- 7 weeks ago
In this Essence Now segment, Christina Coleman, Stacey Tisdale and Jacqueline Twillie discuss the recent buzz around pay inequalities.
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00:00the topic of pay is a big one I mean everyone is talking about it so I want to hear from you
00:10I'm your host Makon Zovu and I am so happy to be back with you how are you we want to hear from
00:16you hit us up at any time using the hashtag essence now or by emailing us at essence now
00:21at essence.com okay so as I mentioned in the hot list this topic of equal pay has everyone buzzing
00:27particularly in Hollywood Monique has spoken out about it about how she considers a lowball offer
00:33from Netflix for a comedy special and actress Michelle Williams revealed that she got paid
00:38significantly less than her co-star Mark Wahlberg for reshoots on a film that they've worked on
00:43and Octavia Spencer and Jessica Chastain teamed up to get five times one two three four five five times
00:50for one of their projects now these ladies have all spoken up about their paying equalities
00:55but let's face it when it comes to money and how much you're getting paid most women don't discuss
00:59it but should we let us know in today's viewer poll should you discuss your salary with co-workers and
01:06peers in order to get equal pay vote a for yes or b for no and we'll read the results later on in the
01:12show now joining us in the studio to talk all about it our essence senior news and culture editor
01:17Christina Coleman CEO and president of Mind Money Media Incorporated and financial expert
01:23Stacy Tisdale and via Skype we have Jacqueline Twillie author of navigating the career jungle
01:29and founder of Zero Gap thank you ladies thank you so much for joining me today now Christina let's
01:35start off with you how do you even have this conversation with your co-workers and peers
01:38considering that companies almost deter you from talking about it yes they absolutely do but I just
01:44I have a testimony actually I was recently having a conversation with a friend who was asking me
01:49about a speaker's fee for something that she was doing and you know I had no idea and so she started
01:56asking around and what she was actually going to ask for was significantly lower than what her peers
02:04were getting and it wasn't until she talked to some other women about it that she realized hey I'm
02:08low-balling myself here and she really didn't know so I find that we have to be transparent with each
02:13other because we are really doing ourselves a disservice by taking whatever the companies give
02:19us or whoever is paying us gives us and not talking about with other women to see you know what is out
02:23there what are the rates what are the rates yeah that is such and transparency is key I think that's
02:28a major point that we're going to keep coming back to now Jacqueline via Skype you've successfully
02:32negotiated a higher pay rate for yourself but how do you even determine your worth in companies when
02:37companies are very secretive about salaries yeah so I haven't I will tell you this the first step is
02:45always to get the data online find out what your pay range is from any of the salary websites but take it
02:52one step further and talk to the people in your network I think professional association is a great
02:58place to start that's where I've always started at to figure out what other people are getting paid
03:02and also backing that up with using a trusted mentor and saying hey this is the company that
03:08I'm negotiating with what do you think because oftentimes people talk and more senior people in
03:15company will have that inside scoop so definitely agree with Stacy and definitely talking about that
03:21transparency with your peers I'm sorry with Chris with Christina no that's okay so this is a really
03:27good tip even if you're a freelancer right where that information may not be easily found online
03:32so you suggest talking to a man a mentor or someone within the industry much like Christina's friend
03:36did with her absolutely it's a really good point freelancers I love freelancer.com because people post
03:44their rates so it's a good place to kind of engage where you are in terms of other freelancers and what
03:50you're charging for your service that's a really good point thank you for that now Stacy what's the
03:54most common reason that women don't ask for what they're really what they're really do it's conditioning
04:00I mean look at all the history and the conditioning that women have around money look how society's
04:04treated us around money I was looking at some research from Harvard and 57 percent of men coming
04:10out of graduate school negotiate their first salaries only seven percent of women do and that ends up
04:16costing them five hundred thousand dollars in the lifespan of their career you know from the
04:21beginning of time men have been conditioned to be the breadwinners the nurturers women on the other
04:27hand have been you know conditioned to kind of take this backseat role but what's interesting is
04:32this really comes down to self-confidence self-esteem issues that's why I love the fact that we're having
04:37conversations about supporting each other with information it's only through that knowledge of
04:42what the real salaries are that we're going to really be able to move through that problem so does it so
04:48is the solution sort of starting at a young age and empowering young girls and having them know their
04:53worth from the time they're you know they're little or is it really women now starting to understand
04:58what their worth is and making sure that they're getting paid back here's one thing that everyone
05:01I want you to get real with when it comes to women and their worth yeah women control the majority of wealth in
05:06the world we control the majority of investable assets we're going to inherit trillions and trillions of
05:13dollars of passed on wealth we have the wealth in our hands we don't have the mindset and the confidence to
05:19step into that wealth so it's really from that early age you know telling little girls you're going to have
05:25these feelings okay what do I do with them it's we all have conditioning we all have patterns but how do we
05:30navigate this where we were talking about earlier the financial education programs that don't just talk about
05:36money there's a lot more to money than dollars and cents money's greatest gift is that it can reflect back to
05:41you how you value or don't value yourself but you really have to know how to see those patterns so that you can make
05:46different choices I know I know I hate to negotiate yeah it's very very so I have to know that going in
05:52that I you know I have to know that fair salary and just know knowing our own tendencies and knowing our
05:58goals so Tina I'm going to come over to you oh no go ahead I was just going to add on to that and say
06:03you know the first time that I actually negotiated my pay it was such there was I was invigorated yeah
06:11there was you were invigorated such a boost of confidence and I wasn't going to do that and it was
06:15actually a white man who told me hey you should negotiate your pain I was like no way what do you mean like I can't
06:20do that and I did yeah and I you know going forward in my career now I have that with me that boost of
06:26confidence and it really makes the world of a difference I'm so glad you brought up the point about a white man
06:30being the one to say hey listen you need to negotiate for this in the case of Octavia and Jessica Chastain you saw that it was
06:35kind of Jessica who was the white alley who came in and really walked the walk yeah do you think that's part of the
06:40solution as well do we need more white women to kind of come in and be like listen let's work together
06:45in this you know I think that we do need allies in this space and I'm really really thankful and also
06:54you know it's it's white allyship is important I'm glad that Jessica stood up and said hey I'm going to
06:59use my platform in my body and I'm going to make my contract you know put my contract in with Octavius and
07:06we're going to make this money right but the fact still remains that black women the pay gap is wide
07:12yeah I think we're making 63 dollars 64 cents yeah to every white man's dollar and so we need more
07:19people to step up and we also need to dismantle the systemic you know structures that are in place that
07:26create this pay inequality because it's not just about it's not just the workplace it's everything else
07:31that goes on absolutely yeah so Jacqueline this question is for you now there are reports that
07:36companies like the BBC are actually cutting the rates of some of their male employees to sort of
07:40even out the pay rates is that the answer is that really realistic is that the right thing to do
07:45well I've read the story about BBC but one that I'm inspired by is Salesforce um I'm sorry yeah
07:53last year Salesforce spent over three million dollars to level out equal pay that was the second time that
07:59they've done that now under the Obama administration several companies signed an equal pay pledge that's not
08:06archived on the Obama website but a lot of companies have said we're going to do an audit and we're
08:12going to bring men and women up and in the case of Salesforce they took it a step further and they
08:17didn't just stop at gender but they also reviewed it by race so I think that's more of the direction
08:22that I would like to see companies go in where they bring women up to those equal pay rates and so
08:28there's a lot of encouragement out there I think what the BBC is doing is interesting and I've
08:34definitely got to keep my eye on that one yeah that's I think that's interesting instead of
08:38Stacey I think you said it best in our conversation before and instead of cutting the rates of men
08:42you should just raise the rates of women make sure that they're getting paid their work now you have
08:47a really interesting website and you were telling me that your website offers resources on tools that
08:52you can use for negotiating your next pay raise yeah I created a financial education program called
08:58winning plays and you can visit it at winning plays dot org and the program is just an acknowledgement
09:05that there's more to money than dollars and cents and our race our culture our role modeling all play
09:11a role in our financial beliefs consequently our choices so the programs for elementary through
09:17college-age students that's the key age right there starting you know starting with that early
09:22conditioning but really interesting pertaining to this conversation is what we're talking about
09:27on gender and again people can just go to winning plays dot org to access that but just a great point
09:33that you touched on is when you're talking about the different experiences black women earning 64 cents
09:39to every dollar Hispanic women actually 57 cents we have an opportunity in this moment to create diversity
09:47within diversity the women's movement different women have very different experiences that's right
09:52and if we're going to speak with one voice we have to hear each other's stories and hear what
09:57those experiences are a black woman has a very different experience in the workplace than a white
10:01woman as does an Asian woman as does an Hispanic woman and what I loved about what we saw with Octavia
10:06it was an acknowledgement that for us to be one voice we have to acknowledge each other's stories
10:12and we see people struggling to do that now and us moving in that direction absolutely
10:17get out of the anger and into that absolutely thank you so much they thank you everyone for
10:21joining us while this conversation we could just keep going there's so much to talk about
10:25now our girl kayla aka shorty doo-wop aka margarita mama aka the fixer is reading all your
10:32comments on social media hey kayla what are folks saying and welcome back mccall thank you so much
10:37so should you discuss your salary with your co-workers and peers in order to get equal pay
10:41okay so lots of votes for a coming years on feeling the girl power liz wesley says yes when you know
10:46your worth have that conversation with those in charge of cutting the check sometimes speaking
10:50to other employees about your salary can hurt so it all depends robert smith is watching us on youtube
10:54she said we all told everyone how much we get paid we may put our foot in our mouths so be careful
10:59stephanie spell says i know a lot of my co-workers don't like discussing their pay but i would like to
11:03know nakia oliver says yes discuss your salary with co-workers who are doing the same job and a
11:07comparable skill level you don't have to talk about this specific job okay have you have you ever discussed your
11:13pay rate with your co-workers no but i've been in a situation where i found out a male colleague was
11:17making more and it's heartbreaking because you blame yourself but i use it as motivation to ask for a
11:22meeting and i ask for more money so you can't let that missed opportunity haunt you forever by not
11:27taking that opportunity you have to ask more power to you more power to you and i think in our industry in
11:31the entertainment industry it's really important to talk about that so i will definitely start doing
11:36that start asking people well how much you getting paid all right it's time to see the results of
11:40today's view of polls now we asked you should you discuss your salary with co-workers and peers in
11:46order to get equal pay and here's how you voted let's see how you voted today 68 said yes okay we're
11:54definitely on the right track and 32 said no and i know it's a very taboo topic it's hard to talk about
11:59but it's really important to get it out in the forefront
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