Transcript
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The thing that you need to answer for yourself is why am I doing this?
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The reason I got my PE is because it was one of those things that, for me, was like.
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It was the pinnacle of what I could achieve in my engineering career.
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It was something I had dreamed about since I was in college.
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It was something that, at the end of the day, I had to prove to myself that I could do.
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And the day I passed, my bosses didn't care.
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I didn't get a raise, I didn't get care in her office, nothing happened for me.
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There was certainly like an amount of frustration over that or disappointment, and, at the end of the day, the reason I got my PE is because in every room I'm going to walk into for the rest of my career, I can walk in and say I'm Stephanie and I'm a professional engineer, and nobody can take it away from me.
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What is going on?
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L&m family.
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I am super excited to introduce to you my friend, ms Stephanie Reichman.
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If you are flirting with the idea of making a career pivot, ms Stephanie has got what you need.
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She can help you get there.
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She's got a PE license License that's the right way to say it right which isn't a small thing.
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It's actually a pretty monumental thing, which means she's like practicing engineer and she's never done a day of engineering, because she has the courage to make ginormous shifts in her life so that she can continue to grow and serve in big, meaningful ways.
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So I'm super excited that you get to talk to her so I can learn from her as well.
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And if you don't know who I am, I'm Jesse.
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I get to host this learnings and missteps podcast, where I get to highlight the windy paths successful people walk and pull some of the lessons they learned along the way so you can take them and apply them to your path.
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And with that, miss Stephanie, how are you doing, sister?
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Hi, jancy.
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That is such a phenomenal intro.
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Your energy just like exudes, and I am here for it.
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We've obviously had some conversation before this.
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I always look forward to our chat.
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Even if I'm having not the best day ever, I know that talking to you is going to put a giant smile on my face.
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So thank you for what you do.
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Super excited to be here.
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Well, we might as well give the audience a heads up, right Like you and I, every time we get to talking, we get to talking.
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So hang on, people, we're going to have some fun here today.
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So, stephanie, you and I connected on LinkedIn, which which that seems to be a theme with most of the awesome guests that I have here that we've connected on LinkedIn in some form or fashion, and I don't know.
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From my perspective, it looks like you just slammed on the gas with this pivot, your career thing, which I think is beautiful.
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So many people need it because they're wrapped up, they kind of have handcuffs and but they're imaginary, like they're in their head, and you're helping them with that.
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So I absolutely want to talk about that, what you're doing now, all the things you have to offer.
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I absolutely want to learn how you got there, and I'd like to start with what are the juicy, savory nuggets that people need to know about?
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You miss step, stephanie.
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Okay, well, that was a lot to unpack, but we'll start maybe with the end.
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Everyone loves to talk about themselves, so I'll start there.
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Juicy Nugget, I'm originally from Staten Island, new York.
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Staten Island used to be just nothing, but then there was the Jersey Shore and Pete Davidson and now Staten Island's cool again, so I'm originally from there.
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When I had to take a major for college, I had no idea what to do.
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I was super confused.
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My older brother is an engineer and when he told people he was an engineer, everyone would have the exact same reaction.
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Everyone would say wow, you must be so smart.
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And as a middle child and seeing that a couple of years older than me, I was like what's the thing I can do?
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That too, I'm smart.
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There are like so many flaws in that whole thought process, but that didn't actually get me to engineering.
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So I appreciate all those white-eyed people.
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So I do have a civil engineering degree, an undergrad and a master's, because I just love school so much.
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And then, of course, I think I joked about this at some point, like if you're really confused about your career, just go get a master's.
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It's terrible advice, don't do it.
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So what I want to dig on that a little.
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I'm sorry to cut you off, but because I've had so many conversations with people that are stuck or frustrated or not having the best experience and they default to well, I'm going to go get my master's.
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And then it's almost as if there's this line of think that, well, say, a pathway that says if you get your master's, then your experience is going to be better in the field that you're at.
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Where does that?
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Is it because you gave everybody that advice?
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Or like, where do you think that comes from?
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Let me clarify that I grew up in a household where it was very expected for me to get a master's, and it was a disappointing time when I announced I was not getting a PhD.
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So that's where I grew up from Now, when I got my master's, I thought it was going to mean certain things for me in my career.
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I thought when I was going to start looking for a job I would have a line out the door of employers just begging me to come work for them at a six-figure salary right out of school.
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And that didn't happen.
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Far from it.
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It was not at all what happened.
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I also now very often get that question of I'm kind of stuck in my career, I don't know what's next.
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I'm thinking about getting a master's or a certificate.
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What do you recommend?
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What do you suggest?
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And I hate that question because, I agree with you, it's almost ingrained in us Go.
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And I hate that question because, I agree with you, it's almost ingrained in us Go, do this extra thing.
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And then suddenly all these things will happen.
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And in my own experience and the experience of people around me, the people that I've worked with, that's just not the case.
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I think if your employer says to you I'm going to pay for you to get this degree so that you can move into this role.
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Heck, you can go for it if you've stopped the capabilities for it, but to just stop working, lose out on that.
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It's a huge financial aspect to it.
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Master's programs are not cheap, and so I think it's really important to realize that you're going to dedicate a year, two years to a degree or certification, whatever it might be.
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Without any guarantees is a really scary place to be.
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I agree and I want to be clear.
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I applaud people that make the sacrifice to do that, because a lot of people are doing it with a family, maintaining a job, like they're taking on the load, and that's tremendous sacrifice, tremendous effort, tremendous commitment and it doesn't always work out.
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I mean, I have several friends that have their EdD and education and higher level degrees, post-grad degrees, and they needed it and it has 100% amplified their career path.
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But I have a lot of friends that same thing and it just it's just more letters at the end of their name.
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So, trying to figure out which way to go, I wonder what is?
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What are some of the criteria that people should consider, since you've walked that path?
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Yeah, so I've actually walked the path twice now, one with the degree and once with the certification, so I can come at it from two different directions.
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But just like to back up a little bit.
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I got my professional engineering license three years ago now and it was the same thing.
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The reason, I think, or the thing that you need to answer for yourself, is why am I doing this?
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So, if I'm walking back, the reason I got my PE is because it was one of those things that, for me, was like it was the pinnacle of what I could achieve in my engineering career.
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It was something I had dreamed about since I was in college.
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It was something that, at the end of the day, I had the proof to myself that I could do.
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Yeah, yes, I love that.
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And the day I passed, my bosses didn't care.
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I didn't get a raise, I didn't get care in her office, nothing happened for me.
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But and yes, there was certainly like an amount of frustration over that or disappointment.
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And at the end of the day, the reason I got my PE is because in every room I'm going to walk into for the rest of my career, I can walk in and say I'm Stephanie and I'm a professional engineer and nobody can take it away from me Nobody, and that's why I did it.
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The master's, in a sense, was also kind of the same reason, but I did both those things entirely for myself.
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I committed a ton of time to doing them.
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Was it the right decision?
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For somebody else, probably not, but for me it was, and I think it really has to be a feeling thing more than anything.
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And the realization that a master's is certification, those do kind of walk alongside you for your entire career, should you choose to utilize them.
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That's like it.
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No, I think two things you said that are ultra powerful.
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One is kind of stinky powerful and one is real power, like for real.
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They can't, nobody can take that away from you, and you did it to prove to yourself.
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That was the thing, and I think that's beautiful, because there's so many different things, so many different challenges that we can pick, or that we sit on the edge of picking because we're afraid or we are not sure, but when we actually do the damn thing, then it's man, I got game Like I can.
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This thing in front of me is not as big because I just did this thing over here.
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The not so beautiful thing is like the rest of the world doesn't care.
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You said like your bosses, they didn't get you a, you didn't get the corner office, you didn't get the special park, you just went back to work and kept doing the same thing I worked with back in the day one of my team members had just got his plumbing license and it's a big deal, right Like he did his stuff that he needed to do, went down to the state board of plumbing examiners here in Texas, took the test, passed the test, got his journeyman's license and I believed he should get a raise.
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So I called the boss, like boss, and said hey, so-and-so just passed this thing and we need to give him something.
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And the words that boss said back were why are we going to get?
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He's the same dumb ass he was yesterday and I was like, okay, but that's not cool, that's just not cool and it's kind of true.
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And so in there, I think there's this thing about intrinsic motivation.
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Right, if we pursue certain certificates, degrees, et cetera, and we're doing it that's motivated by an extrinsic situation, I think we're setting ourselves up for disappointment.
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What do you think?
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And before we get to know a little bit more about Miss Stephanie, I want to do the L&M family shout out to Mr Adam Hoots, dj Hooty Hoots, he left me this cool little thought.
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He said this book will have you reflecting on your own life and the learnings and missteps you took.
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Solid work, jesse, and the book he's talking about is Becoming the Promise you Are Intended to Be.
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So, hoots, thank you, and the rest of the L&M family members out there, shoot me a comment, a DM, it doesn't matter.
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I want to highlight you as much and as often as I possibly can.
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I definitely agree with that.
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I will say, with your plumbing example, I think it kind of takes it to the next level of, once you do all those things, that's not where the work ends for you.
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Those things, that's not where the work ends for you.
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Once you're done, you need to restart the cycle and start advocating for yourself, because you aren't the same dumb ass you were yesterday, because you're now a dumb ass plus your plumbing license, and that is a difference.
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I love it.
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Okay, this is a big one.
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Is that a class that you took in your master's course, or how did you learn and master how to advocate for yourself?
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So I feel, like all these sets of things, it probably has something to do with my childhood, but in all seriousness, this is totally a tangent, but I was actually.
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I'm an immigrant.
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I was born overseas and moved to New York when I was nine and I didn't speak any English and was like wow, this is kind of strange, because nobody can speak the languages that I'm conversing in, and I need to figure it out Because otherwise I will always be the weirdo using colored pencils instead of crayons.
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I still don't like crayons.
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That's so awesome.
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They're very triggering.
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And I think it kind of got to that.
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I saw it really early on where people would just assume that I wasn't good at math or I wasn't good at English, which I wasn't, or wasn't good at vocabulary or something like that, and teachers would make remarks or kids would make remarks and it would get to the point where it's no, I don't agree with you.
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And kind of looking around you and saying the teacher just said that Are you just going to take it?
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Because, like, who else is going to stick up for you?
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My mom's not in the class.
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And I think it just kind of kept building on itself until yeah, myself until yeah, and had a lot of years of practice and advocating for myself.
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But yeah, I think it just came out of cheering me, don't looking around and being like are you gonna take again?
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yeah.
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No, I think I love that you take can connect it back to, like your, the experiences you had in your formative years, because a lot of stuff happens in that time.
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Now there's a bigger conversation that we probably shouldn't touch about properly advocating for oneself and improperly advocating.
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My assumption is that you did it with tact.
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Whereas you know me, stephanie, and the rest of the family out there knows me, I didn't.
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It was like I did it the worst way you possibly can and it didn't.
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It caused some pain, some learning pains for me, which was fine because it got me attention.
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Attention is good, all attention is good.
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Attention in Jesse land.
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Now, under the assumption that you advocated for yourself with tact, in an amicable manner, did you still face some kind of judgment, resistance or friction when you do advocate for yourself, and how'd you deal with it?
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Yeah, great question.
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So I think as my confidence level grew, especially in my career, I had a degree like my engineering degree.
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I take a lot of pride in that and that made me feel a certain type of way walking into a room the PEs of that too and I think as I gained that confidence, people around me were getting kind of uncomfortable by what I had already achieved, and I think that then causes a bit of an imbalance perceived imbalance because I might be asking for something that I think I'm worth because of my self-worth being tied to these things that I've accomplished, but other people aren't, don't have that kind of background and maybe they believe in the school of hard knocks and you should have this experience and you need to send 20 years' pay to your desk before you can even think about asking something like that.
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And I'd come here that's amazing, though I'd be like no, I think I deserve a raise.
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And so I think that there certainly has been a lot of like mismatches, like getting my porn across there, and my personal belief and and what I work with other people on is you can say anything you want, as long as it's the truth and you're being respectful.
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That's always been my guiding principle, and if someone can't accept that, if they can't accept the truth that you know a thing, but as long as you're being respectful, then you're having just a conversation about it.
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Not everything needs to be like, okay, we're getting ready for war, we're not getting ready for war, we are simply gonna have a for war, we are simply going to have a conversation as adults.
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And it's the person that's refuting that conversation and they're melting up a war.
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Well then, it's maybe not the right person, not the right time.
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They're just not open to having the conversation at all.
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And it wouldn't matter if you had the 30 years of experience.
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They still don't want to have that conversation with you.
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Yeah, yeah, that's so true.
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There's some people that, jay, they just can't hear anything.
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So it don't matter what the tone is or when you're going to have it, it's wasted breath, like they, just it's not going to penetrate.
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Now, what would you recommend?
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I get to talk with a lot of young professionals, and when I say young, I mean like the first 10 years of their career.
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I think that's age-wise, that's not a lot of time.
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Well, when you have highlights, like me, 10 years isn't a lot of time.
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But I see a curious thing and this is not a generational question, because I saw it when I was right out of high school, working in the field and so forth.
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So it's a thing that's happened the whole way through.
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But I see some young professionals that will not advocate for themselves and they're utterly irritated, disappointed and frustrated because the environment doesn't accommodate them and that's not good for that mental wellness, right, that's really not good for them as an individual.
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So they're pretty damn miserable.
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But when they advocate for themselves, I wouldn't qualify it as advocating, because it's really just complaining.
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When they complain and send an email to the CEO because nobody's listening to me, what do you suggest?
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That young professional that doesn't speak up for themselves, to their direct supervisor or to their immediate circle of colleagues and advocate for themselves.
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What do you recommend they do to start like to start doing it so that they can get some results, because I know you've done it like your career path shows that you're just not going to tolerate so much for so long.
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That's the way I'm reading.
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Yeah, what do you say?
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First of all, I love that question because I think it's really easy to go out there and say advocate for yourself and negotiate that salary, and then people are like, yeah, but then you're kind of left with I don't know how or what, or like even how to talk about that.
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So love that question.
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I think it's a couple different pieces.
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First of all, for me, especially in my working kind of career, when I learned flash understood what well-employment meant, that was like a mindset You're excited, yes, because I think, because I have a lot of friends they work in like different industries, different jobs, and so often it'll be like years of I hate this and my boss sucks and I'm not getting the promotion, I'm not getting the raise, and every single time it's the same question why don't you leave?
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You're not required to stay there.
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Pn7, for anyone listening to this, if you don't like your job, you don't have to stay.
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It's not said enough.
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I remember, like one of my jobs, that I wasn't getting the fulfillment that I had wanted and somebody close to me had said well, you should stay at this job for at least this number of years.
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And I remember being so taken aback because I was like, oh, I should, probably that makes sense.
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Like I don't want to be seen as like a job huffer or this or that.
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But in the meantime, to your earlier point, like your mental health is suffering, you're not happy, maybe you, maybe you've advocated, maybe you've had conversations, but like the company is just, it is what it is, and so at Will.
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Employment.
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Number one thing you can leave whenever you want my designation letter.
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Don't burn any bridges, just say thank you and just move on.
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Number one I want to say that is.
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I know how difficult that is, but I also know that pick your boss right.
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Pick the people you work with, because if they're buttheads it's not going to be fun.
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Unless they're your flavor of butthead, it doesn't take long to figure out that you're in an unhealthy environment.
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Right the conditions of the workspace, regardless of how fancy the damn website was and the recruiter made everything sound.
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When you actually go sit and share space, you can feel it and you don't have.
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You could leave, you can leave.
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I think when you realize that you hold so much power you hold all the power of your own life, in your own career and being able to say I thought this was for me, but it's not there is so much power in that statement instead of saying like I'm gonna make it work, I'm to wait for the next review cycle, the next one's going to be mine I'm going to prove myself blah, blah, blah, because once those things start happening like it's not going to get better and I hate being the person to burst your bubble if you think that it is going to get better, but it probably isn't- oh, so true, so true.
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Right to work, right to leave, like, just make your own conditions.
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Now you and I have talked about it and, looking on your LinkedIn profile, you've made some significant shifts in terms of careers, so you're not just saying hypothetically make a better choice for yourself.
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You've done it.
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Now.
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Was it easy?
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What was it like?
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What did it feel like when you made the first jump from?
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I think you were in like an engineer and then it was like wait a minute, they this.
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They said vanilla, this ain't vanilla.
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Yeah.
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So I worked for a engineering company as a project manager and I saw it.
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The reason I got my master's, the reason I really did my whole career up until that point, was to be a project manager.
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So when I got to that point and became a project manager was like this is not fun.
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I didn't like it for several different reasons.
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It was a lot more stress than I wanted and a stress that I didn't enjoy and I maybe didn't really have the tools that I needed to be successful in that ring and that was really hard.
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And I was very obsessed with title and that was really important to me was to have that project manager title because I thought that again, that was going to unlock the next level for me.
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And so I went into that role without really thinking about like, how are they going to train me?
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How are they going to help me actually be successful?
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So when I realized that wasn't a job for me again in my civil engineering school days, it was only true path that, like an engineer, could go down.
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It was either you worked for an engineering company, which I had done I didn't like, or you can go work in construction, which I yeah, I had always really enjoyed construction.
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I had four internships that were really construction heavy and I was like heck, yeah, let's go do it.
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I actually started a virtual design and construction team for this general contractor, which again was like a very fancy title.
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I didn't consider training again Some people don't learn from their mistake that is me but I did have quite a bit of background in like that BDNC space, so I felt comfortable with that.
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How do I feel making that transition?
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I was terrified.
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I was yeah, I mean I was really excited.
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I think I was a lot more cognizant of the fact that I didn't have this experience of like how to start a department.
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It was very exciting, but also really scary.
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I think I had a lot of but I did it, I did it.
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I had a lot of support in the early days of what that vision looked like and then was able to run with it.
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But yeah, that's that pivot.
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The first time was pretty scary run with it.
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But yeah, that pivot the first time was pretty scary.
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Okay, you said an arrangement of words that I think probably need to be my next neck tattoo.
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You said about your first job that it was stress, but it wasn't the kind of stress that you enjoy.
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So what I like about those words is there is no escaping stress.
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I mean, unless you know the secret, stress is just a part of life, but there's stress that sucks the life out of us.
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And then there's stress that you enjoy.
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So how would you describe the stress that you enjoy, stephanie and the reason I'm asking this is so that we can cause a little bit of a mind shift to the younglings out there that are listening to this it's not all bad.
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Think about what it is and frame it in such a way that you can use it as fuel.
