It's time for the b ache q a a, the big ach q a.
Okay, the b a q a.
It is brown ambition question and answers. You have questions, we have answers. Ish, But we're not your financial advisor. We're not your doctor, we're not your theory. Nope, what were your financial besties?
You'll ask besties.
We're gonna just give.
A little, you know, just just a little feedback.
You know, you're supposed to take it with a grain of salt, and you know then lead into the people that you pay money to to help you make the final decision own. Okay, okay, yeah, we b a q a go ahead.
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We have two really great questions today.
Two juicy career questions. Career slash. There's no such thing as a career question where there's not some money involved, so you know. But this first question comes from listener Jerika. Jeriica says, I recently landed a new job that more than doubled my salary and has a compensation plan that includes a generous sign on bonus and RSUs. I want to make some smart money moves, but I don't believe
I need a financial advisor just yet. What are other resources that can help me decide how to use my additional funds?
Well, first, Mandy, I have a pop quiz for you. Jeriica was a name in a very popular cartoon. Oh no, do you know the cartoons? It's okay, you were really young a cartoon. Yes, it was like Saturvey Ways kids. Now that's all that's right, because Mandy's like, so Jim Jim is excitement. Ooh you remember Gemen the Holograms. I think you're really really no, they kind of like they had no yeah, so no Gem and the Holograms. For those of you if you remember Gem and the Hologams,
please send me a tweet. The Budgeanista Gem and the Holograms was the Jam and Jim that was like her Sasha Fears but her name before she turned into jam because she used to have earrings where she would like like she would touch these star earrings and go from jericha her normal plane Jane South into Jim, who was
like a singer and a rock star. And so like when I saw the name Jerica, and it was because they got the name Jerica because they did this national nationwide search and my friend's parents helped to pick that name Jerica. It's a mix between Jessica and Erica. And so just a little trivia Jerica.
That was like trivia on trivia. I know.
So I'm wondering, Deerica if your mama named you that after gem in a hologram.
But anyway, Derek is like, can you get to my question? I know?
So then also, can you explain what an RSU is? Because you you explained this, she's got this signing bonus and our SU's could you explain with that is first? So now toll be knowble, Derek.
I would love to. They're my favorite things ever or RSUs. So RSU stands for restricted stock units. It is one of the most common ways that companies. If you ever hear about companies giving equity to their employees. It's one of the most common ways they do that, and restricted stock units. All it means is that they're going to give you equity. They're going to give you stock in the company, but it's restricted as to when you can actually access it. So this is like the golden handcuffs.
This is one of the golden handcuffs. The other one is commonly stock options. But yeah, so they'll give you a batch of RSUs, but you may have to stay a year, and then after a year you probably only get like one quarter or one third of that total money pot, and then you have to wait another year to get the next batch, and then another year. So that's why they call them golden handcuffs because they keep it trapped. But they can they can be such a great way, especially if your company is on the up
and up. They can be a great way to increase your wealth and assigning bonus too. That's just freaking fantastic. I don't think that a financial advisor is always necessary. I mean, you know your your financial picture better than us at this point. But other resources, I mean, our show is a great resource, and you're in the right place Jericha. But let's talk about like what to do, because really, at its core, she's got a windfall. She's got double the salary, so she's got more money in
the bank than she's had. And then she's also got this she doesn't say how much, but she's got a signing bonus in some restrictest stock units. My mind immediately goes to give the extra money a job, like the extra money in your paycheck has to have a job to do, or I promise you will disappear, it will disappear.
What are some jobs like? Honestly, one of the jobs I would say is one the job of paying down debt. I don't know what your debt situation is. You didn't mention do you have credit card debt? Do you have student loan dead? Do you have a mortgage? Do you have car note? So you know, dead is always a debt. Ain't never that never clocks out. Debt be there first thing in the morning, last thing in the evening. So you you could put some toward paying down debt in
a systematic way. Google Snowball method and avalanche method and you know, so that's one of the jobs that you that your your money can have.
Yeah. Absolutely, And if you're able to, especially with your signing bonus and the fact that you've got so much more compensation, what are you automatically contributing to your four one K? Because the very I feel like every paycheck, the very first job has to be like, Okay, what money is going to our long term investing, which has got to be your four to one K or retirement account.
So make sure that you've got a healthy amount going there and that you What I like to do is automate a percentage and not focus on the dollar amount. I think the dollar amount like freaks people out and they're like, what do you mean that hundreds of dollars is not going to go to a bank account? But
just do a percentage. You know, you can do your ten or fifteen percent whatever makes you feel comfortable, and make sure that that's automated, and then get out of your own damn way by automating it, because then you don't have any chance. So let the money disappear. And then of course savings, making sure that you've got some automated money, possibly with your signing bonus. Oh sorry, there's all that saving.
No, I know, I know, No, it's just gonna say, like July twenty eighth. Well, know, if we're in a recession and you're going to want to have a sick a good amount of emergency fund saved, you know either way you should have, so you might be able to boost that up with you know, this signing bonus, Like you know, put that's another job, Like do you have three months? Maybe you want to have six months? How long did it take for you to find this job.
If you were to lose this job, how long do you think it would take for you to replace this income? That should inform how many months of savings that you ought to have.
Yeah. Absolutely, on the plus side, like if you were, for example, if you've if you've maxed that your six month emergency fund, you feel good about what you're saving for retirement. You don't have any debt. Again, we don't know your full picture, but let's say all those things are true and you still have leftover cash from your signing bonus. At that point, you could look to opening
or contributing to a roth IRA for the year. I think the limit is like six or seven thousand dollars for twenty twenty two, so you could max that out and and it began. And again, this roth iray is for you know, long term retirement savings, so you're not trying to make money overnight in the stock market this way, so I wouldn't necessarily be too nervous about investing during a recession. If we're going to be in one, we'll find out. But it feels recesiony out here in the streets.
So you know, I think millionaires can be created during recessions if you are if you still have a long term, a long time horizon ahead of you, so you've gotten many, many years in front of you, and you're able to invest now when things are down because ultimately you can buy more with the money the dollars that you do
have now. So those are just some juicy ideas and if you want to, if you have a big purchase in mind, I feel like, tip, what you're saying is what the way the economy is going right now, maybe hold off until we kind of get our footing and see what's going to happen. And yeah, somebody who want that extra money.
You know, you got you know, extra hundred thousand dollars and you're good, good, good good, and you're like, okay, you like, For example, if a house comes on the market right now that was normally let's just I'm just making up number five hundred thousand. It's on the market for two fifty, and you're someone who's like, I've got two fifty, this is a great deal. I'm not going to say don't get any you know, don't buy any
major things, because for you, that's a different situation. But if you're someone who was like, Okay, I'm tentatively in this space where I'm growing my wealth, and you know, so I would be more cautious but also too less but not least to put your money to work. Is if you're doing all of those things, retirement savings, that all those things, and consider starting to set aside to invest for wealth that comes after investing for retirement. To me,
those are two different things. Investing for retirement says, look around where you live now, this way you fin to live when you're eighty, because retirement savings or investing is really to maintain your current lifestyle. Investing for wealth is to increase your current lifestyle and to lease something for your airs. So you might be in a position where you're like, I can now start to invest for wealth, but that comes later after these other fundamental things are
in place. If you listen to the episode, the Brown Avision episode before this that came out on Wednesday, before this, we talked about how black and brown people, especially black folks, have jumped in to the investing for wealth part before they've done the fundamentals part, and they've done it through crypto and as a result, it's been a detriment to them.
So do the fundamentals first. You have money leftover considering investing for wealth, meaning opening up a brokerage account and investing for wealth that way, whether it's individual stocks, ets, mutual funds, etc.
Yeah. Absolutely, And just one final note on the whole restricted stock unit thing. Here is my simple rule that I used to take advantage of the incredible RSU benefits I got over the course of my career. It's basically a windfall, and it can be a windfall once a year, a few times a year, depending on the timing of it. Every time I got a batch of stock, I would immediately sell it. I had to stop caring what the company's stock was doing. And you work there so you're like, oh,
I know they're working on this. I'll just like, you know, not sell right now and just wait to see how things prefer form. For me, it was much simpler to treat it like a cash windfall. Forget about the fact that it's in my company stock and immediately sell and then diversify it through mutual funds or you know, buying
a purchasing other company stock. It also like if you think about how much of your income is tied up to that employer and for someone who if you don't have a lot of assets outside of your paycheck at this point, you don't have a lot saved for invested for retirement or saved in the bank, like, so much of your income is going to be tied up in that one company, and you're also going to have your stock, like your investment side in that one company. It makes
me too nervous. So as a rule of thumb, and this is my personal opinion and advice with the lowercase A is immediately sell it. Don't worry too much about what the what the company's you know trajectory is like sell it and then diversify it so that you are you know better, You're not keeping all your eggs in one basket, you know, and you can you'll have more diversification. So if something were to happen with that company, you know you're not going to be too too, too hard hit.
I'm talking to you Amazon workers. I know y'all like to hoard your Amazon stock.
And Jerica, tell whoever named you that I said. It's showtime synergy. Don't know what that means. It's from Jem of the Holograbs.
I got it. I will google. I will google it later. All right, let's take a quick little break and we'll be right back with our second question, from a husband who just wants to help his wife. We'll see, we'll see what Kevin has to say about wifey. All right, we are back THEA, Q and A with your next question. This one comes from we love when we have male listeners, right, especially a male listener who cares about his wife's career. So let's see what listener Kevin has to say. He calls himself.
I hope you used your fake name because your wife might listening like, oh really, that's what we're doing. I mean, it's not a bad letter, but I'm just saying, you know, just how Vin gave us your name, now you gave us his name.
Kevin, all right, continue, Sorry, Kevin says, please help a frustrated husband. My wife is the love of my life on and we have an outstanding marriage and we just celebrated our twenty fifth wedding anniversary. She has twice as smart as me, more organized, more organized, gorgeous, and it is outstanding at her job. I see how you made
it twenty five years, Kevin. Keep it up. In her most recent job, they continue to offer her promotions for supervising jobs, but she has turned down three times now. When I ask her why, she says she doesn't want the stress of being responsible for others. Normally I would understand, but she comes home every day and talks about the issues at the job and how to solve them. And as a nonprofit CEO, I always tell her she sounds like a supervisor. I think this is a great opportunity
for her to grow. Plus it will be a significant increase in income. I repeated the stats about women's pay equity over and over and even talked about what a great example this would be for our daughter. Still she says she's fine, but I believe she is just scared. Please Kevin Duchy Duchy, so.
Well, one we have to understand that there are some people who are not motivated by external things like more money, and especially if they're fine and like like prestige, Like you know, I'm a supervisor and I know this because Jarell, my husband, was like that. I could not understand. I'm like, they want to make you a super and they want to do this and they want to do that. And he'd be like, yeah, but I'm fine, And I thought like, at first, I'm not gonna lie. I thought like, maybe
it's laziness. But now that he's no longer here, and I see the legacy he left behind of how much he was in his family's life, how much he was serving the people around us, that Jerrell had mastered the understanding of the word enough that he knew what enough looked like that he was like, because I understand external enough, it allows me to have more than enough internally, meaning I have more time for my wife, my daughter, my twin brother, my sister, my family, my friends, my neighbors.
And he would not have had that extra time and energy to pour into the people he cared about if he leaned into the external more. Now I'm the opposite. I'd be like get it, you know, like and that's okay, there's nothing wrong with that and there's no better or worse. But I've got more clarity with him not being here and really getting like stories from people that I'm like, Okay, it wasn't that he didn't he didn't like aspire to more as far as like what I thought more meaning better,
that he just aspired to enough. And I don't know if that's for your wife, but I think a conversation of really getting to the bottom before you say I think because she's scared. Maybe that's not what it is. Maybe she just knows what enough looks like for her,
but she might be scared. So having an open ended convers with her about like, you know, walk me through like your ideal life, like what is it that you see, what is it you're wanting for us, for our daughter, for our family, for our future, because you might find that yes, it's fear, or you know, this is not really what she wants to do with the rest of her life, or you might find that she actually is good.
She's a rare person that has identified what enough is and and sees that she has it and doesn't want to trade in for more. External validation, which would leave her less for you and your family.
Yeah, I think that's all really like, really smart and wise. I feel like with Kevin, he says he obviously he respects his wife and sees a lot of potential on her too. But I feel like something is missing here. Sometimes when a woman doesn't want to reach for more and doesn't want to supervise and be a manager, she may be getting the feeling and maybe she's not able to articulate it, but that that environment is not going to be an environment where she can actually thrive as
a leader. And what could be holding her back from wanting to reach for a supervisor position is maybe she sees other managers not getting the support that they need to succeed, Like just because she's got the good stuff. And I believe you when you say she can be an incredible supervisor. I know there's so many untapped gems out there. Am I saying, Jem, because you just got that whole gem thing in my head. There's so many on tap. Like I've said it before, I think black
women are the most underutilized resource in corporate America. So much great leadership potential, but at what cost should we aim for more. Like, you know, if she's in a hostile environment where women of color are not able to succeed and thrive, she may just be wanting to protect herself. And for that, I'm like, okay, respect her wishes. There that being said, like maybe talk to her more about her ambitions, like Tip said, and ask her what she's
looking for. Maybe the right space for her is not the place where she's at now, and you know, and maybe you can. It's so hard to tell people to help people get to where you think that they should be. I've had to learn how to just shut up and listen to where they think they should be and then trust that they know themselves enough. Yeah, and oh, Kevin.
We wereun it back. That was great that.
My husband's like, say that louder for that.
Literally, trust that people know themselves enough to know what they actually want. I get it because sometimes we're like they don't know because you know, if he could just get a little push, if only Durell just knew, and he's like, yeah, so you know how you're forty two? So am I Yeah? So just like you say that for the baby, I got it. I know myself and so but you know, so yeah, I think that's also too with our partners, that we you know, we're wanting
what's best and better and more. But here's the thing, more is not always better. Just know that, Kevin, that there's nothing more expensive than money. That money costs a lot to make. You know, money costs a lot to chase. You know, it costs family time, it costs energy, it costs sometimes health. You know, sometimes they even cost people happiness.
Money costs a lot to make, and she might realize that the cost to make more and to do more is just not one that she's willing to pay, despite the fact that she has the knowledge, you know, so asking open ending question that there is just a really place, a good place to start, and like, honestly, Kevin, I
want to know how it goes. Kevin, this is not a one and done bru No, no, no, you don't drop a good question like this, Like have the conversation and even maybe if you don't know how to approach the conversation, maybe have her listen to this part of the episode, you know, and then be like, babe, is you know does that resonate with you? And then you know, then it can start off the conversation because like sis, like tell us why, just why? Because we'd love to know.
It may make you, Kevin, who you say you're a CEO at a nonprofit? It may make you a better leader to understand why someone with her potential wouldn't want to step up? Like what is it about that organization that has made her feel like she couldn't She wouldn't be happy supervising people? Something is missing? Like, that's what I want you to figure out, Kevin, what is it about that place that has shown her that she doesn't it's not worth her giving her best. They don't deserve her best.
And honestly, then that last piece that keeps sticking with me is where he says that he wants her to that she could set a good example for their daughter. I it's like rubbing me the wrong way. I get what he's trying to say. He's trying to he wants to be an ally and all of that. But there's it's your idea of what a good example for your daughter could be. But I'm sure your wife is a great example in so many other ways, you know, And what is your perception of what a role model can be?
And yeah, like a woman that's like sacrifices all to get more, or a woman that is home in present yea and has chosen her family over all else Like is that not also a good example? So yeah, don't take that part of her, Kevin.
So, you know, I believe you can have both. I believe you can be This is a thing like I talk to women every day who are struggling with this, and it's like, you can have both. And I've been fortunate to work at the kind of places where you can be a leader and still be you know, they don't they don't expect you to pretend like they don't expect you to work as if you don't have a family. They actually expect you to bring it to the table.
But you know, in this case, I think it's just about you know, helping her get to a place where she can, like not not not for the sake of having more power, than for sake of being a supervisor to step up and do it at a place that will not help her thrive and will actually you know, could ptentially become toxic or make her really unhappy and miserable.
You know, maybe it's just about again, like listening to her and listening to what she wants and what it is that she feels like she's missing at this organization. And I would involve your daughter in that conversation. I think it's a great example of a woman thinking strategically and critically about not just doing a good job for the sake of doing a good job, but doing a good job and doing great work at a place that deserves it.
You know, Ooh, I'm excited, Kevin. What is the how it goes? If you get if you have to sleep on the count, that's not our faults.
I don't think any man who listens to Brown ambition and it's twenty five years into marriage is sleeping on the couch. He's gonna be.
He's gonna be all right. If you have questions, police ask them. We love questions like this. You know you can don't. You don't have to give you a real name. If you're gonna give us like a phone name, make it fun. But you can ask us at brandonbishapodcast dot com. Ask anything, click that button, slide into our DMS. The brand was it the Oh Wait BA.
Podcast brand and Bison Podcast on Instagram. We are at the BA.
Podcast on Twitter On Twitter slide us to the d ms and ask us questions about career, about money, even about life child. We answer those too. Another great episode. If I do say so myself, and I do say so myself, I.
Learned a lot. I learned so much from this episode. Jericha and the gems. Got to check it out.
Google, Yes, google it YouTube actually so you can watch them into had a very epic theme song and opening like trailer or whatever.
So watch it because it's everything all right. We'll see if she's got anything on Blippy because Blippy is like where it's at. Now, let's what the kids want. Okay, until next week, y'all. This is ben Baq and a bye bye, hey ba fan. We could not do this show without your support or the support of our team behind the scenes. The Brown Emission Podcast is produced by Cumulus Podcast Network. It's edited by the wonderful Emani Crosby
and produced by Tanya Bustos. Dennis Stimplinsky is our in house tech guru, and I am Bandy Woodard Santos your co host, and I will see y'all next week.