Anessa Fike, author of The Revolution of Work, F!ck the Patriarchy, discusses her book and the need to dismantle the current systems in the workplace. She shares her journey into fractional HR and explains that fractional work allows organizations to have experts on a part-time basis at a fraction of the cost. Anessa talks about her decision to write the book and her choice of title, emphasizing the need for an uprising and the dismantling of patriarchal elements in society. She hopes that the book will empower those who already think this way and encourage conversations about change. The conversation explores the need for a revolution in the workplace, addressing issues such as obliviousness of leaders, the need for self-reflection, the rise of fractional work, the role of AI, the challenges with founder CEOs, the lack of diversity in funding, and the importance of pay equity. The conversation emphasizes the need for change and the role of allies in creating a more inclusive and equitable work environment.
[00:00:00] Hide your kids, lock the doors! You're listening to HR's most dangerous podcast. Chad Soosh and Joel Cheeseman are here to punch the recruiting industry right where it hurts.
[00:00:11] Complete with breaking news, rash opinion, and loads of snark. Buckle up boys and girls. It's time for the Chad and Cheese Podcasts. Oh, yeah. It's King Arthur's, I mean, Charles' favorite podcast, aka the Chad and Cheese Podcast. I'm your co-host Joel Cheeseman.
[00:00:33] And joined as always, the Harry to my William Chad Soosh is in the house as we welcome Anessa Fike, author of The Revolution of Work. Fuck the Patriarchy. Jeez, you kiss your mom with that mouth. Fuck the Patriarchy and the workplace it built.
[00:00:51] And she is also CEO and founder of Fike and Co. Anessa, welcome to HR's most dangerous podcast. Thank you. I am here for it. And yes, if you read the book, you'll understand a little bit more about my mom.
[00:01:06] And she's part of the reason I am this way. So yes, she is very around the whole day. Tell me about your mother. Let's go to Blade, right on this one. Nothing wrong about... No, we don't have time for that. We got a book to talk about.
[00:01:16] Okay, we can get into therapy sessions later for God's sake. Let's get into Anessa first. Perfect podcast to be on to actually already start dropping the fuck bomb. That's awesome. Yes. But yeah, let's get a little Twitter bio of you. Joel gave a little bit...
[00:01:32] Give us a little bit more about you other than foul mouth, which is fine with us. Right, right. Love that so much. Thank you for the inclusivity of the... Cuss words. I love it. We're here.
[00:01:44] I have done fractional HR. I've been a fractional Chief People Officer for almost 11 years. So one of the very first to do fractional in our space. And I've worked with over 120 organizations in 30 plus countries and have pretty much seen
[00:01:59] every stage of a business and in almost every industry except for oil and gas. So if there are M&As, if there are scaling, de-scaling and everything in between, I've kind of seen it across the space. Define fractional for the listeners.
[00:02:16] Right. So fractional is when you need an expert in a space, doesn't have to be an HR, could be in other things, that you want to have them in your organization, but you may not be able to afford them at a full-time salary.
[00:02:29] So you need an expert for a fraction of the time at a fraction of the cost. It's a sexy way to say part-time, cheese man. Yeah. Sort of. Yeah. I'm here for the listeners that might not know. What actually moved you into fractional?
[00:02:42] What made you think that fractional was needed? Were you working with startups or were you working with smaller companies? What actually pushed you into fractional? You know what? It's funny because we didn't call it fractional almost 11 years ago. We called it interim or consulting.
[00:02:58] That was really where it started, but I didn't know anyone else in our industry doing it. And actually when I left the Bontlie Fool, I wanted to create something that I hadn't seen. I actually wanted to have a good life balance.
[00:03:13] And so I said, what do I want my life to look like? And then I backed into the business model using actually the subscription membership sort of service of the Mollie Fool and going, how can I make that work?
[00:03:23] But for me, not in an agency way, not in the typical business model way of what had been there before. And I kind of came up with this fractional thing. So that's winning. It was really just me going, well, I want to do cool.
[00:03:37] I'm going to make that happen. Yeah. Back in the day, I was 15. I was a fractional fry cook. That's that's what I was. Here you go. Fractional fry cook. Now he's a fractional podcaster. That's just like me. Fuck you. This is full time.
[00:03:50] OK, so let's jump into the book. So the book is a future work in the way that dismantles the current systems, right? It creates space for employees, etc., etc. I mean, you're actually looking at imploding the current system
[00:04:05] and moving in an entirely different direction before we get into that because this is an interesting concept right out of the gate. We've been doing this shit for way too long in this current framework. Right? What was the journey to actually get here to write the book?
[00:04:19] Because I mean, writing the books, one thing, you've had to have a lot more not just experience but engagements. I mean, how did you get here from a book writing standpoint? Yeah, so it's funny. So I actually was a journalist before I fell into HR.
[00:04:34] You know, we all kind of fall into this. But now it comes out. Yeah, I was a newspaper reporter, a Winner Press Award. It was back when journalism was going like it was just a shit show.
[00:04:44] Everyone was like, what are we doing and what do we put online? You know, I'm dating myself a little bit, but is it not a shit show anymore? Yeah, we were there for it and it's still a shit show.
[00:04:58] You're right. And I was like, OK, so I knew I wanted to write a book. I knew I always wanted to write a book. I actually have a master's in English as well. And so I was like, I want to write a book.
[00:05:07] I always said I would write a fiction book. Well, then fast forward, I guess, to October 2022. And Forbes actually reached out to me and they said, we actually would love if you wrote a book about HR. And I said, funny, you should ask me for Forbes.
[00:05:24] But thank you for the kick in the pants. And I asked a lot of questions, decided that Forbes was not the publisher for me. And then I found a publishing organization that was like, I'm here for you. Why wasn't Forbes? You're going way too fast, Anessa.
[00:05:40] Why wasn't Forbes the place to go? So I had a lot of questions for Forbes. You know, there's a lot of years where we've all seen the HR councils, the write ups, everything that Forbes has been doing. And I knew of a couple very particular instances
[00:05:58] where they were not practicing what they preached, right? They were not kind of this inclusive space. And I had a lot of questions around the authors that they were working with. Tell me about the authors, tell me about who you're working with.
[00:06:11] Tell me about what what topics you're excited to have people talk about and publish this year. And they actually had really awful answers. So when I would ask them about diversity numbers, when I would ask them about how do you support your authors?
[00:06:25] It all was like really fluffy and they didn't have good answers to the point where one of the representatives from their publishing arm said to me, we'll just go look at our website and you'll see all of our authors.
[00:06:39] And I'm like, do you realize that if I did that as a nature of professional and I just like self decided what everyone's background ethnicity was that this that's illegal? And they're like, oh, it is. And I'm like, yes.
[00:06:52] So clearly, I don't think this is going to work out because I'm going to push you. And I don't think you're going to like when and where I push you. And they were like, well, you know, it's not they're like, we really want to have you.
[00:07:06] And I'm like, yeah, I don't think this is going to work out. So realistically, it was just they were not aligned in the same way of what I wanted to do with this book, which was to start a movement,
[00:07:16] to start the conversation, to have us actually do things differently. OK, well, talk about where you did land. Yeah. So I landed with a female publishing organization in Colorado, outside of Colorado, and it's called Grace Point Matrix Publishing.
[00:07:31] And from the start of this journey with them, I said, I want to do things differently. I do not want to do publishing in the same way. We're in 2024 and publishing is actually still a very archaic industry.
[00:07:44] It's it's so interesting when you're looking at it, you're like, wait, are we in the 1950s or are we in the 2020s? And they early on said to me, we are going to be here with you for you. And we're going to push boundaries together.
[00:07:58] And we're going to tell you what the traditional way of doing it is. But if you want to do it a different way, we are here to do that too. And so they were a good guide throughout to say, this is how people typically do it.
[00:08:08] We're OK with it with you doing it this way. Just know that this is going to be you're going to basically be pushing boundaries within the publishing system while you're also pushing a book that's pushing boundaries outside of that system as well.
[00:08:21] And so I was like, OK, let's do it. So, Nessa, I'm very apt to ask a startup how they came up with the name of their company. And with authors, I typically ask what's up with the title.
[00:08:32] This title is a little bit more risque and interesting than others. Talk about how you came up with the Revolution of Work, fuck the patriarchy and the workplace that it built. Take us on that journey.
[00:08:44] Yeah. So the Revolution of Work, I knew that I wanted it to be that. So the base title was there from the start. I don't know about you all, but I get so freaking tired and I roll my eyes so hard at the future of work.
[00:08:57] Because most of what happens in the future of work is like, I did that shit 10 years ago. I don't know what you guys are talking about, but like the future of work, like, what are we talking about?
[00:09:06] And so for me, every time I hear that, I just roll my eyes and I expect to hear something that somebody somewhere decided was new, but we've been doing it. And so I was like really excited to do something different.
[00:09:18] I was like, we need something other than the future of work. For me, the Revolution was we need uprising. We need to dismantle really a lot of what the system has been. And we needed something that was going to be more active.
[00:09:31] The future of work is like this fluffy thing that I think a lot of us think about out in space somewhere of like 10 years from now, we're going to do this. But I think with that, we're doing ourselves a disservice
[00:09:43] and that we don't actually get shit done quick enough. And it doesn't move the needle fast enough to where it needs to be. And so for me, I'm like, OK, Revolution of work. I want that the second part, the subtitle came
[00:09:55] after I had written a good portion of the body of the book. And I went through I had rearranged chapters a few times and I was like, what is the thing that is key? What's the thread? Right. What is the thread? What does this keep coming back to?
[00:10:11] And every time that I looked at it and said, OK, let me look at it from this angle, it was the systems, the capitalism, the patriarchal elements that are in our society. That's what it kept kept budding up against.
[00:10:24] And so for me, I was like, you know what? And I said to a friend of mine, I just want to call it fuck the patriarchy in the workplace at Bilt. And she said, why don't you? And I'm like, OK, that's the name of it.
[00:10:36] So my initial thought was OK, well, it's good click bait in terms of selling books. And Chad and I know what was best as anybody that you can't bore people into watching or consuming. Right. Stuff.
[00:10:48] So we had a conversation a year or so ago about the use of Karen and that Karen had basically replaced a bitch. So if someone's a Karen, they're now a bitch. It's just a more, I guess, strategically more camouflaged way of saying it.
[00:11:04] Did you think that there was any risk of a woman writing a book that's like, fuck the patriarchy that you would be viewed as a quote, unquote Karen and that would dilute your message or damn the torpedoes. This is what I think.
[00:11:15] And this is what I'm putting out there. I think that for me, it's a little bit more than the Karen's for that perspective around. I think anyone who knows me will say this about it. I try to use my privilege for good.
[00:11:30] I have always been that person who will you who is understanding of my white privilege and I will always use it for good. Because guess what? Because of my packaging, I can push harder and I should push harder
[00:11:43] for others that don't look like me who are not able to push as hard. And so for me, this book was like, hey, I'm going to push as hard as I can push because I don't care if it's actually at my detriment.
[00:11:56] I'm trying to make it better for other people who don't look like me. And so for me, it's that it's I think the ownership and the onus that we as white people need to take because racism is racism. All these patriarchal elements, they're not going to solve themselves.
[00:12:10] We need to be more active parts in that. And so I think it's almost the opposite of a Karen, right? A Karen is someone who's like, oh, and they cry white privilege. I am kind of flipping that on its head to say, I know I have white privilege.
[00:12:24] I have a hell of a lot of it. And I'm actually going to use that to the full extent that I can so that other people have an easier way. I will say that like I am actually one of those people who
[00:12:35] I kind of get this like rush when someone calls me a bitch back to my mom. She is the person you'll read this in the book who said who I learned like very early in my life, someone called her a bitch when I was younger.
[00:12:46] And she said, I'm not a bitch. I'm the bitch. Get it right. And so for me, I was like, OK, here we go. This is like a thing where it's like a kind of a pride thing, right? Where it's like you're doing something that matters.
[00:12:59] You are doing something that's pushing the boundaries. And that's why people are uncomfortable. So that said, who do you hope reads this book? I hope that, you know, it's funny. I actually this is something that I went back and forth on
[00:13:11] when I was writing the book a lot. And I thought, am I going to get the people right? Where it's like we all know what political side that is never going to read this book. My goal is to help the people who already think this way
[00:13:26] be more active and verbal and secondarily to help the people who are like, I don't know where I land, but I'm kind of in the middle to maybe skew this side. And I also want people to to realistically read the book
[00:13:42] and just start the conversations to know that they're not alone, to know that they're not the only ones seeing this thing, to know that they're not isolated, that their feelings are validated and what they've experienced is valid
[00:13:55] and that there are way more people out here than they ever thought there were feeling the exact same way. So I've had hundreds of people reach out to me that I don't know on LinkedIn and other socials
[00:14:05] that have said, oh, my gosh, thank you for just writing this because I don't feel alone. You've said the same thing I've said in my head for years. I thought it was the only one experiencing this and I'm not.
[00:14:15] And so I think it's those people that maybe were quiet about it that now feel like they don't have to be. And then also people in the middle that are like, I don't know what to do, but I know this this work isn't working.
[00:14:28] And so what can I do to make a change? Yes, let's let's pivot real quick to the actual construct of work. Right. So the book is very critical of the current work environments, which often suppress employee engagement and perpetuate you know, gender and racial inequalities.
[00:14:46] It cites statistics, you know, like from Gallup to highlight widespread disengagement, productivity losses and contemporary workplaces. Although, Vanessa, old white dudes are trying to get people back in the office. Right. So so everyone back in the office, it's very anti-female in many cases.
[00:15:04] And also, you know, we've also talked about productivity losses, which are blamed on remote work, aka or in creativity, aka what's this fuck the CEO of Nike? Right. So your thoughts on that construct, it really feels like it's being forced back on all of workers.
[00:15:24] Give us some feedback. The research that you've you've actually performed, not to mention your thoughts on where we should be moving. Yeah. So I think that and I go back to this a lot. I think there is a certain type of leader who wants to have someone
[00:15:41] with a button seat, right? There's a couple of reasons for that. None of us are oblivious to those reasons. Number one is they pay the hell of a lot of money for that space and they don't want it to go unused. We understand that, right?
[00:15:55] Two, it's someone who doesn't actually deep down believe in their own managerial sense and the way that they manage. And they don't want to work on that. And so it's easier for them. It's the lazy way to manage by seeing someone in person.
[00:16:11] The third piece is that there's this like normalization that we've tried to all get back to post COVID. And the normalization is that we're just acting like it didn't happen. There's lots of trauma we're not dealing with in the workplace.
[00:16:25] We're just trying to just we're just all in denial, right? Like a lot of us are some of us are not. But a lot of us are in denial around like, hey, let's just get back to what it was pre COVID, right?
[00:16:34] Like, let's just act like it didn't happen. And I think that those three things are why we're seeing so many people being pushed back to offices and none of those are good. None of those are good reasons. It's not about, hey, we actually feel like
[00:16:50] people are more engaged or they are able to do better work because they're in an office. That's not the conversation. Productivity rates increased during COVID when everyone was remote. People who were disabled were able to work and find better and more work when they were remote, right?
[00:17:08] Highest rates ever. Highest rates ever. And by the way, engagement rates are abysmal, right? They're abysmal right now. They're at the lowest that we've probably seen in a really long time, if ever. And we keep trying to fit this very square peg into this very round
[00:17:26] whole of like, if we can just get people into the office, it'll solve everything because we solved everything pre COVID, right? Everything was solved and all engagement scores were through the roof and everyone loved going to work, right? It was completely solved pre COVID. It wasn't.
[00:17:42] But we just act like it was. It's this whole thing where it's just really, if you're paying attention, you understand what's going on. And I think that business leaders don't understand that every person, nearly every person that works for them is seeing through this.
[00:18:02] They're so translucent at this point. We can see right through what they are saying they want to do. I just saw Samsung is saying there's a crisis and they want people to work six days a week. Six days, baby.
[00:18:14] And I was just like, oh my gosh, Samsung doing their employees way dirty. Like what are you trying to do? So it's just it's like these people are just showcasing to the world that they don't get it. And that's really the point, right? They don't get it.
[00:18:30] So for me, it's really just around like when I see these things pop up, I'm just like, you just you're not getting it. So, you know, we'll see what that what that ends up with over the next couple of years.
[00:18:41] I think they're just going to see Max Exodus of employees leaving. And then they're going to have to make a real call as to like, do we even have enough employees to keep the business running if we act this way?
[00:18:51] Well, I mean, you've got a bunch of females who can't right? Or they're choosing not to because kids they they again, we were treated like or forced to be treated like adults during covid. And now it's like you're all kids come back and into the office.
[00:19:10] Now, again, we see where the issue is. The question is how do we get back there? Obviously, manager training, helping CEOs better understand, you know, that they have to retool. I mean, what do we have to do to get on a different track? That's the big question.
[00:19:28] We know there is this ball of just jacked up shit that's happening right now. Totally get it. How do we get away from that? I think the first thing is realizing there's a problem, right? That is the first thing.
[00:19:40] If we don't name the problem, we don't see the problem. We don't start from what is the problem we're trying to solve. I think that there are a ton of CEOs and leaders out there that are still super oblivious to this.
[00:19:54] They're super oblivious to what actually makes their company run. They're super oblivious to, you know, as we've all seen over the last several years, understanding how HR and TA leaders are strategic movements within their organization. I think that it's first naming that there's a problem.
[00:20:10] The second piece is understanding where you actually are as a business so that you can work from it. If you don't know where your starting block is, how do you know when the race ends or if it ends? And so you have to have a starting point.
[00:20:24] And that starting point is to get really clear on where you actually are. And then I would say from there it's interesting. There's I've done a few revolution of work retreats. And what we talk about is what are all the things broken and work
[00:20:39] and everyone gets through and post it. And there are basically like 40 or 50 post it's per person that we put up on a wall. And then I ask, what do we have to keep? What do we need in work?
[00:20:49] And literally those same people put three to five things up. So that shows you just the difference, right? There are 40 to 50 things that people can put on a post that are broken with work. And if you actually think about what we need to make work successful
[00:21:02] and what we need to keep, it's very few things. So I almost think that we need a complete like overhaul. We need a complete revolution. We need to really start over and ask why we're doing these things because we're all just a lot of this time.
[00:21:17] We're all just on this wheel where we're just doing it because this is what we've always done. And that doesn't really serve people well. We need to stop and ask why we're doing those things. In revolutions, heads typically get chopped off.
[00:21:29] I'm curious from your take, are you calling for? I guess the current status quo, typical white male owned businesses managed by men. Are you looking for them to change the model? Cindy Gallup was on the show a couple of years ago and she said,
[00:21:47] expecting white men to replace themselves with women of color is just not very realistic. What you have to have is more and more businesses founded by people like you who have founded your own company. What exactly are you calling for in this revolution?
[00:22:01] Are heads actually going to roll? Are you asking or doing something totally different? Well, I think heads are going to roll naturally. And here's why. If you look at the census and the generational shift of Gen Z and also then Gen Alpha behind it,
[00:22:16] it is Gen Z and Gen Alpha are the most demographic mixed generations that we've seen. And there is going to be a point where a lot of these leaders just quite frankly age out. That's going to happen sooner than we think.
[00:22:30] By the way, Gen Z is just saying peace out to corporate America almost entirely altogether. Right? They're like, oh, you want me to do this thing? This is stupid. I'm not even in for this. Right. And they will go the other way because they have other options.
[00:22:43] We right now, and I write about this in the book actually about a year ago when I was looking at the numbers, we had about five million less people in the workforce than we had jobs to fill. That means that there were five million more jobs, right?
[00:22:57] Then there were people to fill them. Now, they don't always line up skill based on what's needed. Right? They don't always align correctly, but there were still five million open jobs and enough people to fill them. If you think about baby boomers retiring, leaving the workforce,
[00:23:13] then you think about millennials having to caretake for those baby boomers. And then you think about Gen Z peacing out of corporate America altogether. You're not going to have enough humans to sustain this model. It's just not going to work. The numbers don't matter.
[00:23:29] She's totally passed over Gen X. She's like, fuck those guys. That's a pretty small group compared to the bigger generations. Probably the most feral group you will ever have to deal with. Yes. There are five generations in the workforce, right? And so there are bigger generations than others.
[00:23:45] Baby boomer generation is so large that there is not another generation outside of millennials that's going to be close. And so if you look at the workforce today, nearly half is really it's ticking up is millennials, right? Nearly half.
[00:24:02] In the next several years, millennials are going to overtake and be the majority of the workforce. And then the second largest majority in the workforce is going to be Gen Z, which by the way doesn't want to be in corporate America anyway.
[00:24:15] So there's this going to be this economic head that comes to fruition in the next five to 10 years where we're going to have to make a change. And some of it is going to be that leaders age out and different
[00:24:29] leaders come in, we're seeing, I don't know, dozens of people go fractional every single day. Everyone comes to me and says, when is this fractional trying to be over? And I'm like, well, it's not a trend. It's a labor shift.
[00:24:41] We are witnessing a historical labor shift because guess what? None of us that are fractional are ever going back. And so that's also a piece, right? You're seeing fractional in finance and tech and HR. You're saying everyone go fractional to the point that I actually think
[00:24:56] that if you have less than 3000 employees over the next five years, the only full-time execs will be a CEO and a COO. Every other person is going to be fractional on the executive team because it's a win-win for both sides.
[00:25:09] So how does AI actually play in the new molding of the new workforce? And I mean, literally just the new environment that we're going to be working on. Well, number one, I always think that people give AI more credit
[00:25:23] than it actually is able to do because a lot of even the generative AI still have a human in the loop right now. And I think a lot of people think AI is really like intuitive and it can do all these things.
[00:25:35] Yeah, that's so because there's a human in the loop. And what people don't understand is when we take the human out of the loop, it actually gets really, really archaic. And so there's not that much difference in AI today than there was 10 years ago,
[00:25:49] not really when you're looking at it. And so it's going to shift slowly, but it's not going to be this drastic shift. It's going to take away some of the mundane things that we all, none of us like to do. And that happens.
[00:26:01] It's happened throughout history all along in how we've worked. Think about like mechanical pencils, to pens, typewriters, to computers, right? Like we've seen these things happen. It's gradually over time. I actually think that it's just going to shift how it has shifted previously.
[00:26:17] So roles are going to shift. It's going to really take away a lot of the mundane, almost like mindless tasks that a lot of us hate to do anyway. And I think it's going to be a gradual shift.
[00:26:30] But what's going to be a much larger shift is that change in the generations, the change in the demographics, the change in the dynamics. And I think all of those are actually going to be a huge shift way,
[00:26:41] way more than AI ever is going to shift the landscape. It's going to be actually this other things that shifted further. You have a problem with first time founders and CEOs as indicated by one of the chapters of the book.
[00:26:55] Talk to me about your problem with founders and startup CEOs. Well, I think anyone who has experienced this knows exactly what I'm talking about. I worked with over 50 of them and I can tell you that if you go to Wikipedia
[00:27:09] and I cite it in my book and you go to founder itis, anyone who has worked for a founder CEO is going to tell you, yep, they check off all these boxes. It's when someone thinks that a business is their baby, right?
[00:27:20] And it's really hard to call somebody's baby ugly and then be OK with it. And as a person that comes in and tries to understand culture and people and help move the business forward, there's a lot of ego wrapped around that baby.
[00:27:37] There just is like more so than anything else in business. There's a lot of ego wrapped around that. And there are some first time founders, CEOs that are really great at this, but they're few and far between. Most founder CEOs have never worked other places.
[00:27:55] If they have, they haven't worked in leadership. I'll be honest, 90 percent of them have never managed a person in their life and now they're in charge of here's millions of dollars and an entire company and now you want to run this, right? They've never even managed before.
[00:28:10] And so you're teaching them how to manage people. You're teaching them how to be an executive. You're basically teaching them how to be an adult in corporate America while also helping them run a business. And so it very much is like this.
[00:28:25] You as a as a fractional person coming in and working with the founder CEO, you know that like you're going to have to give so much more of yourself because it's such an undertaking. And what's what's the demographic breakdown of this 50 or so startup?
[00:28:40] See, I would say 20s to 50s. White, white dudes. Yeah, 20 to 50 mostly white guys. Yeah. OK. I just wanted to make that clear. Yeah, 20 to 50 mostly. I guess because guess what? Guess where the funding goes to 98 percent of funding goes to what?
[00:28:58] White guys from white guys 98 percent of VC and funding goes to white guys. Yeah, from white guys, right? From mostly other white guys. And so there's another there's a chapter in the book about that, right? Like we're wondering why this cycle keeps continuing.
[00:29:13] And it's because the funders fund the founders and they're all the same demographic. So I don't want to ruin the book. Yeah. What's the solution? The solution is mostly burn it down. You can't just kill all the VCs and say we're giving the money to, you know,
[00:29:29] underprivileged folks. Right? That's against the law last time I checked. So like, is it a government thing? Is it just a vote with our wallet? Like we're only going to support as a consumer businesses that are like this. Don't ruin the book, but what's the solution?
[00:29:44] Right. So I wouldn't say it's against the law because if it were, I mean, like people would be doing that like, you know, they'd be against the law now because they're giving most of it to 98 percent towards one demographic.
[00:29:55] It's baffling to me that VCs and PEs aren't understanding the business value of having, and we've seen this, we've all seen the data. It's been out, it's been out for a decade, right? The more diverse your organization is, the better your bottom line is.
[00:30:11] And it's like VCs and PEs don't want to see that. Now I understand PEs and VCs need to have a good amount of loss on their P and L statements. They they need to. It's part of their, it's part of how they work.
[00:30:26] They don't actually expect all these things to work, right? They expect maybe 50 percent to do well and that's good. I think that the way we think about venture capital and private equity is going to shift.
[00:30:39] I think we're we have already seen that with the fall of Silicon Valley Bank. I think people are already having those discussions. I think that that is going to shift as well with these demographics.
[00:30:51] And I think that it's going to, by the way, I'm seeing more and more VCs and PE firms being stood up by non white men. And I think that is going to help. So I think that as we continue to again see people age out,
[00:31:06] we continue to see generational changes. We continue to see people that have different avenues to wealth, different avenues to work. We're going to see that change drastically. And a lot of these in a lot of these areas, we're seeing these kind of topplings of systems.
[00:31:24] And again, I think it's going to all come down at around the same time. And then we need to build it back up. Feels like a civil war is what it feels like. OK, so let's talk a little bit about who's getting the money.
[00:31:36] Like we're talking about the funders, right? But let's also talk about pay equity, right? So because I think they're they're somewhat aligned. And let me tell you why. Dumb white dudes, they will ask for more money all day. Females will not.
[00:31:52] And that's just been research has demonstrated that, you know, many women will be they will be happy with what they have. And they will wait for that next raise to happen, as opposed to going and asking for it, right? Or demanding it because they're not getting paid
[00:32:08] as much as the guy who's sitting next to them doing the exact same damn job. So the big question is the framework and how we've done this for hundreds of years, right? Where women couldn't even vote for God's sakes, right? Talk about oppression.
[00:32:21] This has been in our DNA since jump. How the hell do we that's that's one of the biggest problems. How do we change that? Because today we talk about females aren't starting up as many. They've got great ideas, but they're not taking the jump.
[00:32:37] They're not taking a leap. That's not that. I mean, whose fault is that? How do we change that? How do we push that? Right. I would say let me push back on you a little bit in that actually in the last five to 10 years,
[00:32:50] women have been asking for more money for a while. It's because we finally showed that they're getting paid less. They never knew before. Pay transparency is a thing. Right. Even if we ask and men don't ask, even if we ask
[00:33:04] and the ask isn't even done by men, the men get the pay and the women. Right. And yes, that's a huge piece, right? The other thing I will say is during COVID, you know, the demographic that opened the most businesses, black women, overwhelmingly so. You know why?
[00:33:21] That got so pissed off at corporate America that they were like, fuck this shit. Out. I mean, why not? Right? Why not? You are seeing so many people being so fed the fuck up that they're just like, there's got to be a better way.
[00:33:38] And I would much rather rely on myself than some idiot who's going to maybe give me a 3% raise every year. Right. And the other piece to think about is that we all know, you know, we're in talent, we've been in talent a long time.
[00:33:53] We all know it's like even if you want and I tell this to people at the time, if you need a 10 K raise this year and you really are doing a good job, your manager has to like you. You have to have done good performance review.
[00:34:05] You have to have good performance reviews. The company has to be doing well enough. All these things. Right. If you want a 10 K increase as a fractional executive or as a person who works for themselves, you figure out how to do that.
[00:34:17] So the illusion of stability and this like whole just workforce thing has been toppled with COVID because there is stability. It's an illusion it always has been. And so when I say to people, you have way more just ability
[00:34:32] to provide for yourself and to figure it out when you work for yourself than ever relying on one person in your organization, which is technically probably your manager to get that for you in a year's time.
[00:34:44] And I always say you spend 12 months trying to get 10 K of an increase from one person. Imagine what you could get by spending 12 months on another thing and people are starting to see that that like it doesn't add up.
[00:34:58] Why would I do that? Why would I stick around? And we also know this with talent in HR that if we got hit by a bus tomorrow, people would replace us in corporate America. They would have the JD ready the next day.
[00:35:13] People are starting to just see that this illusion, this wall that's been built up by corporate America is just continuing to topple down and to be honest, a lot of people are like, what is left to fight for? Not much.
[00:35:26] And so while I joke and say like, now is the time. Give me the gasoline and let me light the match in the book. It's it's not actually that high of a wall to burn down anymore because it's been toppling through COVID,
[00:35:40] through everyone seeing through a lot of these like initiatives that are bullshit, right? Like people are not stupid and they see you for what you are. And so if you're not authentic or you want to be like Samsung and say,
[00:35:53] there's a crisis we need six six days a week out of they're going to be like that's stupid by. So I think that people are just getting fed up. They're smart people. Organizations can't hide shit as easily anymore.
[00:36:07] And so I think all of that is coming to light. So Nessa, I don't want to be burned at the stake. I'm attached to my head. I don't want it severed off. What what can us white guys do to be an ally? I love that question.
[00:36:19] Thank you for asking me that, Joel. Honestly, speak up. I mean like how many times have you all probably been in a meeting where you've heard someone talk over someone, where you've hear someone speak in a way that was unbecoming about somebody?
[00:36:36] When you've heard, oh, they're just here because of this and that. Or they were the diversity hire all the bullshit that we all hear, right? Say something like tell people it's not OK. That continued routine is going to be helpful
[00:36:48] because we also the thing is we need your help in making this change. We need allies to make this change. There's a good friend of mine that said those with power are not going to give it up willingly. And I actually think that some of us will.
[00:37:04] Right? Like I would like to give some of my power up willingly. I have. I'm actually still an optimist. Even though I wrote this book, I'm actually still an optimist. I actually think there are a lot of really good people out there.
[00:37:16] So if more of you, if more people that look like me, if we can like say speak up and say like this isn't right, this is the way we should actually be thinking about these things. I think we can actually make some, you know, make some movement.
[00:37:30] Yeah, don't be a bystander, kids. Yeah, actually get involved. That's an SFI. The name of the book is The Revolution of Work. Fuck the patriarchy and the workplace it built. That sounds like a series that should be on Netflix, by the way. Look, we're working on it.
[00:37:47] If somebody if somebody wants to buy the book, where would you send them? Amazon, you know, it's it's still still leading in the publishing world. Amazon actually rules the publishing world for better or worse, right? Keyword, keyword. Fuck the patriarchy.
[00:38:03] Give Jeff Bezos some more money to fight the patriarchy. Keep the guillotine away from me, Anessa. That is another one in the can. We out. We out. Thank you for listening to what's it called? The podcast, the chat, the cheese. Brilliant. They talk about recruiting.
[00:38:23] They talk about technology. But most of all, they talk about nothing. Just a lot of shout outs of people you don't even know. And yet you're listening. It's incredible. And not one word about cheese, not one cheddar. Blue, nacho, pepper jack, Swiss.
[00:38:42] So many cheeses and not one word. So weird. Anywho, be sure to subscribe today on iTunes, Spotify, Google Play, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. That way you won't miss an episode. And while you're at it, visit www.chadcheese.com.
[00:39:04] Just don't expect to find any recipes for grilled cheese. So weird. We out.