Why Do We Shrink When We Talk About Money? 💰

Why is it that so many capable, ambitious women can negotiate million-pound budgets, lead teams and deliver incredible results… but the moment someone asks, 'What do you want to earn?"' everything changes?

In this episode, I'm diving into one of my favourite subjects: money.

After more than 20 years in recruitment, salary negotiations and career coaching, I've seen the same pattern play out time and time again. Women who know their value suddenly begin negotiating against themselves before anyone else has even had the chance.

They tell themselves they should be realistic.

That they don't need what they used to earn.

That changing career means accepting less.

That money isn't important.

But what if the biggest barrier to earning more isn't the market?

What if it's the story we've been telling ourselves?

In this episode I share personal stories from my own career, including negotiating promotions, challenging unfair pay decisions and why I believe the ability to talk confidently about money is one of the most valuable career skills you can develop.

This isn't really an episode about money.

It's about self-worth.

It's about permission.

And it's about having the courage to ask for what you're worth.

In this episode we explore:

• Why so many women feel uncomfortable talking about money
• The hidden ways we negotiate against ourselves
• How conditioning shapes our earning potential
• Why possibility and permission matter more than confidence
• Questions to ask before accepting a salary or pay rise
• How to prepare for salary negotiations
• Why knowing your value changes everything
• The mindset shift that can transform your earning potential

If you've ever talked yourself out of asking for more, convinced yourself to settle for less or felt uncomfortable putting a number on your own value, this episode is for you.

Ready to stop settling?

If you're ready to stop second-guessing yourself, build confidence in your value and create a career that feels as good as it looks on paper, take a look at Reset & Rise.

It's my signature coaching programme for ambitious women who know they're capable of more but need the clarity, confidence and strategy to make it happen.

If you enjoyed this episode...

Please follow the podcast, leave a review and share it with another woman who needs to hear this conversation.

Because the more we normalise talking about money, the easier it becomes for all of us to earn what we're truly worth.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 1:12

I can't believe I have not done an episode on money yet. It is one of my favourite subjects. And it was one of the best bits of my recruitment job, right? I would, without hesitation, go back and ask for more for my candidates, even if they didn't want me to, right? I would boldly refuse to present candidates with an offer if the company was trying to label them. And trust me, this happens all the time. Sometimes they said no, right? Most of the time they came back with a little bit more. And maybe because, you know, I've been reflecting on this. Maybe because I spent 20 odd years talking about money every single day, would that be kind of salary and package? You know, I am completely desensitized from it. But I believe, especially as women, right? The more we talk about money and more specifically, the more comfortable we become at talking about money, the more fundamentally we're going to earn, right? And we all want that. So it's obvious, really. So I something that I have observed and alarmingly continue to observe is how women do not want to talk about how much they want to earn, right? They often don't have a problem telling me what they do earn or what they have earned in the past. But when I ask this kind of million-dollar excuse the pun question, um, okay, what do you what do you want to earn? The energy completely shifts. They clam up, I hear trepidation in their voice. Some become quite childlike, they shrink, they lower their voice. And then what usually comes is one of the following phrases, right? Oh well, you know, I don't need, you know, don't need to earn what I did before, or it's not all about money, and that's not my key driver, or you know, I don't think I'll get what I was on before. I know the market isn't great at the moment, I need to be realistic. Um, I know changing role and sector or company means I'll have to take a pay cut. I mean, you can fill in your own blank here, right? And literally the list could go on and on and on. And actually, I've actually got so much to unpack on this. There's a whole entire module dedicated to this inside Reset and Rise. But back to the point. So, what continues to fascinate me is how quickly women move from what they want to what they will settle for. Like it's completely unheard of to get paid what they currently do in a new role or get paid for actually doing something that they want to do, right? You ask someone what they'd love to earn, right? And within seconds, they're telling you why it probably isn't possible, why they don't need it, why they wouldn't expect it, why they should be grateful for less, etc. etc. And before the conversation's kind of even started, they've already started negotiating with themselves, right? I don't know if this sounds familiar. So I wanted to share a few stories of money stuff that's shown up in my career, right? Um, in the hope that it helps, and also kind of we're going to work through how we can get through some of these kind of money challenges. So there's this one time um I've been acting up in the role and I had gone for promotion, right? Guess he got it, a man. I mean, now granted, I was really, really pissed off. Not only had I not got the job, but the guy who got it, in my humble opinion, was completely unworthy. But the timing of this also tied into our end-of-year reviews. So there I am, like really pissed off, really frustrated, and then they present me with my annual uplift, right, which was a measly 5%. And I was up in arms, right? So I went for it. I thought, God, you know, I've got nothing to probably lose. I asked them for clarity as to why, right? So, what is the clarification as to why? Despite me and my team hitting over 125% of target the year before, why my uplift was so small. And at the same time, they also tried to change my commission structure. So ironically, because I, you know, I'd received this huge bonus for achieving 100%, 125% of the target, right? That element the following year was going to be removed, right? It's typical of this company, right? They wanted to incentivize you to do well, so you do well, and then they take it away the next year. Anyway, that's a completely different story. But seriously, I was expected to do the same job. My targets had increased because my team had done so well. My uplift on my base salary was so tiny, nowhere near reflective of my performance, that they had and they'd actively encouraged me to go for this promotion. So they must have thought I was good enough for something. And then they took a huge part, right, of my commission away. So I fought for it. I thought, you know what? Sub this, I worked my absolute ass off of this company. So what did I do, right? I asked for a comparison. I asked for a comparison of my pay against my peers who were guessed it, get you can guess it, right? They're all men, right? I put together a case for my growth target being reinstated because whatever target they set me, I would hit, right? And they knew that because I'd hit every single target for the years gone up to, you know, leading up to that point. I dug my heels in. And now this bit is really important because I wasn't doing it because I thought I was entitled, right? I was doing it because I needed them to explain the logic. I needed them to, I wanted them to justify the decision, right? And I think that's what so many of us don't do. We accept this kind of first version of the story that we're given. We accept the salary, we accept the measly pay rise, we accept the package, you know, we accept what we think the market will play. And we rarely, I think, stop to ask, is that actually true? Because the interesting thing is, I don't think a lot of this comes from it being a money problem. I think it's a combination of possibility and permission, right? Because when I ask women what they want to earn, they know they know they know the figure, right? The challenge, I don't think, is identifying the number, the challenge is saying it out loud without then immediately kind of talking yourself out of it. The challenge is believing it's possible, and somewhere along the line, I think we've learned that wanting more is uncomfortable. So instead of asking what we want, we learn to justify what we'd accept less, right? And there's this other point in my career, same company, probably about six years later, and this time I was moving from a sales role into a group support role, right? And the role, by all intents and purposes, has been created for me. So we got to the package discussion, and what happened next will make me laugh, right? It makes me laugh when I think about it. So the chief people officer at the time was a guy, he was an interim, and he started acting really weird. This is a guy who's like sat on his exec, right? He started acting really, really weird. His voice dropped, right? And he started whispering the salary figure, right? Almost like we were discussing something terribly inappropriate. I remember him saying to him, like, Dave, I haven't got an issue talking about money, right? We should know I'm a recruiter. I negotiate, you know, packages for a living. Wake up, I thought. Come on, like I was embarrassed for him. Like, let's talk about this like adults. But what struck me in that moment, right, wasn't the number, it was the discomfort, it was like the awkwardness, the fact that someone so ridiculously senior was uncomfortable having a direct conversation about money, right? And now here's what you know, I know because I then was objective. I put my business head back on, right? The role that had been created, right, that they wanted me to step into. I know the value that role had had, right? I know the role was existing to mitigate risk. I know the role existed to raise brand value. I know the role existed to create better working environments for our colleagues. It was to build this strategy from you know from scratch. And to use my knowledge of the business, the industry, and the subject matter expertise in this field, right? That doesn't come cheap, right? I know my worth, right? I knew the impact the role was going to have. So I pushed back. And I think it's because if you're not advocating for yourself, who the hell is, right? What could have easily followed, right, was me just going, yeah, thank you, you know, become really meek and like mirrored his weird like way he started communicating with me and like been really submissive and played this corporate game, you know, nodded politely and accepted whatever was put in front of me. But like my financial security depended on it. Of course I wanted the job, right? I really wanted the job, but not at the cost of my values, and I also didn't want to accept a lower salary because I knew I would feel resentful. I knew I was going to give this 110%, right? And also, if I'm being really honest, I knew what everyone else was earning. So I think the suppose the message I want to get across today, right, is don't just throw reasoning out the window just because you're talking about money. Like make it make sense. And if it doesn't make sense, ask the right questions, right? We know the reality, we know that the gender pay gap exists for a reason, right? There is a gap. We know that women are statistically likely to ask, you know, to accept less, right? And be paid less than than their counterparts. And we all know that we've all been conditioned to be grateful and not difficult and demanding. But I think knowing your worth and holding your nerve and sticking to your guns will pay dividends in the long term. So, genuinely, before you go into any negotiations in the future, put your business head on, right? Ignore the voice that tries to talk you out of it. Get really, really crystal clear on your value, get really crystal clear on your proposition, and get really crystal clear on what it is that you won't want to earn and go for it. Because the worst thing that someone's gonna happen, right, is someone's gonna say no, right? That's the worst thing. You know, you know better off. But what if they don't, right? And if the thing standing between you now and you earning more money was simply you having the courage to ask for it, I genuinely think your future self is gonna thank you for it. So, and I'll be over here as well, like celebrating you for it from afar, right? So that's it. Ask kicking coaching session over for today. Talk about money, talk about it to anyone who will listen because the more we normalize it and the less weird and awkward it becomes, the more, ladies, we are going to earn.