Hey, Hey, Hey, va fam I cannot wait to introduce you to today's guest. She is someone who I have been cyberstocking, not in a creepy way, in a totally cool way for a long time. I feel like she is my nine to five hotty partner in crime.
She's me.
I think we have so much in common with the way she's approached her career and her inspirational message of how anyone out there, even if you're working nine to five, you can still build wealth. I am so happy to welcome Sonia to the show. Sania founded Flyinance, which is an online platform dedicated to helping ambitious working women, who she calls nine to five hotties, effortlessly build wealth and
say yes to more travel. She's a product manager and she's worked at major companies like AMX and MasterCard, and she has grown her salary four x in just four years, became debt free, and managed to reach one hundred K net worth by the tender age of twenty six years old. Her story has been featured everywhere from GMA to CNBC and now she's on Brown Ambition. So now you've made it, okay.
I know.
GMA is like cool but come on, it's brown ambition for legends.
Right now, that's a fast I'm jan girling very hard inside. Thank you so much, Mandy.
Likewise, Cinia, it's such a pleasure to have you on the show. First and foremost, thank you for being I feel like I've been banging this druma of quit your way rich like kind of alone, and there's this like stigma around telling people to quit their jobs. Talk to me about and you're you know, you're a few years younger than me, right are you? How old are you?
If you don't mind, I'm twenty seven right now.
Yeah, so you're a few years younger. It was around my mid twenties when I started making those really you know, strategic quits, and I quit six times in a decade of my career.
Now.
I was in journalism, and I remember my little brother kind of telling me like, why do you want to go into journalism? Do you not want to make money? And I remember thinking, listen, I tell stories. I'm gonna go for it. And I managed to quit and increase
my wealth along the way. But yeah, it wasn't like the traditional traditional career trajectory or the traditional industry you would think you could build wealth in now you chose tech or did you tell me a little bit about your career journey, where you started and when you started to realize, oh, I can quit and actually build wealth here.
Yes, I love this question. So my career really actually started in financial services. I landed my very first job at AMEX on a product management team totally by chance.
Right.
I did not know anything about what I wanted my career to look like when I graduated from college and grad school. This was around twenty seventeen, right, so product management wasn't quite the hot, buzzy, you know, career choice that it is today. So at that point I was just happy to have landed my first big girl salary and to land on a team with really great leadership.
But as I kind of spent more time at AMX and really learned that, hey, product management is not only something that's very strategic, it is something that I really enjoy.
I really feel like this is like my zone of genius.
That's kind of when I started to see that, Wow, there's a lot of opportunity out here for me, and a lot of opportunity for me to grow and pivot my career. Right, I don't just have to stay at this one company. I don't just have to stay in this one type of work. So I think tech was always kind of something I was drawn to, really curious about, so I.
Really spent more time.
I would say as I became, you know, a bit more comfortable with my career my skill sets, to say, hey, I can take the skills that I have as a product manager, even though I've only ever worked at big banks and turned that into a career in tech. So I would say that, you know, my my pathway from graduating school in twenty seventeen to today has been very serendipitous.
I've leaned very heavily on my network and really just kind of putting myself out there for opportunities and to the question around, you know, how I've known when to make these strategic jumps. Honestly, it's been like a gut feeling, right like. And we can definitely talk more about this, but I think for me, even as a young black woman, very rarely was I ever encouraged to leave a job.
Right.
I left my first job in twenty nineteen. I was like twenty four years old, right, So I remember having bosses be like like oh my gosh, are you sure you want to do this? Right? Very much, A lot of a lot of that, you know, a lot of that language around, kind of almost like kind of wanting to shame me for wanting to make these kind of decisions.
This go ahead, okay, young blood, go ahead, you're gonna leave, you'll come back?
Literally no, literally literally that I feel like that was definitely that was definitely the energy. But I think for me, especially around twenty eighteen twenty nineteen, when I first started to learn about financial freedom and the Fire movement, I really saw myself being someone that could take advantage of that lifestyle of being able to grow my income keep my expenses relatively the same.
So how was I going to do that?
I had to make more money, So that meant having to make some of those quote unquote calculated risks to say, maybe I need to go somewhere else to make more money to build my skill set. And that's kind of the energy that I've taken with me for the past four and a half five years.
Yeah, So what did you study in college? And you said you went to grad school, what did you study?
So in college I studied Africana studies. I loved it. I absolutely loved it, but there was definitely no immediate professional ROI. Right, It's like most of my most of my peers who majored in Africana studies are obtaining PhDs right now or work say academics.
I want to teach them and be in academia forever.
Literally, I feel like most of my peers went like the Melan maze academia academia away, and then a few of us kind of went into more like social justice nonprofit work.
I think I'm probably the only.
Person from my class that actually ended up pivoting working in corporate and definitely today working in tech.
And then graduate school.
Actually did a one year master's, my Masters of Sciences and Business Management, so kind of gave me more of that business acumen, more of those practical skills, and I think more of that confidence to say, you know, I spent four years in undergrad kind of shying away from you know, more quant heavy subjects.
Right.
I was an Africata SIDI major, so I think that master's program really kind of gave me that confidence to say, hey, yeah, I can do excel. I can you know, I can read financial charts, which I think really helped me pivot and land an American Express as my first job.
Yeah. I think that's wonderful because a lot of people, I mean, I do a lot of career coaching, and a lot of women maybe they study something and they or they have experience in a certain field and they want to pivot into a new one. So for sure, I mean, talk to me about the interview process. When with you with your Africana Studies background. Did you go back to get your MBA because you were struggling to find work or was that just part of the plan. You know, this will help me as I interview.
Yeah.
So when I was a senior in college, I had no idea what I wanted to do professionally. Right, I went to this really great school, I went to Barnard. I was at this really great school, but had no
job offer. And so senior fall I really started to think, Okay, I have two choices, Right, I can either try really hard to convince an interview or on the other side that this Africana Studies degree can help me work in a more business aligned job, or I can see, hey, there are a lot of At that time, there were a lot of these programs kind of popping up at Duke Wake Forest and other kind of business schools, kind of giving people like me non traditional backgrounds, lower arts backgrounds,
and opportunity to break sort of speak into more business focus fields.
So that's actually what I ended up doing. I ended up taking.
I ended up deciding to get my masters right out of undergrad one because it was fully funded, right, so I received a full ride fellowship, and then two because to your point, I really did struggle, I guess kind of telling my story really to the point where I could land offers, right, So I did a lot of interviewing. I was interviewing for a lot of rotational associate programs at that time because I felt like I had a lot of skills and didn't really see myself narrowly fitting
into one. Right now, in hindsight, I wish someone would have told me, hey, you could be a product manager, but that was never something that I even knew about, right, So that's why I decided to get my masters. It was fully funded. It gave me an opportunity to be a student again, something I'm really good at. I'm really
good at regurgitating information. But it also gave me a chance to kind of like have another year to kind of figure things out and be in that position where, hey, jobs are coming to me, you know, recruiters are looking for me. I'm a student, which really helped me in terms of my interview process.
I casted a really wide net.
My master's program was done at WAKE four, so I was in Winston, Sdalem, North Carolina. I did not love it down there, so I was pretty much putting out increes connections my resume to as many companies in the New York area as I could. And how I had
landed up at AMX was actually through networking. I met a lot of different people across AMX, but one person in particular we really built a really great relationship, and it just so happened around the time that I was about to graduate from my master's program.
I really needed a job.
She made her own personal decision to leave AMEX and to leave New York City and she recommended me for her job. So that is literally how I ended up on a product management team, on a high profile product management team at American Express. Is my first job. By networking, hustling, building relationships and a little bit of luck.
Yeah, I mean and thank you for giving a shout out to Lady Luck because it is a piece of it. I mean, it's also open. It's also kind of approaching your career in a way that you leave room for luck, and you you leave room for that uncertainty, which if you're someone who's like obsessed with doing things on a
certain schedule, it's very uncomfortable for you. But it's hard to articulate that too, that you have to put your best foot forward, like you said, the build those relationships, but then you got to wait for an opportunity, right, and that a little bit of is luck. And how wonderful that someone was able to kind of put you in that position for success. Now, I'm sure that she recommended you, but she still had to interview for the job, right and get in the door. So I mean, congrats
to you for that. When you so going from kind of liberal arts to sitting down at a financial services company, what was that transition like?
So I will I will say I think that one year and my master's program really set me up well for success.
Now I will say I'm an overachiever.
So I was that person even in this really intense, you know, Master's pro that I always pushed myself for more. So I ended up graduating the top of my class for my master's program, was inducted into Beta Gamma Sigma, which is a business honors society. So I took my studies really seriously. I really took that year really seriously to learn and absorb as much as I could. And I think as a result, when I, you know, got to financial services, got to AMEX, and here I was
doing analytics, right, I was in Excel. I was, you know, having to create really educating create stories for my team around the data that was coming back from our car members.
Like it was kind of easy, right.
Because I'd spent this year really really trying to build up these skills that I felt like I didn't really have a chance to practice.
An undergrad And I think as a result, I.
Think that that's why I was really successful at AMEX.
I think one being really.
Sad for success, but I was also extremely lucky to land on a team where I had really strong leaders and women, leaders who really were invested in me being successful, right, who mentored me and said, yeah, I know, this is your first corporate job, and.
This is how you can do things right.
This is the brand and the culture at AMEX, and this is how you can show up and show your best self, right, And that really helped me. Right, even as I think about my experience as a young black professional at ames and the short amount of time that I was there, I think I was able to get promotions and have really high profile opportunities because I had
such strong leadership and strong mentorship and sponsorship. Right that, as I looked at some of my other peers who were just as intelligent as me, just as capable as me, not having those pieces, especially in a corporate culture like AMEX, I think kind of kept them from I think, getting some of the markers of achievement and success that I
think that they were really owed. So I would say the transition wasn't it wasn't too tough, but there was definitely a learning curve, as there is any time you join a new organization.
Yeah, a couple of things I want to talk go back to you really quick. You mentioned a fellowship that got you a full ride scholarship or how did you how did you find that opportunity to get your degree paid for? Because I think that's important for listeners to maybe get a tip from that.
Yeah, So the tip from that is put yourself out there for any and all opportunities.
So, I mean the opportunity.
That allowed me to get a full ride fellowship to get my master's program actually goes back to even when I was applying to colleges in high school. I was that girl that went to the library, got a scholarship book, knew my parents could not afford to send me to college, and just applied to everything that I was eligible for. One of those things was being a part of the rom Brown scholars Network. Now I was not a rom
Brown scholar. I did not receive all of the money, but I was a part of their network and took advantage of all the opportunities that they would send to students in the network. Right, So I ended up getting an internship one year in college through that network, and they were also partnering with the wake Forward School of Business to promote this new program and promote the fellowship.
So when I saw that it's like free ride, y'all are gonna pay for my room and board and I can get a master's Oh yeah, okay, I'm gonna do this. So that's what I did, And you know, I had the delusional confidence that I was exact I was going to be picked right like. I went into my interview saying, when I am a corporate fellow for this program, these are the people I want to sponsor me, right like. And I think that confidence and I think my my persistence, I think is what helped me get that.
Right.
So, I think the tip there is anytime you see an opportunity, don't be afraid to go for it, right. I think, especially as women, as women of color, especially as Black women, we receive so many messages that tell us we're not worthy enough, we're not capable enough. But I think I've always kind of kept with myself that, hey, if I see something that's out there that speaks to me, I'm gonna put myself out there because I never know
what can come out of it. Right, My seventeen year old self sept my twenty one two and now twenty seven year old self up for so much success and she didn't even know it back then.
Oh, baby Sania, Thanks baby Sania.
Look what you've said up to her. All right?
Another thing that I was thinking while you were speaking about you know, you being and thank you for pointing out the importance of those relationships and having sponsorship and actually putting your best foot forward to build those relationships and not necessarily being the person. You get a job and you come on and you just think you're going to quietly sit in your cubicle and that someone will just tap you on the shoulder and say you you,
we've noticed you. That's not how it happens. Building relationships is so important and getting that sponsorship did that make it? And this is I'm going to ask you this question, And the reason I'm asking it is because I think you and I both agree that when you quit jobs, there is that perception that you know or you're often told, be grateful, be loyal. People took a chance on you, and you had people who were going to bat for you within your company at Amexo, but you still left.
And I love that. So talk to me about your decision around leaving and why, when, what all that stuff.
Yeah, so let me set the scene for you.
So my decision to leave Ammex the very first company I ever worked at, and to your point, where I had a lot of brand equity right not just on my immediate team, but I had leaders across the company who knew me believed in me, were putting me in a position to when I think it started to conflict with my holistic vision of what I had for myself, and that was to become more financially sound. That was
to start building wealth. That was to have more money so that I could get over some of the financial challenges that I felt like I was kind of in. Right, So twenty eighteen, I've now had spent a year working full time, and I was fucking my money.
Up, right.
I was that girl that was just kind of like, yeah, it's okay, I have my first set of credit cards.
I'm just you know. Yeah. I was bread real hard. I was ubering really hard. Oh, these were the days of uberpool. Oh my gosh.
Right, So I was having a good time, right, I was having a great time in New York. I would argue, as you should have done, but yeah, yeah, definitely, And I don't regret those times at all. But as a result, right, not having any type of financial acumen when it came to money management, I put myself into a lot of debt, and it was debt that I couldn't afford to pay. When I kind of looked back at and those times,
it was like, Hey, I have this decent salary. I have a great salary as a single woman in New York, but I have nothing to show for it. I don't have any savings. Now, I have all this debt that I put myself into. I don't have anyone I can go to and be like, oh, mom and dad, can you send me a small loan of ten thousand dollars to pay off these credit cards?
Like?
It just wasn't It wasn't a thing, right, So that was a big wake up call for me, right, Yeah, that was a big wake up call for me.
It was about ten thousand dollars of credit card debt.
Yeah, I had I one summer, I put myself in ten thousand dollars of credit card debt.
So, wow, tell you really good? Did you take a vacation.
I was traveling, I was out.
I was going to Pollo Classic, buying one hundred dollars bottles of Bilfleco Like I was living.
Okay, I was living. I was living right.
Yeah, I can't say that now, but I mean in the moment, I had a lot of shame around it, right, Like I had a lot of shame around around my money mistake.
You were tender swindling yourself pretty much.
That's the nurse whindler that summer.
Wait, so what was your salary at AMEX though?
So when I around this time, I was making seventy two thousand dollars.
That's not jabby at all for your first kid out of college. I was making at all. Well, you got about I got about eight years on you. But I came into I came to Manhattan making forty five K. But my problem was I had it. I'm from Georgia and I had a Georgian mentality about salary. So I thought forty five K. I was like, babe, I made it. I'm here. Uh it took. But now don't worry my my my expectations are definitely on the New York level. Now, all right, So you had this debt, you were still
making a decent salary, But was was your career purely about? Okay, I'm going to increase my earnings and I can't get it quickly enough here at AMEX, so I'm going to have to go somewhere else.
That's exactly it. Right.
So I got a little sidetrack when I was telling you the story, right, I wanted to set the scene though, Right, So twenty eighteen.
I put myself into all this debt.
Twenty nineteen, I end up getting connected with the financial advisor, I start learning about fire, I start following all these personal finance accounts on Instagram. I'm just like, oh wow, I can do this, Like, okay, let me start to kind of figure out, like what does it mean to live on a budget?
Okay, this is not so hard.
Okay, I actually have more money at my disposal that I could be putting towards like my future self. But I've been overspending so much that I don't even see that it's there. Right, So this is kind of twenty nineteen. I spent that year really kind of learning a lot about my own spending habits, triggers traumas, and also learning about future state where do I want to be? And at this time, I'm like, Okay, I was promoted at AMEX,
so now I'm a manager. I ended up getting a harity raise, So at this point I'm making actually right under six figures. I'm making around ninety nine thousand dollars. Still have a lot of disciplsal when income, and I'm like, Okay, this is great. I really want to become debt free. So in addition to like the credit card debt that I mentioned, I also did have some student loan debt from from my years in school right that I was kind of like, this isn't like a super big deal.
But for me, I'm an overachiever.
I want to become debt free, like I want to be able to have that major bunk to my net worth growth. So this is twenty nineteen and now twenty twenties approaching. Obviously had no idea what was around the corner, but at the beginning of twenty twenty, I'm like, Okay, I want to set a really ambitious goal for myself of paying off all of my debt in one year.
I'd spent a year working on a budget.
I feel like I can do this twenty three thousand dollars in one year on my salary.
It's going to be a stretch. I'm actually probably short some so.
I need to make more money. You know, I'm doing great work at AMX. I'm working on all these strategic projects. I just got promoted in a year that almost never had and then I'm having these conversations with my leaders and I'm just like, yeah, so like, let's talk about career progression, like what is it going to take for me to get to senior manager? That's the next level On AMEX, it was just kind of all like, oh, yeah, you know, yeah, we just promoted you a year ago.
Oh well, But.
I think also the writing was on the wall, right that I could see other professionals, even on my team.
Right who had kind of matriculated.
Even before me, that they were not being hunted down for promotions.
Right.
So I also had this sense my own self awareness to say, Sis, the longer that you stay here, the longer these people are going to pay with your money.
Right.
Like It's like all of those things that you were talking about in terms of this idea about loyalty, this idea around like paying your dues, this idea of oh we need to make sure that the people who are more senior get their chance, right, headcount can only go
so far. All of those things were embedded into the culture at AMEX, and I just kind of realized, like, I want to make more money, not just for money's sake, but because I want to become debt free, because I know that I now feel like I have the skills to be able to put this money to good use for my future self. And also I just feel like it's time, right I'd spent three and a half years at AMEX. I felt like there's more out there again
leaned on networks, right. So I ended up actually landing my next job at MasterCard through a connection that I had at Columbia. I went to Columbia for undergrad a fellow alum. Her team was hiring. They were looking for someone with my expertise, a product manager, ideally a woman of color who had my financial services background. I interviewed, the interview process was really smooth, and literally got my offer a week before New York City went into shutdown.
So I like to say that I was one of the first people to create the exodus that has now happened at AMEX, especially amongst professionals of color. I was probably one of the very first people to leave AMEX and the pandemic because I ended up putting my two weeks in right at the end of March twenty twenty. And for me, it wasn't just again, wasn't just purely
about the money piece, right. I knew I was leaving behind all these great relationships, but it was also just like I had this gut feeling that I wanted to do something else, and you know, I feel like I'd heard this idea all the time. Right, you have to be the driver of your own career. You have to be in the driver's seat. And I just felt this
urge to say, this is a calculated risk. Right, I'm going to another big financial services company that's going to pay me more, that's going to give me a chance to also develop my skills as a product manager.
What do I have to lose? Right, And it was definitely the best decision I made for myself.
Can I just mention too that a lot of times we put too much I think a lot of especially women, put way too much value in the stability of a job itself and how a job is stable and you know, and not recognizing that you are your own stability at
the end of the day. Like even with you, Sania, you're the fact that you have an MBA, the fact or you have a business administration a masters in, that you have this college network, you've done so well in you know your school, You've built relationships professionally, Like that is resiliency and at the end of the day, is it a risk take a new job? Sure, but also no, because you can get laid off and I'm sure you'd bounced right back off, bounce right back because you have
you know, this foundation of success yourself. All right, ba fam, Let's take a quick break. This is brown ambition. All right, ba fam, we are back now. I want to ask you what was the pay jump? Because I love I feel like any anytime we can like share how much of a jump we made by quitting. It's powerful because I mean, in my experience, maybe you can agree with me, we'll see, But the biggest pay raise has come when you are ready to leave and move.
To a company. I totally agree with that, Mandy.
Yeah, So when I left Amex, I was making just under one hundred thousand dollars. I was making around like ninety nine thousand some change. By joining MasterCard on the team that I was on again also being a product manager, which is seen as more technical, therefore more strategic and worth more, I increased my base salary by thirty two
thousand dollars. And then when I kind of throw in the fact that I also got a bonus at the end of that year, in total, I ended up earning an additional fifty thousand dollars by leaving Nice.
So when you negotiated a new offer, MasterCard, what was that experience like? Now, did you have to fight for that thirty two? And was there any talk of signing bonus equity other incentives that you know you were able to ask for.
Yeah, So when I negotiated my offer at Massacred, I was I'm very happy to say that I had a recruiter who was very direct, very transparent, so it wasn't a hard negotiation at all. I pretty much just asked
for what I want. I think the initial offer was maybe like eight or ten thousand dollars short of the number that I actually ended up landing on, So that came from negotiating, and I think I was also able to negotiate a sign on because you know my thing, Because I have also been pretty fortunate to kind of always leave jobs right before bonuses are paid out, I always use that as an opportunity to negotiate for more
cash in my pocket. So I think I ended up leaving AMEX right before my bonus was paid out and kind of used that number to say, Hey, MasterCard, I really want to sign this offer, but I need this money, right So, and that's actually the same tactic that I used again when I now join my current employer in tech to say, Hey, if I leave MasterCard, I'm leaving behind twenty nine thousand dollars. What can you guys do
to bring this in the offer? And that's how I was able to negotiate in this current job a twenty nine thousand dollars sign on bonus that was not even on the table initially, right. So for me negotiating, I've always been like, really stern on just getting my base salary up, Like I haven't really negotiated for other perks like PTO DA's and things like that. I've kind of always just kind of been happy with the packages that
I've received on that front. But I've always been trying to just get more cash into my bottom line, whether that's through my base or through a sign on bonus.
Yeah, hell's yes. I mean, I will say it till I'm blue in the face, really sit down and crunch the numbers on how much money you're leaving on the table. I love that you mentioned your annual bonus, especially for leaving at the beginning of the year, and those bonuses, don't pay out till March. Don't let that keep you stuck. Don't let that card stock car or if it's equity, or even if it's your unvested you know, four oh one k matches. Add it all up, baby, and then
ask for it as a sign on bonus. I love that you did that, and it gets easier each time. You know, the fact that you were the fact that you've even been able to ask this early in your career should be inspiring to anyone listening that. And I too was asking very early in my career and I was hearing no, or if I was hearing yes, it maybe was a couple thousand or this or that. It
wasn't anything crazy, but it made me prepared. And you will be two for those days when then you're when you're walking away like I have with like one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, you know, signing bonus or equity grant like that's it's all about practicing and getting the in the habit of asking, because I will you agree that it's still stressful and it's still like do you get nervous when you negotiate? So do I?
Oh, yeah, of.
Course, yeah, I think it's I think it's totally normal too. And I think especially for me, right, don't I don't necessarily have so many women in my family to kind of lean on and say how should I go about this? Right, Like, my eldest sister has kind of worked the same job for fifteen years, and the women before her, right, my mother and grandmother, they spent their entire lifetimes working at the same company.
Right.
So I think for me, am, I am even a testament of how we talk about this all the time, how the new generation goes about things, how millennials go about things, because I think even the women and my family are so inspired by when I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna leave this company and I'm.
Going to negotiate for more, They're just like, more power to you, girl.
Yeah, I mean true. And I think for our generation too, it's almost like we have the we have the benefit of having the Internet and having social media and having
all that. I feel like virtual sisters, big sisters who are kind of showing us another way, and those little like nudges and those and even sharing your story, you kind of can become that mentor virtual mentor for other people to inspire them and show them a different way, whereas like my mom didn't have any you know when without social media, you're just kind of closed off to whatever's happening in your bubble, you know what I mean? So absolutely, I mean I feel like my career coaching clients,
I've talked to so many women. I'm surprised, honestly how many women are in their fifties and sixties who are reaching out to me and they're like, I see what y'all are doing. Let's go. Yes, it's not too late. So I do follow you on the tiki talking and I know that you like to travel.
Now.
I was looking at your TikTok and I know one of my one of my favorite posts. You always post these like gorgeous, you know, scenes of you and I'm beautiful. I got to ask where you get your swimwear at because you're always looking fly. I guess it's why you go buy fly, nanst. I get it. But you tell
a story on one of your viral tiktoks. How about a year and a half into the pandemic, October twenty twenty one, you were suffering from depression and feeling like you were in a toxic work environment, and also you were job hunting. Can you take me to that time and tell me what was going on in your career and how you were able to move through that to your next opportunity.
Yeah, so I'm happy to talk about it.
I will say September to November twenty twenty one was probably the hardest, some of the hardest like moments of my life thus far.
Right, so just kind of paid the picture for you.
I had been working at MasterCard for about a year and a half and really just started to feel like I was not appreciated, like I was not really receiving the development that I wanted to see in my career.
That I was essentially being siloed and stifled. Whether that was intentional or not, but you know, I kind of came and expecting one thing about how this job was going to look, and by I would say, by by mid twenty twenty one, it was kind of clear to me that if I did not take the reins over my career, I was either going to get pushed out or worse. And I think that was kind of like a wake up call for me. I'd never really experienced
that in my career thus far. So here, I was feeling like, one, I definitely want a new job, but two, I also want more freedom in flexibility. I had spent three months living remotely intulom in twenty twenty one, and that gave me such a taste of the lifestyle that I want. I am someone who wants to be location independent,
who sees myself living overseas and retiring early overseas. So I think to have that experience was such an eye opener for the type of job that I need to be able to experience that and not kind of sacrifice. And then at the same time, I was job hunting, which anyone of us knows it can feel like a second job. So here, I was dealing with a lot of toxicity in my nine to five that's paying my bills, right, I don't have the option to quit my job because
I don't want to necessarily rely on my savings. I don't necessarily want to put myself under that pressure. But at the same time, job hunting, it took me a lot longer than I thought. Right here, I am a qualified product manager. I have all these great companies on my resume.
What's not clicking?
Steven, Right, I was going on all these interviews, I was talking to a lot of great companies. I did not receive a single offer when I started my job hunt in May twenty twenty one too about November, did not receive a single offer, and that was really frustrating. It was very humbling. I knew that I knew that was suffering room depression because I couldn't get out of bed. I'd started having just like apathy towards all the things I enjoyed doing right.
I wasn't posting as much on Flinance.
I was honestly burnt out right from trying to travel, create work a nine to five job hunt.
It was just was way too much on my plate.
So kind of what started to shift for me is one I had to seek out a new therapist. I just had to get new help too. I had to change up my career strategy. I realized, maybe I can't do this by myself, maybe I need support, right, So I ended up investing in a career accelerator called product Gym to really kind of help me create a new strategy and build up some more confidence when it came to interviewing and kind of telling my story. And then I just had to kind of keep the ground running, right,
I took a break. I took like two and a half weeks where I just didn't do anything. I did not apply to any jobs. I just was kind of like, let me just do my job and I'm going to just spend the rest of the time just resting and focusing on me. And I came back with a vengeance and then ended up applying to literally about one hundred and fifty jobs in a like three week span. One of those jobs ended up being the job that I have now. So I ended up receiving my offer in December twenty twenty one.
And you know, I.
Would say that every day it started to get easier. I think as I started to really see some real traction and my process, as I started to kind of focus on my mental health and really kind of prioritize my own self care, you know, I started to feel like I could come out of that depressive state. And then I really did win. I ended up getting I mean offer that I accepted in the job that I have now was my dream offer. I know that because I tweeted. I'd like put out a tweet saying I
am manifesting this. I think I said, I wanted like one hundred and sixty thousand dollars fully remote PM job if I'm limited PTO and equity, and I got that and then some in the offer that I ended up landing. So whooh, I would say last year was definitely a not only a test of my patience and humility, but also a test of my resilience to say, this too shall pass and it's going to get better, and you can rest, but you cannot quit, right, There's so much
more that's out there that you're deserving of. So let's rest, let's take breaks, but let's keep going, right, Because imagine if I if I, you know, if I had stopped, if I had stopped my progress, I would have kept myself from all this abundance and.
Success that I have now in this current role.
Yeah, I think the majority of the clients who gravitate toward me have ended up being women of color in the six figure range mid career. And when I tell you, and I have to tell them a lot too, is it's the most challenging I think when you are at a certain level in your career to find your next opportunity, and it takes a lot longer, it can because those opportunities are not they're fewer and further between, right, They're also a bit more competitive, and at that point your
standards are higher, so you're not ready. You do have like you, for example, you wanted something that was fully remote. You want a certain salary range. So though you know it does take time, and I think even adjusting your
own expectations for how long this journey may take. And then and there's so many women who I've looked at on the other end of a you know, a zoom call during coaching sessions and I've said, you have got to take a break because even I can feel your tired energy, your your lethargy, your depression like it's coming through and it's hard to sparkle and shine and attract a new opportunity in an interview when you are carrying
that energy with you. And I think it's a tough pill to swallow for a lot of people, but I love that you recognize it. Okay, I've got to like take a deep breath, you know, take time, pause, pour back into yourself so that you could go back fighting.
You know.
Definitely, you mentioned a program that you joined, what was it, Product Gems what is Tell me more about that.
Yeah, so product Gym is a career accelerator for experience aspiring or experienced product managers who specifically want to learn how to land higher paid product manager role. So why I ended up landing there is because I knew I
didn't I didn't necessarily need general career coaching. I knew exactly what I wanted, I knew exactly where I wanted to be, but I really felt like there weren't really many resources out there that were kind of giving me that specific coaching around how do you win at these
product manager interviews? Which if anyone is out there looking for product manager jobs, you know that it's its own ethos, it's its own culture as it relates to, you know, being able to kind of navigate those interview processes.
So it was it was a.
Pretty significant investment, but I think it was a worthwhile one because it really gave me the confidence, the clarity, and that push to say, okay, there's definitely more out here.
How much was it?
It was six thousand dollars.
Oh okay, shit, I've heard worse. I know that kind of great and may not know. So for those who are listening and who have heard and seen Sonia and others, especially on TikTok. You know, really speaking about the possibilities in product management to find for people who are listening, what is a product manager? And then you mentioned the
particulars of the interview process. Any tips that you can share for how to navigate that or what maybe there are what's different about applying for those PM roles.
Yeah, So you know, in a nutshell, a product manager is really that person that's thinking about an end to end customer experience and building the best experience for their.
Subset of users.
So, as a product manager, you could be owning any type of products. Right. Product does not just have to be a physical item. It could be a software, it could be an app, it could be a digital platform.
Right.
So as a product manager, I have worked on financial products, right, like credit cards. That was the very first product that I owned at AMES. I owned the American Express Gold card. So what that meant is every step of that customer journey from someone applying for this card, through using it and even as they consider closing that account. Right, as a product manager, I was thinking about all the steps
in that process deliver the best customer experience. I would say when it comes to interviewing for product management jobs, especially if you don't have that true PM experience, I think think about any time that you have been able to either create something from scratch or significantly improve a process, and what were those outcomes. That's what a product manager
is doing. So, whether you've worked in a classroom, you've worked in healthcare, you worked in social services, you worked in other types of business, I think we all can think about those moments where we've said, hey, there's something really wrong with this process, here's how I would improve it, here's how I'm going to improve it, and here are
the outcomes. I think the more that you have those examples to be able to speak to even if you don't have this quote unquote PM true experience, I think that's what many of the hiring managers that are hiring for product managers are looking for. Can you really kind of dig your hands into something that might be complex or it might be kind of broken, offer new solutions and then be able to create a new path forward.
Do they commonly give you those like case studies, like here's a situation, you know, what would you I've seen them?
Yeah, So I would say as a product manager, you can be very on the technical side, and I think especially as you think about some especially as you kind of look at more tech companies, you might have more case studies or more.
Product exercises, but there are.
Plenty of business focused teams that need product managers where your interview process might just be behavioral. It might just be tell me about a time when it might just be Hey, our clients are XYZ. How would you approach the scenario?
Right?
Where you don't necessarily have to be able to create or build something from scratch, You don't have to be able to explain code, but can you explain how you would approach a situation and how you would bring your skills to the situation. There are plenty of business product managers that don't code, that don't have technical backgrounds. Right, You've heard a lot about my experience. I don't have any certificates, I'm not PMP certified, I don't have any
of those more technical certifications or qualifications. But I've built things, right, I can talk about the things that I've built. I can talk about how I think about approaching new or difficult situations. And I think that's what's kind of kept me going on this process and what's made me stand out even in interview processes.
Yeah, and do you have a particular opinion about the whole PMP certification. I can't tell you how many people I've seen considering it while they're kind of throwing everything at the wall in terms of pivoting into a different career.
Yeah, My short opinion is that I think they can be very fruitful if they are aligned with the jobs you actually want.
Right.
So, if you are looking for job descriptions that are not mentioning PMP, they're not mentioning any certifications you don't necessarily want to be a technical product owner, for example, then it may not be worth your time, Right, It might be it might be better to invest that time in learning how to interview with confidence, learning how to brand yourself, spending time connecting with other product managers.
Right, Because as you've just.
Heard, my first you know, four years that I spent as a product manager have come through me just having relationships with people who are inside companies looking to hire.
Right.
So if I had spent so much more time thinking about, oh I don't have these certificates, I might have missed out on the opportunity to build relationships, build connections with people who could have just gotten me right into an interview process.
Yeah, and you mentioned branding, and I love talking about professional branding for you and I and you went through the product gem's course or what was like a program curriculum accelerator. You said, right, what were some of the turning points for you you think in your interview strategy,
because it sounds to me like that was. Will you tell me, you know, what was it that finally broke for you where you were finally kind of hitting those callbacks to interviews and eventually getting your you know, your job offer.
Yeah, I think it was.
I think there are a couple of things. I think one of mindset shifts to say, there is such a high demand, especially right now for product managers.
Even if I.
Don't get this one job, red rejection is redirection, right, I'm gonna land somewhere else, right that there's just so much out here. I think two was through product I'm
really learning to apply at scale, right. So I think when I was doing it myself, I was trying to update my resume every time I was applying to jobs, trying to be super picky about what I applied to and I really learned through their curriculum how to apply at scale so that I could put out twenty five applications a day, right, which meant I was getting a
lot more interviews. Right instead of kind of focusing in on these like five or so I spending all this time focusing on a handful, I'm going to focus on twenty five fifty seventy five a week, right, which means I have more interviews, more opportunities to land and offer.
And I think the last thing was really even as someone like me who was an experienced PM, I really had to I think, redefine and refocus my skills so that I was also rising to the top of when recruiters were looking for product managers, especially online like LinkedIn right.
So there were things that I didn't even know that I could do, for example with my branding online, like to call out a lot of the skills that I had, for example on LinkedIn right, and to really like crystallize some of the things that I had done and show results because then, I mean at the peak of when I was interviewing, I was probably receiving in mails from like three to five recruiters a day, right, Like, that's how much my profile was standing out because I'd made
more of these strategic choices around how I talk about myself, how I show up right, how do I just kind of really show any recruiter that's time for product managers that yes, I need to be in your interview cycle. So those are a lot of things that I learned through Product Jim that I definitely feel like I wasn't doing well on my own and I think.
That's what gave me that confidence.
That's what kind of gave me that momentum again that ultimately helped me land the offer that I landed.
And you know it.
I will say also as part of partis to them curriculum is that, hey, getting one offer isn't enough, Like it's great to have multiple offers to be able leverage against. I mean, I think that's great advice for anyone, Right, But I was pretty happy with the offer that I received, so I decided not to keep interviewing.
But I remember when I kind of announced.
Hey, I got this great offer, one of the co founders was like, Okay, are you going to keep interviewing? Like, cause you don't have to stop interviewing, you know, like, why don't you keep going right? But I think for me, I was honestly just kind of ready to.
Focus on someone else. I had been at it for a while.
Yeah yeah, And also you had the driver of kind of being in a situation that you wanted to get out of. So I mean, there's all the advice in the world, but ultimately it's like sitting down with yourself and do I feel ready? And is it right for me? And I feel like you could never go wrong, you know when you're doing that for what's right for you. Well, Sonia, it has been such a pleasure having you on Brown Ambition. Thanks for letting me pepper you with questions.
This is such a great interview.
Thank you so much for your time, and I'm so glad that we got to spread this message for more women to hear that. You know, there is no shame in taking control of your career. There's no shame in asking for more and getting what you deserve.
Hey Man's sister friend All right, nine to five hotties, Thank you so much for listening to this interview with Sonia. Go to Fly danced on ig check her out. Where else can people find you?
I'm everywhere.
I'm on ig TikTok, Twitter, and you can also find my website flinance dot com. And yeah, I would love to know if you heard me on the Brown Ambitious Podcast.
DM me and let me know.
Maybe find you on a beach somewhere. Hey, ba fam, We could not do this show without your support or the support of our team behind the scenes. The Brown Ambition Podcast is produced by Cumulus podcas Cast Network. It's edited by the wonderful Imani Crosby and produced by Tanya Bustos. Dennis Stimplinsky is our in house tech curu, and I am Bandy Woodard Santos, your co host, and I will see y'all next week.