The BA Q&A: Leaving a Toxic Work Environment

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Thank you the Webby Awards for nominating us. Now let's take this on or home, y'all. Hey, hey va fam, it's Mandy. I am back with another episode of the Brown Ambition QNA. I am loving getting y'all's questions. Y'all have some doozies for me this week though, some really juicy career questions. I cannot wait to dive into those. But before I do, I've got to remind y'all how to submit your questions. Head over to Brownambitionpodcast dot com. You can simit a question there, or you can slide

into our DMS. We are at Brown Ambition Podcast on ig Send us your questions again, finances, career, relationship, pet, maintenance, whatever, Just send me your questions. Okay, I'm happy to take them on the show without further ado. Let's jump right on into these questions for the week. We've got two who are very justifiably so going to be required to be anonymous, which is fine. Our first question comes from a woman who works in broadcast news and ooh, I

felt this question deep, deeply inside my bone. So let's get into it. Okay, here's our first question. Let's call her Oprah Winfrey because she works in broadcast news. So Oprah says, how do you navigate whitesplaining both on social media and in the workplace. I'm a news anchor and I recently posted an IG video about why job seekers should network and proactively pitch themselves to their hiring managers rather than reactively waiting for job descriptions to be posted.

I received a comment on the video from a white woman who says she works in HR. She said networking is a good supplement in the job search, but is not a replacement for sending an online application. She also explained it's inaccurate to say many jobs aren't posted online as job descriptions kickstart the hiring process. While I don't doubt this is how the hiring process works at her company, I'm really annoyed that she went out of her way to try to correct me when I know what I

said was accurate for many companies and industries. I don't mind if people correct me when I'm actually wrong, but I found whenever I'm corrected by someone with inaccurate information, the correction is always coming from a white woman or a white or Asian man. I'm tended to point this out when I respond to their comments, but I never do because I don't want to be seen as playing

the race card. My question isn't necessarily about how to respond but I'd love to hear how you navigate white splaining and how you prevent it from ruining your afternoon. I'm just so tired of dealing with whitesplainning from mediocre people,

and it triggers so much anxiety whenever it happens. Okay, lady, oh, lady Oh, listen first and foremost as as a fellow woman of color who's out there on these internet streets sharing her point of view on many subjects, including how to network, and I will back you up one thousand percent on what you have said. It is so important to think about way more more than just applying online for jobs when you really want to get to the

next level of your career. And while it can be true that and I just had a coaching mentor mentee of mine today who told me that she got an amazing job as an assistant director at a major company and she applied online. So absolutely it can happen. It can happen. From filling out a job application, you can get an opportunity. However, it is factual that many, many, many, in fact, the large majority of jobs are not even

posted online. They aren't they're being filled internally. They're being passed to candidates, from recruiters, from hiring managers before they're even published, you know, formally online. So I back you up one hundred percent. But to your point, as someone who is out there constantly sharing my point of view and trying to help people by sharing my perspective on lots of different career and finance questions, just as I do on the show right now, you do open yourself

up to critiques. You do open yourself up to other people sharing their opinions in return, I had to really check myself to be honest. I had to check myself from that instant gut reaction of like, who are you to tell me that my opinion is wrong? I'm correct, Here's what I've said. I had to stop myself from kind of having that initial negative, like you said, ruin my whole afternoon response to someone like a naysayer trying

to tell me that what I said wasn't accurate. What I tried to do even more for myself was remind myself what was my rationale for what I said? What was how how did I say it? Was I factually correct? And actually being open to another's perspective I think is something that we can all do a better job of now.

As black women listen, we are challenged in a way at a fever pitch that is not seen I don't think by other categories of people when you see a black woman who knows what she's talking about and has the confidence to assert herself and to say with her

full chest how she feels on a certain map. I don't have any data to back this up right now, but would I would hazard a guess that we are more likely to be We are more likely to be seen as not qualified to come up with that opinion to oh, well, she doesn't have this degree or she doesn't work in that field, so how does she know? And to try to be, as you said, white's blained or man's blained or whatever, just basically look down upon and patronized by other people. That's sort of our burden

to bear. I feel like I don't want that to stop. You do not stop, Okay, do not stop, lady. Oh continue, You've got to keep sharing your voice, because for every person who's taking the time out of their day to leave you a comment and try to tear you down, there's many, many, many other viewers who are probably really empowered by what you're telling them. And I see this

every single day. So a couple of ways that I don't let negative comments, regardless of who they come from, white, black, whoever. How I don't let them ruin my day is I take time to read the positive comments too. Okay, those comments matter, but they don't sting us the way that negative comments do. Right. I just had someone last week who told my followers do not follow her. She literally said this came on my page. I'm Brown ambition and said, do not follow her. She does not know of what

she speaks. And it was all about the conversation I had in a recent BEAQ at a episode about how a resume is not the only thing that matters when it comes to getting your dream job. This person, who liked to point out that she worked in HR said no, no, no, no, no, this is not accurate. Don't follow Amandy. She's inaccurate. Blah blah blah. Had I let that kind of ruin my day, it would have discounted all the other amazing comments and responses I've got from readers or listeners to the show.

And I don't want you to get in that space where the naysayers are the voices that are ricocheting around your mind. You have to actively fill your mind with positive affirmations, with positive reassurances, and positive feedback that you're getting. I assure you that you are getting it from your followers, from your viewers, from your colleagues, from your managers. Those

are the people whose opinions ultimately matter. Right And also one of the reasons that I have gotten so much more confident and sharing my point of view on things is because things happen to me, and you can't tell me that something didn't happen to me and I didn't see something like I stand in my truth with and I speak of what I know. I speak from my

own experience, and I speak from my heart. And at the end of the day, it's impossible for anyone to tell me that my point of view doesn't matter and that it's not accurate. They may not agree with it, but what you can't do is take away from my experience and what I have seen. And all I'm doing is sharing my opinion and my thoughts based on those experiences. So it's going to happen. This is the beauty of having a public platform and sharing your point of view.

But ooh, lady, oh, please don't stop, Please keep going and let me be the first of many positive reaffirmations. Is that even a word reaffirmation? Let me be one of the positive voices that you hear today. And I want you to keep what I'm saying close to you and don't let the negative, you know, negative comments be what carries you throughout the day. Listen to me. I'm telling you that you're doing great work. I'm telling you that I agree with you. I'm telling you to keep going.

And I think for all of us, it's really about who are we gonna choose to Let's sit with us, and let's sit on our spirits and let's sit in our mind. Who are we carrying with us? Whose voices are we going to carry with us throughout the day. And I try to do my best to carry positive voices with me wherever I go. It doesn't mean that the negative voices are not there, and often they're my damn own negative voice, you know what I mean. But I do try to actively seek out positive vibes from

other people. I ask for feedback I literally have. I'm not even gonna lie, i'mnn tell you all my secret to happiness. When I'm having a really shitty day, I survey every single one of my coaches clients. After I chat with them, they get a little survey ask for their feedback. And I don't check this spreadsheet of my responses every day, but when I'm having a really shitty day, I sure do. I open up that spreadsheet and I read what they have to say, and I skip right

to the positive feedback column. Yes, I ask for what could have been better, but that's not what I'm concerned about in that moment. I want to read the positive love and support and happy vibes from the people that I have helped, and I just think we all could use a little bit more of that. It doesn't mean

that we can't take a bit of criticism. I think we should all be open to that, and certainly on the Internet, like I'm trying to create a space where people feel safe and they feel like they can share their opinion in a way that's respectful. But at the end of the day, we have to know deep in our bones, you know who we are, what our experiences are coming from, and that our voices do matter, and our experiences and our thoughts are just as important as

anyone else's. Okay, so keep keep keep keeping on. Okay, lady, Oh, thank you so much for sharing this question with me. I hope this was helpful. I feel you, I hear you, I see you, all of it. Okay, let me take a quick break and I'll be right back with another of your questions. This is Brown Ambition. Hey, hey va fam Okay, we are back with our second and last question of the day. This one is a juicy one. It comes from a listener who would like to remain anonymous,

so I'm just gonna call her Hailey. Okay, Hailey says, Hey, Mandy, I love the podcast, and I've been loving the Q and A episodes lately. I have a question I hope you can answer. I am resigning for my position at a financial services firm due to some really negative circumstances. I was sexually harassed and HR essentially did nothing about it.

There was never a formal onboarding process, so I've been in the dark about many fundamental elements of the role, and there's absolutely no trust within the team I'm on. Everyone on the team, including our director, have gossip to me about other members behind their backs. I've heard that I shouldn't include complaints or grievances in the letter of resignation, But if anyone asks why I'm leaving, I've got pages

worth of negative experiences I could share. How would you approach this situation and would you include any of that in a letter or exit interview? Sincerely, a millennial who seems to think she can change the old white men in the finance industry with two crying face emojis, Oh man, another woman who I just want to say, keep going, my girl, I keep going. We need more of you out there. First of all, I'm sorry, I'm sorry you

had this awful experience at a financial firm. No less, because we all know financial services industries pay a lot of lip service these days to wanting more women, especially women of color, joining the industry because they are struggling. They are finding that, oh, there's a lot of money to be had from having diverse clientele, and yet we can't give them diverse financial representatives. So let's go start a big marketing effort to get more women and people

of color to want to work here. And clearly what they're doing is they're only thinking about how to get us stupid door, but not how to actually make us succeed once we get there. The fact that you weren't even given any sort of orientation process and you're not really understanding your role. That screams it's giving, toxic work environment. It's giving we want you on the brochure, but we don't really care about your longevity in this space or

in your career. I'm really glad that you're getting on a bat of there. I hope your next job is nothing like this one. I hope that they give you everything that you need to succeed, and I hope that you continue being open to leaving whenever you're not being valued where you work. Okay, so a couple of things here. The sexual harassment unacceptable, the fact that HR did nothing about it. That tells me a lot about this company

and why you are leaving. Now. What to do when you feel like you've got a list of grievances a mile long, and especially when it's so fresh and you're about to resign, It feels like you want to let them know why you're leaving, and I honestly support that. I think at this point on your way out, how much do you have to lose by telling them exactly about your experience. And I think you have to kind of carefully weigh your options here, play it out in

your mind. You know, who would you be sharing this list of grievances to and what would be the pros and cons here now? In your industry and maybe in your city, your state. It depends on who's at this company and if you think they could make things more difficult for you in your career later on, because first

and foremost you have to protect yourself. And I'm going to be a little bit of a cynic here and say that if the issues were so deep with this company that a sexual harassment claim was not really dealt with in an appropriate manner, and someone like you is resigning, you know for that and other reasons, that you telling them their issues is maybe not gonna change things there for the better for the next person behind you, Like, is it worth would it be worth potentially putting your

career at risk if there are people working there now who could make things more difficult for you down the road. Now, that's a question only you can answer if you kind of weigh out the pros and cons and you say, you know, I actually don't have much to lose career wise professionally, and maybe people work here they'll go on. But I feel like my brand is strong enough, I've got a great network. Clearly, you're great at your work because you were able to get a job when you

wanted to. But if you feel like pretty confident that no one at this company will cause issues for me down the line, and on top of that, you're willing to stick your neck out there to make things potentially better for the next woman who's hired behind you, that's a valiant effort. That's a valiant step to take. In my opinion, it's brave. It takes courage to put yourself out there in that way. Now, how to do it?

I mean, you want to protect yourself, so I would say, you know, putting it in an email is one thing. If you have a conversation on the phone, absolutely record it. I'm all about kind of having my voice memo on for certain phone conversations so that I have a record of it. But an email is perfectly fine. You know, if you don't have a formal exit interview process, what you could do is, you know, write a letter and make sure that it's going to the people who have

the actual power to change things. So I wouldn't send an all like company wide email to the whole company list serve and just be like, you know what, screw you, guys, I'm out, So let me let everyone know. I might start with head of HR, your department, head whoever their

bosses are, and just very you know, objectively. And I think I mentioned on a question from last week's episode about how important it is to come with some evidence, you know, sit down and make a list of here's what happened, here's the date, here are the key players, and here's how these things made and actively contributed to me wanting to leave. And if you approach it that way, I really I feel like that's that's the approach that

I would personally take. If from that email people want to have follow up phone calls and they want to talk to you, and oh my goodness, we didn't know at that point. It's too late. It's their problem. And I wouldn't take any of that burden on your shoulders to stick around any longer than you absolutely have to and help them get to the bottom of what happened.

Like it's too late for all that you're just trying to let them know so that things can maybe get a little bit incrementally better for the next person who comes behind you. And I think that, honestly, you're doing them a service. You're helping them. You're giving them an opportunity to clean up a little bit and to get better. And if they take the opportunity or they don't, that's not on your shoulders. You can say what you got to say and then keep it moving. All right. I'm

so excited for you about your new opportunity. Thank you for being brave enough to even consider the idea of telling them what happened to you. There is power in our stories. I hope that they hear your story and

they take action. But at least you can take heart and mils that you know, hey, I went out of my way to tell them what happened, and then kind of take that pressure off yourself and take that burden off your own shoulders to actually create the change that obviously needs to be happening there so that things are not so bad for the next person who comes along.

One thing that you didn't mention is whether or not they already have a formal interview, a formal exit interview process, and if there is going to be a formal exit interview, I would absolutely you know, come prepared with that list and ask them. You know, I actually do have some points I'd like to make. Would you prefer I cover that in a phone call or would you like me to just forward you on this email and it can

do the talking for me. That's more than fine, honestly, whatever, whatever's gonna get your point across with the least amount of work on your side, that's what I would do, so you can save it for the exit interview. Like I said, if you want to take things a step further, you could make sure that a copy of those grievances are emailed not just to the person conducting your exit interview,

but the people who are responsible for whatever grievances. You know you're calling out their managers, like you could decide how you want to escalate it. It all comes back to, you know, what's the risk versus reward here and are you doing things you know in a way that is going to help hopefully make things better for your other colleagues you're leaving behind. And that can tell you, like on a scale of one to really bad, petty how

petty you want to be. I would go for covering it in an exit interview, following up with an email and just tagging, copying the people who really have the power to rectify the situation, copying on that, and then let it go. At that point, you've done much you need to do. Go to your new opportunity, go to your new job, start this new chapter in your life.

Always remember what happened to you here so that it makes you a better leader in the future, and talk about it, and you know, find people who can support you in the future. And that's really all you're responsible for at the end of the day. All right, Miss Haley aka millennial who seems to think she can change the old white men in the finance industry. Yes, I hope you're not a alone there, because they, y'all the financial industry needs so much help. Okay, that is it

for B, a Q and A for this week. I'm Mandy Woodriff Santos. Thank you so much for listening to the show. Don't forget to subscribe, Share, tell a friend, tell a friend about Brown Ambition. Tag us on all of your amazing social media posts. I love to see them, I comment, I share, I retweet, I reshare all that good stuff. Thank you so much again, be a fam and I will see you next week. 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 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 Woodriff Santos your co host, and I will see y'all next week.