Inside Steph's all-women group chat

everyone to start. Hillary Rosen one of the most extraordinary voices of influence in crisis management pr as well as a CNN contributor Amanda Kats who was most recently with CNN in their investigations team. She is currently the author of an intriguing substack known as The Interpreter. I highly recommend it. Tammy had Dad, veteran TV superstar from both CNN and NBC. She is now a media consultant, and Caris Wisha, host of not one but two podcasts, Sway

and Pivot. Thank you all so much for being here. You are my group chat. I as a rule do not have group chats. I find them to be too risky, too dangerous, because I don't necessarily trust or no everyone on it. As Heidi Cruz learned from hers, But I want to talk to you all about how important it is in life as women, professional women to have sort of this not official women's network, but to have real

women friends. Hillary, I turned to you first. I mean, I think it's in a in a way, it's everything right because, particularly this past year, I've noticed that Amanda's actually written about this. I noticed that there's so many moments where, you know, I lived inside my head because I was isolated and I wasn't in my regular life, and having the outlet of you know, the five of you to to talk to on the phone, on you know, on chat it, I actually don't know that I could

have gotten through this year without you guys. Um that just amplifies everything that I've experienced in my professional life. This year was sort of the culmination of that, Amanda. When we hear people talk about girlfriends, they often think like a coffee clutch, a mom's group, gossiping. But how much of an impact does it have on your life professionally to have this group of brutally honest women who also love and care about your success professionally. That's a

good question. I think that you guys actually are kinder than you are, brutally honest, I don't feel like the function of the group chat is to, like, you know, truly call you out, except when it comes to my love life. Your guys are all brutally to me. It's been very, very welcome. I mean, as as Hillary was just saying, this has been a really challenging year, I

think in terms of lack of access to friends. For me, I compounded that by moving to a new city right at the start of the pandem make I also have a small baby. Last summer, I left my job that I've been in for several years, and the combination of those things has made it more important than ever to

have these kinds of connections. You know, I will say, like, when I hear the word girlfriends, of course, you know, I think of something a little more romantic, just because of where I'm coming from, and you know, my other group chats are pretty co ed. Actually, this is I think the only one that I can think of that's

all women. But there's something about women who are really looking out for each other and have each other's best interests at heart, and also have a sense of humor, also are there to debate and discuss and gossip and can move from the light to the serious seamlessly. I think that is such an important thing right now, and especially when I'm not seeing those people in person, as I haven't for the last year, you know, with a few exceptions, it's felt really critical to have that outlet

Tammy talk about what a change we've seen. Think about the beginning of your career. I remember, for me, when I started in investment banking, there was no women's mafia. In fact, there were so few women. It was much more like I had to scratch and climb my way here. You know, good luck you you find your way on your own. It has changed so much at this point that if you're not a woman who stands with other women, you're the outsider. Yeah, I do think that's changed. And

just even having that many women in the room. But you know, this is all very lofty talk. I miss seeing all of you and the horrified look on your face when we talk about someone or something. This is so great that we can see each other, Stephanie, because this is what we're missing in real life, Like did that person actually do that? Did this person that I've worked with for twenty years actually say that McCall has everyone gone crazy? Has this pandemic really tipped us over?

And it's such a reminder that just being able to tell your friends about it and bounce it off them and think about things a different way. You know, I think people are interested in other opinions and look at all of us here, even though you guys are usually

wrong and I am right, sure, okay, whatever. I just like the visceral sharing of all the good and all the bad, and to be able to run things by my friends to make sure I haven't gone start breading man care For someone who doesn't know you, they might not know that you have an informal women's network, a mafia behind you that stands behind you, that talks you through things. I mean, you're a very outspoken, independent person, and I'm not sure an outsider would know. You've got

a group chat chatting you up every day. Yes, I do, but I have a lot of group chats that you don't know about, and they're started. I actually do. I have very different group chats for different things, and so um, I think it's important to have to. I have it. Like when something happens and you want a quick reaction, depending so I'm really interested in this idea of how through the pandemic, like this idea of what will stick

and what won't. But this idea of reaching out to people that is an analog which has been happening past two decades. But where does it evolve too? So you see like the Clubhouse, which is I think I'm trying to figure out what's right about it. And actually this idea of being alone and then being able to reach out and just listen to people talk. It's not unlike talk radio, it's not unlike group chats or something like

that is a really interesting one. And so I think text plays into that because you can do them quickly. It's not Twitter, where you just have nine people responding to you. But I don't I don't think that's what this is. I mean, all of that's performative. You don't below Clubhouse and people on most of it on Twitter, they're all they're all speaking to an audience that they're not selecting, that they're you know, they're trying to present

themselves to the world. And I do think despite Kara's desperate desire never to need anyone or demonstrate that no person that she's talking to is the most important person in her life, which is why she dishes us even into our face. The group shout that we have and you know, we obviously all have other friends, but there's something about dear friends and take who will call you on your who will hold up a mirror while they still are the most supportive people in the world and

rooting for your success. And I think that you hear it differently, like we're all, you know, public people, and we're all subject to criticism, and I think when you hear critique and engagement from somebody really trust, like I trust you, guys. I listened to it differently, and I think that that's a hallmark really of kind of the connection. What's funny that we should tell more about our groups, Stephanie.

We'll text each other people were respond and then it gets to the point that somebody calls someone else and then we're all on the phone, right, correct, that's the tipping point that you have to get the person on the phone, but all of a sudden, we're like, what did you just say? Yeah, it's usually for clarification of extremely offensive content, which is always from you. I haven't

slightly offensive maybe unpopular opinion, but I do. It's a red flag for me in terms of never trust a woman who doesn't have girlfriends, because I think who you surround yourself, your girlfriends do make you better and smarter. Is that, in your opinion, Amanda? An important thing, especially when when it goes directly back to what Hillary was saying. When you think about people's public actions or hubrisk, it often makes me think, where's that person's girlfriend, Where's their mother,

where's their sister? Where someone shaking them saying this is a terrible move? What are you thinking? I would say, we're broadly that people need friends. I guess for me, you know, some of my closest friends are guys, and both gay and straight men. That's just always been true in my life that I have a lot of friends who are women and a lot of friends who are men.

You know, So for whatever reason, that hasn't been true for me so much that it's just been a kind of like mainly female group of people who are my support system. You know, I think that friends are critical. I mean this came up a lot during the Trump presidency when clearly he had a lot of acquaintances, but you never really had the sense of him having a lot of friends, and that in this way that was very um concerning. It was one of the things that

made Trump feel very alien. I think a lot of people is that he seemed to have a lot of like business associates, but not people who work for him. I guess maybe I say girlfriends because for me personally, while I have men and women friends, men don't come to me unsolicited and say that was a bad move, that was the wrong thing you said. My women friends do that for me to trust women more when they say that, whereas men won't say that to you at all, or you if they did say it, you would be

concerned about what their motives were. A man would say it to me if I asked him, but a woman would say it to me unsolicited because she risked putting herself out there. A real friend will risk hurting you, hurting your feelings, hurting their relationship with you by telling you the truth. I have that with women. I don't have that with men. I have a ton of men friends too. Apparently Amanda and I went on that score.

Not that this group is competitive at all, but anyway, I don't think I have one group chat you know more than two people with men. Does anyone else I do? Yeah, I did too, Yeah, business or personal personal, Okay, I do not. I have a lot of one on one but no group kara. That is a thing. There's a whole idea of girlfriends and you know, someone we do talk about in our group, Cheryl Sandberg and a lot

of the stuff like that. She used to have these dinners in Silicon Valley that we're all women that were at her house and they have a guest in and stuff like that. And at the time, she was trying to prote the idea that there weren't networks of women and these these were work events because a lot of men have these work events naturally. Um, so she was trying to promote work events. What I have seen a lot more of is women doing more by themselves in a network point view, in helping each other at a

network point view than ever before. That's something that's really shifted. I think a lot more that there's individualized networks of women. I think about and this isn't a good group chat, but like Melinda Gates and Mackenzie Scott and some mothers and lorn jobs are all giving money to women and venture capitalist for example, like right now because they want to promote a lot of different things whatever they're trying to do. That would be a pretty funny group chat,

I know. And I just say care of when you were doing code and we were all there, we would have dinner that Hillary hosted, Yes exactly, I'm just gonna mention another. Yeah, and it was women and there's real bonding and I'm sorry it doesn't take place the same way with men. I do think men don't volunteer it because some men are, of course nervous to like, you know, there's very few men. Maybe Scott Galloway would tell you, for example, what he really think. Who does doesn't he

but he's like a girlfriend, right. I think men feel nervous about saying something to you that would be helpful. You be nervous to do so. These days, I think in a lot of ways are not used to having that kind of friendship relationships. I think that tends to be harder, and then so you end up not confiding

in them as much, I guess. And that's I think the very point, which is we all have an obligation in our profession to engage men, to be thoughtful, to be good colleague, to the extent that we're talking about feeding our own soul, we can have the obligation to figure out who feeds our soul, Like we don't have to raise up men to do that if we're not Amanda and have those you know, fuzzy men in our life already. So yes, of course there's you know, great

men out there. But you know, I stretch to say that women have a different kind of communication when it's just women, and so a different kind of lived experience that women have, you know, so that there's certain kinds of things that are similar, both personally and I think professionally, Like there's certain bullshit that you deal with as a woman that other women also deal with and that you

don't need to explain in that sense. I think it's you know, I feel like I look to women friends less to call me out than to have my back and to yeah, help me, help reassure me that I'm saying. I feel like I've spent a lot of time during this COVID pandemic in particular, just telling other women that they're having a hard time because the situation is really hard.

People who are struggling with things like their kids, mental health, they're taking care of their parents and their kids simultaneously, and you know, trying to kind of do the impossible. And there's a way that having another woman tell you you're doing what you can, you're doing the right thing. I've got your back, Call me anytime you need to blow off steam like that, is that. I definitely see women helping each other out that way a lot. We'll

be back after the break. The fact that we all know and have one another is a privilege, because, especially corporate America, over the last ten or fifteen years, you know,

they sort of identified the importance of formal women's networks. However, for me, and I'm going to guess all of you here at sort of name your Fortune five company or bank and their women's networking events and their conferences, We've all attended them, spoke at them, drank their wine, eating their cheese, and that in and of itself has become sort of a cottage industry that unfortunately becomes a bit

of a of a pink ghetto. Do you actually think that formal women's networking campaigns and events make more of a difference or actually connecting with individuals caring about them, Right, none of us work together per se. We can't directly, day in and day out, say ka, I'm gonna deliver

this thing that's going to help advance you. Because when you were talking about these women's networking dinners, they often have formal takeaways and plans and then they tell you know, twenty three year old, once you find a sponsor and a mentor, that's your path. What we all have has nothing to do with a formal network, Kara, Right, No, I no, of course not. We can help each other.

I was just talking to someone today in a group chat and they needed help meeting someone and this was a social one and I just said, I can do this for you, right, So, No, I think we spent a lot of time gossiping. Really we honestly do. Or there's news stories. We don't have to say what news stories. We like to like think when something happens, like usually Stephanie is like, oh my good God. Essentially she's like

can you believe this? I mean I couldn't believe when Heidi Cruz got outed by her group chat when I think about who's on your group chat, Like, how would that even happen? Tammy? Yeah, And this is a person that doesn't have power doesn't have water, and the first thing they do is they're leaking Heidie cruises. And then who's the photographer that's taking pictures of our poor woman in her bikini with her kids on the beach. Honestly, TMC has resources everywhere. I think the question our group

chet became who would drop a dime on everybody? And we think it's gift. It was believe I volunteered, and then we started to worry that we should kick you out or not. And then something about our group check got up on Twitter and there was a lot of comment. Here is the deal. If you pulled Idi CRUs I would totally drop a dime on you. Thank you. There you go. You cannot betray the group in with a

behavior like that. I'm gonna take a step back those um and I'm gonna disagree a little bit with Stephanie on the whole idea of the pink ghetto, the groups that have formed around women's organizations, news organizations, et cetera, because at first I felt the way you did, and then I went to one. It was one of the Fortune Women's Dinners. Well those are very good, they are, And I was sitting with younger people, and I thought,

you know what's really good about this. They get to see, you know, some of the more older and more successful women, and they can model behavior. I am a parent at heart, right and I feel like, and you guys are great with my kids. Even when Stephanie curses, was so much conviction that teaches my daughter when you curse, you really curse, and you gotta use your hands, you gotta make it count. Your daughter is so mild mannered compared to Stephanie exactly.

It's a real opportunity for women to see how other women operate at a high level, and even at like Code is another example where you had Kara had I act like it. And it will never happen again. I'm sure it'll come back, and I'll look forward to Why was it so valuable Because you saw really successful people, You saw people in the middle, you saw people struggling, You saw journalists, and everyone was talking to each other and and even when they didn't want to write. I

think that's true. I also think though, that the five of us have sort of a little bit of a non traditional career in that we don't depend on big corporations in that way, we don't have those kind of bosses, we sort of have each developed our own brand, our own actions, our own careers, and I think, and to be serious per second, I do think, Yeah, we gossip a lot, but I think there have been multiple times where we've relied on each other to figure out how

to define that, what that means, What do we expect of ourselves? What are other people expect of us? And I think that similar to those kinds of sort of corporate outings, UM, where they have unique issues like how do I get to be from a you know, s VP into the C suite? We don't have that issue, but we have other issues right um, whether it's contracts or whether it's colleagues or whatever it is. And so I do think that this kind of judgment free support.

Here's what I did, Here's who I talked to, Here's the experience I had. Let me introduce you to so and so. I think that's kind of invaluable. And I it is recreating, as Amanda said before, what men have done for centuries. And I don't think we should hide the fact that we do it. I think we should embrace it. Do you think we get judged more for

being women? And I turned to Amanda. If we were all respective CEOs of different businesses and put all of us one another on each other's advisory boards, or picked one of us to be the banker for our next deal. That is the way corporate America has worked forever and ever and ever. Right, you can track certain guys and they have huge overlap and all the deals they've ever done, the boards they sit on together. Would there be a whole lot more scrutiny if it were the five of

us doing that same thing. That's an interesting question. I mean, I think that that network does exist to some extent among women, but I think less so because women have less power. I know so many more women who are kind of stuck at the deputy level in whatever situation they're in. You know, I know a lot of women who are working to help each other handle that situation.

But I think that there you have your situations where it's just a woman who's at the top of the pyramid and can therefore make alliances with other women at

the top of the pyramid. You know, right now, there's a big generation of women who have been told that they can have whatever they want and they should be able to get there and you know, I know that in my own career, I've had moments where I've had to take a step back to realize that something about what's happening at work actually is sexism, like actually is you know, I had a situation happen once and a friend of mine who's very high level corporate lawyers, said,

you know, what's happening is you're hitting the glass ceiling, and I just really was startled. You know, I sort of didn't think that that was something that would happen to me. And there are moments that you realize, you know, it's it can be less the glass ceiling than a discomfort with women being in charge, or you know this idea that men you know, what's been sort of found in studies is that men are hired on potential and

women are hired on accomplishment. And you know this idea of the glass cliff or women are sent in to clean up other people's messes. Um so I think, you know, I don't know whether there would be more scrutiny, but I that it would be a more unusual situation to have, like essentially the you know, see you on the golf links. You know, women women do that for each other, but in some ways without the benefit of as much power

as men have on average. I don't. I mean, I think the answer to your question is one it would get more scrutiny, like if women did the same kind of insider back scratching and the life at that financial level would get more scrutiny. Now maybe for the oddity of it because it doesn't happen, but no question for the keeping us down. Look at Joanna Chole's She's one of how many women that have a spack this year or maybe more than one. She's gotten so much coverage.

She's such a competent executive. She ran hers for a long time. But I think more these things are not more about like doing better at work. It's like bouncing ideas off of people. I think that's what's really helpful. And I think we would probably do it a lot more in person, although we all have really busy lives normally, and we don't see each other at events like we used to do or other get togethers and things like that, and so I think it sort of is a pressure.

Valve to me is to like it makes me laugh. I just laugh when I like get these texts from you all, and you know, you go on and on, and so I think there is an element of that. And then if you need a really good piece of advice, bouncing off a couple of different people, because everyone has a different reaction, often at cross purposes. Hillary has a certain reaction, Tammy does, Amanda does, Dephanitely does. And then you can take a range of ideas or sometimes everyone

coalesces around an idea. So it's super helpful, you know, to be able to share that. And I just want to ask, it was interesting to me when Amanda was talking about women sort of capping out at the deputy level, or this idea that sometimes we face sexism and don't even realize it. Hillary, when Time's Up was created and the work it's done over the last few years, how much of a game changer has it been compared to any other organized effort. I think it's it's change things

on a couple of levels. There's no question that we're making progress in sexual harassment in terms of visibility. Call a political correctness if you want to, but you know, the idea that even Andrew Cuomo, you know, who was an untouchable guy, could be called out for what people perceived to be offensive behavior just a few years ago.

I think is indicative of that now we have some work to do about putting sexual harassment in perspective versus, you know, in terms of the quality of what's worse than what's terrible, And we've all talked about that a lot in this group. But I think that just the resources available for women who feel like they have no place to go and no one is listening, I think is dramatically changed. I think Times of has dramatically changed. That there has never been resources before for people to

go get lawyers and be our help, etcetera. So I think that conversation has changed. I think that business in particular, almost every company has now had a different level of engagement and training. And I think the other piece though, and the board of times I've just had this conversation, the sister that it created around the women who were involved continue to be involved and and have grown this

organization in a way is immeasurable. And I think trying to think about how you promote the sisterhood in multiple places around the country so that people do feel support, you know, this is one of them. That's why I like you calling this podcast matters because people do need that sister who Men's appearance is different than women in

almost every part of their life. It doesn't mean that men can't be good or can't relate, but giving women permission to have those moments of togetherness where they're finding shared values, where they're fighting for something they've all believed, I think is immeasurably important. And I do think times

I've intributed to that. I didn't have a professional sisterhood in the early days of my career when I worked in banking, I was definitely a hyper competitive, sharp, elbowed solo operator and you're hurtful, you are active um and I actually think on a flat level, sure it resulted in success or compensation, but it didn't help my career. I actually think it hurt my career and my reputation. Kara,

do you think you've always had a professional sisterhood. It wasn't until I was thirty, probably I realized the value of it. That's a good question. I don't. I don't know. I don't think of it that way. I guess I didn't. I just sort of, well, bowl does through everything, So I'm not sure. KR's like I was always just awesome. Let's just face it, it's a little easier to get Stephanie's inner, um Bush than it is to get cars inner mush. I don't know, I don't, I don't know.

I was interesting because I was at the Washington Post for a lot for my early career, and I did notice that women at a harder time dealing with men, but for some reason, they had an easier time dealing with me because I was a lesbian. I don't know what it was, which is interesting when you're in like

environments like Silicon Valley where it's like all men. It was an interesting situation in covering them because it's usually like pretty much your reality all the time, and the same thing with you, stephan when you're in banking or whatever. You have the same kind of groups, and so you get kind of used to dealing with that environment and then having to dominate it, actually having to figure out ways to actually dominate those people and get them, uh

to bend your will essentially. Um. So you do learn kind of skills. One of the things that was uncomfortable for me, I remember, is when you're gay, for some reason, men think you're not a feminist, you know, and so I would be at some of these venture capital things or tech things and they'd be like, oh, she's a good looking right, And I'm like, but like, you know what I mean, And I'm like, still a feminist over here, just f y. I I haven't experienced that, but I do.

It's just me because I'm just trying to be willfully ignorant about the situation. I think there's something else. And you know, Aara and I've known each other since we were baby lesbians, like thirty five years ago or something like that, forty years ago. I think that the there's a little bit different when you're gay because you're sort of used to having a double life, at least in those days. I think it's very different now. But we did have a professional life and then we'd have a separate,

entire circle of people we could be ourselves with. And I think that that is something actually that straight women have started to experience later now where it's okay, I do have this circle where I let my hair down with. I do have this group, and um, but I think for us, and I don't want to speak for you, but for me anyway, that was something I was always living with. Aman that's interesting I mean, I think that also when you don't need things, certain things from men,

it's very liberating. So I mean, I like, this is the difference between my being a few years younger than you guys. So I came of age at a point when I never felt like my life was that ye for catered. Um, So I was gay, but I was work. It wasn't you know in my twenties. You know, that did help, I think to some extent. I also worked. You know, it's interesting, Stephanie, you worked in such a male dominated industry in that period of your life too.

I was working as a book adder, so I was in a industry that was almost entirely female with the scattering of guys. You know. Um, it was a very very different kind of composition. And I worked for you know, particularly badass woman actually in the main job I had in that field, So you know, I had I had a kind of different experience where right away there was a kind of network of women who looked out for each other and helped took each other up with things.

You know, that idea of being a solo operator wasn't really that rewarding in that context. I think, well, has that sisterhood changed in media. Then I turned to you, Tammy, because I'll tell you when I left banking and I moved into media. I remember I just started at Bloomberg, and I was so excited to work with women and have these women girlfriends, and I was super gung ho, and absolutely nobody was buying what I was selling, like

no one was looking to be friends with me. That might be the state of the industry now, but that's the past and going forward, yes, things can be competitive, but I don't think that's the future. What do you think, Timmy, I don't think it is the future. I mean, you used to have to kill each other to get on TV because there wasn't that much airtime. Now there's massive amounts of airtime, whether it's cable or network. And frankly, you're better off in cable than you are in network

because you can't get on the air. I mean, look at ABC News. I mean when do you get on TV? I mean a great Good Morning America, this week world news, you can't get on there. But it's you know, this is very competitive, high level business. And by way, this is producers too. It's not just alant. You know, you want to win at the highest level. And the truth is that people are not going to stay in one of those four positions anymore. So they have to really

find a way to work together and to figure it out. Now, think about when you moved over to NBC from the BERG, and they're definitely groups of women, and there's definitely this system that exists to try to help you, officially and unofficially because the NBC was really smart their talent relations people. I work with HBO. HBO has an entire talent field in addition to PR and everything else, because your success is their success, so it's not individual success anymore. So

those kinds of things would never happen today. I give Hillary the last word. How much of a role does having this group chat girlfriends? How important is it in your life? Well, for me, it's everything, And now I've learned that it's not that big a deal for you guys, Like no, just not for Karen. Yeah, I don't I discount everything. Carra says emotions on air because even in this environment, Amanda's nodding. Even in this environment, she's got to play the tough guy. My my last word is

you guys have my back. I have yours. There's nothing I wouldn't do for you, and I feel like there's nothing you wouldn't do for me. And there's just not a lot of people in my life that are that way that I have that experience with. And so thank you for getting me through this year. And I'm gonna kick Ka out of the group chat because I don't want to be dimed out for anything. Let me just tell you, if you did a cancoon, that would be

that Let's call that a verb in this group. If you can coon, If you can coon, that's when you call your girlfriend and say I'm picking you up at the airport and you're gonna stay with me for a week. We don't have anyone here who would do a can because well, this goes two. Is Heidi Cruz publicly as accountable as her husband is than we we're just Heidi Cruz. Would that be a problem if she and her kids were going or is it only because it was Ted

Cruise because he lied about it. I get the Ted Cruise problem, But this was Heidie's friend diming her out because Ted Cruz led about it and said it was another thing, and this proved that it wasn't. That's why. Yeah, But I still wouldn't dime out my girlfriend for her husband doing something terrible. I'd call her on the phone and be like, hey girl, I'm gonna pick you up and we're gonna have a drink, maybe even worse, and

we're going to talk some truth here. But I would not dime out my girlfriend on my mom chat to the world. All Right, we're with you. We agree, we don't go to cancoon, Stephanie. That's all I gotta say. Okay, Luckily we're none of us are at risk of that. A group chat is a circle of trust, and if you cannot be trusted, yeah, all right, ladies, thank you so so much. I love you. I miss your faces. I can't wait to see you all and eat Hillary's food.

We love you. Thank you, Stephanie. I'm Stephanie Rule, and you're listening to Modern Rules, a podcast from NBC Think, MSNBC and I Heart Radio. This podcast is hosted by Me Stephanie Rule. Mike Beet and Katrina Norvell are executive producers. Meredith Bennett Smith is Senior editor for NBC Think and our editorial lead. The podcast is engineered and edited by Josh Fisher. Additional production support provided by Charles Herman, Rachel Rosenbaum,

and Lauren Wynn. Special thanks to Katherine kim Are, Global Head of Digital News right here at NBC News and MSNBC. For more thought provoking analysis, visit NBC news dot com slash thank