Latest / The Curve / RTC94: The very best bits of 2023, part one.

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RTC94: The very best bits of 2023, part one. · The Curve

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This podcast is made possible by the wonderful team at HelloFresh.
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HelloFresh is all about removing the hassle of meal planning and grocery shopping,
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which let's be honest, can be an absolute drag.
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So you can focus on cooking yummy meals at home.
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Plus, they're freezing their prices on meal kits until March 2024.
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So it is the perfect time to make the most of using HelloFresh.
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Welcome to Raising the Curve.
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A podcast designed to teach you everything you need to know
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to be better with your money.
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And the wise words of Amy Schumer
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were slipping carrots into the brownie recipe.
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I don't really get the saying.
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It's kind of like eating vegetables that actually taste good.
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You know, I'm like, still not with you.
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Are you on the script?
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It's basically like saying, investing in finance can be boring as
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but it totally doesn't need to be.
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Okay, okay.
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So we're making it fun by putting the carrot.
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Okay, the vegetables are good for you.
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It's the brownie recipe.
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Okay, we got there.
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We got there.
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Okay, okay.
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Well, you've really got a finance way.
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Yeah, one of us has to.
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This is true.
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Okay, come and learn alongside me
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from Vick Harris, ex-fun manager.
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Well, I'm going to ask all the questions that you wish you could.
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And I'm going to be eating all the brownie you wish you could.
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Oh, that's so not the joke, Vick.
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Okay, just come and talk and learn and laugh with us
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because together we really can raise the curve.
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So we're technically on holiday.
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I mean, look, we're probably on a beach somewhere
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with our feed up, you know, enjoying summer.
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But we thought we can't leave you with no podcasts.
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So for the next two weeks, we are going to be doing a best of
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which is inspired by my early producing days
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when I used to JoJo Mac and Don.
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They would do this in the weekend, Vick.
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They have like, they choose the best bits from that week
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and then they'd have a Saturday morning show.
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And I thought, oh my god, let's do a best bits.
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So we have basically gone through the whole year
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and pulled out some of our favorite bits
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that we thought were worth either replaying
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but also if you haven't heard the full episode,
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maybe you'll want to go and listen to those in the meantime.
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It's also a combination of us just wanting a bit of a break
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and being a bit lazy and being like, you know what?
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My god, there was just like so many good bits.
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We've got to repeat them.
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But there actually was.
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Yeah, like us.
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We definitely was.
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We went through some of the year
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and remembering everything that we did this year.
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I was like, wow, I can't believe that that was even this year.
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I know that sounds stupid.
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But I was like, wow, our mindful mini series
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that we did with Braveface was in February.
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And it feels like so much longer ago
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but that technically counts as 2023.
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That's crazy.
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I loved this.
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This was an awesome, so sounds so rare again, doesn't it?
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This was awesome, but I actually did really love it.
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We interviewed four different women
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all about their experiences
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with mutual health and finances.
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I didn't realize until we started the curve
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yet how intertwined mutual health
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and financial stresses.
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It's crazy.
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And so yeah, talking to these women
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and their different perspectives
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and ways of dealing with it
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was just super, super helpful.
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It was also the first time that I had
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reflected personally on my own money stories,
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how much I am affected personally
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by stress about money.
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And actually, it just becomes such a constant in my life
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that it was just almost normal
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for me to be stressed about money,
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which is so sad, but it kind of was the truth.
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I don't think until I picked apart
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my own mental health
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and then my own relationship with money
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that I realized how much of us connected.
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And I know you kind of felt the same.
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And probably more so now being full time in the curve
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and money not being as readily available
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as that probably has been for a big part of your life
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and your working career,
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you start to feel that stress
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around can I afford things?
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Can I not?
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And then trying to figure out ways
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of living in the world where you're not so bound by
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this constant underlying feeling of worry
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around money and finances.
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And it is the longest relationships
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we'll ever have is with money.
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So it's getting it right,
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dealing with it, making it work for you,
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making sure it doesn't stress you out
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and really get you down
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and putting things in place,
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whether it be an emergency fund, for example,
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or steps to get out of debt.
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All those little things can have such an impact
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on your positive impact on your mental health
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in terms of if you're getting through that,
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paying off that debt,
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having that safety net.
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So I think coming out of this
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wasn't just like everyone should do better
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to actually having those practical tips as well.
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I know people found super, super helpful.
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And also talking to a woman that had been
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in the situation and it's normalized,
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you know, so many people go through life
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not wanting to talk about money
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or being scared to talk about how much debt they're in
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or the fact that they are living paycheck to paycheck
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and it stresses them out.
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But I don't know when you open up the conversation,
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you realize, oh my god, thank goodness I'm not alone.
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There's so many other people feeling the same.
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And I think that's that can be quite a relief
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for a lot of people and help with the stress levels as well.
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I totally agree.
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And I think what you said before about the practical tips
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and things that really helped,
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we'll link this in our show notes for the podcast.
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If you go into the description, we'll link it in there.
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But we created with Brayface,
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a kind of downloadable resource kind of an ebook, I guess.
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And it does have practical tips and tricks
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on how to get through your mental health
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and your finances.
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Because I think it's what you said
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about putting steps in places such an important piece to it.
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Because even if you haven't got everything sorted,
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if you know that you've done the work
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to at least have a plan and be implementing the plan,
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you know you're on your way to being in a better situation.
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Then you are.
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And even that, the amount that that lightens the load
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on your mental health is huge.
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So for me, when I was starting to build my emergency fund back up,
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I wasn't there.
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And yes, there's a bit of anxiety around,
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oh, I'm a shit.
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Like, I still, my emergency fund is like looking a little bit dire.
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But knowing that I was contributing money each month
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and the same with my Kiwi saver, my pension,
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like retirement, sorry, 20-year holiday fund.
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The fact that I know I have an automatic payment set up,
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yes, I'm still quite stressed about the future of my finances.
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But I also know I've put some barriers and nets in place
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that like, if I fall, I'm not going to fall on the ground.
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It's not necessarily about having it all sorted,
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but it's about having the tools to get it sorted.
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Totally, yeah.
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And so this first episode that we wanted to introduce you to,
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one of our best bits was Raising the Curve Episode 15.
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It was worth Dr Victoria Thompson.
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And she is the resident psychologist who works with Brawface.
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And she essentially just talks about how your mental health
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and your finances are so massively intertwined.
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And it was just a chance to understand your own psychology
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and your own spending and your own ways of being
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when it comes to like your metro after your money.
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And if you haven't listened to the full episode,
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definitely do so.
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It was Raising the Curve 15.
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What you might be saying as well is how do I differentiate
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anxiety that I have about a bill that's coming up
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versus whether I have some underlying anxiety difficulty.
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And I suppose that one can be hard to tell.
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But what you would try and look for is
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does your anxiety resolve with the resolving of the financial issue,
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like when you pay the bill, does it go away?
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Or do you notice that it moves then onto something else
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and the anxiety doesn't go away?
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And always looking for the impact that it has
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on your overall functioning.
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So how much is this affecting my ability
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to engage meaningfully in my life?
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Symptoms of depression include things like like no
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lack of concentration, low motivation, that sort of thing.
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So if you have those difficulties,
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then being proactive with your finances,
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managing money is going to be a lot harder.
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Of course, mental health conditions can also impact
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people's ability to work and earn money.
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So what happens then is your finances start to take a hit.
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You might end up overspending or not budgeting.
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And then of course that has long to impacts on your self-esteem.
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I suppose as well, it's useful to think about your warning signs
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for when you might be starting to get into a bit of
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avoidance around your finances.
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So that might be things like an I am guilty of this,
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not looking at your on my banking, ignoring your credit card statement,
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putting stuff on the credit card that you're like,
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ah, I'll pay it off.
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Whatever, like those are all some warning signs
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that maybe you're starting to slip into a bit of an avoidance pattern.
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Our next guest, the lovely Kayla Gordon,
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she was the second guest as part of our
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break-face mini-series on mental health and financial health.
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This is raising the curve episode 51.
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And she was both of us speaking of the room.
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Welcome to the room and you could just feel this sunshine.
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Positive energy sunshine.
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I want to be your friend kind of energy.
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It was, it was really, really great.
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And for such a young person,
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she seemed very put together, switched on,
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knew what she wanted out of life.
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I don't know, it felt like I was talking to a very wise soul.
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But yeah, it was a great conversation
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all about not comparing yourself to others
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and how everyone's on their own journey,
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got their own experiences, difficulties,
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shit they have to deal with,
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and just being a bit compassionate as well,
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which I thought was so, so true.
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And what I loved about this conversation
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was she grew up in a pretty poor community
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and didn't have a whole lot,
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but comparatively to other people she did.
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And one of the things she spoke about
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was the idea of playing it small
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and how she's really changed her own mindset
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around money and creating wealth for herself.
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And I think it's a really nice follow on
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from Dr. Victoria Thompson
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and the idea of understanding your own relationship
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with money and your mental health.
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So yeah, I think you'll really like the little snippets
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that we've picked out from this episode.
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And if you would like to go back and listen to the full thing,
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it's raised in the curve, episode 51.
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But yeah, let's get to Kayla.
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That's all I knew.
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So, and honestly, like I felt like I was privileged
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and I definitely was because I had shoes on my feet
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and I had clothes on my back, like people at school
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and children at school, some of them didn't have that.
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So I thought I was very lucky.
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And yeah, the view on like people with money
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was kind of like, oh, there was almost like a,
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there was an energy behind that to be like,
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oh, you know, they're not like us or.
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And so there was a fear around even wanting to show
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that I had anything better than anyone else.
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So I kept myself quite small.
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But I also learned fast to want to,
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I wanted to make money.
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So I started taking on doing like paper runs and stuff
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at like a 11 years old.
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And if I wanted to play any sport,
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I had to pay for that myself.
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So I learned quickly to save and to,
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yeah, to work for what I wanted to do, basically.
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I think it's okay because I've needed to learn the lessons,
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personally.
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Like if I had everything set up even like a year ago,
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I would not have experienced what I had in the last year.
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And holy shit, I've learned so much in every aspect from,
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from the struggle, from the challenges.
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And from, we, I feel like, and fully believe we need to hit
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these places in our lives and the rock bottoms to,
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to make the changes that we need.
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And it's trusting that.
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So all of our social media girls have said to us,
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well, they've said to me, you've got to stop calling
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these episodes your favourite because every single one
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is sounding like your favourite at this point.
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It's true.
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I love so many of them.
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Yeah.
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So having, picking a favourite child, you just can't,
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but you love them all.
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And at times, you're going to be like, you're my favourite,
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you're my favourite because they are.
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Yeah.
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So JJ Feney, scandal queenie.
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Do you remember that when that was her name?
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Yes.
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Oh my god.
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She would do all the scandal for like the morning breakfast show.
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JJ Feney, scandal queenie, anyway,
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we used to, I used to work on a show.
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The breakfast show, we used to produce it.
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So we worked here there for about just under three years,
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loved her, obsessed with her, the most generous kind,
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beautiful human ever, and also just absolutely hilarious.
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And do you know why?
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I think she's probably one of the reasons why I am really open
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about my life and things that have happened
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and how I feel on this podcast because working with her
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for such a long time, she was the most authentic person.
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I'd be the man and so comfortable sharing about her life
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and her struggles and the things that she loves
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and then she's good at and the things she finds hard.
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And when she catwood said she'd come on our podcast,
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I kind of didn't know what that would be like
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or what she would share because money
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isn't really something she talks about.
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Yeah, no, she was one of our most open guests.
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Would you say that in terms of just the comfortableness
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that she felt in terms of talking to us?
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And it's probably a fact that you knew her,
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but yeah, the way that she was talking
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so openly about money in her situation was for me,
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was quite a breath of fresh air, I think.
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And I think for a lot of people, she wasn't trying to conform
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to any way of managing her money,
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you're having her money sorted or anything like that.
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And I think the fact she's got a really cool dynamic
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with her ex partner and her current partner
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and that whole financial situation is super cool
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because it's like everyone's different.
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You don't have to be the same as everyone else.
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With all different ages, stages, experiences, amounts.
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You know, it's like whatever works for you, works for you
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and that's great, don't care about being judged by other people.
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And I think that was just really cool to hear from her.
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So if anyone who hasn't listened to that episode
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and has no idea what we're talking about,
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she basically splits her finances
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with her ex-husband of five years.
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So, you know, most people would hear that
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and be like, what is going on?
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But actually, I really rate it.
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I think it's, yeah, it's very selfless, isn't it?
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Because she's like, well, he would do that for me.
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He's very selfless.
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And it's so funny because I think if we'd had this conversation
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with a male and they were like,
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I split my finances with my ex-wife's stall,
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there wouldn't have been as much of a reaction.
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Whereas the fact that it's a female doing it for a male ex-partner,
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there's all of a sudden it's like, what?
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And it's like, you know what?
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It works for them, let them do it.
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No, no, I think that's been a learning for the whole year, honestly,
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has been, don't judge other people's situations
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because they're different to yours,
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learn from everyone, totally understand why they do it differently.
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Yeah, and not just with money, with everything in life,
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just because they don't act like you look like you do what you do,
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doesn't mean it's right or wrong.
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Yeah, she's amazing.
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In this podcast, she talked about what she earns,
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she talked about negotiating pay risers,
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she talks about her situation growing up and not having a lot,
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and how she now supports her mom.
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There's so many amazing parts of this interview,
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and I think if you haven't listened to it,
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honestly, I would say it would be up there
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with one of the must-lossums fit anyone.
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It's just such a good interview.
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Yeah, she is, I was just sitting there laughing,
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and I kept thinking I was on the radio.
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Love?
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Yeah, she's awesome.
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But that's raising the current episode 53
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for anyone that wants to go listen,
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and it's just on J.J.
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for any on money and mental health.
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But we're going to play a few snippets for you now.
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So enjoy.
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Okay, I think this is going to be a bit of you.
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You're going to love this one.
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Ooh, what is it? What is it?
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So basically, it's a price lock.
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It's really exciting.
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Basically, HelloFresh are locking their prices
16:21
until March, end of March, 2024.
16:24
So what it basically means is that you can take advantage
16:27
of cooking at home in a convenient way,
16:30
at an affordable price,
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knowing that they're not going to be changing their prices,
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because I think there's so much stress around
16:37
the cost of living right now.
16:38
There's so many unknown costs you go to the supermarket,
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and you've just been so much money.
16:43
I thought you'd be quite excited about this.
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Yes, I am.
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Obviously, I'm such a planner,
16:49
and I love processes and structures.
16:51
So knowing that the prices are going to be fixed
16:54
until the end of March, 2024 is awesome.
16:58
Match the visibility that you can have
17:00
on what you're spending, because honestly,
17:02
every time we go to the grocery store,
17:03
I have no idea how much it's going to cost me,
17:07
because it always goes up and up and up,
17:09
and every time it's like a stab to the heart, I'm like,
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Oh, you know, and also I walk in there,
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and I don't think I spend less than $16 New Zealanders
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ever in a New Zealand supermarket.
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Even if I've bought like a salary,
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somehow it's $60, I'm like, what is happening?
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And then you're like, oh, actually, do I need this?
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No, I don't need this, I don't need this,
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and then you end up going home and just having a bowl
17:29
of broccoli for dinner.
17:30
And do you know what I thought was kind of interesting,
17:32
a national survey from HelloFresh revealed that Kiwis
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estimate their grocery spending has increased by 33%
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compared to six months ago.
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Wow.
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And that's only six months.
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Like imagine if they'd looked at it from two years ago,
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I feel like it's almost a hundred percent.
17:47
That's a big increase in market that you have to find from elsewhere,
17:50
because you have to keep eating.
17:52
So I think being able to have visibility
17:56
on your weekly budget and know, okay,
17:57
this is how much money I'm spending on my meals for the week.
18:02
It's going to be so, so, so helpful for Kiwis, definitely.
18:11
JJ would come in on, on Radio Day, on Results Day
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with an envelope of money.
18:17
And it would have been like two and a half thousand dollars
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in cash and he would give it to me.
18:20
And then he'd give it to our audio producer and just say,
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we know you paid like shit, we really appreciate you.
18:24
Like his, his like a top up.
18:27
It actually kind of makes you feel emotional to think about it,
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because those were, that was the reason I knew I was valued.
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Every day we sort of like bossing you around and, you know,
18:35
telling you what to do, we get mad sometimes.
18:37
And you might think, oh, this job sucks, it's hopeless.
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But we just want, that was our way of showing you
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that we actually bloody appreciate everything you do.
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We couldn't do it without you.
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So there's, if the company can't do it, we were going to do it.
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The only other reasons when money makes me to precess
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because of other people when like when my sister decided
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not to talk to me anymore and it's over money or, you know,
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I've had a few problems with when I have a nephew
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standing money and things like that.
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It's mainly about the way other people behave
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around the money that has caused me stress.
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There's three things in your life.
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There's work, family and love, right?
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And if one of those things isn't going well,
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then okay, it's a bit shit.
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But if two of them aren't, then that's the reason
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when you're going to start breaking down.
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So you need, you need to be happy in love,
19:27
happy at work, happy with your family.
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And you're happy person, what more could go wrong, you know?
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But when one of those breaks down, you start thinking,
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oh, my relationship's breaking up, I'm a bit sad,
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I'm a bit sad, but then you lose your job, I'm fucked.
19:43
And so this was the last guest as part of our
19:47
Mindful Many Series with Braveface
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and got rid of the bang with the last guest, didn't we?
19:53
I love Tika Hukura.
19:55
She is such a queen.
19:58
She's got so much kindness and like fun, playful, youthful energy in her heart,
20:06
but she is so knowledgeable and so just inspiring in all of the ways.
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And I think for both of us, this conversation,
20:16
it was all about colonization and how there's so much racism still in New Zealand
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and all over the world, but particularly how moldy
20:23
have suffered financially from colonization.
20:26
And it was one of those conversations where
20:29
Vic and I often, and this doesn't happen very often,
20:32
we just sat there and kind of stopped talking, didn't we?
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We were like, we've got nothing important to add here,
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you just take the floor and she was just so eloquent and funny and tortoise
20:44
to look at New Zealand and its people in such a way.
20:48
It's not just what you see in front of your eyes.
20:51
The reason that there is so much inequality financially
20:56
and a lack of education, the way that it's disadvantaged moldy people
21:02
is enormous and I think that if you're from New Zealand,
21:06
this is a must listen.
21:08
She is just brilliant.
21:10
And I think this really hit home for me was in terms of
21:13
how much money stems into so many other aspects of your life
21:19
in terms of, like you said, education, a lack of education,
21:23
which can have impacts for generations, generations,
21:26
a lack of adequate health care, which can impact how much you can earn
21:31
and how much you can work and just suffering.
21:35
And I was just like, wow, if you have money and privilege,
21:41
the differences in your life are just so massive in terms of that scale.
21:47
I don't know, it was just quite a realization of, wow, okay,
21:51
money stems back to absolutely everything
21:54
and how colonisation even though it was generations ago
22:00
can still have so many effects generations later.
22:05
Yeah, I think just like understanding the concept of colonising
22:09
is taking land from people who had it before,
22:13
you're taking an incredibly valuable asset away from somebody
22:18
which is going to revert break for generations.
22:20
Yes.
22:20
And, you know, being in our white privilege bubble,
22:24
we just didn't, I don't know, I learned about colonisation at school.
22:28
I learned about moldy culture but was there much of a financial lens
22:33
to that, not really?
22:34
And so, yeah, I mean, for what is such a prevalent and important
22:38
and also super debilitating position to be in society
22:42
from a financial perspective, how this is all impacted them?
22:46
For them is at the forefront, but for us, it's so easy to forget
22:50
the impacts that that would have had.
22:52
So, this is an incredibly important episode.
22:55
We're going to play a few snippets for you now,
22:56
which I think you'll be like, oh, I cannot wait to listen to the full ep.
23:00
But also, if you would like to follow Takahu Kura on Instagram,
23:04
she is the moldy millionaire at the moldy millionaire
23:07
and she's hilarious.
23:08
So, this is raising the care of episode 55.
23:12
Moldy suffer every bad statistic
23:14
at where it's far worse than any other race in Ottawa.
23:17
And so, I think that that also has really strong ties with money
23:22
because when you don't have money, you can't go to the doctors.
23:24
When you don't have money, you can't focus at school,
23:28
you know, all these things.
23:28
And so, I think, you know, due to colonisation,
23:32
we are still suffering impacts today.
23:35
And I think that money has a really strong tie to that.
23:38
And if we're able to bolster our moldy economy
23:41
and, you know, our wealth and things like that,
23:43
then we will be able to transform these other statistics
23:46
in our lives, whether it's healthcare, justice, whatever it may be.
23:51
You know, the impacts of colonisation and racism are so crazy in my life.
23:56
And like, even, you know, people in my own family,
23:59
they say things like, oh, Moldy, don't get treated differently.
24:02
But, you know, it happens so often that it's just accepted
24:05
and that, you know, people don't even notice things.
24:08
But have you had any examples lately that have happened?
24:10
Or were you like, wow, I can't believe this is happening still?
24:13
Yeah, well, I was at the bank, probably, I don't even know, a year ago or something.
24:17
And I have, you know, all my different, like, sinking funders,
24:20
like, my nails account, my travel account, all this stuff,
24:23
you love this game.
24:24
So organised.
24:25
And the bank tellers like, oh, I've never seen someone like you
24:29
have been so organised with your money.
24:31
And I was like, no, huh?
24:35
The old gender pay gap.
24:37
I am so sick of talking about this.
24:39
My mother.
24:40
But it's so important.
24:41
And it's such a fundamental part of why women end up in financial hardship.
24:46
But I am so sick.
24:48
I can't wait for the day to wake up.
24:50
And we're like, you know what?
24:50
There is no gender pay gap.
24:52
We're who.
24:53
I don't think we've been making up this.
24:55
I think it's past our time.
24:56
Yeah, I think our children's children's children
24:58
might be waking up to that, unfortunately, not us.
25:02
No, but we can do the hard yards and we can do the hard yards
25:05
by putting the message out there and telling everyone how important it is.
25:08
And one lady that definitely is doing the hard yards
25:12
and trying to close the gender pay gap and open the conversation
25:16
was the wonderful Jolie Hodson from Sparks.
25:21
She's the Spark CEO.
25:23
And for those of you who aren't in New Zealand,
25:26
Sparks is the largest telecommunications company here in New Zealand.
25:30
And the fact that Sparks is the only female lead company
25:34
in terms of a CEO and a chairwoman on the New Zealand Stock Exchange
25:38
is, was quite amazing.
25:39
So we feel very honored to have been able to have the conversation
25:42
with Jolie around the gender pay gap
25:45
and what she's doing at Sparks to improve that.
25:48
And yeah, it was just great to see a woman in such a powerful position
25:53
actually trying to bring about change,
25:55
not just getting to the top of her career
25:57
or a senior leadership position.
25:59
And being like that, that's it.
26:02
I've got here.
26:02
It was like, OK, how can I improve the situation
26:05
for generations of women to come so that I don't have the barriers that I had?
26:10
And I think that was really, really interesting conversation.
26:12
I really loved this conversation
26:14
because it wasn't just talking about the things that she's doing either.
26:20
It's talking about how if we zoom out as a collective
26:23
as business owners or not, as people
26:26
under the education system or not,
26:28
just how collectively we could all be encouraging women
26:32
to be more educated and encouraging women into different spaces
26:34
and society into jobs that have traditionally been reserved for men,
26:38
you know, it all starts at the education piece.
26:41
And I think what I loved about this conversation was especially in tech
26:45
because obviously telecommunications is edging into the tech space.
26:48
There's such a low representation of women in tech.
26:51
But that's because a lot of us don't even consider it.
26:55
And those kinds of conversations start at school
26:57
and the representation that she's trying to create within her company
27:02
is a really brilliant reflection
27:05
as to how we can all learn from it,
27:08
but be trying to implement similar processes.
27:11
And I work whether you're in a position of leadership or not,
27:14
like you can go to your HR and say like,
27:17
hey, I don't really like XYZ or hey,
27:19
can we do something about XYZ?
27:21
Or I've got this great idea or Jolly from Spark does this cool thing, you know.
27:25
I just think what she did was she really made me feel empowered
27:30
and I know that she would make other people regardless of where they are
27:34
in their career, whether it's their first job or their last job,
27:38
the feeling that the workplace is just as much a place for women as it is for men
27:42
and the reflection of that is we should then be
27:45
renumerated and paid equally.
27:48
Yeah, so this is raising the curve episode 56.
27:52
What roles are people in?
27:54
So yes, this is a seniority thing, but there's also a type of career.
27:59
So if you think about our organisation, I've got over 5,000 people.
28:02
I've got a mixer people from context centers, retail stores,
28:05
really deep technical expertise, data and automation,
28:08
or all of those types of skills.
28:10
They have quite different salary profiles for those roles.
28:14
And depending on where people come, or what they study at school, etc.
28:18
So what we see in a lot of the legacy tech and new tech,
28:22
a lot of male and higher roles and with the experience here,
28:26
we have more women in some of the context, etc.
28:29
So you get this immediate, not different pay for same role.
28:34
But if you look at our overall organisation, we have more men in these roles
28:38
and more women in these roles and then when you add that,
28:40
do the median of that, that gives you the difference.
28:42
That's so interesting, because I always thought that it was more people in the same role,
28:47
I just getting kind of shafted.
28:48
We also have been needed to look at.
28:51
If we want to see more women in some of the tech roles, for example,
28:55
how are we encouraging the pipeline?
28:57
So good to hear such a holistic explanation,
29:00
because I think it makes me, personally, more mad without that contextual understanding
29:07
that it's actually probably starting from an education standpoint.
29:10
It's way back to representation in different industries,
29:13
so that more women learn and grow and then into the workforce,
29:18
into those higher paying roles.
29:19
It's not as simple as, oh, because of your genitalia,
29:22
we're actually going to pay you less than the person next to you.
29:25
It's actually not that simple.
29:27
And the reality is for me, it's most important we're moving
29:31
and we're taking the action to make the shifts.
29:34
And I said it's a combination both of bringing people in,
29:37
making sure people are talent is coming through the organisation where it should,
29:41
opening up positions and really thinking about
29:44
what is the right next experience for the individual to put them in the best place.
29:50
So family and money has been an interesting conversation that has come up a lot throughout
29:55
this year, and I think it's because we've spoken to young moms, we've spoken to older moms,
30:01
we've spoken to moms to be, we've spoken to people who want to have kids one day,
30:06
and this whole idea of can you have it all?
30:09
Can you have the career? Can you have a beautiful relationship? Can you have kids? Can you balance
30:16
money and family life and relationships is such a complex conversation?
30:21
And one that I don't think I had really thought about a whole lot until this year.
30:27
I thought I had and I thought I had a way of how I was going to run my family and how I was
30:33
going to balance the career and being a mom. And then it's so funny the more people
30:38
and guests that I get on and hear their situations. And because I'm not in that situation yet,
30:44
hearing the realities of it and the things that they've had to deal with or change or accept
30:52
has made me kind of, I guess, sick and guess.
30:55
Oh, it all in a hot minute? Is that what it's like?
30:58
Yeah, I'm like, oh, okay, so maybe I can't do that in there. And maybe I need to reassess that,
31:04
well, maybe I do need to think about that. And it was just, I'm so glad I had this conversation
31:08
before I had children. And children, like, I don't have them. But yes.
31:14
Are you pregnant? What's going on? No, no, I'm not. I'm making me weird. No, I'm not pregnant.
31:20
You are not pregnant. But I've done all the research, babe, and I know what to do.
31:26
But you do want this particular conversation that we are about to play a little snippet off.
31:31
So Amy Fraser, it was all about balancing family, career, especially when life does not go
31:36
according to plan. And this was the first time I'd heard her, or I was about say,
31:41
heard her, but heard anyone talk about the invisible load. And what she was referring to was the idea
31:47
that women generally at home do more of the cooking, more of the cleaning, more of the,
31:54
you know, looking after kids, et cetera. And it's just kind of this given and this thing that
31:57
kind of flies under the radar. And I think quantifying those efforts financially had never been
32:03
something I'd even thought about, let alone the idea of it being really disproportionate in
32:07
terms of what each partner contributes. And I think, yeah, that conversation I found super fascinating
32:14
coupled with the idea of sticking to your guns on what, when do you feel powerful? Like, do you
32:20
feel powerful at work? Because if you do, even if it doesn't make financial sense for you to be
32:26
working because majority of your money, if not all of it is going to childcare, but it makes you feel
32:31
really proud and like you're doing something and like a powerful force to be reckoned with,
32:37
then don't give up on that just because you have kids. If it doesn't make sense financially,
32:41
it's, it's really thinking about the kind of life you want to build, not just how the numbers
32:46
add up, but also how you feel in those moments and how you're going to, yeah, I don't know,
32:51
look at your life and be proud of the things you've done. And I think it was also about communication
32:55
with your partner as well. I think one takeaway from this was all around communicating, okay,
33:01
well, what do you want to do? Also, what brings you the most joy in terms of raising the children?
33:07
Is it reading them bedtime stories? Is it feeding them? Is it going to their day care and picking
33:14
them up from from day care? Because if there's things that you can communicate that you're enjoying
33:18
that you don't and then you can have that conversation about, okay, well, what can you do and what
33:23
can I do so that you're both feeling like you're contributing and feeling valued and enjoying it
33:30
without being negative if that makes sense. And I mean, Amy's story is a really powerful one and
33:37
that her entry into motherhood was not a smooth one. So she essentially found out that her partner
33:45
was cheating while she was pregnant. So she entered motherhood as a single mother and she's an
33:52
amazing mother to two wonderful kids. But she's also spent time unpacking what is important to her,
33:59
not just financially, but from a career perspective and how you can really dig deep when things
34:04
get really shut. So if you're looking for some career inspiration, this is a brilliant episode
34:10
for that. Yeah, also her, she was so eloquent. The words she used sometimes, I was like, I really
34:16
need to brush up on my vocabulary. She was so well spoken and used such beautiful words to
34:23
explain things. But yes, this is raising the curve episode 58.
34:30
I found out at five months pregnant that he had essentially a double life with multiple other
34:36
women. And so that and that was after we'd been married for about eight years. I mean, the one
34:42
thing that I always offer people in terms by way of advice in situations like that is just hold
34:49
on to the things that make you feel powerful. And for me, that was my work. Well, you have to look
34:55
at both paying the mortgage and raising children as something that you both reap the reward from
35:03
and you both put into those things respectively throughout a relationship and say one partner
35:10
takes less time or spends less time at work or them spending less time at work as a byproduct of
35:16
them investing their time and energy in the children. Both of the parents get to have return
35:23
on investment from the kids. You could say, well, then the division of property, the one partner
35:29
hasn't contributed as much financially to the property by way of money, but they've invested
35:35
in the family in a different way. So it goes back to and both of you enjoy the roof over your
35:41
head, but both of you enjoy fed safe, healthy children. That's a really good way. So you have to
35:47
look at it as a return on investment that you both reap the rewards of whether that's a gain
35:55
from when you sell the house. You also have the return on investment from the kids. The kids are
36:00
like little assets running around. Yeah, they're like little assets. So you've got to look at
36:03
you've got to look at the family as an asset.
36:07
Our pay rises. Gosh, this is something I wish I knew years and years ago, so I could ask
36:13
social pay rise. Just about to say I need to ask for a pay rise.
36:19
Never get told. It's such a frightening conversation or confronting conversation to have with
36:27
your boss and so many people get scared when it comes to having those pay rise discussions or they
36:33
don't know their value or their worth and so they just avoid it and avoid having those conversations,
36:38
but it's so, so important and can actually have such a huge impact on your wealth trajectory.
36:45
And so we had an amazing conversation with the fabulous Miggy Palmer all the way from New York.
36:53
She is a pay rise negotiating expert and she gave us so many great tips and tricks.
37:01
And I think this was one of the most useful in terms of resources and practical tips that she gave
37:08
us in terms of putting them in action. Well, definitely for me, it was and so it was all around
37:15
how to get a pay rise, how to be prepared going into those discussions. I also spoke about how
37:21
I found out that I was getting paid nearly 40% less by male colleagues which was quite frightening
37:28
and I never really thought that I would be one of those people that got paid there because I
37:34
just always thought that I fought for when I was worth, but I obviously didn't fight enough and
37:38
it actually knowing your worth is is probably the most tricky part. So yeah, it was a really,
37:43
really good conversation and again, such an eloquently spoken lady and she does this for a
37:49
loving so she knows all the answers. Yeah, I loved this one. Miggy Palmer is the absolute
37:56
go-to if it comes to trying to get a pay rise. If you're wanting to learn anything to do
38:03
how you walk into that room and ask for more money, this is the episode to listen to.
38:07
And we actually have also done a code resource with her. She can find it on the free b section
38:14
of our website and download and just get all of the top things that you need to know so that you
38:20
can hopefully get more money and actually we had quite a few people message us saying like,
38:24
holy shit, this episode, but also like that resource was so helpful. I am now on 40K more than I
38:29
was like really, really cool success stories. And I think the frustrating thing with women in
38:36
particular is that we always get told you're hard to cut back on spending and we had to save money
38:41
and all of this and we aren't privy to or we haven't felt like we're the ones that should be
38:48
having these conversations about, okay, but how do we earn more? There's two sides of the equation
38:53
when it comes to you as a person. There's your income and your expenses. And if you can increase
38:58
your income, then you don't have to cut back as much on your expenses. So you can only cut back
39:04
so much on your spending before you can't cut back anymore. So being able to improve that top
39:10
line or that income or that revenue that you're generating is can be so, so, so helpful,
39:16
particularly in this current environment where everything is so much more expensive. So yes,
39:22
give it a listen. I'm sure you will come away with at least one or two super helpful tips and
39:28
tricks about getting a pay rise. So this is raising the curve episode 60 with Miggy Palmer.
39:35
People listening today can start the change by talking about their salary, by encouraging
39:41
their nieces to negotiate that first salary, by supporting others in their workplace,
39:46
by calling out BS behavior at work, you know, we all have a role to play.
39:51
And then I've had a similar situation to you where I found out I was getting paid 40% less than
39:55
my male colleagues. The HR had actually accidentally printed the boxes.
40:00
A lot of land that happens. Yeah. And there was like the salary, you know, obviously,
40:04
it paid a bonus according to your salary. And so there was the salaries on it. And then I went
40:08
into the salary negotiation just with more confidence because I knew that what I was asking,
40:14
like, I was like, they just can't be a no. Anyway, they said no. They said come back in six months
40:19
time. And I was like, oh, and then we back to my decent, I was sitting there and I was like, oh,
40:24
you know, maybe I don't work as hard as John and oh, maybe I maybe I am a little bit less
40:28
experienced. You're like, you start. You think there's something wrong with you. But there's
40:32
a system. It's a systemic problem. But the numbers make you think, well, it must be me. John,
40:37
maybe John does work harder. Maybe John is better. No. Typically what I recommend is I would,
40:43
exactly what you did Victoria. So it'd be like, hey, Suzanne, like I just wanted to talk about my
40:47
compensation. As you know, here's what I've achieved, A, B and C. As you know, I'm a superstar
40:53
because of X, Y and Z. Love to talk to you about my compensation. And also just want to level
40:59
set and ensure that my comp is commensurate with everyone else at my level. It's kind of a way of
41:04
saying, hey, if you pay me and don't even think about, like, not keeping me at the same level as
41:11
all of the fellas, without saying there's a gender pay gap, you're the worst. Like, I'm going to go
41:16
legal on you if you don't pay me enough. So that was I can't even ruin the how many top
41:22
bits we chose, but that was lots of good bits. We've got so many good bits.
41:27
Bits is kind of a funny word, isn't it? We have so many cool bits. No, but it just sounds like
41:33
so my grandma, whenever she's like, this is actually kind of gross, but when she travels, she's like,
41:37
make sure you wash your tits, your bits and your pits or something like that. So we never
41:43
always say bits. I'm like, no, I don't know if that sits very well with me, but I think this is,
41:47
yeah, this is fun. I like going through the archives. And next week, we're going to do the same
41:50
thing. So we'll have a big bunch of things that we think, if you've missed it, you should go
41:54
back and listen to it. But also if you don't listen to them, they're just some nice little nuggets
41:58
to remind you of things that are helpful when it comes to your money and investing.
42:03
Thank you so much for listening to Raising the Curve. These conversations are designed to teach
42:08
you everything that you need to know to be better with your money, from saving, to investing,
42:13
to talking to your friends about your salaries. And if you liked what you heard, we would love it.
42:17
If you could hit subscribe button, please leave a review. It'll only take five seconds
42:23
and it would really make our week, our year, our month. Okay, lots of love. See you soon. Bye.
42:34
We would like to say a massive thank you to HelloFresh for making this podcast episode possible.
42:39
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42:45
in my opinion, the best part is that all the ingredients are pre-portioned in just the right
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