Episode 01 - Are You Ready For A Career Upgrade?
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Does your career need an Upgrade?
One where you are valued and respected for your expertise.
Where you get to use your strengths every day
Where you are doing work that matters
Where you have healthy boundaries
And where you are paid really freaking well?
And not only that, but you use your privilege to open doors and support others in their pursuit of their own upgraded careers?
Well, you are in the right place!
In this first episode of The Upgraded Career Podcast you’ll learn:
About the host, Nicole Case, as she walks you through her Upgraded Career journey from a first-generation college student from a small town in western PA, to decade long career in corporate Human Resources, and now as a speaker and coach for women corporate leaders.
3 mindset shifts you need to Upgraded your own career right now
What to expect from this podcast
Follow Nicole on LinkedIn and on Instagram @nicolecasespeaks
Transcript:
[00:00:00] Are you ready for a career upgrade? One where you are valued and respected for your e. Where you get to use your strengths every day, where you're doing work that matters, where you have healthy boundaries and where you are paid really freaking well. And not only that, but you use your privilege to open doors and support others in their pursuit of their own upgraded careers.
[00:00:23] Well, you are in the right place. Welcome to the first episode of the Upgraded Career podcast. I am your host Nicole Case, and I'm so thrilled that you're here and to celebrate the launch of this new show, I'm gonna share with you my own upgraded career journey. Three ways that you can upgrade your own career right now and just what you can hear, expect to hear more of on this podcast.
[00:00:45] So a little bit about my own upgraded career journey, and this starts back to my small hometown in Western Pennsylvania. And I, I promise I'm not gonna go through all of the details here, but I think it's important to set the stage because some of this might resonate with you. So I grew up in a really small town in, again, rural Pennsylvania.
[00:01:07] We're talking less than 7,000 people. I only had 86 people in my graduating class, and the closest Target or Starbucks is over an hour away. And that's still true to this day. I didn't have cable. I couldn't watch cable growing up because it didn't come out that far to my house. And so not only did I live in a rural area of western Pennsylvania, I grew up in the country of that rural area of Western pa.
[00:01:32] Family lives on 33 acres of farmland, and my dad worked in road construction. My mom stayed home and my mom always said that the store had dropped me in the wrong place. I always knew I wanted an upgrade, that I knew that I didn't wanna stay in that small town, that I had other things that I wanted to go on and do that I knew I couldn't do in that.
[00:01:55] So I was a first generation college student. I paid my own way through college with lots of student loans, which is a story for another day, and I graduated at the peak of that last recession in 20, in 2009. And after lots and lots of time job searching, my husband and I finally found jobs and moved to Raleigh, North Carolina, where we still live today.
[00:02:21] And we got here at the beginning of 2010 for a job that literally paid me $16 an hour, but that was the most money I've ever made in my life I started my master's program while working full time and I didn't have anyone to navigate, or I didn't have anyone to model how to navigate. That wild world of corporate hr, right?
[00:02:43] Because my dad worked for construction. My mom stayed home. Like I just didn't have that model for it. I didn't know anybody close to me that worked in that type of job, so I just didn't know how to navigate any of that. So I Mudd along and eventually landed in an HR business partner role at a large enterprise tech company.
[00:03:00] And this is really where I grew up in my career. It was an amazing opportunity. I was able, Really observe what the other professionals were doing in the office. And I had access to leaders in this role of, of an HR business partner. And I was really privy to conversations and I was in meetings that most people in their mid twenties didn't get access to.
[00:03:25] Right. So we were talking about who was getting the raise, who was getting the promotions. You know, we. A bunch of layoffs during that time period. I think I did six layoffs in four years at that company. And so I again, was in these conversations that most people in their mid twenties probably didn't have access to in their, in their careers, just due to the nature of the role in hr, right?
[00:03:47] So I started just moving up the ranks and made a few lateral moves, and when it was time to move on, I got super strategic on where I wanted to go next. And I landed in, you know, the biotech, pharma clinical research space, which is another big industry here in the Raleigh area. And I was quickly promoted to a people manager, a people manager for the first time.
[00:04:14] And I led a team that was really spread out over all over the east coast that I had to manage remotely. I had a few employees who sat here in Raleigh with me, but a lot of my team sat in other location. And the team was also like really in different places in their careers. I had some employees who were really, or in early stages of their career, I had another woman who had 25 plus years of, of experience, which was really interesting to lead a team in that way that had such different, um, it just had such different backgrounds so far in their, in their career.
[00:04:53] But during that time, I had the idea for my current coaching and speaking business, and I started to, to build on that little by little, but I knew I wanted to, I, I knew I wanted the experience of building an HR and training function at a tech startup. So, Again, it got really super strategic on the next move that I wanted to make.
[00:05:14] So when that opportunity came up, I was able to very quickly network my way in to that position, and I was there for about a year and a half when the pandemic hit in 2020. And let me tell you, it was a wild time to be in hr. Um, and not only was it a wild time to, to be an HR professional, so for those of you who are HR pros out there, you know, I see you, it's been a long, several years, um, and it's been really, really challenging, uh, in, in this, in this space.
[00:05:49] But on my business side, I just had so many people coming to me really wanting help to figure out where they. Wanted to go next. What do they wanted to do next? How they wanted to upgrade their own careers, because I think this happened with a lot of people that during the pandemic, it just really, you know, got people thinking about what was really important to them and really prioritizing different things in their life other than work not, it's not that they didn't want to progress and achieve and continue moving up and being really successful, but they also wanted.
[00:06:26] Some additional things out of life, whether it was to spend more time with family, they had their own side hustles that they wanted to work on. They had hobbies and friends and different things. They just, they just recognized that this hustle culture in corporate America was just not something they were willing to do anymore.
[00:06:43] And so, again, I had so many people coming to me at that time wanting my coaching, um, services at that time. So I just knew that it was just, it was time to go full. In my business
[00:06:53] so that's how I got started in my coaching and speaking business, the upgraded career. But the idea for this podcast actually started many years ago, back in college. I had an idea for a blog way back then. Um, you know, just around, just succeeding in life and just career stuff because I was working in the career services department at Penn State when I was in college.
[00:07:16] So I had a lot to say even back then. Well, I've always had a lot to say Um, and, as my career progressed in hr, Definitely knew that I wanted to share everything that I was learning. When I realized that because I had access to these leaders and I was in these conversations, that I had this insider knowledge basically on how to navigate and succeed in corporate.
[00:07:39] Like again, I didn't have anybody to model that for me before. And so I again, had access and had and was privy to some of these conversations that I knew that I figured out by talking with my friends that they didn't know all of this stuff. It was just the nature of my role in HR that I was figuring all of this out for myself.
[00:07:58] I knew I wanted to share all of these insider secrets to everybody else because everybody else needed to know this, right? And I had spent years and years saying I was gonna start this blog. I wasn't gonna do this thing. And my friend Katie finally called me out one day. She was like, Nicole, if you keep saying that you're gonna do this blog, but you don't because you're scared, you know, that's just gonna become part of your story.
[00:08:21] So basically she said, shit her, get off the pot, Nicole, with this blog thing. And that was definitely the kind of the kick in the pants that I really needed from her. And so, all right, so let me go get the domain, figure out how to start a, start a blog, and the website and the whole thing. Tried it and I posted two blog posts and I realized I didn't like writing
[00:08:45] I just, I, it wasn't very good at it. I didn't, or at least that was the, that was the story I was telling myself that I, I wasn't good at it and I really didn't enjoy it. And so I was talking to somebody at a networking event about that, and they were like, well, Do you like speaking? And I said, well, yeah, of course I'm speaking to you right now.
[00:09:03] And the woman was like, well, why don't you start a podcast? And I was like, oh, I hadn't thought of that. So that conversation was five years ago, . So here we are, where I am now. Finally getting started with this podcast. And so you are listening to the comb. Of over 11 years in corporate HR in five years of being a career and leadership coach and keynote speaker.
[00:09:29] And I'm so excited again that you are here and that you are listening to this very first episode. So if you are someone who definitely loves to take action, I am right there with you. But what I have found that jumping right into action without pausing to check in with our mindset and our. Can really have you spinning your wheels.
[00:09:52] Like I said, it took me five, it took me five years to actually even start this podcast after I realized that blogging wasn't my thing and that took seven years from that, from that point. But I am definitely someone who hates being a beginner if I don't think I'm gonna be good at it right away. So, Hence the needing to stop and pause, to check in with our mindset and our attitude so you don't end up spinning your wheels for five years on a podcast idea like I did.
[00:10:22] So after all of that, I wanna share with you my top three mindset shifts that you need to make right now in order to upgrade your career.
[00:10:31] The first mindset shift for you to make is to recognize that you cannot do this alone. Leadership is a team sport and we are now being productive through our teams and other colleagues, so I, I don't even know of any other job that doesn't require you to collaborate with others in order to be successful.
[00:10:51] But it's definitely true. As you are moving up into leadership, you are now no longer the doer. You are the one that's leading the team and organizing the team. You're structuring the team, you're motivating them, so you cannot be successful without them and without your team, and probably without your peers and your colleagues, and just other functions across the.
[00:11:13] And it is way easier to do that when you already have a relationship built. So who do you need to build those stronger relationships with, both inside and outside of your company? Because you do not want to wait until you need something to build that relationship.
[00:11:31] Who do you need to build stronger relationships with both inside and outside of your company? Do not wait until you need something to build that relationship.
[00:11:42] How can you use your privilege to help others? What doors can you open even if you did it all on your own to grow in your career? We become stronger together. The more of us who are in these leadership positions, the more we can change these rules that we had to fight and claw tooth and nail to get to where we are.
[00:12:05] So if you were able to do it on your own, why would you want someone else to have to do it on their own? Wouldn't have you have wanted some help and support? So again, we become stronger together. Mean girls and queen bees are no longer welcome. Fighting for that one seat at the table just does not work.
[00:12:22] We have been lied to that. We have to fight and tear each other down in order to battle it out for just that one seat. That was just a way to distract us from the real problem, which is that the system was never set up for us to succeed for us women. Those who identify as women, others in the LGBTQ community, people of color, immigrants, and anyone else in a historically marginalized community
[00:12:46] those who built those systems didn't do it alone. The White Boys Club did it together on the golf course in a happy hour. So we all need to pull together to support each other, to tear down these systems.
[00:12:57] The next mindset shift to make in order to upgrade your career right now is this idea that putting your head down and doing your job really well is not what gets you the recognition and the promotion that you want. This again, is a lie. We have been lied to. Keeping, doing what you're doing is a great way to keep yourself stuck right where you are.
[00:13:17] Now this is something that I had to overcome as well. My dad values hard work over everything else, and that does not translate into the corporate world very well, especially at those leadership levels where you're at or where you want to be at. I mean, there's when, there's definitely gonna be some more episodes on this in the future, but I want you to think
[00:13:40] where are you spending your time? Is it in meetings that you don't wanna be in? Do you have time for deep thinking and reflection? And if not, now is the right time to really look at your calendar and see what can be shifted. And if you think that you aren't empowered to do that, have a chat with your boss and with your team.
[00:13:57] I mean, they want you to find ways to be more effective. You know that's good for them. So what meetings or tasks can you delegate, delete, or delay?.
[00:14:07] And the last mindset shift for you to make in order to upgrade your career right now is to remember that no one cares about your career more than you do. There are just so many things in the corporate world that we don't control, right? We don't control budgets. In a lot of cases. We don't control the promotion process or our customers sometimes, or just the economy around us, right?
[00:14:30] Like we just don't control a lot of those. But what we do control is how we show up our effort and our attitude.
[00:14:37] But first, we need to figure out what our version of an upgraded career looks like. We need to position ourselves strategically, and we cannot wait for opportunities just to drop in our labs.
[00:14:48] I've had several clients who've just gone with the flow and let their managers, you know, put them forward for things or assign them to projects and teams, and they just went along with it. And they thought that that was just how you progressed in your career, going with the flow and saying yes to whatever came your way.
[00:15:03] And now they realize that they have a career that they don't even like, they're not using their strengths and they feel it's too late for them to shift. But yet they're miserable. So again, no one cares about your career more than you do. So take control back and start crafting that upgraded career right now.
[00:15:20] So those are the three mindset shifts that you need to make in order to upgrade your career right now. You can't do it alone. Who are those people that you need to build those strong relationships with and allies with in order for you to be incredibly successful and for them to be incredibly successful as well?
[00:15:38] The next mindset shift you need to make in order to upgrade your career right now is to forget about this idea about putting your head down and just working really hard, and that's what will get you the promotion. Actually, that is a really great way to keep yourself stuck.
[00:15:53] And finally, remember that no one cares about your career more than you do, and it's up to you to take control and really craft that version of an upgraded career for yourself.
[00:16:04] And that's what we're gonna be talking about throughout this podcast. And according to the World Economic Forum, women make up more than 50% of the workforce, but only 27% of management positions. There are more Fortune 500 CEOs named John than there are total CEOs who are women, and that's just total and utter bullshit.
[00:16:24] But according to the latest McKinsey report of women in the workplace, more and more women are leaving if they aren't getting that promotion that they feel that they deserve. So my mission in life is to help more women and those in marginalized communities get into and then thrive in positions of power and influence, because as we all know, those in positions of power and influence, impact all of.
[00:16:50] And the more diversity in those leadership levels, positive, positive, positively, there we go. Impacts the bottom line of businesses and our communities. Plus it's just the right thing to do. So this podcast will always be 100% free so we can get this information out to the most people as possible. We're gonna talk about how to play this corporate game as it is today, while working to change it and make it more equitable tomorrow.
[00:17:19] You're gonna hear more about how to get a promotion, setting boundaries, how to speak up in meetings, building your personal brand, how to say no, dealing with crappy bosses. Plus how to upgrade your own leadership skills so you can lead your own team effectively and authentically. And again, how to create a psychologically safe environment where everyone can thrive in their own upgraded careers.
[00:17:41] And we're gonna do all of this without burning ourselves out because we can't help anyone if we are burned. So you're gonna hear from me in solo episodes like this one, and I'll also be, be bringing on other amazing leaders and experts who have upgraded their own careers
[00:17:56] these are going to be conversational and practical episodes. I'm not gonna be doing a ton of editing on this. I just want this to be like we are in your favorite coffee shop or happy hour spot, and we're just chatting, so you're gonna hear me flub my words. Not use proper grammar and probably make some up along the way as well.
[00:18:15] But I am committed to keeping these episodes to around 30 minutes or less so you can listen while on your morning commute, during your lunchtime workout, or just while you are winding down at night.
[00:18:26] So that is it for our very first episode of Next. I'm gonna start us off with a five part series on my upgraded goal setting process. This is a process I've developed and refined over the last several years, and now I'm sharing with my clients and audiences, and I promise that I'm not even gonna mention smart goals.
[00:18:46] That's the only time I'm gonna mention them is right here, because we're not gonna talk about them again. So thank you so much for being here. I'm excited to be going along this upgraded career journey alongside you, because as you'll see, it never really ends. It would mean so much to me if you subscribed wherever you listen to podcast and share it with your friends and colleagues who you think will love it to.
[00:19:07] I'll see you in the next episode, and remember, your career deserves an upgrade.
