You're at the Coaching Inn, 3D Coaching's virtual pub where we enjoy conversations with people who engage in the world of coaching. Hello and welcome to this week's edition of The Coaching Inn. I'm Claire Pedrick and today I'm in conversation with Jamie Fiorae Higgins.
Everyone has a story when they come to coaching and Jamie's story is that she worked at Goldman Sachs for many years before leaving for a number of reasons which she's written about in her book Bully Market, My Story of Money and Misogyny at Goldman Sachs. Jamie is now trained to become a coach and is taking into the coaching with her all of the story that's inside her. So welcome, Jamie. So nice to be here. Thank you for inviting me. It's a pleasure. It's a pleasure.
So the end of the story is that you've become a coach. That's right. So do you want to start with your coaching journey or do you want to start with how you got here? Hmm. No, we can start with my coaching journey. Fantastic. Tell us about your coaching journey. So for me, and this kind of is almost a like a filled wish going back 30 years at this point, that kind of helping healing community role is something I always craved as a career.
And when I was at university, those were kind of the careers I was looking toward. And my parents just said no. And I don't blame them. You know, they came from a different generation and it was very much that success was getting a good job with the company, making money. And they weren't quite sure that me going into a professional like coaching would equate with that. And so literally 20 years later, I left my career and I said, you know what? There is not an expiration date for opportunity.
I'm gonna pursue this now. And I will say in a lot of ways, I'm a better coach for it because for a lot of the people I work with who are in the workplace, I've been there. I walked the halls. I've sat on the floor. I've been in the conference rooms. So I feel like it makes me... more of an impact in a lot of ways in my coaching. Yeah. Yeah. You, you have huge credibility, don't you? And it's just feels so good to finally be doing something aligned with my values.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that's the thing that struck me when I listened to your book. So you and I went on a lot of dog walks that you don't know anything about. With me in your ear. with my raspy New Jersey voice in your ear. Yeah, you have a great company. But I think the thing that struck me most about your book was what you've slightly mentioned about your parents wanting you to go into a different kind of career.
Because the theme for me through the whole book is doing right for the family and living with integrity and how difficult it was to keep them in tension. Yeah. Absolutely. And I think a lot of it is, you know, not having the confidence as a child or as a young adult, I should say, to forage on my own recipe for success. My parents made their very clear recipe for success. You work hard, you make money, you climb the corporate ladder, you elevate the family.
And I couldn't blame my parents because they were immigrants. My mom didn't even have plumbing as a child in New Jersey. I mean, she had an outhouse. So for them, all that they accomplished was through education and hard work. And they really brought the family up a notch. And the mantra was every generation has to do better. And so for me, my loyalty to that trumped my vision of what a fulfilling career could look like.
And I also trusted them, like, you know, you do what your parents say in a lot of ways. They had more knowledge and experience than I did. And so I followed their recipe and it worked for a while until it didn't work at all. So tell us a bit about that part of the journey for listeners who haven't read your book. Although I do absolutely recommend that you do read it. Everybody. So my journey to Goldman Sachs. Yeah. Yeah. So my parents made me the directive best child possible.
highest paid job possible, best industry. And in 1998, that was Wall Street. And you know, you talk to anybody, it's Goldman Sachs. That's the brass ring. And so I made it my mission and I had 40 interviews to get my job four zero. Which often surprises people. But looking back, it was kind of like their first job at gaslighting me. Because where I got other jobs after, eight interviews, nine interviews.
And I got a lot of job offers that year, which is more just about the robust job market that was the spring of 1998. I mean, it was just a great time to graduate college. And I would think like, why am I going on and on with this organization? But it really made sense because they kept saying how special they were. And we want to be so sure we let so few in. that we really need to make sure you're of the caliber.
So instead of looking and saying, what is wrong with these people that they can't decide about me? A bunch of their peers in the industry decided about me with a quarter of the interviews. It started that whole belief that you were lucky to have Goldman. Goldman wasn't lucky to have you. And that really kind of set the tone for the career.
And, you know, with my naivete, not growing up in a world of high finance, with the pressure of providing for my family of origin, I so easily succumbed to what they told me, which, looking back, was just a complete untruth after untruth. Yeah. As you're telling that story, Jamie, I'm wondering what difference... The journey that you've been on makes for you now you're on the outside as a coach. You know, when I left Goldman, which I left on my own, I was depressed.
Like I was so depressed that you would have thought I had been fired. I got really curious about that. And my writing kind of brought it out. And it's something that comes up in coaching a lot is the sense of identity. And, you know, for me, U S East coast, New York metropolitan area. If it's not the first question, it's the second question, what do you do? That's how we define ourselves in this area.
And it made me realize that the reason why I was so depressed is it's like they took away my identity. And I think that happens to so many people. I dare say even more with women, because I think women tend to also be caregivers, whether it be to children or parents. And so, you know, I think a lot of women think of themselves first as a spouse, a mother, a daughter, a sister, an employee, before they think of themselves as just themselves.
And the danger of losing sense of who you are is that you give up control in terms of how you view yourself. So Goldman had led me to believe. that I was nothing without them, nothing without their name, nothing without their opportunity. They made me really believe that if I left all the things that had made me successful would have stayed in my desk in New York City. You know, I think it's really important for employees.
And I do a lot of this mindset work with my clients is get very clear on who you are, what your core values are. So I'll say to my employees, you know what? You might work for JPMorgan Chase. No, you work for yourself and you just happen to contract out to JPMorgan Chase. So you're always kind of solid with who you are.
So if any of those relationships go away, a divorce, your kids go off to college, a parent dies, you know, you lose your job, you still are intact because you know who you are first before you let that blend into all the different relationships we have. I remember years and years ago reading a book, I think it was by William Bridges called Creating You and Co. And that's exactly what he said. You start with, I am me and I subcontract to my employer. Because it happens.
It doesn't even happen with, you know, I have worked with women who, you know, their last kid goes off to college and they're like, who am I? So that's the danger. We need to always know who we are. what we stand for, what our mission is. Make sure that everything we do, whether it be paid or volunteer, relationships are always reflecting that core value and mission. Yeah. Yeah. And reading the book, you can see that underneath, but I'm guessing that that came out in the retelling.
Yeah. I don't think that lifestyle. was so exhausting. I mean, I was getting up every day at 4 a I was getting home, best case, 8 o 'clock p worst case, midnight 1 a I was so exhausted. I didn't even have time to think about what it all meant. But it was after I left that kind of everything settled and I was out of that environment and I was able to not only look at it with a fresh perspective, but then even, I would tell people anecdotes about my experience.
I'll never forget when I left, I was really depressed. And so my kid's preschool teacher said to me, you need to be the head of the parent teacher association. So literally like four months out of Goldman, I had a one year old, I was doing it. I would like to report that I tripled revenue that year. I did very well by then. But I remember volunteering one day and someone said, like, where are you from?
Because in my area, either the parents have not been working for a while or we're still working. It was very odd to have this like 40 year old woman just kind of show up. And I would tell them stories and I'll never forget. I told a woman about when I went to use the lactation rooms to pump for my youngest and my colleagues moot at me like a cow. And don't get me wrong, I knew that was messed up. But when I saw her face, she was just like, what?
And it made me realize, my God, like, I normalized so much of this. So those were the breadcrumbs that made me say, I need to really like write this out and reframe it in my mind. And that's when really through that kind of quiet contemplation, those themes were able to come up. I was too frenzied and harried at the time to even have space to think about those things.
Well, I need to, we need to keep this anonymous, but if you were to coach people like yourself in the role that you were in, what would be your hopes for them? I would hope for them. I would ask that person, what do you want to see? No one ever asked me that. I was always, like I said, following everyone else's recipe. I would want to give me the space to say, what is it you want? And really show them that we live in a world of abundance where what you want is possible.
Goldman Sachs was very good at creating a scarcity mindset. Ironically, they had an abundance mindset over time and a scarcity mindset over money. Meaning they made you feel like you could not make money anywhere else, so you were stuck. And they also made it feel like time was infinite. if you're not happy with your bonus this year or your promotion, give it a couple years. When I left, I realized, my God, they taught me all wrong.
Time. is infinite, excuse me, time is scarce and money is abundant. Like you can make money anywhere, but you only have so much time. So if I were sitting with that, with myself, I would be like, basically, what do you want to see with the time you have? What do you want to create and give them space to really play and think about possibilities? No one, I never even had time. to even give that any space to ponder. And I think that's something that really everyone should be able to do.
Everyone deserves that space to ponder. And if they find that the answer to that question is not aligned with what they're currently doing, well, then it's like, what's a step? What's a step to kind of to change that? So what's your hope for coaching in the world now standing where you are with the story that you've had? I really hope for coaching to really bring agency and autonomy back, especially when it comes to careers.
That's a bit of my passion because of how my career really changed who I was. I really want my clients to live in that world of abundance, live in that world of possibility and realize like, It is their book to write and that that view of stuck is a mindset. So many people are stuck. They're just stuck and really letting people take the wheel of their life instead of sitting in the back seat. Some people aren't even in shotgun. They're like in the back.
I want them in the front and I want them driving and knowing that they have that power. Yeah. How exciting. Yeah. So what are your plans for the future for you in terms of your coaching journey? What are your dreams of sitting in the front of this vehicle of yours? So my passion is really workplace equity. And I kind of think about it from the top down and the bottom up. I don't know if, I always joke, I'm still waiting for David Solomon to invite me for a coffee.
He hasn't, I don't know if he can. I don't know if he will. But for me, it's kind of one person at a time to keep touching people. especially people in college, right when they start to launch, challenge some of their ideas and assumptions. Like I wish someone had challenged mine. I love working in groups, you know, and really working on mindset and positioning when it comes to their careers. But really it goes beyond careers. It just is life.
But I would say like my real passion, is women in the workplace and young women as they launch into the world. Whether it be out of high school going into university or kind of going out of university and beyond, because that is such the sweet spot for opportunity. That's the fertile ground for opportunity. I mean, I did say there is no... exploration date for opportunity night, I wholeheartedly believe that. But being a human is messy and it usually gets messier as you get older.
And so to me, it's like really working with those young people as they launch. And so they can just design what they want on the spot. How exciting. How exciting. So what kind of feedback are you getting about the book, Jamie? I am so lucky. It's kind of a tale of two cities with the feedback. When I first pitched the book to publishers, there were some naysayers saying, me too has happened. That was then, this is now, this is an old story. This is a pertinent or relevant anymore.
And I had had enough friends still in the industry that I knew. It was still very much relevant. I actually think in some ways it's gotten worse since me too. But when the book came out, I have been shocked. I've gotten over a thousand messages and still to this day, every day I get at least one. Someone who tells me they feel seen, they feel understood, they're able to reframe their experiences in a new way. But, but.
I've also been invited to speak at places and then uninvited because so many organizations are afraid of powerful organizations like Goldman Sachs. And that's been kind of shocking for me. Like, don't get me wrong. I knew why I put up and shut up when I was on the payroll. And I understand why current employees and current clients are gonna keep their mouth shut.
But even like women's affinity groups, are afraid to have me because they're afraid maybe if they get funding from Goldman, it'll get pulled or, you know, connections with Goldman will be severed. And so that's been kind of shocking because to me, it's really showed me how these large powerful organizations, their tentacles are far beyond just their one workplace and especially Goldman. I mean, prime minister, is a Goldman guy for you. My governor in the state of New Jersey is a Goldman guy.
So, you know, they usually go on to do pretty powerful things and they're everywhere. So I guess I've been surprised that so many people with a lot more money than I have and a lot more influence than I have are still prostrate to the Goldman gods, whereas I feel completely free. And so my view is, you know, I really feel Claire, people don't like women who speak up. People don't like women who speak up, right?
Like, you know, they just want to continue to shut me up, which is great because it just makes me want to speak even louder. Because I feel like I have the position to do it. A lot of people don't. I don't think my story is that unique. I think it was unique that I was able to tell it. And so I want to continue to advocate in that way. And it was unique that you had the. One of the things I noticed in the book is that because that this isn't me.
It through the book, the This Isn't Me is in every chapter. Yes. And I love the fact that you started your exit fund so early. Yes. So as much as you lost yourself through the lack of sleep and through everything else, you actually were planning your exit. Well, that was my first small step. Yeah. Right. Yeah. It was my first small step. And, you know, In my estimation of my world, you can't just quit Goldman willy -nilly. It's like quitting cigarettes, cold turkey.
But when that career had done enough damage to my personal life, to my marriage, I said, okay, like what's my one small step I need to figure out? Like, do I really need to stay? And this is the kind of thing, you know, I talked to my coaching clients about like, I feel careers are like a pie. There's that, I mean, I'm really making this quite simple, but there's a like economic piece, like what you get paid. There's a flexibility piece. Do you have a life outside?
And there's like the passion piece. Do I like what I do? And my pie was really skewed. It was all money, no passion, no flexibility. And so, and so when I finally decided, okay, what's one step? I said, you know what? Goldman has so convinced me. that I can never leave, that I will never be successful anywhere else. And not only do they tell you this, Claire, literally, you can only leave Goldman once.
When people would leave, you know, I always joke that a Goldman Sachs divorce is never amicable. It's always messy. So say someone left to do something else, you'll never be successful there. You're going to regret the day you left us. So this was like, something that was modeled for me over 18 years. And so one of my first steps was, is this really true?
And that little spreadsheet of, you know, what my professional goals, my economic goals were, that was my first step in autonomy, because numbers don't lie. There's, you can't, you can't be dramatic over numbers. It's, it's what it is. And that was my first autonomy, like, you know what? I can leave. And, The sad part is clear. I could have left years before. I could have. That was the sad, twisted irony of Goldman was I felt like a prisoner, but the door was unlocked.
You know, I felt stuck, but the door wasn't locked. I wasn't being held there as a hostage, but in my mind I was. And that's kind of going back to the coach really working on your mindset around it and those feelings of identity. and claiming that autonomy and agency back. And as a coach, what I'm noticing as you're talking is you're such a great role model to say, I've done it. Yeah. Yeah. I've been sucked up the corporate.
And that's, I think, the blessing of me postponing this career because I get it, you know? And to me, it's always one small step. My favorite quote by Mark Twain is like, the secret to getting ahead is getting started. The secret to getting started is breaking your overwhelming tasks into smaller ones and doing the first one. You know, and then that just builds momentum. And I've seen it with my clients, you know, and I think part of the magic is just holding space. for that creativity to shine.
Because everyone knows what they want. Everyone knows what they really desire. How many times are you able to sit with someone to witness what that is when you're even asked? That rarely happens that people have that opportunity. That's why I think coaching is so powerful. And your presence has a confidence, not an arrogance, but your presence has a confidence to say that says all the way through this, this podcast, you've said it is possible.
It is possible with a deeply held confidence that comes from your story. Yeah. That's right. Because when I tell you where I was at right before I left till now, It's like, I'm kicking myself that I was so frivolous with my time. You know, I'm kicking myself. And I mean, I just want to look forward, but thank goodness I didn't drop dead the next day after I left Goldman. And so, you know, that's why even talking about advocating, I want to make the most of the time I have left.
Like I will not be frivolous with my time anymore. I will make sure. that what I do has meaning and aligns with my values and my identity. And now you can. Yeah. Because you're in control of your own career. That's right. I'm driving my own. I'm driving my own car. And what a difference on a life it makes. Like my husband will joke, something will happen around the house. You know, something got botched or messed up. And my reaction will be like, okay, you know, no problem.
And he would say, my gosh, Jamie, if Goldman Jamie had heard that she would have been screaming her head off. Goldman Jamie, you know, Goldman Jamie was a terror. And it's just amazing to me how different I was. I mean, I really was a 180. And you know what, Claire, if it can happen to me, this 22 year old who wanted to help and support others. can go from those wishes to this kind of cutthroat, ambitious stab someone in the back to get ahead. That could happen to me. It could happen to anyone.
It could happen to anyone. And it's possible to go back, which is the most important part. Redemption. Yeah. This is the word that comes to mind. Yes. And it's lovely to meet you, Jamie, 2023 version. yeah. You would not have liked me. 2016 or earlier, bug. So if people want to talk to you about having coaching and they're working in that kind of a world, how do they get in contact with you? On my website, which is jamiefiorehiggins .com and there's a contact me button. Yeah. Fantastic.
And you won an award, I notice, in the UK. the FT. Yeah. Tell us about that. Sweet finish. Yeah. The FT named me one of the 25 most influential women of 2022. And it was quite an honor. I was joking. There's a there's a children's program in the US called Sesame Street. I'm sure you heard of it. Yeah. And one of the things is one of these things is not like the other one of these things doesn't belong.
And I'm looking through these other women and it's like one of the Williams tennis players, a prime minister of a European country. And then there's me. No, I mean, you know, and to me, I loved it because. How I differentiated myself according to them was a truth teller.
And I feel like in 2023, in this world of social media filters, both literal filters on photos and figurative filters on our content, I feel like people crave authentic real people who are gonna really tell it like it is and tell the truth. And so I was very grateful for them to recognize it because it was a risk putting myself out there. So it was a really nice honor that they kind of saw that. So, yeah.
And I love that when we first met, that was so not visible because what came across was your humanity and your loveliness. And it's beautiful to know that that was inside and that it's come out. Yeah. Yeah, the book really. The book really helped it not, not the writing of the book, but once it was published, it was like, it almost felt like when you saw the astronauts stake the flag in the moon, right? It was like, I claimed it.
I finally claimed it and I just laid it, you know, laid it out there. So that was a very transformative moment for me. And I feel like it really changed me as a person, as a mother, daughter. wife, sister, coach, everything. Because, you know, as writers, we always talk about show, not tell. And I feel like before the book was published, it was more tell. And that book was like, I'm showing you now, like this is how to do it.
Brilliant. Well, Jamie, thank you so much for coming to The Coaching In. Thank you for having me. It's an absolute pleasure to have a conversation with you today. So JamieFioriHiggins .com and collect. Click on contact me if you want to get in touch with Jamie and I'll put the information about Bully Market, the book in the show notes. Thank you, Jamie. Thank you. Thank you, everyone, for listening. Bye bye.
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