersey, and I was confronted with my own privilege is a light skinned Asian is an executive coach who works with knowledge workers, finance managers, MDs, PhDs, and I do it from the comfort of my home office. So I don't even have to commute. And as the daughter of immigrants who worked their fingers to the bone, so that I wouldn't have to. And that's also when I realized that all around me were people of the global majority. Global majority is a collective term for ethnic groups, including but not exclusive to African, Asian, indigenous or dual heritage backgrounds. We also refer to them sometimes as bipoc, Black indigenous, indigenous people of color, the global majority constitute about 85% of the global population. And like my parents, some of those folks on that subway platform may have been dreaming of their children living a different life in the future, a more financially well resourced one, a professional one, a dream in which the global majority take up space and take the lead, where they had one spend the majority in all the rooms where decisions are made. And I really believe that dream is award of the one. And I want to be part of the solution to help bring that dream, one step closer to reality. And that's why in two weeks on Wednesday, August 23, I'm hosting a powerful standalone and completely free group coaching session. It's called Leadership lab for women of the global majority, and you will find the registration link in the show notes. This is an open group coaching call for professional women of all backgrounds who want to grow their leadership and accelerate their career growth. Here's what's going to happen in this session, we're going to prioritize coaching those in the global majority, we will not be excluding anyone based on apparent identities, you will get the opportunity to raise your hand for coaching with me or you'll also get to attend witness and learn from others getting coached on self advocacy, communication strategies, people leadership, and so much more. I'm going to share the same tools and processes I share with my private clients in my one on one coaching sessions. The one on one coaching container is where I get to see my clients and by the way, I think about 50% of my current clientele are women of color, they're all brilliant. And in this coaching container, I get to witness them transform right in front of my eyes from overwhelmed, anxious, uncertain to sitting tall, proud, Regal, grounded in their self confidence and in their leadership. And this happens because through coaching the axis the power they've always had inside, but forgotten how To access because of socialization, because of the world being effed up, they have the power to affect change the power to lead. And so I want to invite you to join too because I know you too want to access the power to lead the access the power to make a positive change in your career in your life. So with that said, I hope you will join leadership lab for women of the global majority. And if not, I hope you will extend this invitation to other women who can find who can benefit from this event. And in the meantime, I am so excited to share this interview with my esteemed colleague, Emily Frank, who is also a smithy and also a career coach. And I didn't intend to have this set up so that we're both Asian American women coaches, but here it is, we're both women of the global majority. In this conversation, you're going to learn how to navigate interviewing with different types of recruiters how to leverage market salary information, so that you don't leave money on the table when you negotiate for your salary. And you're going to find out how to take advantage of AI so that you can get through applicant tracking system. So the conversation that we recorded here, we had in mind job seekers, people who are looking to get hired and get a new job and negotiate their salary. So just to make it super clear, the leadership lab that I'm hosting, we will not be talking exclusively about salary negotiation, but I believe that negotiation skills are leadership skills. So if salary negotiation is what you are most interested in this podcast episode is so for you. Okay, so without further ado, please enjoy, and I will talk to you soon. Welcome everyone. We have a really wonderful, wonderful treat. I'm so excited for this conversation. I have my fellow Smithy. I'm a Smith College alum. And so is my esteemed guest, Emily Frank. And we Frank is a professional career counselor with over 15 years of experience, which is also a certified career coach, and Myers Briggs Master Practitioner. Okay, Emily, what do you not do?

Emily Kikue Frank  7:36  
I don't do executive coaching.

Jamie Lee  7:38  
Or you don't do executive coaching? Yes. Okay.

Emily Kikue Frank  7:41  
I love that for other folks.

Jamie Lee  7:45  
I asked Emily. So what is the distinction? Right before we hit record, I asked her what is the distinction between a career counselor and career coach? And Emily, maybe you can actually tell us a bit more time?

Emily Kikue Frank  7:58  
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So that there isn't actually an especially clear distinction, because there isn't really any sort of required licensure or certification for either one. But where I make the distinction in my own practice, is that my background is actually in mental health counseling. So the what the master's degree I got is was sort of focused on is this sort of mental health piece of it? It tends to be the case that career counseling is pretty short term, and task focus. So it overlaps a lot with coaching anyway, since that's kind of what coaching tends to be like. So there's not a huge distinction I did then go ahead and pursue coaching certifications when I went into private practice. So I call myself a counselor and coach for people who are looking for someone to work without needing a little bit of support with their career growth. Don't worry too much about what the distinctions are. I always tell people, your best guideline, when you're looking for someone is that you can find someone that you feel you can trust with your story and information and that you feel kind of gets you more than what that person's credentials are. Yeah, difference really is. If you're a counselor of any sort, you to either, generally speaking, you either need to be registered with your state, as an unlicensed counselor as I am, or you need to actually have a credential on file somewhere, but it's a small distinction. At the

Jamie Lee  9:37  
end of the day, what I'm hearing is that, is this a fit for you? You feel like when you connect with that, absolutely, you can trust that person. I love that. In fact, I've heard from coaches that I have coach with that the report that you have with coach, a counselor, a therapist, like what is that report that actually has really big, outsized impact on the results that you create through that relationship. And, you know, I sat in on Emily's open forums where she invites people of seven SR alums to attend her open free, weekly sessions of conversation like a support call, right that you offer. And I thought, the insights that you offered were so useful that I knew people who are listening to this podcast would also benefit from that. So I want to read more of what Emily does she, she also spent four years living study and working in Japan, that's awesome. I spent.

Unknown Speaker  10:42  
Yeah, she is

Jamie Lee  10:43  
also a social justice advocate who believes everyone deserves career success right on, she helps people find meaningful work and define success for themselves. She coaches on resumes, cover letters, interviewing, salary negotiation, workplace self advocacy. I love that I also, you know, help people with workplace self advocacy and workplace negotiation. But I don't really do a lot of resumes and cover letters. So for that reason, I really wanted to bring you on and have you share some of your expert insights here. And I see here that in addition to all of that, and we also offer speaking in group workshops, her areas of specialization are diversity and inclusion, international work, creative fields and inter Office Communication. She is amazing. In one.

Unknown Speaker  11:40  
Yeah, thank you. And you know,

Jamie Lee  11:44  
the session that I attended, you were talking about how when you encounter different types of recruiters, in your job search, that you could expect a different kind of experience. And that could also lead to different types of negotiation. Right. So I'm super curious, in your 15 years of experience as career counselor Career Coach, what what do you see is the difference between internal versus external recruiters. I mean, like, what are they first of all, and maybe a little bit more about how that can impact the negotiation?

Emily Kikue Frank  12:25  
Yeah, absolutely. So in the broadest terms, there are kind of two camps of recruiters. So the internal ones, as you mentioned, are the ones who work for a large company, let's say Google. And they're tasked with finding folks to fill particular roles within the organization, at a really large organization that size, it's a pretty robust team. And they typically have a reasonable amount of negotiating they can do with candidates, once those candidates are pretty clearly in line, four positions in the organization, sometimes they will focus on internal candidates. So if they're looking for someone who's good promotion material, for instance, and they'll tend to have a little bit more leeway with the negotiations with those folks. Sometimes they do more outward facing stuff. So they'll look for people with particular skills, you know, kind of poke around on sites like LinkedIn, to see if there are people who meet particular needs that they have been assigned to find for the organization, the external recruiters fall loosely into two camps. So there are the kinds of external recruiters whose companies have contracts with larger organizations. And those folks will tend to get kind of lists of the kinds of people that each ord needs. And so they do much the same, they'll kind of hit up places like LinkedIn looking for folks, they might read through some of the applications that do come in through the other sites. And because they're external to the company, they tend to have a little bit less room to do any kind of salary discussion. Sometimes they will have gotten a range and sometimes they won't, if they don't have a range, what they'll do is just kind of put your questions around salary off, you know, they'll say things like it's competitive, and that sort of thing. But they don't really have a ton of latitude to do that kind of negotiation. You know, unless they have been told you can go up to x with this particular role. And within that, there's kind of a third mini category of recruiter and those are the sort of self employed or boutique recruiters. Those are the folks who tend to work with smaller companies. Not tiny but you know, a couple 100 people fish big and maybe a little bit smaller than that. And they they're my favorite recruiters to work with, because they're the ones who put the most time and effort into getting to know the individual of jobseekers and kind of what those folks want out of their next role. But they also don't tend to have a ton of buy in, if you will, from the hiring agencies, people at the companies tend to trust them. But their employers are going to make the final decisions about who gets hired for any external recruiters. So the bowtique recruiters tend to have kind of the least power to do any sort of salary negotiation. But they are the most fun to work with, because they're the ones who want to know all about you and what you want from your next role. Ultimately, what I tell people, though, is whether you're working with a recruiter or not, your final salary discussion is going to come at the end of the conversation anyway, once you have that offer in hand. So don't feel like anything you've said, towards the beginning part of this conversation is set in stone. I mean, don't lowball yourself. But if you do kind of lowball yourself, you can recover from it.

Jamie Lee  16:04  
I like you said, I love that you said that. Because I actually approach it from a slightly different perspective, I think about the negotiation is starting at the in a very, from the very first conversation, you get to have the employer, right, because you're sort of, you know, framing for the value, you're positioning yourself, talking to them about what can become possible when you are in that role. So I mean, that there's a bigger conversation that's happening. But I think, if you like sort of think about salary negotiation, just the discussion about the number itself, it does make sense. So I'm curious, this is really interesting information for me. And I'm curious to know when somebody is a boutique recruiter versus an external recruiter, because I'd imagine if your internal recruiter you would have like, you know, Jane jane@google.com, right, you'd be able to go by their email address, but how can you tell between somebody's whether somebody's boutique recruiter or just like a bigger firm?

Emily Kikue Frank  17:11  
Yeah, so if you do a Google search for, like, recruiters near me, most of the ones you're gonna get are gonna be those larger external recruiters. And so the really big ones, you've probably heard of their, you know, Kelly Services and Robert Half and those kinds of places. So there should be a little piece of familiarity with them. If you're wondering though, if you get approached, for instance, by someone who's a recruiter, look up the organization name, and you should be able to find a few things out online, things like the size of the staff, so your boutique firms are typically going to be fairly small, they'll have a couple of recruiters, maybe three to five, at the large end of things, it might even just be one. And then the other staff members for an organization like that will be a resume writer, for instance, or a receptionist who kind of does the paperwork. So they tend to be pretty small. So if you look them up, you'll get a sort of piece of insight into it. And then the other way you can tell is the size of the company they're recruiting for. So it's a really big company that they're recruiting for, it's probably your kind of standard, large third party recruiter. And they do good work, but they tend to be a bit less responsive, because they have so much on their plates, it's it's a little bit overwhelming for them to try to get to everyone that they've reached out to so the ones who reached out to you seem really excited, seem really interested. And then you hear kind of radio silence afterwards. First of all, try not to take it personally, those are almost certainly those big third party recruiters. They got excited about you at first, and then they sort of lost the thread because they're supposed to be finding 200 people for different roles in companies. And you know, sometimes as many as 15 or 20 companies, so they lose their minds a little bit. If that happens, and there's a roll that you're actually really interested in, do feel free to reach out again, another couple of times. If you continue to get silence, give it up, find a different recruiter.

Jamie Lee  19:22  
And when you do have like an established connection or a conversation dialogue ongoing with a recruiter, I'm curious what you think about this, sometimes I advise my clients, most of my clients, actually all of them are mid career women. So they're unemployed and they're thinking about how can I you know expand how can I maximize my earning potential right how can I ask him for a raise or find out what is the going market range? So sometimes i i suggest to them what if you did have a conversation with a recruiter because they might have like a finger? On the pulse, so to speak about like music going more coverage, because sometimes that market range, it fluctuates, right, depending on market conditions, the job market conditions and what do you think about that?

Emily Kikue Frank  20:10  
Yeah, well, one of the things I definitely see a lot of I'm sure you see this as well is that women tend to undervalue our work in our services. And so then this is part of that whole big conversation around pay equity. But, you know, what I often say is, if the further away you get from cisgender, white guy, the less likely you are to feel entirely comfortable owning your entire worth. And this is just because of messaging, we've gotten our whole lives about kind of who's worthy of the high salary. And so there is a conversation that I think we need to be having with our clients who are female identified and who are not white around what all of this looks like. And I think it's really important to relax into the value of the work that you do. And to begin having those conversations, as you say, early on, in the process, the work we do has value. And I think it's okay, if that value is quite high. It's because we bring skills to the table and experiences and and that's, that's worth money, I always sort of joke that we none of us would work if we didn't have to. So, since you have to, you might as well have the value that you bring, be reflected in the paycheck that you get

Jamie Lee  21:32  
100%. And do you think it could be worthwhile? If you are having a conversation with a recruiter who seems to get it who seems to like genuinely, like want to have a conversation with you? Do you think it'd be worthwhile asking them, Hey, what are you seeing is

Emily Kikue Frank  21:51  
absolutely 100%. And not only that, so I definitely recommend people do that. For one thing, that's often a powerful bargaining chip to bring to an existing job. But I also recommend that people do some research to figure out what they can on their own, and bring all of those pieces of information together. So that means sometimes hitting up sites like Glassdoor, also salary.com, and payscale.com often have that kind of information. One of those, I think it's payscale.com. That information is a bit hidden. And it sort of looks like it sits behind a paywall. But I think if you're inventive, you can still get around it. But if you do research on those sites, if you put in information like where you live, where you work, how many years of experience in the field you have, etc, there is a question, I believe it's on salary.com reputation, which gives people pause, this isn't your reputation as a professional, this is the reputation of the employer. So if you are putting in an application for, let's say, one of the big five accounting firms, then the reputation for that is on the higher end. Whereas if it's a small local accounting firm that doesn't have very big national reach, or any at all, the reputation is going to be on the lower end, it doesn't mean they're a bad employer, it just means that they're not famous. So anyway, you go through all of that plug in that information. And that's going to give you a salary range, as well. So I think pulling all of that info together is really valuable. And regardless of what you find, you can make the numbers work in your favor, even if it doesn't, like if you do the research and it appears that you're very much at the high end of the potential for your role. Just push it a little bit further over, because you still deserve to get good pay for it. And those conversations can be really valuable. And what I often tell people is if you like your job, but you're simply negotiating a pay, raise, do that research, talk to people like those recruiters, and take that information back to your boss and say, hey, look, I did some research. And it looks like with my experience with my education, with the skills that I bring, I actually should be making between x and y. Is there space, we can discuss this? What's the recognition, by the way, that often there's a specific cycle that a workplace has for those conversations, but at least it's on the table, and you can kind of continue proving your value to the organization.

Jamie Lee  24:28  
I love that you said that because you know, you want to bring it up early and often. And actually, I want to go back to what you said earlier, which is, which was really powerful, which is that even if you said something early in the in the you know, sort of like the interviewing phase, right? Don't worry so much about what you did say because it's still negotiable, right? And it's something that, you know, I remember worrying as somebody who used to You know, apply to jobs online and look for a job. Like you get that application. And they ask you, what is your salary requirement. And sometimes recruiters will ask you internal external boutique rival, they'll do that as a way to sort of filter for a better fit. And so I think the worry can come up, am I going to lowball myself? Or am I going to shoot so high that I get myself out of the running for this position when I'm really hoping to get a new job? And so I'm curious, you know, what kind of best practices do you offer this? I when I was looking for jobs, like, like a decade ago, I think I just aged myself too much. But anyways, I remember, you know, getting the advice that instead of putting a number putting, like competitive market salary, or even just put in a, and I'm curious what you think about that?

Emily Kikue Frank  25:59  
Yeah. So the newer thing is that some places won't allow you to do that some places will actually require a number, which, I really hate that, I feel like it's such a disadvantage to the job seeker. I wish there were a lot more transparency around this kind of information, there are a few places that are increasingly putting a little bit more of that power into the hands of the potential employee. I'm in Colorado, we actually have a state law, that job postings must offer a salary range in a public place once they're posted. Which I really prefer, because then it's a conversation, you can say, your job posting said the the range was between this and this. And that range works for me. If it's a form you fill out that actually has a space, that hasn't been the range you put in, that's where it can get really tricky. And so you have a couple of options when it requires a number. One is to do that research and put something around the mid zone of what's realistic for you. Mid zone gives you the most leeway to negotiate upwards, which of course you want. Without it running too big a risk of being a bit too high for them. Or the other thing you can do is simply be mysterious. So people will put in numbers that don't necessarily make sense, like they'll put in 100. What does that mean? Do you want 100k? Is your going rate 100 bucks an hour? What does this 100 mean? Which then hopefully leads to a further conversation that's a little bit riskier. If the box if it's a text box, and it does let you put in test text, then certainly feel free to do something like, you know, reasonable offers considered best market value, whatever makes sense in there. But since so many of them really are requiring a number these days, your best bet, honestly, is to have a number. And put that in. The other piece is know what you're willing to settle for. If you're not willing to go below a certain number, make sure that any range you include in any of this discussion, whether it's in person or on paper is higher than that lowest rate, because that's just going to even if you were to accept a job at a terrible rate, you're going to feel terrible about it, you're going to burn out a little more quickly, you're going to be super aware all the time that you're working harder than you're getting remunerated for. And it's just not fair. It's a crummy feeling.

Jamie Lee  28:48  
And people if people are watching the video replay of this, they'll see me vigorously nod my head through all of this. I love what you're saying. So what I'm hearing is that be savvy, right? So do your research. Find out? Yeah, go for the mid range, right so that you don't take yourself out of the running. But also be mindful that this This isn't like set in stone. It's still possible.

Emily Kikue Frank  29:16  
Yeah, exactly. And you have a conversation, you continue the conversation, when you do find yourself in front of the people who have the power to make those decisions. And you know, often the first few interactions you'll have with an organization will be with people like those recruiters or sometimes with folks in HR. And again, those are people who have somewhat limited capacity to make final decisions around things like the salary and benefits. So you keep that discussion going with the idea that you're willing to work with their range, if you are and then when you actually get to the person who holds the real purse strings then you can have the long discussion about here's what I bring, here's market value, what are the benefits that are included in this and so the final decision around what your potential compensation packet is going to look like, is likely to come from the person who would supervise you directly, or the CFO or somebody like that. And if you can really demonstrate your value to the organization as a whole, then you can really have a much more robust conversation with that person, but you put yourself within the range of what they're considering. And without making it sound like you don't value your own skills and input, but also that you're not so far above what they're able to pay that it's ridiculous. I years and years ago, I worked in higher education. And we were looking for a director of the career office. And at the time, the university I worked at, didn't ever post any information about its salaries, which is terrible practice. And we had a really, really wonderful candidate, but she was coming from a corporate setting. And when we got to the finalist discussion with her, we asked what salary she was looking for. And she said, Well, I've been in the corporate world, but I'm willing to come down to around 150k, which is not a higher education salary in the state of Colorado, that's maybe, maybe if you're a dean, maybe. And you know, what we were offering at the time was something like 60. It wasn't going to work on either end, we could have negotiated up a little bit from 60. And she might have been able to come a little down from 150. But the gap was too big. And so know what you're willing to settle for. At the end of the day, because if you're not willing to go down to say, a 60k salary for a position like that, it's not going to work. And it's okay, if you get removed from consideration for something that's just super low balling you.

Jamie Lee  32:14  
I thank you so much for sharing that. Because again, you're highlighting the importance and the benefit of pay transparency. And I'm pretty sure where I live in New York State, they also instated that law. And my one of my clients really benefited she works in the museum, she works for like nonprofits, but in in that world, you have to share your salary executive salary public. So she really benefited from that, she was able to say, Yeah, I know what I can expect. And I can see That's double what I'm making, but that's what I'm gonna go for it right. And that really helped her to feel competent in the negotiation and be able to secure that that higher salary when she when she got that position. And I think this also touches on how it is important to have conversations, right? We talked about talking with recruiters or talking with people in the in the network or talking with people in that industry, finding out what is the going market range so that you don't, you don't end up, you know, shooting for something that is not doable, not feasible. Either spectrum, there's so good. And so especially because you work with people who are seeking a new job, a new employment, I was curious, what kind of best practices do you offer for people who really want to better articulate or best articulate their value starting from the resume? And um, yeah, the work that I do, like, I just want to give a quick plug is I do have other episodes like Valley article, articulation clinic, how to make a compelling case, all about how to, you know, think strategically about what the employer wants, and what are their bigger goals so that you can make that case for whatever you want. Make it really enticing and compelling for them. But also, I think it can start as early as what's written on the resume. So I'm curious what absolutely recommend?

Emily Kikue Frank  34:16  
Yeah, well, one of the things I tell people to do all the time is start by listing your accomplishments from your work setting. Listen for yourself, but start putting them somewhere, put them down someplace that you can access really easily, because one of the tricks about all of this is that what we're really good at becomes something that feels almost effortless to us. You know, if you're operating kind of in your I always call it your zone of genius. If you're operating in that space, you don't really think about the effort that goes into it because you've gotten so good at it, you've gotten really polished. And so it's easy to look back over the work history and just minimize everything that you've done. And it's a really good practice to begin capturing those accomplishments. Because that stuff does then at some point go into your resume. So, for instance, I was talking to someone recently, who is she has experience as, I think, a middle school teacher, and is transitioning out of teaching, because it's a pretty low paying job. And so we were talking about the skills she offers. And I said, Well, don't forget, you have a ton of public speaking skills. And that kind of stopped your tracks because she hadn't thought about it before. But what does the teacher do? A teacher goes up in front of a roomful of learners, and talks, that's public speaking, right? She just hadn't framed it that way. So you begin going through, and really listing those work accomplishments. And then you figure out the ways to plug them into the resume, particularly in ways that are a little bit more transferable if you're looking to transition into a new role. And so, you know, we worked on this person's resume. So we weren't saying taught classroom of whatever students, right, we said, conveyed difficult technical information to diverse audience, things like that, because those are much more transferable. And if she'd wanted to stay in teaching, we wouldn't have needed to think about changing the language up. But she's looking for our new role. So we were really conscious of capturing those accomplishments differently. And I just say that people to keep a running list of these accomplishments, because at the end of a big project, for instance, you'll feel good, you'll understand that you were successful in this, but you will forget all of the pieces that went into the making of the project itself, what you did to make things happen, how you did trouble shooting, how you smoothed over communications, where people's feelings got a little bit hurt, how you put out a whole bunch of fires, because that's what projects are. And so you want to be sure you're capturing those in the moment. And the hidden benefit of that is if you have a really crummy week, for instance, just it feels like everything is going wrong, you're just in a really bad mood, if you look over that list of accomplishments, you're gonna feel a little bit better, because you wrote that all down, you have proof right in front of you that you've actually been able to accomplish a lot. And so start there. And then we figured out ways to plug that into the resume, to put that into the cover letter to have that as part of your conversation around your worth, for a workplace. And to some extent, even in the interview process. And then sometimes you have to do a little bit of work to figure out the monetary value of each of those. But sometimes that's built in, sometimes you are aware that your efforts have made or saved your organization, a certain dollar amount. So you actually have the price tag, you can stick on it right there. If you've made them, you know, 5 million bucks, that's probably not your salary, but you can throw that result into your resume. And those kinds of results are really going to make employers eyes light up.

Jamie Lee  38:12  
I love that. Yeah. Because that's something I'm always cognizant of whenever my clients asked me to take a look at their resumes like okay, are they telling a compelling story? Right? Are they opening stories with specific details? And those kind of, you know, those metrics, dollar amounts or like percentage of love that makes it really pop? It makes it memorable and specific in mind? And I'm also curious, what are your thoughts about keywords? Because my understanding, again, I don't have as much exposure to this, because I've worked with people who are already working, but like, my understanding is that when you submit a resume to an application system, it's it's something that gets processed through ATS application tracking systems. And yeah, sounds like some of these systems have been equipped with like AI bots, and whatever. So they're looking right, they're looking new words, and so

Unknown Speaker  39:06  
should job.

Jamie Lee  39:10  
Hunters, you know, should they get strategic with, you know, using those keywords so that it becomes more easy for their applications to stand out?

Emily Kikue Frank  39:20  
Yeah, very much so. And I encourage people who are seeking new jobs, as well as people who are seeking promotions to do this work. The landscape of applicant tracking systems is very much changing, as you say. And mostly it's changing for the better. The good news about AI is, it's more able to fully grasp the language of the documents, but it's still limited. It's still not a person, right? And so it can't kind of make decisions that this thing is equivalent to this thing. So you do want to be a little transparent With this and really demonstrate how your background and skills match what the employer is seeking, the hard part is we tend to focus on the stuff we resonate with in a job description. So we'll see something and think that looks great. And we often skip the stuff that we are capable of doing. But it's less compelling to us in that job description. Or sometimes we skip over the stuff that seems really obvious, of course, I've done that kind of stuff. And the truth is, a lot of employers are really looking for that information. And sometimes, even if you're applying for a promotion, or an internal move, they're still looking for evidence of that. And depending on where you are, some employers can only consider the paperwork that is in front of them. So even if you're looking to move up in your organization, depending on what their rules are around this, they may not be able to say in the search committee, or however the hiring happens, will remember that this person also did this, they're often only able to consider what they're presented with. That's what gives sort of a fair chance to external candidates as well. So you want to represent yourself as best you possibly can, as a candidate for any role that you're applying to. And so there are a few things that you can do now, that will really help you capture those keywords. And most of these are free. So you can obviously just use chat DPT, I don't love chat GPT for cover letters, what it tends to do is just kind of re summarize your resume. And to me, that's not the point of the cover letter. But it's great for helping you come up with bullet points. So you get in there and you say, Hey, I'm applying for a job with a title of blah, can you help me come up with bullet points, here's the job description. Here's my resume, and you paste all of that in and this system is actually going to help you generate bullet points, you're gonna need to proofread them. Because sometimes it's wrong. Sometimes it sounds really awkward. Sometimes it just puts things in a way that you would never put them yourself. But just to have that framework is really useful. And then there are a couple of resources that I also send people to for the review of the resume as compared to the job postings. One is called a job scan.

Unknown Speaker  42:29  
The dumb one is job scan.

Emily Kikue Frank  42:32  
Obviously, it's job scan.co. I don't know why, but it is. There's one this one, I'll have to send you the link where there's one that's cultivated careers Prezi match tool, I'll send you that one because I can't remember exactly what the URL for that one is. But they're both they have a certain number of free scans each month. And those are really helpful when you're trying to figure out am I using the right keywords, you know, am I is my resume matching what they're looking for. And you know, the places that have smaller budgets, places like education, nonprofits, foundations, smaller companies, sometimes startups, since they have a little bit less reliable cash flow, they may be using an older applicant tracking system, the older ones are not as savvy and so they're not as good at figuring out that two things are equivalent. So you also just kind of want to, I hate to say idiot proof, but you still kind of want to idiot proof the resume, you want to make sure that anyone who reads it understands at first glance that you have the qualifications that they're seeking in the job, regardless of what it is you're applying for.

Jamie Lee  43:58  
This is really big. So, I mean, this is really big. My mind is kind of blown. So what I'm hearing is that number one, don't assume that what you take for granted, should go silent, like myself. I remind my clients sometimes you have to make the obvious explicit. Yeah, in the second year percent really thing that's blowing my mind is like, yes, we know, applicant tracking systems are leveraging AI, so we can do.

Emily Kikue Frank  44:28  
Exactly, exactly. And I know there's i right there with some of the concerns people have about AI. You know, I I don't think it has any place in the arts and I have big ethical concerns around things like you know, content creation and those kinds of things. But I also think that the genies out of the bottle this is a tool that's out there that exists and I think we are wise to figure out ways to take advantage of it and to understand how it works so that we can kind of mitigate mitigate against any potential harm it can have. And it's a tool also that you can use. I have a friend actually who is relatively new in a role that involves kind of a lot of grant writing. And she was a little familiar with grant writing when she took on the role, but not super adept at it yet. And what she did was she just opted for the paid version of chat GPT. And the first couple of grants that she had to write, she relied heavily on the system to help her do that. And of course, she would go back through and make the edits, make sure it was actually correct. And, you know, factual representing the services of the organization well, but she said it was incredibly helpful because it took care of a lot of that nitty gritty stuff that's so hard for us as individual brains to parse when you read through something like a grant, or a job description, or whatever. I've only ever used the free version of chat GPT. But it's really useful for things like those resume bullet points, or for those of us who are entrepreneurs, it's really good for helping generate things like the headlines or blog posts that we make. So might as well use that tool because it's out there, and it's not going away.

Unknown Speaker  46:20  
Yeah, I've

Jamie Lee  46:22  
played around with the free version of catch up. So I know the generative AI, it's growing, you know, it's becoming so much smarter at exponential rate, really wrap our heads around it. But I agree that the version that I played around with was really good with the summarizing of keypads. And when I when I played with it, I'm like, Okay, this is not how I want to sound at all. I don't listen home is like, you know, kind of schlocky row body, right, boys, but the main points, yes, it's summarized for me. So it's helpful for me to remember, these are the key points, so good. And I want to I want to address before I let you go, I want to address the elephant in the room, which is that you and I are both Asian, like, we're both women of Asian heritage, who went to women's colleges. With alums. Yeah. And I think in my experience, coaching people, folks who are like similar, right, folks who have been historically excluded, especially in the workforce, where you and I work, and I feel like those blind spots that you talked about, like overlooking the things that we're so good at that we just, it just becomes a blind spot. Like those things. I think part of that is cultural part of that is also social, you know, just like you mentioned, at the very top, how we've been just conditioned with these messages from a very young age. And so I'm curious, I want to hear a little bit more from you. And from your personal experience, what is that been like over, you know, like, you know, overcoming some of those cultural as well as gender socialization, especially, since you work with other women as well, and you're an entrepreneur, right? You, you've been a career counselor, you've worked in higher education. And I'm curious what your experience has been with that?

Emily Kikue Frank  48:17  
Yeah, it can be a bit of a tricky landscape to navigate, because there is more judgement around the voices of women, and the voices of people who aren't white. When we do things like draw attention to our successes, Sarah Cooper actually has a very funny book about that. That's called how to be successful without hurting men's feelings. It's mostly cartoons, it's very funny, and also kind of painful. Because a lot of what she says is, you know, instead of saying, Brad, that was my idea, you just said it. After I said it, you should say what a great idea breath. There's definitely a piece of judgment that comes into this. When women are forceful in our communications, it's really easy for people to label us bitchy or demanding or whatever, when we're simply advocating for ourselves. So the trick to it is finding the ways to give voice to that finding ways to own our own successes. But in a way that feels authentic enough that it doesn't come off as trying to prove something we're not. And I'm not necessarily talking about softening our language, you know, about putting a perky, super feminine face on things or any of that. I mean, if that's how you roll, that's fine. But it's really about I think, finding what's true for you, because if we're really speaking from that place of congruence with ourselves and our values, the language doesn't feel

Jamie Lee  49:56  
harsh. It doesn't

Emily Kikue Frank  49:57  
feel like oh, it's all about me. Shut up and pay attention to the thing I'm saying, because I'm important, it feels like it really comes from a heart place. And so I think that's part of it. I think it's also, one of the things I tell people all the time is when you're trying to own your own accomplishments, if it feels super uncomfortable to you, as it does for a lot of us, you can frame it in terms of other people. So if someone says, you know, what are your greatest strengths, you can absolutely say, I've been told that. And then you list the stuff that you're awesome at. Because you have been told that that's how we know right, we understand what we're good at, from reflections from other people. And so there is a sort of balancing act with all of that. And there are certain assumptions made of, of those of us with Asian faces, female Asian faces around things like, you know, are you going to be super weak and feminine? And, you know, bring everyone coffee? Or are you going to be a dragon lady. And we actually get to be full people, we had to have dragony moments, because everyone has those, we get to have moments of like super polite kindness, because everyone should have those. And so seeking that authenticity, seeking that inner voice, I think, is really how we assert ourselves in ways that feel a little bit more comfortable. This takes practice. And especially around self advocacy, it can get really uncomfortable. But we live in a place now where I think we can draw attention to those things. And I don't think there's any need for us as there might have been a generation or two ago, to kind of put up with some of the casually sexist and racist comments that are for mothers may have suffered in the workplace. I think we just get to draw lines and say, you know, hey, money.

Jamie Lee  51:56  
Yeah, that's not professional. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. But you said resonated so deeply with me, because I've definitely when I was younger, my 20s and early 30s, I've been that girl, you know, quote, unquote, girl. We went to a women's college. Not gross. But, you know, for me, I feel like the part that you talked about the authenticity. I do feel like it gets a little better as you get older. Ya know, in the Korean culture we call the middle aged women who's got a kid who like, doesn't give any EPS about what other people think about her anymore. And she she dresses however she likes and she's got like, really sharp elbows, you know, we call her a jamaa. So it was like the dragon lady energy. And in Japan, it's up obasan. Right. Yep. Yeah. And like, when we really embracing that, I'm like, yeah.

Emily Kikue Frank  52:54  
Yeah, absolutely. And it's a powerful place to be. And I think that's, ideally we get over that. Super people pleasing part of ourselves in our users because it, we get to please ourselves, too. We deserve someone bringing us coffee as much as anyone else does. Totally, you know,

Jamie Lee  53:17  
I'm still dragon energy is good. Yes, a little dragon energy is amazing. And you won't be surprised people love it when you bring a little bit of that fiery energy to your, you know, job interview to yourself advocacy in the workplace. Because we think, Oh, no, there's a part of us. We think we're not supposed to do that. Because if we do that people will be offended or somebody will be upset or they'll become aggressive. But actually, you know, when you become a little bit more assertive people like, oh, yeah, she's, she's got She's witty, she's, you should bring a little energy to this. We want that we want people who are bringing energy and some, you know, excuse my metaphor, but like spiciness? Yeah, absolutely. Fire. Yeah. Okay, this has been so fun. Where can people go to find you?

Emily Kikue Frank  54:10  
Yeah, a handful of places. I'm all over social media. The easiest is my website, which is Denver, career catalyst.com. And people can always email me at Emily at Denver career catalyst.com email is typically the easiest way to reach me as it'll stay in my inbox until I have responded to it. And Smith grads can find me on the app.

Jamie Lee  54:38  
Yes, yes, that's it. That's how we got connected. We're both part of the Smith business network where you know, coaches that support the Smith business network. And if you are an alum of the Seven Sisters schools, check out Emily's should they go to your LinkedIn to find the invite to The Weekly open the

Emily Kikue Frank  55:02  
easiest place to find that is on the sisters hiring Seven Sisters Facebook page I post reminder about the calls every week there.

Jamie Lee  55:09  
Got it and if you're not one of the seven sister alums Don't worry she's still got you email her directly at eight Emily at Denver career catalyst.com.

Unknown Speaker  55:21  
Yep,

Emily Kikue Frank  55:22  
that is the place. Yep.

Jamie Lee  55:23  
Yeah. Awesome. Thank you so much, Emily.

Emily Kikue Frank  55:27  
Thank you, Jamie. So good to see you. And so good to be on your podcast.

Jamie Lee  55:34  
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