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007: From Corporate to Content Creation: Slay Financial Freedom with Reni the Resource
101 Plays1 year ago
In this episode of the Career Slay Talks podcast, join us as we dive into the inspiring story of Reni the Resource, a former corporate professional who transformed her career and achieved financial freedom through content creation. Reni shares her personal journey, highlighting the highs and lows of her transition and how she conquered financial challenges along the way. Tune in as she unveils her top 5 tips on financial literacy for professionals, empowering you to slay your own financial freedom. Get ready to take charge of your financial future and embark on an exciting new path with Reni the Resource.
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Transcript
Preparing for Content Creation
00:00:00
Speaker
It doesn't have to be like, you're like, yeah, quit your job and go be a content creator. I wouldn't advise that, but it's like, have they been putting in the work before they ever think of quitting their job? Because a lot of people, I have one-on-one calls with a lot of people and they just want to jump into content creation, but they've never posted anything on their social media before. And I'm like, the math is not really math. It's not computing.
00:00:28
Speaker
I just don't understand I'm like I was always creating content about like fat especially my just my outfits of the day and things like that way before I ever got paid for anything like since high school I've been posting and your consistency probably started a good
00:00:43
Speaker
five, seven years before you actually went into it. That's a really key step because folks forget that. They see the finished product. They're not seeing all of your trials and errors and all the other hours that you put in.
00:00:58
Speaker
Again, if you really wanted to become a full-time content creator, you would be creating content before you ever get paid for it. Hello
Introduction to Reni Odetoyinbo
00:01:05
Speaker
and welcome to another episode of the Korea Slay Talks broadcast. My name is Brenda Dogbrey, also known as The Korea Slay Mama, and I'm really excited today to chat with Renny, the resource.
00:01:19
Speaker
And I've been following Reni for a while now on Instagram, and I really appreciate it. All of the great content that she puts out just to give a bit of an intro. So Reni Odetoyenbo is a content creator and a marketing consultant who is based in Toronto, Canada. And on her YouTube channel, XO Reni, she shares resources about career development, lifestyle, and financial literacy.
00:01:46
Speaker
After buying her first house at the age of 23, she decided to share her knowledge with others with the goal of helping people understand adulting. And she helps them become more financially literate and shares tips to help
00:02:01
Speaker
them excel in their careers. From finance to career and lifestyle content, Reni aims to make complex topics simple. And Reni is also part of YouTube Black Class of 2022, which is an accelerator program run by Google to build her channel. So I'm super excited to talk to you today. And I'm really glad that you were
00:02:29
Speaker
available. So why don't we start by just hearing a little bit more about yourself. I mean, owning a house by 23, you know, in this market. So I just like to, why don't you share with us a bit of your personal journey.
Influence of Financial Upbringing
00:02:43
Speaker
Yeah, so thank you for having me, Brenda. I appreciate it. So hi, everybody. My name is Reni. People call me Reni the resource or XO Reni, either one you can call me. And I have a YouTube channel, as Brenda said,
00:02:56
Speaker
I am currently a full-time content creator, so I make content for a living. I basically talk on the internet for a living, and I speak about personal finance, career development, and my lifestyle, and a lot of travel as well, too, because I've been to 35 countries, and I share my... That's what I like to spend my money on, so I like to share that as well. Yeah, that's a little bit about me. Nice.
00:03:21
Speaker
So you born and raised in Toronto and then what was the catalyst for you in terms of your financial literacy and your journey? So I was not born and raised here. I was raised here. I was born in England. So I was born in London, England. And then when I was four years old, my parents moved here to Canada and I've been living here ever since.
00:03:42
Speaker
And yeah, I've lived in Thailand for five months, but everything else has been here in Mississauga, actually, right outside of Toronto. And how I got into financial literacy is my parents were also very intentional about financial literacy.
00:03:59
Speaker
So my dad started talking about financial literacy when he moved to England from Nigeria and he realized that he didn't understand money basically from the lens of like, you know, it's very different back home versus in a Western country. So he was on a mission to learn how to understand money. And then when he and my mom had
00:04:21
Speaker
me, they were like, okay, we're going to teach them the same thing so that they don't have to go through all the struggles that we went through. And when I was four years old, for example, I remember them helping open my bank account. And like saying that every time that you get money, you have to put it into this account a little some of it into this account. So again, financial literacy is kind of like embedded into my growing up
00:04:42
Speaker
journey and then upbringing. Yeah, exactly. And then when I was 18, they taught me about credit cards and like, make sure that when you go to university, you know how to use your credit card correctly, because it's not free money, things like that. Also, when I turned 18, they got me to start investing in the stock market. And that's how I actually purchased my first house. So I started investing stock market when I was 18. And five years later, by the time I was 23, it was large enough that I could put it towards a down payment. And
Journey into Investing
00:05:11
Speaker
that's exactly what I did.
00:05:12
Speaker
That's amazing. That's so amazing. So was that self-taught like in terms of investing in the stock market? Did your parents kind of coach you through that process? Did you discover for yourself or is it a bit of a mix of all of the above? Yeah, it's a mix of them. So I'd say at the start, it was very heavy on my parents teaching me about it, especially my dad. He's the one who every two weeks when I would get paid, he'd be like, okay, what are you buying this week? What stock are you buying? And he was like my accountability partner for the first few years.
00:05:40
Speaker
But then I think when he saw that I was comfortable with doing it, and I was actually investing over two weeks without with or without his prompting, then he was like, Okay, go on your own. And that's when I really started to learn about investing. And I started to read a lot of books, I started to listen to finance podcasts. And now I basically do the same thing as all those podcasts that I was listening to.
00:06:03
Speaker
Nice, nice, nice. And so, so you mentioned university. So was that like, um, did you, what did you study? And then how does that line up with what you're doing now? Yeah.
Early Career Experiences
00:06:15
Speaker
So I went to the Schulich school of business at York university, which is a business school. And I did my BBA. So bachelor's of business administration. And I did this, uh, and then, so while I was there, I, they are very big on,
00:06:30
Speaker
telling you about networking and the importance of networking and things like that. So I would say I learned that very. And for my first year, I had an internship at a real estate company, I realized I didn't like that the next year, I got an internship at a bank, realized that
00:06:46
Speaker
it was okay. So I'm like, okay, not for you. But I was like, it's okay. Like, it's not it's probably not long term. But it's, it's, it's a job. And they pay more than minimum. You can make your work exactly. And they pay more than minimum minimum wage for these internships. I was like, Yeah, I like this. And then the next year, I so I was working as a business analyst at the Bank of Montreal. And then I asked them, then
00:07:09
Speaker
Again, the role was OK, but it wasn't ideal. So I started networking as I was there. And I was like, I found another team. I asked my manager if I could job shadow that team. I job shadowed them for about two weeks. And while I was there, I was like, hmm, I kind of like this more. So then at the end of my two weeks job shadowing period, I asked the manager. I said, oh, I am looking for an internship for next year. If you're looking to hire anyone, I'm your girl. And then she did hire me the next summer, which is pretty cool.
00:07:37
Speaker
That was my third year of university. And then when I graduated the next year, I was looking for an internship again, same thing, networking. And I got another business analyst role right out of graduation. So that was cool. But once I got into that role, it wasn't exactly what I thought it would be. It was very administrative, I would say, compared to my previous roles. And after three months, I was kind of like, I can't do this for the rest of my life.
00:08:05
Speaker
And I think a lot of people in that scenario usually just stick it out because it's like, oh, it's a job, they paid decent. Country level, you have to do your five to seven years or whatever it is you're supposed to do. I was like, no, immediately, no, I'm not doing it. So when I was at Schuler, I studied both, I did business, but I did a specialization in marketing and operations management. So because I had the marketing side, I was like, I really liked marketing when I was working at the, when I was in school.
00:08:32
Speaker
Let me try and get into a marketing role. And again, I networked my way into a marketing role. And I was working at BMO private wealth, so the wealth management arm of BMO.
Transition to Content Creation
00:08:43
Speaker
And essentially, what I was doing was I was creating marketing plans to attract ultra high net worth clients to the bank. So like millionaires, billionaires, yeah, and providing them with financial literacy content. So
00:08:53
Speaker
it was basically like so how receptive were they to you because you're like you're probably the age of their children right how did you how did you overcome that because i think that's so amazing and courageous and bold of you yeah so it's more so that i was creating the content for the investment advisors who work there and then the investment advisors would be the one actually like for like saying it so they didn't know what was coming from a 22 year old kid yeah
00:09:21
Speaker
But still, that's still pretty amazing. Yeah, it was a great experience. And again, it was like, but then as I was there, I was I was like, Hmm, I'm kind of helping the rich get richer. Like I'm creating content, like, here's how to utilize your RSP, here's how to donate to charities to lower your taxable income, you know, things that
00:09:40
Speaker
Okay, rich people they probably already know and I was like, I think I guess I think all this I need to make me rich and I need to also share that knowledge with people who need it Yeah, it was like I think the average person especially black people need to know this information and I also saw when I was working there the Rich people most of them were white men and then their kids they would start teaching them at a very young age But I realized a lot of my friends don't have that same thing, right? So that's why I decided to start
00:10:08
Speaker
After I purchased my house, my friends were like, how did you do this? And I'm like, guys, I've been telling you about investing in the stock market since I was 18 years old. And they were like, nope, we need more information. Write a blog post, record a podcast. Put the info out there. And I was like, OK. And I always wanted to start a YouTube channel, honestly. So it was a natural pivot. Next step, yeah. And then I started my YouTube channel. And now I'm a full-time content creator.
00:10:38
Speaker
So that's what I want to talk to you about. So tell me about the transition from like, I work at BMO and you know, I'm doing these, I'm doing a nine to five to starting content creation. I imagine that you probably did both, you know, did content creation as your side hustle. So how did you make it your main hustle? So I started like, I want to know, I need to, I need to also learn these ways because it's good knowledge. Yes, I started in,
00:11:07
Speaker
May of 2020.
Balancing YouTube and Work
00:11:08
Speaker
That's when I started my YouTube channel. I was working at Bank of America at the time. And it took like three months for me to start making money on YouTube. So I made my first hundred dollars that year. And I was like, Oh my gosh, this is so amazing. You can make money on the internet. It's like my mind was expanded drastically after that. Yeah. And was this mostly advertising revenue? Yes. So it was pretty much all. It was only advertising revenue. Yeah.
00:11:37
Speaker
And basically, who would put ads on my YouTube videos. And then they pay you, I think it's a 55, 45 split between you and Google. And they pay you some. Decent, considering it's a free platform. Exactly, right? So I got some money. OK, cool. Now I think I can do, I think I can scale this a lot. And I started making videos. I was very consistent. So every week, I was posting twice a week, every single week.
00:12:05
Speaker
And these are long form, like 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 20 minute videos. So I was really going hard at the beginning. Um, and where were you like, so how are you balancing your time? Because you were still working. Good question. So I would say at that point, my job, I had kind of mastered my role at that point. So it was kind of like a role where I knew from, I'm only working from nine to five. It's not like it's going to take me longer because I'm, I was very good at it at that point.
00:12:32
Speaker
And I was able to set good boundaries with my manager at that point as well. But also, I would use my Saturdays. So I would record four videos on Saturday morning, and then I would edit those four videos on Sunday or Saturday night. And then I would schedule them out for the next four weeks. Like that's the way. I mean, and that's like four, that's a month out. So one,
00:12:57
Speaker
weekend that gives you your four months of con- I mean one month of content and that's pretty good because I'm sure you could splice and dice for like Instagram and TikTok. So is that where you do like you repurpose some of them? Exactly. So yeah, that's the way to manage it and
00:13:12
Speaker
I think batch creating is something if anyone wants to become a content creator, you should be batch creating because it just allows you to have, it's like a sustainable workflow. If you're just recording the same day on a post, it's not sustainable at all. And so you made your first hundred dollars and then what?
Quitting the Corporate Job
00:13:30
Speaker
And then same thing, I just kept going. And at that point, my channel was growing pretty slowly but surely. And my community was extremely engaged. Then a affiliate program reached out to me for one of the banks in Canada. And I was like, it's kind of a conflict of interest if I accept this when I am
00:13:52
Speaker
working at a bank. Working in one other bank, you're giving financial information and you're taking another bank's money. Yeah, I'm like, Oh, yeah, I can't be saying I love RBC when I work at BMO, you know, so I had to turn down that first one. And then I also got a promotion that same year. And this is still 2020. 2020. When was that?
00:14:15
Speaker
did I quit? Yeah, 2020. It was the end of 2020. I got a promotion. Okay. That job was very hectic, I will say. So I went from like, being able to- It's no longer my nine to five. And then I have my weekends and evenings to myself. Yeah, it was a nine to nine at that point. And two of my co workers went on
00:14:36
Speaker
leave like, like a month after I started. So it was very hard. I was basically doing my work plus balancing their work. And I'm like, I don't even understand what I'm doing. Yeah, I just got here. So yeah, it was a bit hard to manage. And again, I got that. And then I got another affiliate program. And it's an online only bank. And I was like, Okay, I'm gonna, I just was like, I'm gonna take it regardless. And then I started getting paid for it. And it was pretty good income. Like in June of 2021, I made
00:15:05
Speaker
$3,000 on YouTube from like the affiliate income from one brand and then and then from the adsense of my videos and I was like oh my gosh I was like I can do this like so at that point that was when my mind was made up that I think I can quit my full-time job although $3,000 a month is not enough to support me each month
00:15:24
Speaker
And you have a mortgage at this point in time. Yeah. Actually enough to support me, but, but I, I'm pretty sure that like I can scale this if I actually had time to dedicate to this, because at that point I was, yeah, I wasn't, I couldn't,
00:15:42
Speaker
be as consistent because I was so tired. Like on Saturdays, I didn't even want to record. Like I was, I was so tired. So I was like, okay, somebody has to give either. I was going to leave the job regardless, uh, and maybe just find another nine to five. But I was like, let me just bet on myself and take it out of myself. The best bet you could ever take. Yes. And I did that October 1st, 2021 was my first, my last day at my corporate job.
00:16:10
Speaker
And I went full force. Were you scared? I wasn't scared because I was like, if it doesn't, if it fails, I can just get another job. That was my logic. I love it, you know?
00:16:23
Speaker
I'm like, so I'm like, adulting, adulting, like more kids, three kids. So the thought of, you know, I think there's something really amazing about being in that season where you could really bet on yourself and you could also, you know, like you said, if it doesn't work out, you'll get a job. And it takes that courage, which I think is just amazing. Thank you. Yeah, it was a
00:16:49
Speaker
It was a good decision. But yeah, I always recognized the privilege that I had to like not have, I don't have children. So that would definitely change the dynamic. Yeah, for sure. Equation, but it's a good season. And I think maybe even seguing into, I think there's a lot of pressure on young people to know exactly what you're going to do in life and, you know, figure it all out in your 20s. Never mind that, you know, I always hear Gary V saying this, that
00:17:16
Speaker
Your 20s to your 30s, that's your experimentation time because you've got the luxury of time. People are living longer. This undue pressure to find this job and figure out your purpose, whereas that's the season to kind of try things out. What have you learned? I think one of the things I really love about the content that you share is your transparency.
00:17:37
Speaker
a lot of people like, oh, I'll be a full-time content creator, blah, blah, blah, but they're not showing you the receipts of exactly what you're doing and how you're doing it. And I think that it's both transparent, but it also, it really shows that I'm not just faking until I make it like this is what I'm doing. So what advice do you have for folks who are thinking about content creation as a
00:18:04
Speaker
as a source of income. And then both from the parent perspective in terms of, you know, the parents of kids, younger and older, who are like, I want to create content full-time and then like, you know, get a real job. And also for that young person who's, and even not just young person. I don't think it needs to be, you don't need to be young to work in the content creation space. And so for
Advice for Aspiring Creators
00:18:27
Speaker
that person who wants to take the leap on their self, they're still like, I don't know.
00:18:32
Speaker
Yeah. So for the parents, I would tell them that support your children in what you want to do, especially if you see that they're passionate about it. So it doesn't have to be like, you're like, yeah, quit your job and go be a content creator. I wouldn't advise that. But it's like, have they been putting in the work before they ever think of quitting their job?
00:18:52
Speaker
because a lot of people, I have one-on-one calls with a lot of people, and they just want to jump into content creation, but they've never posted anything on their social media before. And I'm like, the math is not really math. It's not computing.
00:19:11
Speaker
Yeah, because I just don't understand. I'm like, I was always creating content about like fat, especially my just my outfits of the day and things like that way before I ever got paid for anything. Like since high school, I've been posting my different outfits. So I'm like, you're consistent. So your consistency, your consistency probably started a good
00:19:30
Speaker
five, seven years before you actually went into it. That's a really key step because folks forget that. They see the finished product. They're not seeing all of your trials and errors and all the other hours that you put in. Yeah. And I feel like a lot of people would
00:19:47
Speaker
Again, if you really wanted to become a full-time content creator, you would be creating content before you ever get paid for it. It's not a normal type of job where you get an internship. You're freelancing, essentially, and you have to start creating a portfolio before any brand will ever want to work with you. So I would say if parents can see that this
00:20:07
Speaker
that their child is dedicated, they're putting in the work, they're actually consistent way before they get paid, then that would be something to be like, okay, I encourage you, let's, you know, support that. My dad, when I quit, my dad said, he said, okay,
00:20:24
Speaker
Give here's a year go and do it for a year If it doesn't work then go come get another job and I was like, okay cool Like which is fair and it was very it was motivating for me because I'm like I have a year to just you know Work hard and prove dad that I can actually do that and I'm sure he'd be proud and I'm sure here Yeah, and in my first year, I think I was one hundred twenty thousand dollars that I make and he was like, okay You're good, you know, keep going keep going. So I
00:20:48
Speaker
Yes. So break down this math for us, please. 120K. So that's October 2021 to 2022. You need to spill this tea because we need to know. So that was like January 2022 to December 2022.
Monetizing Content
00:21:07
Speaker
I think I have a full YouTube video giving the exact numbers of what I made, but essentially it's like working with brands. So I have a lot of sponsorships and brand deals and
00:21:18
Speaker
they will pay to advertise on my platform because I have built like a very engaged community where all my comments are always popping. You know, if I promote something, I recently just partnered with Aeroplan and my comments were going like they were full, hundreds of comments, right? So friends like to tap into reaching black
00:21:37
Speaker
people my following is mostly black women so you know they they're tapping into that and i love it for me and they will pay big bucks i love it for you and i love it for us yeah it's amazing and this is the kind of stuff that we need to do and see so tell us a little bit about the brand partnerships process like how do you so how do you go about do brands contact you are you reaching out i know i know that you now also have a bit of a team that's supporting you so
00:22:06
Speaker
Let's talk about the brand partnerships process and then a bit of your scaling process because it's very cool. Yeah so for brand partnerships I would say I learned this when I was working in corporate actually and it's the power of personal branding and like having a presence online and basically telling people how you want to be perceived. A
Importance of Personal Branding
00:22:27
Speaker
lot of people think they don't have a personal brand or they've never worked on their personal brand
00:22:30
Speaker
But whether you think you have a personal brand or you don't think you do, you do have a personal brand. If you ask 10 people who know you what's the first three things they think of when they think of you, that's your personal brand. And you can let people
00:22:45
Speaker
you can let people determine that or you can be strategic and craft that personal brand. So I was very strategic about crafting a brand that I am the finance girl. I am the career. I'm a resourceful person. Anyone who wants resources come to me and I will share those resources with you. That was my whole, that's my whole brand and brands
00:23:05
Speaker
like TD bank, like wealth simple, simply financial, all these brands come to me because it's like she's clearly, she's marked herself out as the finance girl. Who else are we going to go to? Who focuses on finance? We're going to go to her so she could get to them because they're coming to her. Exactly. So that's how I've been able to get brand deals, basically positioning myself strategically and allowing brands to see how they can fit in into my content.
00:23:29
Speaker
Like a lot of brands who reach out to me have never thought have never ever done partnerships before with creators But then they see my content and they're like you share a lot of resources We share resources, but we never saw content creators that share to share information like this So let's partner with you to share it. So I would say 99 probably percent of my brand deals just come to me and it's all because the positioning my platform I also
00:23:55
Speaker
have reached out to a few brands, but I would say, yeah, the majority just come to me. And then when you work with them, the process is that they come with a campaign. So they say, I want to promote my self-directed investing platform. I want to do a one-minute video on it, 30-second video, whatever their deliverables are. And then you will go back and forth with them on a brief of the content that you're going to put out. And then you will put that content out for your audience to see. Yeah, so that's the process of how. Nice.
00:24:22
Speaker
Oh, that's amazing. And then tell us a little bit about scaling. So just you going from one on one brands reaching out here and there to being, you know, what, when did you know that you needed to, um, scale? And then, uh, how did you, how did you do that?
Scaling Content Creation
00:24:39
Speaker
Hmm. When did I know I needed to scale? I don't know. I, that's a good question. I just,
00:24:46
Speaker
When it was my full-time job, I was like, well, I need money now because I don't have a regular income. So we're going to have to work hard or harder or work smarter, I would say. So I got like an assistant, for example, to help me manage all the emails so that she could go back and forth with the brands instead of me going back and forth with them. I also had scheduling my meetings and things like that.
00:25:07
Speaker
I also now have an editor who is now going to be editing my YouTube videos, just so I can consistently put out content without being burnt out. Because editing is not something I enjoy, so if I can consistently put it out. That was the first thing I had to outsource in terms of the podcast, because I wanted to do both video and audio. And I was like, no, I'm not learning this. So if I can outsource a piece,
00:25:33
Speaker
it focuses you on the creative space and then you don't have to do that. Exactly. And then I also had an intern for the summer and she was helping me write blog posts so I could be writing blog posts consistently. So things like that really, they just allow me to again focus on the creative side and then outsource all the technical things that I don't really like to do or that I just don't have time to do. Some of them I actually do enjoy doing. I just don't have the time.
00:26:03
Speaker
And I think my time is better spent doing other things. I'm a big proponent of paying experts to do what they're an expert at. Which is a big, big part of the outsourcing, trading time for money and then money for time. And it's like if somebody else can do that and do it faster and leaves me with a space to do, you know, that's a good thing.
00:26:25
Speaker
bringing the conversation home. I'm loving everything I'm hearing, and I can't wait to share this podcast episode with the world. So five tips that you have on, I want to talk about financial literacy. What
Financial Literacy Tips
00:26:43
Speaker
five things can you advise Black professionals, especially in that Canadian context, to do to set them up professionally and financially?
00:26:55
Speaker
Okay, so the first thing I'll say is, as a professional, a lot of us rely on this one source of income that we have, and we are very dependent on it, which is natural, because it's a very consistent salary, but layoffs are a very real thing right now, especially if you work in like the tech space, recruiting, a lot of the it's a very volatile space right now. So I always tell people to start up an emergency fund, that would be my first tip, start an emergency fund, and that would be
00:27:24
Speaker
where you put money into a savings account and it's three to six months worth of your expenses. So if you spend $4,000 a month, you're going to try and save $12,000 so that if anything happens to you, then you can tap into that emergency fund rather than going into debt. And when I say anything happens to you, that could be something like you get God forbid in a car accident that now you can't work for some time, or you get laid off from your role, something like that, that it's like very, it's catastrophic that you need, you need, um,
00:27:53
Speaker
time to bounce back from it, you will, instead of going into debt, again, you will have this emergency fund. And it also allows you to, it's like your vex money where it's like, okay, if this job is pissing me off, I can leave and I know I have this money to tap into. I love that. Your vex money. Like I'm done with you guys. I'm gonna, I have enough to at least sort myself out while I get to my next job or whatever.
00:28:17
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. So that would be the first tip that I have. You always want to start up that emergency fund. And again, you don't have to start, it doesn't have to be like, I need to $12,000 immediately to put in there. It can be that you are putting in $100 from every paycheck until you're just building up that that fund.
00:28:36
Speaker
The second thing that I will talk about is that you should start investing in the stock market because you should start investing in the stock market because inflation is inflation and it's taking away our money. And ideally, like your money is basically losing value second by second. So
00:28:55
Speaker
every day. Just go to Costco, go to Walmart. The things are shrinking and they're doubling in price. And it's just the math is not math. Exactly. So ideally, we want to make sure that we are making the money that we make at our corporate job, we're making it work for us by putting it somewhere where it will work for us. So you put it in the stock market, for example, and it can grow. But I think a lot of people are scared by this concept. So an easy way to do that would be to
00:29:24
Speaker
tap into your employer's registered matching programs. So if your employer has an RRSP program, which is the registered retirement savings plan, if they have that program, you can tap into that program and what it is is
00:29:38
Speaker
You put in, say, $500, they will match $250 or $500, whatever the plan is. And I think that's a great way to actually start investing because it's coming right out of your paycheck. You can't spend it. And they are experts who are investing on your behalf. So that would be the second thing that I would say. The third thing I would say is
00:29:57
Speaker
negotiate your salary. That's a little tip that I always tell everybody, please negotiate your salary. Whenever you go into a new job, it's a must they typically people come at you like the recruiters coming at you expecting you to negotiate, right? So if you don't negotiate, then
00:30:16
Speaker
You're leaving money on the table. Yeah. So I have lots of videos on this. Should anybody and everybody negotiate? Because I think sometimes folks feel like, OK, if it's a unionized job, can I really negotiate? Yeah, I've heard that you can negotiate between the pay scale within a union. So if there's a job grade, then you can negotiate within the scale. Pump me up, put me somewhere. Yeah, that's fair. Number four.
00:30:45
Speaker
Yeah, next one would be that you should job hop. I'm a big proponent of job hopping. Yes, I say this all the time and I'm so glad to hear you say that. Yeah, I'm a huge proponent of job hopping. I think that staying in a role for, or in the same company for, or even actually let's say the same role for four, five, six, seven years is a way to just not make any money long term. Yeah.
00:31:11
Speaker
And lock yourself in and not be seen as more. Exactly. And you'll even see there could be a new role on your team that comes up for the exact same thing you're doing and they'll offer that person way more than they're paying you, right? So I would always,
Career Advancement Strategies
00:31:26
Speaker
I left every single year I got a new job when I was working and my salary was able to go up significantly even though it was within the same company. So I would say
00:31:36
Speaker
Consider job hopping. People think it leaves a bad rep, but honestly, in 2023, I think... If you do it right, I think, and if you do it strategically, right? Like we're not saying go mess up your reputation and then try to find another job because that won't speak well of you. But I think even within, I like that you said within the same company and even like in that career strategy, right? Within the same, if you don't want to change organizations,
00:32:03
Speaker
then just within the same company move around and move up because you'll find again every move can be leveraged and I think staying in the same job will hurt you more than it will help. Yeah it definitely hurts you and even another tip I guess would be to negotiate your
00:32:22
Speaker
like raises every year, because even if you are going to stay in the same job, say you don't want to, you can still ask for raises every single year. And that's what I did. Whenever I was there for more than a year, I asked for, I asked for a raise, right? Um, and not just a cost. And 90% of the time you get it. Yeah. And again, you, you miss a hundred percent of the shots that you do not take. So you might as well ask if they say no. Okay. But at least, at least ask. I love that you miss a hundred percent of the shots that you don't take final tip.
00:32:51
Speaker
One tip, I guess it's a career tip, but I think it helps you is to get a mentor within the space that you are in. I find that mentorship has helped me accelerate my career and again, get more money long-term because they have gone where you want to go and they can tell you the mistakes that they've made on that path.
00:33:13
Speaker
So if you are sharing, if you ask them specific questions, obviously be very intentional about the questions that you have for your mentor. It's very, it's, it allows you to not make mistakes that could be otherwise costly. Yeah. Oh no, that's very true. And, and again, all through, you know, at the beginning of the podcast to talk to a lot about you networked and then you networked and then you networked, right?
00:33:36
Speaker
So networking is, it goes hand in hand with that mentorship is that you're leveraging your mentor to help your network. And then you're leveraging your network to get to, you know, new mentors and new opportunities and whatnot. This has been a really, really, really great conversation. Um, where can folks find you? So
Social Media and Community Impact
00:33:56
Speaker
I call this my shameless plug for folks who don't yet know you, where can they find you on YouTube, on Instagram, Tik TOK, wherever.
00:34:04
Speaker
Yes, you can find me on instagram at X O Reni at youtube at X O Reni. That's X O R E N I on tiktok at X O X O Reni all the platforms bidding pretty much. I have a website called Reni the resource calm and I also have a podcast that is coming out season two is coming out very shortly. My podcast is called don't go broke trying and it helps you to not go broke trying to live your best life. So I actually have an episode called
00:34:33
Speaker
Don't go broke trying to job hop because there are right ways and wrong ways to do it I also have don't go broke trying to build your career and i'm bringing on two recruiters on my podcast So yeah season two is coming out soon You can find out all platforms like spotify stitcher apple podcast all of them So, um, yeah, and if you go on my page x or any you'll get links to all of these things as well
00:34:53
Speaker
Wonderful, wonderful. Well, thank you so, so, so much. This is great. Every time I come on your page, I love the professionalism of your content, your consistency, and I like being seen in terms of, as a Black-Canadian, seeing someone sharing links, and it's not Amazon.com, it's Amazon.ca, those little things. So keep doing you and keep shining.
00:35:21
Speaker
rooting for you and just know that you're really trailblazing and that's something that all of us I think as Canadians and as Black women benefit from. So thanks again and let's keep slaying together. Yes, thank you for having me. I appreciate it.