Speaker 1: It's time for the b a qa A. The b
Speaker 1: a q A what you say, the b a q
Speaker 1: A mand the b a q A with Tipp and a.
Speaker 1: The b a qa A, It's Brad a question answered.
Speaker 1: You have questions. We have some of your answers because
Speaker 1: we are smart, beautiful brown girls who know a thing
Speaker 1: or two about business, career, money, and entrepreneurship.
Speaker 2: That was the other one, I think, So yeah, welcome
Speaker 2: back to b a qa I'm so excited about this
Speaker 2: week's questions. We are diving into y'all's career questions and
Speaker 2: there's some juicy ones in here. And also one of them,
Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure Tip's going to have some some juicy
Speaker 2: advice for too, because it's about someone who's dipping their
Speaker 2: toe into consulting and contracting and wants to know how
Speaker 2: they make people pay him on time or her on time.
Speaker 2: But let's get into it. Just remind her, like Tiff said,
Speaker 2: we're not financial experts or you know, especially certainly not
Speaker 2: your trusted advisor out side of the podcast, so please
Speaker 2: don't sue us. You know, we're just here for a
Speaker 2: fun time and a good time and to leave y'all
Speaker 2: with hopefully a little bit of wisdom. But yeah, you
Speaker 2: can miss us with your lawsuits. Let's jump into it.
Speaker 2: This first question comes from concerned contractor. They say, longtime listener,
Speaker 2: first time writer, Love you both, bunches. I recently began
Speaker 2: grad school and have been dipping my toe into part
Speaker 2: time consulting and contracting. So I have a two part question.
Speaker 2: How do you on the front end prevent non payment
Speaker 2: when you are consulting? And number two, what do you
Speaker 2: do when you when you haven't been paved and you're
Speaker 2: starting to receive the run around. I'm currently in situation
Speaker 2: number two. I've been trying to be patient, as I
Speaker 2: have a previous relationship with your organization. However, I'm beginning
Speaker 2: to feel taken advantage of I'm non confrontational by nature,
Speaker 2: but I can be sugnighted if it comes to that.
Speaker 2: Help concerned contractor, all right, let's put the piece down.
Speaker 2: We don't need any sugar night shenanigans here, okay, but
Speaker 2: I not tiff like in your work and certainly in
Speaker 2: my work. Now I have dealt with more contracts and
Speaker 2: more you know, looking at the terms of the agreement
Speaker 2: and like when will I get paid? And it's funny
Speaker 2: because or not funny. It sucks when you are, you know,
Speaker 2: expecting people to pay you during it, like you think
Speaker 2: you should get paid right away, but sometimes these contracts
Speaker 2: be like you know, what's the word what's that phrase
Speaker 2: they use for when they're going to pay you? Yes,
Speaker 2: thank you? Yeah, net thirty, next sixty, next ninety. So
Speaker 2: my first piece of advice would be too, is to
Speaker 2: have a contract, like actually have the terms so that
Speaker 2: you know and they know what you're agreeing to. And
Speaker 2: I'm wondering if in this case, did you have a
Speaker 2: contract or was it a situation where it was like
Speaker 2: because you had worked with them before, you know, you
Speaker 2: did the work and you know that you were all
Speaker 2: like Kiki, nice, nice, and and get it written down
Speaker 2: you know when they were gonna owe you, because that's
Speaker 2: really important.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And also to consider having some money being paid up front,
Speaker 1: you know, like like a deposit, so that way you know,
Speaker 1: at least you get something, you know, upfront, Like typically
Speaker 1: I get about half upfront.
Speaker 3: Typically sometimes not, it.
Speaker 1: Depends, like like for example, if I speak for a
Speaker 1: college or whatever, sometimes I'll you know, they'll literally have
Speaker 1: a check for me today I show up.
Speaker 3: But typically I get that check before I hit that stage.
Speaker 1: You know, really yeah, but consider you know, like in
Speaker 1: your contract having people pay you upfront, not not they're
Speaker 1: likely not to pay you all, but half upfront or
Speaker 1: like in thirds front middle end, depending how long the
Speaker 1: contract is for.
Speaker 3: You know, they'll consider that too.
Speaker 1: And I, I know this is really hard, Like you
Speaker 1: might have to take people to small claim score. You
Speaker 1: might have to you know, you should, like when you're
Speaker 1: in business, you don't have to have return an attorney
Speaker 1: on retainer, but you should have an attorney that you
Speaker 1: can reach out to that's different. So my attorney, Tony Moore,
Speaker 1: she's awesome, she's not on retainer, Like I don't just
Speaker 1: pay her every month and be like I could just
Speaker 1: ask endless questions. But when I need something, I know
Speaker 1: I could say, hey, Tony, how much.
Speaker 3: Does it go across?
Speaker 1: Because this person is do that. I need your help
Speaker 1: with this. So you might have to take them to
Speaker 1: small claims court and you might need the help of
Speaker 1: an attorney, you know, Like there are some people you know,
Speaker 1: I work with enough that like, I know I'm gonna
Speaker 1: get my money. And there's definitely been some times because
Speaker 1: a lot of my contract works gets filtered through my spokesperson,
Speaker 1: agent Ellie k. And I've seen her like write emails
Speaker 1: like hey Tiffany, I haven't gotten that first deposit, please
Speaker 1: stop work and take down that post.
Speaker 3: So she'll do something like that like see seeing.
Speaker 1: Me in the company and then like wait wait wait
Speaker 1: wait waitit because we did have somebody that was dragging
Speaker 1: their feet.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: She made it very clear to them if we don't
Speaker 1: have this money by this time, Tiffany will stop working.
Speaker 3: She won't ever work with you again.
Speaker 1: So also see if maybe there's a third person, bad
Speaker 1: guy that can like reach out even if it's you. Girls,
Speaker 1: sometimes you just need to get another email address and
Speaker 1: be the.
Speaker 2: Third person that I like real legal at contractor dot
Speaker 2: com exactly.
Speaker 3: Yemm hmm.
Speaker 1: So consider that too, and like I said, you might
Speaker 1: have to go to small claims court and know that
Speaker 1: you don't work with that again, you know, or if
Speaker 1: you do ever work with them again, because certainly not
Speaker 1: to shade the city I live in, but the city
Speaker 1: I live in is notorious for late or no payment.
Speaker 1: I said it no work, and I had to get
Speaker 1: real gully with them when they owed me like a
Speaker 1: lot of money it was like eight thousand dollars. And
Speaker 1: this is when I pretty early on in my career.
Speaker 1: So eight thousand was a break because I had put
Speaker 1: they ordered books for me. I had paid for the
Speaker 1: books on my credit card, and when they received the
Speaker 1: books and nobody wanted to pay me, it was a
Speaker 1: run around. It was a nightmare. And I was like,
Speaker 1: it'd be one thing to not pay me for speaking,
Speaker 1: because I wouldn't necessarily come out of pocket. But I like,
Speaker 1: the books cost me like three thousand dollars, you know,
Speaker 1: And I was like, I don't have three thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: And so what I did was I found out the
Speaker 1: email address of every council person, the mayor's personal and professional,
Speaker 1: every single person.
Speaker 3: Of notes in Newark.
Speaker 1: I put them on an email and I wrote a
Speaker 1: letter saying I'm writing this letter out of active desperation
Speaker 1: as a daughter of Newark, because they love that someone
Speaker 1: was born here, taught here as a preschool teacher, started
Speaker 1: my businesses here.
Speaker 3: I spoke at this time.
Speaker 1: I did this work and I have not been paid,
Speaker 1: and I tried everything in my power to recoup this
Speaker 1: income and I haven't been able to receive it. At
Speaker 1: this point, I'm at my wits end. I'm not sure
Speaker 1: what to do, so I'm reaching out to you for assistance.
Speaker 1: Before I learned the media, girl, it was good, and
Speaker 1: I took like I had screenshops of all the work,
Speaker 1: screenshops of everyone who I spoke to. Every person that's folks,
Speaker 1: so that gave me the run around. I highlighted their
Speaker 1: name because I wanted them to know exactly who to
Speaker 1: yell at. When I told you my phone right a
Speaker 1: minute five May, my phone rang. So because the woman
Speaker 1: who was supposed to pay me actually went to college
Speaker 1: with she was a friend of mine, So I was like, girl,
Speaker 1: why did not pick it out?
Speaker 3: Is this someone that you know? Girl?
Speaker 2: Always that personal connection that screws you, I mean, which
Speaker 2: sucks because when you're early in your career, you rely
Speaker 2: on those yes like relationships to get your first gig sometimes,
Speaker 2: but they give me the run around.
Speaker 1: But she had the right and the wrong one. So
Speaker 1: she was like, I can't believe you write that and
Speaker 1: that email. Nobody on there is related to this this whatever.
Speaker 1: And I was like, girl, get off my phone. Let
Speaker 1: you have my money, you know, I said, because she said,
Speaker 1: you could have just rolled me directly. I said, check
Speaker 1: your text messages. I've been texting you for months. I
Speaker 1: have been calling you for months. I've been emailing you
Speaker 1: for months. You've ignored me, and so now here we are.
Speaker 1: And then then I was like, wait, hold on, boop.
Speaker 1: It was the Mayor's office. Your check is ready. You
Speaker 1: want to pick it up? I said, sure, dude, I
Speaker 1: at the time was driving my nineteen ninety eight Toyota Camri.
Speaker 1: That sounded like who shot John? And why I pulled
Speaker 1: up they I was like, They're like, do you want
Speaker 1: to come in to get your check? I said no,
Speaker 1: bring it to the car, because by then I was pissed.
Speaker 1: Garve rolled down the window just slightly so they could
Speaker 1: slip the check to the car.
Speaker 3: And yeah, read to the bank.
Speaker 1: But I just see all that to say, it might
Speaker 1: be that you have to email above and beyond whoever
Speaker 1: this person is running you around, c see everybody and
Speaker 1: write like a you know, an a not so overtly threatening,
Speaker 1: like this is what I've been through. Email, email, email,
Speaker 1: screenshop screenshot, screenshot, you know, and you know my next step. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: will we have to take take this the small claims core,
Speaker 1: which is not ideal and so that's it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and also I love that as a first up.
Speaker 2: And then also I mean you could skip also to
Speaker 2: just having a letter from an attorney or drafting up something,
Speaker 2: and I bet you could find a template or something.
Speaker 2: But you know, hello, it has been and you have
Speaker 2: your facts. You know, it's been so many days of
Speaker 2: non payment, and if you haven't completed the project, I
Speaker 2: would say stop, you know, until you get the payment,
Speaker 2: and then learn from it and make sure that in
Speaker 2: your future contracts that either you have the language you can.
Speaker 2: It does not have to be fancy legalies either. I
Speaker 2: remember I spoke for like a PR firm and in
Speaker 2: a Google doc, we just outlined, you know, when I
Speaker 2: was going to speak, the rate and when they would
Speaker 2: pay me. They didn't have any kind of contract like
Speaker 2: in their you know, in the can that they could
Speaker 2: use for this kind of thing. They hadn't done it before,
Speaker 2: and I just we've signed it, like I printed it out,
Speaker 2: signed it and scanned it back, you know, and that
Speaker 2: was all it took. It doesn't always have to be
Speaker 2: super complicated, but you have to look out for yourself
Speaker 2: and make sure that people can take advantage of you.
Speaker 2: And then yeah, there's I feel like the bigger the company,
Speaker 2: the longerson has it takes to get paid, you'd be surprised.
Speaker 2: It's never the people who are small businesses or other
Speaker 2: you know, other entrepreneurs who forgive me the run around.
Speaker 2: It's it's the big companies. So but exciting for you
Speaker 2: to have this additional source of income while you're in
Speaker 2: grad school. I think that's really smart. But I mean,
Speaker 2: if you want to work with people and you want
Speaker 2: to attract the best talent, you can't be paying them.
Speaker 2: You can't like not be paying them on time. It's trash.
Speaker 2: It doesn't look good on you. I bet this person
Speaker 2: like you probably will look think really long and hard before.
Speaker 3: You have to work for them again. You know, so
Speaker 3: money up for it?
Speaker 1: If you ever worked for the city of Newark Hill
Speaker 1: before I do anything now, I'm like.
Speaker 3: I need my money up. Five. Thanks. I love You're
Speaker 3: probably legendary.
Speaker 2: They remember.
Speaker 3: The daughter of Newark. Let's take it all. Second question.
Speaker 3: Let's do it.
Speaker 2: All right, y'all, we are back with our second question.
Speaker 2: This book comes from Listener and you want to read
Speaker 2: it to sure.
Speaker 1: Hey, ladies, A few weeks before I thought out I
Speaker 1: was pregnant, congratulations. Oh, I was fired from a new
Speaker 1: job I started due to budget cuts. Although being fired sucked,
Speaker 1: it was a blessing in disguise. I had a horrible
Speaker 1: first trimester. If I were at the job, I would
Speaker 1: have had to be put on FMLA for the entire trimester.
Speaker 1: Now that I'm striving in my second trimester, I decided
Speaker 1: to start looking for work. If I find a job
Speaker 1: before giving birth in about twenty four weeks. When do
Speaker 1: I tell them I'm pregnant or should I wait until
Speaker 1: I give birth to start looking. I look forward to
Speaker 1: your suggestions.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Oh, this is out of my wheelhouse.
Speaker 1: Well, I'll say this as an employer, I would prefer
Speaker 1: her obviously that you let me know and let me decide,
Speaker 1: and I might say start after you come back from
Speaker 1: you know, the baby.
Speaker 3: I don't mind because we've had people.
Speaker 1: I mean, Tam, it's my CEO of the Literature Accounemy
Speaker 1: has had two kids while here. So having children when
Speaker 1: you're you know, when you are part of the staff,
Speaker 1: we love it. It's a little baby unicorn. You take
Speaker 1: your three four months whatever, no problem. But someone who's
Speaker 1: literally starting and then like a month later leaving, I
Speaker 1: feel like that might be a bit disruptive, and so
Speaker 1: as an employer, that would not be my first choice.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't want to know. So I can say you
Speaker 1: seem awesome. How about you come back when you're back back.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, the good news for you, Anne is that
Speaker 2: you have no legal obligation to tell your employer that
Speaker 2: you're pregnant before you take a job. Now that doesn't
Speaker 2: mean that in some cases, like TIF said, it wouldn't
Speaker 2: be nice to give them a heads up. But I
Speaker 2: think the reality is, like I can see how if
Speaker 2: you're coming into a role and you're in an executive
Speaker 2: level position and you are going to have you know,
Speaker 2: you have more skin in the game and you are,
Speaker 2: you know, a key player in the business's success, that
Speaker 2: you would want to bring that up, probably before you know,
Speaker 2: if you were getting closer to your due date. I
Speaker 2: remember when I was at Yahoo and Marissa Meyer, who
Speaker 2: came from Google, she took the Yahoo CEO job in
Speaker 2: twenty thirteen, fourteen or twelve, I don't forget, and she
Speaker 2: was like nine months pregnant with twins. So, and that
Speaker 2: was back when you had to interview in person. So
Speaker 2: it's a lot. It's harder to hide that, and I
Speaker 2: think in that case you have to be upfront. But
Speaker 2: in your case, I mean, I'm not sure what position
Speaker 2: you are, what position you're in, but I would say
Speaker 2: I would keep that close to your chest, especially if you,
Speaker 2: like you're in your second trimester, so am I going
Speaker 2: to be doing around the same time. You're probably not
Speaker 2: showing terribly or not showing that much right now. I
Speaker 2: would keep it to yourself. And I would say, if
Speaker 2: you get a job, which you likely are hopefully you do,
Speaker 2: you know, get a job and you still have a
Speaker 2: few weeks left before your due date, I would take it.
Speaker 2: I would tell them. I would tell HR you know
Speaker 2: when you join, like I. And also this is another thing,
Speaker 2: find a way to strategically ask about parental leave benefits
Speaker 2: before you join, because you're going to want to know
Speaker 2: will you need to be here a certain number of
Speaker 2: weeks or months. Sometimes I'll want you to be there
Speaker 2: for a year before you qualify for additional paid leave,
Speaker 2: and based on that you may decide, Okay, I feel
Speaker 2: confident in taking this job, you know, because I will
Speaker 2: be accepting some leave with that. I know that there
Speaker 2: are companies who if they do find out that you're expecting,
Speaker 2: they have no problem holding your spot for you. And
Speaker 2: I'll mention Google my friends and it was not even
Speaker 2: my friend who was pregnant, it was her husband. Got
Speaker 2: a brand new job at Google and he interviewed in
Speaker 2: August the baby was dueing Wait no, he interviewed in August.
Speaker 2: Baby was due in August, and they were like, you
Speaker 2: got the job, we'll see you in January. And they
Speaker 2: gave him his parental leave upfront. So the benefit of
Speaker 2: maybe telling them is that maybe there's a something that
Speaker 2: can be worked out where they can maybe give you
Speaker 2: your leave upfront and then hold that spot for you
Speaker 2: to join down the line. It's dicey because, like you,
Speaker 2: you really have to feel it out and feel if
Speaker 2: you feel safe. Because I'm not gonna lie. Some jobs
Speaker 2: may just need someone you know in the seat right away,
Speaker 2: and they may come up with another reason for turning
Speaker 2: you down, but really it could be that, oh, you know,
Speaker 2: we want someone who can really hit the ground running,
Speaker 2: and that's discriminatory and illegal for them to deny you
Speaker 2: a job based on, you know, your pregnancy. But I
Speaker 2: live in the real world and that shit still happens.
Speaker 2: So this is probably like a real unsatisfactory answer, But
Speaker 2: I at least want to make you feel like take
Speaker 2: the pressure off yourself, because you actually do not have
Speaker 2: a legal right, legal obligation to tell them unless you're
Speaker 2: probably like in the C suite executive level and they
Speaker 2: make you sign something in advance, being like, if you
Speaker 2: have anything you need to tell us, you know who's
Speaker 2: gonna it's gonna potentially interfere with your work. You know
Speaker 2: you have to tell us, But that's very like rare
Speaker 2: and unlikely to be happening in this case. Then I
Speaker 2: get both sides, but we wish you a very healthy
Speaker 2: and easy birth, happy, delightful baby.
Speaker 3: They have breathe like a dope job sis.
Speaker 2: Okay, Yeah, well I hope you got some good, good severance.
Speaker 2: At least you could have been off at that time
Speaker 2: the first trimester, Yo, it can really kill. I don't
Speaker 2: know what I would be doing if I had to
Speaker 2: work nine to five right now? How did I do this?
Speaker 3: Girl without my two to four naps?
Speaker 1: You was like, no, I'm not sure about this, shifting
Speaker 1: change and now look shifting and changing livid.
Speaker 2: Where would I be without my two thirty four to
Speaker 2: three thirty PM naps every day. I don't I can't
Speaker 2: go back. I can't go back. But and thank you
Speaker 2: for your question. Congratulations on your little one, our spring chickens.
Speaker 1: If you have a question and you know your dooh
Speaker 1: about career, about business, by entrepreneurship, by your finances, or
Speaker 1: just about being brown girl, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: we at here.
Speaker 3: You can send it to us.
Speaker 1: You can go to Brownivision podcast dot com that like
Speaker 1: can ask us anything button. You can send us a
Speaker 1: voice note via Instagram or Brownivision pod or podcast because
Speaker 1: we might have you in the stew virtually, you can
Speaker 1: tweet us the BA pod right is it the b.
Speaker 3: A podcast right at the BA podcast. Yes, you can
Speaker 3: tweet us.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we love your questions, and you know we love
Speaker 1: to have some of you guys back in the stew
Speaker 1: as well. Until next week, sisters and occasional brothers.
Speaker 2: Kevin, what's up, Kevin?
Speaker 3: You can't have them doing care Hoppy doing your cap
Speaker 3: to you and your beautiful wife. I love under say,
Speaker 3: I love the both of them. They're really awesome.
Speaker 2: RBA fan, We'll see y'all. Bye bye, Hey BA fan,
Speaker 2: we could not do this show without your support or
Speaker 2: the support of our team behind the scenes. The Brown
Speaker 2: Emission Podcast is produced by Cumulus Podcast Network. It's edited
Speaker 2: by the wonderful Imani Crosby and produced by Tanya Bustos.
Speaker 2: Dennis Stimplinsky is our in house tech guru, and I
Speaker 2: am Bandy Woodard Santos your co host, and I will
Speaker 2: see y'all next week.