Speaker 1: Hey, hey, hey, we're back. We're we're extra black today.
Speaker 1: You just wait and see. We're brown. Oh you are
Speaker 1: that voice? We're Brown Ambition.
Speaker 2: Hey man, they heard that bass, they heard that baritone,
Speaker 2: So that's not mandra Hey, Tiffany, how are you? There's
Speaker 2: some testosterone in the show today. What are we gonna do?
Speaker 2: I know, so excited y'all. Today we have a very
Speaker 2: very special guest. We have been trying to have this
Speaker 2: gentleman on the show for a minute now, but Covid
Speaker 2: had other plans for me, for everyone else. But we
Speaker 2: are so so excited to welcome Drew mccaskell.
Speaker 3: To Brown Ambition.
Speaker 2: So let me tell you a little b about Drew
Speaker 2: before we get into you know, let him and bless
Speaker 2: him with bless you with his velvety voice. But Drew
Speaker 2: and why everyone should know about drews. He's a LinkedIn
Speaker 2: career expert and culture analyst, an inclusion champion, a marketing
Speaker 2: executive at LinkedIn. Of course, he's a career expert and
Speaker 2: communications executive. But before LinkedIn, I mean, Drew's career just
Speaker 2: spans runs the gamut. He most recently was leading d
Speaker 2: and I Diversity and Inclusion strategy for the global sales,
Speaker 2: marketing and public Affairs function at Facebook M I've heard
Speaker 2: of it, and US consumer marketing and global communications at Nilsen,
Speaker 2: where he also led communications for Nielsen China. And he
Speaker 2: was named one of PR Week's Top forty under forty
Speaker 2: PR executives and co authored y'all co authored the award
Speaker 2: winning Diverse Intelligence series on the economic and cultural impact
Speaker 2: of multi cultural consumers. So, without further ado, welcome to
Speaker 2: the show, Drew.
Speaker 4: Yes, Hey, thank you all for having me. This is amazing.
Speaker 4: I'm loving it.
Speaker 1: So I have been.
Speaker 5: On a shoot so many times, and you guys might
Speaker 5: have heard of at the Karen Hunter show. Karen is
Speaker 5: a girl, and so Jo and I have been guests
Speaker 5: many times and often sometimes we'll be on at the
Speaker 5: same damn time.
Speaker 4: The same damn time, and I love every minute of it. Look,
Speaker 4: not only were we on at the same time, but
Speaker 4: my nieces both got your book.
Speaker 1: That's awesome.
Speaker 4: I was like, I was like my I was like, y'all,
Speaker 4: we got to all get our money right and this
Speaker 4: is this is, this is going to give us the
Speaker 4: jump start we need. So I am I am also
Speaker 4: a fan, so awesome.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm really excited. First and foremost, tell people, what
Speaker 2: does a professional LinkedIn at career expert do?
Speaker 4: Yes, a lot of what I do is sort of
Speaker 4: break down into in the layman's terms, like some of
Speaker 4: the things how one to effectively use our platform, as
Speaker 4: well as to talk a little bit about trends, things
Speaker 4: that are happening in the marketplace, like for job seekers
Speaker 4: that to help you understand. I mean, I lean in
Speaker 4: heavily to having conversations with people who look like me
Speaker 4: and kind of helping them decode some of the things
Speaker 4: that are happening in the economy and the job market.
Speaker 4: That's sort of like what I've always done, even at
Speaker 4: Serious I was culture and economics contributor at Serious XM.
Speaker 4: My strong opinion is that women and people of color
Speaker 4: need to all of us should have a LinkedIn platfor profile.
Speaker 4: I don't just say that because I work at the company.
Speaker 4: I thought that beforehand, but now I definitely realize that
Speaker 4: every ten seconds somebody gets a job on LinkedIn, and
Speaker 4: there's a lot of opportunity for information sharing, and I
Speaker 4: truly believe that the people perish for lack of information,
Speaker 4: and when the information is there and free and all
Speaker 4: you have to do is use the tool. I'm like, Yo,
Speaker 4: that's us, Let's get on it. Because I think about Twitter,
Speaker 4: right like, African Americans in particular, let's talk about black
Speaker 4: folks for a second, make up fourteen percent of the population,
Speaker 4: but we make up about twenty eight percent of active
Speaker 4: conversations on Twitter. Imagine if we over indexed on a
Speaker 4: technology tool and platform that was literally created to connect
Speaker 4: people to economic opportunity. What that could look like. What
Speaker 4: if we over indexed in a place where everybody is
Speaker 4: having conversations about economic opportunity, about getting the bag. That's
Speaker 4: a whole different way of using your time online. And
Speaker 4: part of what I do as a career expert is to,
Speaker 4: you know, I feel like sometimes having a person who
Speaker 4: looks like you, who comes from your community, who sounds
Speaker 4: like you, who talks like you, giving you that information,
Speaker 4: it will oftentimes make people say, oh, Okay, I can
Speaker 4: trust this voice. I mean I had I feel like
Speaker 4: I've built some credibility long before I came to LinkedIn,
Speaker 4: and I think, you know, the mission is good enough
Speaker 4: for me to leverage that credibility to help people understand
Speaker 4: the opportunity that it's out there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you talk about LinkedIn and listen as a current
Speaker 2: coach myself. Just today I had a client and I
Speaker 2: hear this all the time. I'm scared of LinkedIn, like
Speaker 2: or it's not even I'm scared. They first they said
Speaker 2: they hate it. I hate LinkedIn. I don't want to
Speaker 2: be on LinkedIn. My profile is old and dusty. You
Speaker 2: haven't updated it in years. And you know what it's
Speaker 2: at the core of it is LinkedIn sometimes doesn't feel
Speaker 2: like it's for us. So you mentioned like Twitter, you know,
Speaker 2: twenty I didn't realize that stat. That's just you know,
Speaker 2: black Twitter is so strong. We all know that, but
Speaker 2: I didn't know there was the stat behind it.
Speaker 3: So thank you for that.
Speaker 2: But how can we make what's your take on that?
Speaker 2: Why doesn't LinkedIn feel as free, you know for.
Speaker 4: Us to join us on the fair question? Is such
Speaker 4: a fair question. And I think that black folks aren't,
Speaker 4: particularly black women are thriving on LinkedIn, particularly black women
Speaker 4: entrepreneurs are thriving on LinkedIn. But I also think that
Speaker 4: we're doing we're doing a little bit better job I
Speaker 4: think now and making sure that we have content that
Speaker 4: feels good and it feels like, oh, this is for me.
Speaker 4: One of the reasons why I came on board was
Speaker 4: largely to help us reintroduce LinkedIn to consumers who have
Speaker 4: felt like, oh, I don't think it's for me. Actually
Speaker 4: it is. So I'm having conversations in our community about
Speaker 4: how to use the tool, how to make it less daunting, right,
Speaker 4: how to find information that is that's germane to you
Speaker 4: and your experience, and a lot of the things that
Speaker 4: we did, Like we just spent all of February and
Speaker 4: March doing specific content around entrepreneur black entrepreneurs. Right, black
Speaker 4: folks are black all twelve months, not just February, shout
Speaker 4: out to that. And so in the entire month of March,
Speaker 4: we highlighted and profiled black women entrepreneurs and them telling
Speaker 4: their stories and how they found how they found community
Speaker 4: as well as opportunity on the platform. And the more
Speaker 4: that you sort of have those conversations and amplify those conversations,
Speaker 4: the more when people come to the platform they start
Speaker 4: to see content that looks familiar. Right, But we also
Speaker 4: wanted to be incredibly useful, and that's a journey, and
Speaker 4: it's a journey that I'm excited to be a part
Speaker 4: of the leadership on so that people do feel more
Speaker 4: they do feel more connected to the platform. But we
Speaker 4: got a lot of work to do and in terms
Speaker 4: of that, and you know, there's a lot of investment
Speaker 4: going into that, but it's also around you know, I
Speaker 4: think sometimes career conversations can feel like medicine, right, and
Speaker 4: you know, if you've got you know, a sugary snack
Speaker 4: over here and a little bit of medicine over here,
Speaker 4: like that sugary you know, Twitter snack.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, it may be easier to twitter
Speaker 2: conbos Drew are not appropriate for LinkedIn.
Speaker 5: He was like, you can't bring all that ratchet to
Speaker 5: LinkedIn and sometimes you do the jobs.
Speaker 4: Okay, we have we have we have controls for the chaos,
Speaker 4: right because it is still a professional platform and that's
Speaker 4: what the conversations are about. And I think that's actually
Speaker 4: a good thing.
Speaker 1: Can I ask a question, Drew?
Speaker 5: So so I love that you said that black women
Speaker 5: and entrepreneurs are thriving on LinkedIn. So if someone's listening,
Speaker 5: I would love if can you give some best practices
Speaker 5: if you are an entrepreneur, this is the way you
Speaker 5: should lean in versus if you you know, are you know,
Speaker 5: have a career, you know, and you don't own your
Speaker 5: own business. This is the best practices how you can
Speaker 5: lean in. Can you like kind of differentiate the best
Speaker 5: ways to lean in and those two sides.
Speaker 4: Yeah, So off top, there's a couple of things that
Speaker 4: everyone should just think through. It's like, one, have a
Speaker 4: good have a good profile picture, right, Like you don't
Speaker 4: have to go out and spend a lot of money
Speaker 4: on headshots, but you probably shouldn't have a beach selfie
Speaker 4: on your LinkedIn profile unless you're a surf instructor, right,
Speaker 4: And so I would say, have a great have a
Speaker 4: great picture so people know that you're a real person.
Speaker 4: Be really keen about what your superpower is and talk
Speaker 4: about your skills and your experience, right, and why what
Speaker 4: people need to know about you as a professional. That's
Speaker 4: really really important. Use keywords that are that are really
Speaker 4: germane to the work that you do, right, and talk
Speaker 4: about your skills. Skills, skills, skills. That's how people find
Speaker 4: you is based on skills. Skills are the key to
Speaker 4: the algorithm. I will say in addition to that, if
Speaker 4: you're an entrepreneur, say what you're looking for and figure
Speaker 4: out who what groups there are that you can join
Speaker 4: on the platform. There are lots of groups for entrepreneurs.
Speaker 4: If you're an entrepreneur in finance, join the finance groups.
Speaker 4: If you're an entrepreneur and you have a service or
Speaker 4: a business, do all of those things. If you're if
Speaker 4: you're a professional looking for a traditional job and you're
Speaker 4: actively looking for work, there are a couple of tools.
Speaker 4: One that I think is absolutely amazing and it is
Speaker 4: called job Alerts. Job Alerts allows you to look for
Speaker 4: a job while you're eating, sleeping, working at your current job.
Speaker 4: Because you set up a profile of the types of
Speaker 4: jobs that you want, the geographies that you're looking at,
Speaker 4: companies that you would like to work for, and as
Speaker 4: soon as a job posts on our platform, and there
Speaker 4: are millions of jobs that post on our platform globally,
Speaker 4: every day, you get an alert in your email that says, hey,
Speaker 4: a job that matches your profile that you set up
Speaker 4: just opened up. Here's how you can now go and
Speaker 4: apply for it. And I would say engage. Engage in
Speaker 4: terms of finding the people on the platform that are
Speaker 4: part of your community and even people that you want
Speaker 4: to be a part of your community, particularly if you're
Speaker 4: an entrepreneur. I think LinkedIn is a great way for
Speaker 4: you to engage with your network, with people who are
Speaker 4: talking about and about the business that you also are about,
Speaker 4: and using the platform as a networking tool is incredibly important.
Speaker 4: So if you are if you are a person who's
Speaker 4: in that sort of phase of I'm I'm working, but
Speaker 4: I'm also an entrepreneur at the same time as many
Speaker 4: of as many folks are in sit in both of
Speaker 4: those categories. Having a service page in addition to your
Speaker 4: LinkedIn profile page that talks about this is my business,
Speaker 4: this is my other business that I do, I'm a
Speaker 4: freelance writer, or I'm you know, I'm on the speaker circuit,
Speaker 4: and have that connected to your to your profile page
Speaker 4: as well. That says that that makes it easy for
Speaker 4: people to search for you if they're looking for somebody
Speaker 4: with your skill or somebody who does what you do right.
Speaker 4: Also if you're looking for if you are a person
Speaker 4: who's looking for a job, LinkedIn has a feature called
Speaker 4: open to Work you can turn on.
Speaker 3: People are so scared of that one, Drew.
Speaker 4: And so here's I know people are typically scared because
Speaker 4: you know, if I'm working at LinkedIn, I don't want
Speaker 4: LinkedIn recruiters to see it up open for work, right, Yeah,
Speaker 4: but there's also there's a control for that too that
Speaker 4: recruiters from the job that you have listed won't necessarily
Speaker 4: see that you're open for work, but other recruiters will
Speaker 4: be able to see that you can even if.
Speaker 3: You I didn't realize it. How the way of like
Speaker 3: filtering out recruiters from way of.
Speaker 4: Filtering that out. I mean, we've heard that before, We've
Speaker 4: reacted to that, and we've we've created a solution for that,
Speaker 4: and so that says to recruiters, immediately listen. My partner
Speaker 4: is in recruiting and his entire team lives by LinkedIn, right,
Speaker 4: They use it every single day. That's how they find candidates.
Speaker 4: Particularly if you have on that you're open for work,
Speaker 4: you go to the top of the list for when
Speaker 4: recruiters are searching.
Speaker 5: Like, I didn't know that there was like a like
Speaker 5: a service page. So because I I'm like looking at
Speaker 5: my LinkedIn now, I'm like, I mean my pictures all right.
Speaker 1: It's the cover of my book, which will be for
Speaker 1: a while.
Speaker 5: But I didn't know I could like a link it
Speaker 5: to like, hey, I mean, people reach out like, actually,
Speaker 5: I'm looking at my LinkedIn profile and a company has
Speaker 5: just reached out because they want to talk about like partnership,
Speaker 5: so I do check. I would say weekly give or take,
Speaker 5: but I didn't know I could have a service page.
Speaker 5: That's pretty cool. I'm definitely gonna like look into it.
Speaker 4: I mean someone that if you, hey, here's how you
Speaker 4: booked me for speaking engagements, or here's the types of
Speaker 4: I help and partner and do these things with with
Speaker 4: you know, internal employee resource groups or things like that,
Speaker 4: or I'm open to consulting all of those things. You
Speaker 4: can do that on a on a profile page. And
Speaker 4: two you can go to Opportunity dot LinkedIn dot com
Speaker 4: and figure out better ways to do all of those things.
Speaker 4: Like we know that that it can be a little daunting,
Speaker 4: but opportunity at LinkedIn dot com also helps you look
Speaker 4: at these are the top jobs that people are looking
Speaker 4: for right now. This is the way that you can
Speaker 4: write a really cool bio in that top part right
Speaker 4: there that uses the keywords to help people find you.
Speaker 5: Hold that thought, drew, because we're going to go to
Speaker 5: break and will be right back and pick up with
Speaker 5: all this awesomeness.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much.
Speaker 3: All right, be a fan. We are back.
Speaker 2: Here's more of our conversation with Drew McCaskill. Can we
Speaker 2: pivot just a little bit and talk about the you know,
Speaker 2: we're coming off of this period where it has felt
Speaker 2: like a job seekers market, you know, the great resignation
Speaker 2: giving way to labor shortages, companies competing more than ever.
Speaker 2: There's something like two jobs for every open job seeker
Speaker 2: right now. That being said, there is obviously a little
Speaker 2: bit of like a cooling off in terms of the
Speaker 2: job market, just a cooling off. I don't want people
Speaker 2: to get like freaked out. I mean, the job's report
Speaker 2: just came out Friday. It's still really strong. It's a
Speaker 2: little bit under what we saw in May, but still
Speaker 2: really strong. And an unemployment it's still so low. But
Speaker 2: you must be getting the same kind of questions I
Speaker 2: get from my coaching clients, which is, you know, do
Speaker 2: I need to change my Do I need to try
Speaker 2: to find a job quicker than I thought? Is it
Speaker 2: going to be really tough to find a job in
Speaker 2: six months? So for job seekers who are maybe a
Speaker 2: little bit anxious about what's happening in the economy, what
Speaker 2: what would you say to them about their hopes for
Speaker 2: finding a better opportunity.
Speaker 4: No pressure, no, no pressure on that. Listen. I don't
Speaker 4: have a crystal ball, but I will say that you
Speaker 4: can read the tea leaves on what's happening in the
Speaker 4: economy right now, right like, let's just let's just be
Speaker 4: real about it. I think that there's going to be
Speaker 4: some contraction in the market, and that's you know, that's
Speaker 4: my opinion, not as an economist, but as somebody who
Speaker 4: reads the paper every day, and I think for job seekers,
Speaker 4: one of the things that you have to do is
Speaker 4: get really clear about what it is that you want
Speaker 4: to do and why is it. Is this the right
Speaker 4: time for you to make that move? What are you
Speaker 4: looking for in a new opportunity. You also have to think,
Speaker 4: I've got to now really investigate these companies before I
Speaker 4: before I leave the job where I am today and
Speaker 4: go work for somewhere new, and I've got to really
Speaker 4: get a good idea of what I'm getting myself into.
Speaker 4: I think what we saw a lot in the what
Speaker 4: we call the Great Reshuffle, others call the Great Resignation,
Speaker 4: is that there was some there was some resignation regret
Speaker 4: on a lot of folks. A lot of people boomerang
Speaker 4: back to their old jobs if they were if those
Speaker 4: jobs were still available, because they looked at that number,
Speaker 4: and they looked at the prospect that they're looked around
Speaker 4: all of their friends were changing jobs, and they thinking, Okay,
Speaker 4: well the block is hot, let me go out and
Speaker 4: get this additional bag without thinking about the culture. And
Speaker 4: so what I would say to job seekers is you've
Speaker 4: got to be really clear about what it is that
Speaker 4: you want from work, why you want it, and what
Speaker 4: your expectations are, so that when if you do make
Speaker 4: the decide to make that move, you know the right
Speaker 4: questions to ask. And you need to be asking companies
Speaker 4: just as many questions as they're asking you in the
Speaker 4: interview process. Are there people in leadership who look like me?
Speaker 4: You know? You know who? Do I know who works there? Right?
Speaker 4: Is there someone who works there who has a life
Speaker 4: experience similar to mine? Let me reach out to them
Speaker 4: and ask them and ask them about their experience working there,
Speaker 4: Like you have to investigate the companies that you're going
Speaker 4: to go work for just as much as they're thinking
Speaker 4: about you and googling you and all of those things.
Speaker 4: And so culture matters. The other thing I would say
Speaker 4: is it's still very much an employee marketplace. But I
Speaker 4: do think that folks have to we'll see that contraction.
Speaker 4: And so now it is making that decision. Do I
Speaker 4: am I looking for more flexibility? Am I looking for
Speaker 4: more money? Am I looking for a different a different
Speaker 4: role altogether or in a different industry altogether? How and
Speaker 4: is there an opportunity for me to make those moves internally?
Speaker 4: Because a lot of what companies are saying right now
Speaker 4: is my next employee may be my current employee, just
Speaker 4: in a different role inside of this organization. A lot
Speaker 4: of people leave great companies because they got shitty managers, right,
Speaker 4: and so there may be an opportunity to think through
Speaker 4: how do I move on from this particular role and
Speaker 4: still stay with this company if there's an opportunity in
Speaker 4: other places that in that in that world you have
Speaker 4: not because you ask not. We have to get really,
Speaker 4: really confident in the fact that there's so many more
Speaker 4: things that are negotiable now than they've ever been before.
Speaker 4: Employees have more voice and more choice than they've literally
Speaker 4: ever had before. There are more platforms for folks to
Speaker 4: be vocal about their work experience, and their lived experience,
Speaker 4: and companies are being a lot more mindful of that
Speaker 4: now than they've ever been, and they're taking on and
Speaker 4: they're taking on a lot more empathy and care than
Speaker 4: they've had than they've done before, because now they literally
Speaker 4: have to.
Speaker 1: I was going to ask.
Speaker 5: That's like a good segue because I was going to ask,
Speaker 5: if someone is an employee and kind of looking for
Speaker 5: a new place to work, what are some things to
Speaker 5: consider as it relates to what's happening right now from
Speaker 5: you know roversus wayed to you know, post racial reckoning.
Speaker 5: It's funny because I was on a I was on
Speaker 5: a call the financial brand, a huge financial brand, and
Speaker 5: we're working together, and I was like, can I ask
Speaker 5: something candidly? They were like sure. I said, why do
Speaker 5: you care about black people? All of a sudden, everybody
Speaker 5: was like scr.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 5: I was on my Kanye because I was like, what
Speaker 5: you're gonna do? You're gonna find another budgetiesta you not.
Speaker 5: We're gonna ask these real questions. And plus it was
Speaker 5: like the leader on the call, she's a sister, so
Speaker 5: she looked at me like, ooh girl, yes I ask.
Speaker 5: I was like, so I said, because I remember, like
Speaker 5: not less than ten years ago, when I first came
Speaker 5: out and I was trying to book things and whatever.
Speaker 5: You know, I had to be careful to say women,
Speaker 5: you know, because if I said black women, y'all ran off.
Speaker 5: And I said, because you're not the only financial brand.
Speaker 5: I mean, I'm beating financial brands off with a stick.
Speaker 5: I said, they just camped out, you know, in front
Speaker 5: of my my budgeteste to port. You know, they don't
Speaker 5: even care that I'm working with there, and you know,
Speaker 5: with the whomever. They're like, we'll go next. And I'm like,
Speaker 5: but why, And then of course it was like the
Speaker 5: answer was something to the effect of, like, oh, because
Speaker 5: of the racial reckoning, you know, we want to do better.
Speaker 5: I said, let's be real, what is the financial benefit
Speaker 5: for helping black and brown people? Because you're a company,
Speaker 5: you're not I mean you you know, y'all been down bad,
Speaker 5: so like like for real, and so if you know,
Speaker 5: for folks who are like making decisions now about what
Speaker 5: company to work for, what are some things that they
Speaker 5: should be looking at as it relates to modern challenges
Speaker 5: that that that companies have to have to account for.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think that they I think that you're you're
Speaker 4: absolutely right, and I think the question that you asked
Speaker 4: that organization is spot on, right. But and part of
Speaker 4: that is black folks contribute one point one point four
Speaker 4: one point five, you know, trillion dollars to the US
Speaker 4: economy every year. Right. If black folks, just black folks
Speaker 4: were a global economy, we'd be the fifteenth largest GDP
Speaker 4: in the world between Spain and Mexico. Is Black America, right,
Speaker 4: And so when you put that into context, that's companies
Speaker 4: are like, oh wait, well what wa wait a minute,
Speaker 4: And black folks, particularly led by black women, are demanding
Speaker 4: more of the people that we spend our money with.
Speaker 4: That's just point blank period, right. I think that companies
Speaker 4: are reckoning with the fact that there's an empathy gap
Speaker 4: out there. People are disillusioned with church, they're disillusioned with government.
Speaker 4: They've been disappointed with all of these organizations and entities
Speaker 4: that have had such huge impacts on their lives, and
Speaker 4: they're thinking that the one place where I have some
Speaker 4: modicum of influence is now work. And companies are having
Speaker 4: to get religion around the fact that people are expecting them,
Speaker 4: employees and consumers are expecting them to have some sort
Speaker 4: of you know, moral impact, right to be moral actors,
Speaker 4: and that's so new for most companies, and you're now
Speaker 4: seeing companies like figuring it out right, Like you see
Speaker 4: a lot of companies that are saying, Okay, row has happened.
Speaker 4: What can we do for the women at our company? Right?
Speaker 4: We can't change the laws in the world, but what
Speaker 4: can we do for our folks. Well, what we can
Speaker 4: do is that if you need a reproductive health benefit
Speaker 4: that you can't get in your state, we're gonna pay
Speaker 4: for your travel so that you can get that benefit
Speaker 4: and still be able. And we're gonna look out for you.
Speaker 4: We're gonna look out for you. Right, you're seeing companies
Speaker 4: now say, wait a minute. Black folks have you know,
Speaker 4: thirty plus percent more student loan debt than their non
Speaker 4: Hispanic white counterparts. It takes them a decade longer to
Speaker 4: pay it off. Okay, we can't do anything about whether
Speaker 4: or not the government is going to is going to
Speaker 4: write off student loan debt. But for our folks, we're
Speaker 4: going to create a student loan debt relief program for
Speaker 4: our people when you come work here, right, or we're
Speaker 4: going to bring in the budgetista to talk to our
Speaker 4: employee resource groups about how to actively pay off student
Speaker 4: loan debt or how to use company benefits to do
Speaker 4: those things and do those things effectively. And so if
Speaker 4: you're a prospective employee, the first thing you got to
Speaker 4: do when I talk about researching companies is in those
Speaker 4: interview processes, ask hill, can you give me an idea
Speaker 4: of what your black employee resource group does? Or can
Speaker 4: you give me an idea of what your pride employee
Speaker 4: resource does. If it's just parties and potlucks, then that
Speaker 4: might not be That might not be what you need, right.
Speaker 4: You might need something bigger than parties and potlucks. And
Speaker 4: shout out to the parties and the potlucks because they
Speaker 4: breed culture. But you also have to think about how
Speaker 4: does this benefit me? Right? Are there people in leadership
Speaker 4: who look like me? I've always said that if the
Speaker 4: senior most person in your organization of color in your
Speaker 4: organization is the person, then you probably have a D
Speaker 4: and I problem. Right, So you need to look across
Speaker 4: and see are there people who are who are in
Speaker 4: management and leadership who look like me? Talk to somebody
Speaker 4: who else used to work there or who works there currently,
Speaker 4: what is your experience like we have to do peer
Speaker 4: to peer mentorship and peer to peer information sharing as
Speaker 4: people of color primarily much more so than any other
Speaker 4: group because our experience is so differentiated when it comes
Speaker 4: to when it comes to being at work. I say
Speaker 4: the same thing with people who are part of the
Speaker 4: queer community and the LGBTQ plus community, is that the
Speaker 4: questions that we have to ask are different, right, and
Speaker 4: what is your commitment to diversity and inclusion? You can
Speaker 4: ask that question. Are there any other people of color
Speaker 4: who are going to be on my team? You can
Speaker 4: ask that question. If those questions make the people that
Speaker 4: you're talking to at work uncomfortable, it may be an
Speaker 4: uncomfortable environment for you once you get there, right, Like,
Speaker 4: lean into the discom for in the beginning so that
Speaker 4: you won't have to sit there and be uncomfortable for
Speaker 4: the next eighteen months while you're looking for a new job.
Speaker 2: Thank you for saying that and what you said about confidence.
Speaker 2: We have to be confident enough to ask for that.
Speaker 2: And also shout out to the employees who are asking
Speaker 2: their leaders right now the tough questions about what are
Speaker 2: you going to be doing? Are you going to be
Speaker 2: rolling out any benefits you know, similar to XYZ companies
Speaker 2: to offer that, like you said, the reproductive care or yeah,
Speaker 2: healthcare benefits in other states, and like paying for travel
Speaker 2: to get access to those benefits.
Speaker 3: You can do that. You can act right.
Speaker 2: You can raise a hand, you can submit a question,
Speaker 2: you can email the CEO. They got emails too, So.
Speaker 4: I raise your hand and say, hey, company leadership, or
Speaker 4: hey head of equity and inclusion, or hey senior person
Speaker 4: in this organization. I don't feel comfortable as a queer
Speaker 4: person for us to have this, to take our company
Speaker 4: and our money and to this event in this state
Speaker 4: that is one of the states that has the more
Speaker 4: than two hundred and forty pieces of anti gay legislation
Speaker 4: in it. Can we have that conversation right? Employees, much
Speaker 4: like consumers, have more voice and more choice than they've
Speaker 4: ever had before. And I think that a lot of
Speaker 4: it is around being able to say. I think that
Speaker 4: we've been conditioned to just stay in the pocket, don't
Speaker 4: ask too and don't ask any questions, don't do this,
Speaker 4: just be happy to be here, and that's it. And
Speaker 4: I think that that, particularly for younger professionals, that's not
Speaker 4: good enough. Anymore. It is perfectly okay to say this
Speaker 4: is good, but I think we can do better. That
Speaker 4: is okay to say in this world that this is good,
Speaker 4: but I think that we can do better. That's for
Speaker 4: your career as well as for just how you move
Speaker 4: through the companies in the spaces where you're where you're working.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I love the power of choice that you said,
Speaker 2: Like it's still very much, as I agree, a job
Speaker 2: seekers market, and for our listeners who are largely women
Speaker 2: of color, but for people from the queer community too,
Speaker 2: like yourself and black men. If you are not feeling
Speaker 2: safe where you are, I think the power of this
Speaker 2: moment is that you are able to find a new
Speaker 2: opportunity and you can. There are places that exist where
Speaker 2: Adrian McCaskill can be, you know, an executive and a
Speaker 2: budget neist to can be getting these checks for all
Speaker 2: the monies, you know what I mean? Like, those places
Speaker 2: do exist. Maybe they're harder to find, but they are
Speaker 2: out there, you know.
Speaker 5: And even you know, like we just like we'll have
Speaker 5: a press release coming out soon. I was like, I'm
Speaker 5: committed to providing health care to because my team is
Speaker 5: largely women. If you've been denied in your state, you know,
Speaker 5: and that comes up for you. And so we've committed,
Speaker 5: we said aside a thousand dollars to help with travel
Speaker 5: and accommodations, and so all of our employees have access
Speaker 5: to that. If you're in a state that does not
Speaker 5: provide you with a safe mechanism for not being pregnant anymore,
Speaker 5: if that's what you's so desired, so we're like, okay,
Speaker 5: you know, and if you're in that state and you've
Speaker 5: decided to terminate the pregnancy and you're not able to, well,
Speaker 5: we will give you money to be able to safely
Speaker 5: come to a place where you can do so. And
Speaker 5: so like so don't think like you're listening, you're like, oh,
Speaker 5: that's all. It's only these big companies. It's like no
Speaker 5: small companies can commit, you know. I asked my CFO.
Speaker 5: I said, how much if everybody said yes, you know,
Speaker 5: just in case, like, how much can we commix?
Speaker 1: I don't want to say yes, it's ten thousand dollars
Speaker 1: and everybody says me. I'm like okay, wait a minute.
Speaker 5: So, you know, so like she looked at our budget,
Speaker 5: it was like she's like, if everybody said yes, we
Speaker 5: could comfortably do one thousand dollars per person. I said, Okay,
Speaker 5: let's do it. And then next year, you know, as
Speaker 5: business does better, we can commit to more. So just
Speaker 5: know that you know the same goes through.
Speaker 1: True. The same is true for small businesses as it
Speaker 1: is for a large companies.
Speaker 4: And oftentimes it's small businesses, Tiffany like, things are way
Speaker 4: more negotiable at small businesses sometimes than they are at
Speaker 4: larger corporations. Right. So oftentimes I say this all the
Speaker 4: times that we have not because we ask not. We
Speaker 4: have been conditioned to have this theory of lack, where
Speaker 4: as many of us are walking around in the face
Speaker 4: of abundance and our eye is not trained to see it. Right.
Speaker 4: And so what I say to people all the time
Speaker 4: is do not let these jobs steal your edges, your hairline,
Speaker 4: if your men steal your joy, right like, because there
Speaker 4: is a place out there where you can go to work,
Speaker 4: be your authentic self and thrive. You do not have
Speaker 4: to just stay somewhere and just try and survive, and
Speaker 4: survival is not optimal. We want you to thrive, right
Speaker 4: and there are places out there where you can do.
Speaker 4: You may have to jump out of that you may
Speaker 4: have to jump out of that boat right and try
Speaker 4: something that you've never tried before, or get into a
Speaker 4: place where you're saying, I'm going to take control of
Speaker 4: my career and I'm going to use all of the
Speaker 4: tools in my tool belt to do that. But work
Speaker 4: is supposed to give you wings, not shackles. The reason
Speaker 4: why I go so hard around talking to people about
Speaker 4: their power and their choice and their voice is because
Speaker 4: work is supposed to give you wings and not shackles. Right,
Speaker 4: money is supposed to give you wings and not shackles.
Speaker 4: That's the biggest piece of this, right. And so the
Speaker 4: reality is that I don't want we've got to speak
Speaker 4: abundance into the lives of other people, because I can
Speaker 4: tell you that at my grown age, many of my
Speaker 4: peers and I'm in my forties, many of my peers
Speaker 4: have never had anybody speak abundance over their lives. Professionally.
Speaker 4: They've told them about lack, They've told them about limitations,
Speaker 4: they told them about well, these are the rules. You
Speaker 4: got to follow this right here, and this is what
Speaker 4: you got to do, and keep your head down. No,
Speaker 4: you deserve better than that. You're better and bigger than
Speaker 4: a job. Right. And so most of what freedom looks
Speaker 4: like for many of us who are working, and we're
Speaker 4: all working in some way, shape or form, is figuring
Speaker 4: out what your mission is, right like, what do you
Speaker 4: what problems do you want to solve in the world,
Speaker 4: what's your superpower, how do you use it? And what's
Speaker 4: in service to And that sounds lofty, but it makes
Speaker 4: all of your decisions so much easier about work and
Speaker 4: your jobs. And I say that plural because previous generations
Speaker 4: where there was this thing that people just told you,
Speaker 4: get that good job and don't do anything to make
Speaker 4: them white folks mad at you. Right, yes, and that
Speaker 4: is the wrong way to think about any of this. Right,
Speaker 4: is your superpowers? Can you can have three or four
Speaker 4: jobs if you lean into your mission and your superpower,
Speaker 4: if you lean into just I got to do everything
Speaker 4: I can to keep this one job. Managers will come
Speaker 4: and managers will go. Jobs will come and jobs will go.
Speaker 4: Most of the jobs that half of us have, especially
Speaker 4: in our twenties and our thirties, our vehicles and not
Speaker 4: destinations most of us don't need. There are plenty of
Speaker 4: folks in jobs that they really don't need to just
Speaker 4: set up shop and stay at that job forever. That
Speaker 4: job is probably a vehicle and not a destination, and
Speaker 4: we've got to do a mindset shift around it. Because
Speaker 4: there is abundance around us, and that's up and down
Speaker 4: socioeconomic lines. All that's across the board as it relates
Speaker 4: to people who are first line, in frontline workers, as
Speaker 4: well as people who are in corporate environments. There's abundance
Speaker 4: out there.
Speaker 2: Please pass the plate because I'm ready to put some
Speaker 2: money in it. Like, I feel like I've just.
Speaker 3: Been to a career servant.
Speaker 2: My heart is so warm because I agree with like,
Speaker 2: and that's what I preach all the time as professional resilience,
Speaker 2: not job stability and job security. So oh, I feel
Speaker 2: like that's so exciting. I mean, it's great to hear
Speaker 2: it's great to hear that from your perspective, because there's
Speaker 2: people that I think even I can't reach and to
Speaker 2: have like there's there's people who will hear your voice
Speaker 2: and listen, and I hope that they hear that true incredible.
Speaker 5: We're all FROs are like, wow, pass the piece and
Speaker 5: please turn.
Speaker 1: Well, I guess I mean to wrap up. I think hmm,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I feel like you're don't set all
Speaker 1: things to wrap up.
Speaker 5: Maybe if you can leave, like you know, our listeners
Speaker 5: with one piece of efact because I feel like someone
Speaker 5: took like one of my friends Lovely she had posted
Speaker 5: on insigns she.
Speaker 1: Said, God, if it's the last days, just say it's
Speaker 1: the last days, you know.
Speaker 5: Like so sometimes it feels like that, whether it's your career,
Speaker 5: your business, or I feel like that it always feels
Speaker 5: that the sky is falling down. If you could just
Speaker 5: give a piece of advice to our listeners, you know,
Speaker 5: whether they own a business, whether they are in their careers,
Speaker 5: like you know, as they move forward, because to your point,
Speaker 5: there's a lot of people who have not had abundance
Speaker 5: spoken over them, like one last piece of advice that,
Speaker 5: you know, to give them that little boost, you know,
Speaker 5: as they as we navigate, you know, what is likely
Speaker 5: going to be a recession or whatever else is coming up.
Speaker 4: You know. Yeah, the last thing I would say is
Speaker 4: what I've learned as a black gay man in corporate
Speaker 4: America is that nobody's coming to save you. So and
Speaker 4: and there's a freedom that comes from that. It sounds pessimistic,
Speaker 4: but there's a freedom that comes from saying that nobody
Speaker 4: is coming to save you. And why I think that
Speaker 4: that's so important to know is that but there are
Speaker 4: things that you that you can do as it relates
Speaker 4: to building building your career and building the professional life
Speaker 4: that you want. And the first thing is find your flock.
Speaker 4: We have this. We've been taught that like there's gonna
Speaker 4: be that you can get this mentor or a sponsor,
Speaker 4: and somebody in an ivory tower somewhere is going to
Speaker 4: come down and anoint you with the knowledge that you
Speaker 4: need to take the same career path that they took
Speaker 4: when they were your age fifteen twenty years ago and
Speaker 4: the world was totally different. Find What I would say
Speaker 4: is get find your people right, find a community and
Speaker 4: network the hell out of it. I my group chat
Speaker 4: has saved my life so many times. And we as
Speaker 4: people of color, I think there's a lot of there's
Speaker 4: a lot of ego and shame tied up around talking
Speaker 4: about money and talking about compensation. We got to disavow
Speaker 4: ourselves of that notion. Find people that you can have
Speaker 4: real conversations with and you can information share and that
Speaker 4: you can talk to about and you can say, did
Speaker 4: they give me all of the interns from Howard because
Speaker 4: I'm black, or you can say, wait a minute, I
Speaker 4: don't know how to I don't know how to negotiate
Speaker 4: for equity. Tell me the SKUs again. What should I
Speaker 4: be asking for? Is am I asking for enough? All
Speaker 4: of those things matter. Peer to peer mentorship will save
Speaker 4: your life as a person of color. You just got
Speaker 4: to find the right people who are willing to share
Speaker 4: information with and you share information back with them. Your network.
Speaker 4: That information that comes from your network is amazing. Glean
Speaker 4: into it. Don't let the old rules about not talking
Speaker 4: about money, or I don't want you to know how
Speaker 4: much money I make, or I don't know what the
Speaker 4: only want you to want what my offer was, Let
Speaker 4: that go. It's not a competition. Community will save you.
Speaker 4: The other thing that I would say too is always
Speaker 4: be in the market. Always be in the market. You know,
Speaker 4: when you are comfortable, that's the best time to still
Speaker 4: be looking around to see what your other options and
Speaker 4: your other opportunities are. Right, that's when you have the
Speaker 4: most power to shift and to change. Because I will
Speaker 4: tell you that God will make you so uncomfortable in
Speaker 4: comfortable situations that you can't help but move and get
Speaker 4: out of that situation so you can go and be
Speaker 4: who he called you to be. And I know that
Speaker 4: to be a fact. I've lived that myself, and so
Speaker 4: I would say, always be in the market, Always be
Speaker 4: understanding what you're figuring out, what your value is in
Speaker 4: the market. And the last thing I'll say is the
Speaker 4: last thing that the ref says to the two fighters
Speaker 4: in the ring before they ring that bell, is protect
Speaker 4: yourself at all times. And I say that to women,
Speaker 4: I say that to queer people. I say that to
Speaker 4: people of color. Protect yourself at all times, meaning protect
Speaker 4: your peace, protect your integrity, protect you know, the integrity
Speaker 4: of your work and your work quality. And don't let
Speaker 4: these jobs break you. Don't let them break your spirit.
Speaker 4: Don't let the markets break you. Don't let the things
Speaker 4: that are going on in the zeitgeist break you. I
Speaker 4: said this to like about a year ago. I said,
Speaker 4: White America discovered that racism is real and that June
Speaker 4: tenth exists, right. And what I said to my what
Speaker 4: I said to my black friends and colleagues all the time,
Speaker 4: is like, you do know that if somebody walks up
Speaker 4: to you and ask you to explain racism and the
Speaker 4: history of racism and all of that to them at
Speaker 4: that particular moment. You don't have to get involved in that, right, Like,
Speaker 4: there's all of these things that I say about protecting
Speaker 4: your piece, whether it's at work or in any other place.
Speaker 4: And that's also like taking a break when you need it,
Speaker 4: asking for help when you need it. Like, don't you know,
Speaker 4: we did a survey around queer professionals and like fifty
Speaker 4: six percent of them say that that all of the
Speaker 4: anti gay legislation and the stuff that was happening in government, right,
Speaker 4: the stuff that was happening around them was giving them
Speaker 4: was causing them to have mental health issues. That's over half, right,
Speaker 4: And so we don't have the luxury of not of
Speaker 4: being able to turn off the world just because we
Speaker 4: got to get up and go to work at nine
Speaker 4: o'clock tomorrow, Right, we don't have that luxury. I still
Speaker 4: am a black man when I get up and go
Speaker 4: to work and do all those things, and when I'm
Speaker 4: driving to work, you know, I also have in the
Speaker 4: back of my head that one in one thousand black
Speaker 4: men will be killed by law enforcement in this country. Right,
Speaker 4: I still have to go to work and do all
Speaker 4: the things and So what I say is like, protect
Speaker 4: yourself at all times, meaning like give yourself space for peace,
Speaker 4: whatever that means, even if that means looking for a
Speaker 4: new gig, even if that means taking some time off,
Speaker 4: even if that means saying, you know, I'm excited that
Speaker 4: you want to have that conversation. I wish more people
Speaker 4: outside of the black community were interested in learning. I
Speaker 4: applaud you in doing that. I'm just not the right
Speaker 4: person to help you with it. You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 4: find your flock, always be in the market, and protect
Speaker 4: yourself at all times.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, Drew. That was awesome.
Speaker 2: Drewe mccaskell, Thank you so much for joining bran Ambish.
Speaker 2: I feel like I can listen to you.
Speaker 3: Talk all day.
Speaker 2: If you guys want to find out more about Drew,
Speaker 2: please go follow him immediately on LinkedIn. Right now, we'll
Speaker 2: post a link to his profile in the show notes. Drew,
Speaker 2: thank you so much for joining BA.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Thanks find you?
Speaker 1: Are you the on you on the instagrams?
Speaker 4: I am on the twitters. You can find at Drew
Speaker 4: McCaskill on Twitter. I talk about career stuff as well
Speaker 4: as my favorite TV shows in politics. So be If
Speaker 4: you go follow me, just be ready because it's not
Speaker 4: all about it's not all professional Drew, So just know
Speaker 4: that my professional insta is at Drew mccaskell. You can
Speaker 4: follow me there, but it's all work stuff. Thank you, Drew,
Speaker 4: Thank y'all, Thanks for having me all right.
Speaker 3: 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 Emani Crosby and produced by Tanya Bustos.
Speaker 3: Dennis Stimplinsky is
Speaker 2: Our in house tech guru, and I am Bandy Woodrif
Speaker 2: Santos your co host, and I will see y'all next week.