In my mind, power equated to asshole and evil.
But after reading the book, I realized, oh, power is a tool.
Welcome to The Trill MBA Show, the career management podcast teaching black women how to become unstoppable at work.
I'm Felicia Ann Rose Enuha, AKA the Trillest MBA delivering the inspiring truth through strategies and tactics.
So you feel protected, confident, and ready to conquer your career.
Hey guys, welcome back to the show.
I'm so excited today because we have our first guest.
After wrapping up the Seven Rules of Power, I wanted to bring on the person who introduced me to Dr.
Pfeffer's work, my former manager, now one of my besties.
Welcome to the show, Breana Jones.
How are you?
Good morning, Felicia.
How are you?
I'm doing well.
Thank you for coming on the show.
So first of all, I learned something new every time I talked to you.
Like every time we talk on the phone, I leave the conversation like, huh, OK, I think about that.
And one of the things that I love
that you do is you always are looking and curious about new knowledge.
How can I get better?
How can I sharpen my tool kit and make sure I'm ready?
So one of the things I wanna thank you for is you introduced me to this book, Power, and it blew my mind.
Cause I was like, we did this wrong.
completely totally
completely did this wrong.
But I had questions because I was like, OK, this sounds good in theory, this gaining power at work.
But does this work for black people?
Does this work for women?
Does this work for us?
That was my question.
And the funniest thing was I went searching for a more recent book because power came out in 2010.
So then I found the seven rules of power.
which came out in 2022.
And I was like, you just answered my question, sir.
The tagline is surprising but true advice on how to get things done and advance your career.
And the funniest thing is I had that question and I felt like he wrote this book to answer that question.
And in the beginning of this book, he talks about how he wasn't gonna write another book on power.
He was just like, I wouldn't write in this book, but clearly y'all don't get it.
So let me tell you one more time.
So I want to know from you, how did you even come across this book Power?
Ironically enough, someone shared it with me.
So my line sister called me one day and she said, what's your address?
I figured it was a Christmas card.
And she sent me a book and she said she had gone through this woman on board training session and she had been exposed to the book and she said, everyone needs to read it.
And when I read it, I thought of you.
And so I wanted to share a copy with you.
I really appreciate that.
And then I read it and I was like, so first, like immediately I read it and I got angry.
I said, I've been doing this completely and totally wrong.
Maybe he's wrong.
Cause there's no way that I've been this wrong.
But then I kept reading and I said, and then I referenced other things.
So because you've worked for me, you've heard me say everybody needs to read Sun Tzu's Art of War.
Like not the cleaned up version that they do for business, like the original.
This is a, I mean, this supported the tenants that I learned in Art of War.
Behind me, I have Robert Green's 48 Laws of Power, which is a little bit satiric, definitely more scathing, but again, it still plays out.
So the tenants and the concepts behind it of like, this is how you gain power.
are so very true and I'm just like, I don't understand how I missed it.
So what I did was because it had been shared with me, I figured let me share it with everybody.
And I think I recall the conversation where we talked about it and I said, I don't think you will like this book.
You did.
You are always anti-power.
But then the more I read it, I realized this book is telling you it's not about power as an end goal.
So this isn't a guide for how to be a bond filler.
That's 48 laws of power.
This is telling you how to use power for your end objective.
And I said, well, since I know you are, you know,
This was something that you could and should have.
So get you a copy.
Yes.
So you shared it with me.
And before reading the book, I think it would be fair to say, like, I don't want nothing to do with power because in my mind, power equated to asshole and evil.
But after reading the book, I realized, power is a tool.
So now I equate power with money.
because I've never thought money was evil.
I, as a half Nigerian Capricorn, I think money is great.
Now, I think if you love money and that's all you care about, you don't care about other people, then I think that's where you go awry, because it's the love of money is evil,
like you worshiping money.
But God gave us tools.
And now I understand,
Power is simply another tool.
What you do with the power, just like what you do with the money, that's what makes the difference.
That's where you sell your soul or you don't sell your soul.
I mean, that's where you get bells and bubs in government.
And the funny thing was he wanted to write this book about that man.
I will not say bells and bubs name, but you know, it's polarizing.
But when you look at the seven rules of power,
And every time I see like, they just breaking all these rules.
Just like the constitution doesn't mean anything, blah, blah, blah.
And it literally is this, this is the second rule.
It's just break all the rules.
That's how you show you have power.
That's how you gain power.
And so it left me feeling like, huh, you know, like that sounds good in theory, but as a black woman, how will I be penalized?
I can see that.
would say out of all the rules he put forth, the breaking of the rules was the one that set most not right with me.
Not because I'm particularly a rule follower, but to your point, this is really going to work for me because, but then I realized he said that you had to break the rules.
He didn't say how you break the rules.
And so
I realize, yeah, there been times when I've gone in and tried to break rules, but I broke the rules the way other people broke rules.
No, no, no, no.
You have to break the rules as only you and only you as a black woman can do.
it's maybe you have to be a little bit more strategic in how you break the rules.
Maybe you have to test.
mean, go in, don't be a Tyrannosaurus Rex, be a Velociraptor.
So no, you don't go full throttle on breaking the rules.
Let me test.
does this gate look like?
Where are the weak points?
And then you get through.
And once you break that first rule, then it gets subsequently easier.
But you have to be, I mean, with all of this, you have to be strategic.
As a black woman, no, you're not going to take this book and say, hey, all of these rules apply to me and I can do it like, you know, John does.
But you have to put it in our vernacular, our lexicon, and that's how you're going to be able to get it out.
Yeah, it has to be in the context of our lived experience because what we don't need everybody doing is just going to work and like full bull and China shop because I mean the
forces are going to lift you and kick you out.
And to be clear, everyone can't be the powerful person because if everyone is vying for power, then we see how that appears now.
I think what you have to do is you have to, again, are you looking, what's the power for you in that situation?
Is it your team?
Is it your department?
Is it your company?
Is it your family?
Again, these rules apply to everywhere.
just got to, you know, again, adapt.
Yeah.
I think one of the most powerful rules is that building your personal brand.
And I feel like it's something that now has become a cliche almost.
You got to build your brand.
And as a marketer, when people say that, it means a certain thing to me.
And I'll be looking at people like, you don't even know what a brand is.
I hate that term.
a classically trained CPG marketer, when someone says, build your brand, I'm looking at them like, do you really have the time, energy and money to build your brand?
Because building a brand and it's not just slap on a new shade of lipstick or update your resume or get on social media and post some pictures.
You really have to start with the, who are you?
What are your values?
What's your mission?
Like, what are your absolute do's and don'ts?
Where do you want to be?
Who are you talking to?
It's a process.
So building your brand?
I laugh.
Yeah, I want people to stop using build your brand when it comes to a personal brand, because what people think building a personal brand is, like changing your wardrobe and
changing your hair and then cosplaying as some whatever you believe is a boss babe adult.
And that's not building your personal brand.
You're being an actress.
What you truly want to do is own and drive your narrative.
You want to tell your story.
Yes, and you want to craft the story that you want that's authentic to you, but it's really about driving your narrative and controlling your reputation.
That's really what this is about in the workplace.
When it comes to, I'm trying to get promoted, if you use LinkedIn strategically, that could help you, but you have to understand the company culture that you're working within.
If you work in a more conservative culture,
they don't want you out there splashy.
you know, they even in, Courtney, what level you are, the PR people may have some words for you.
The corporate comms people may want to dictate what you say and what you do in your public space.
So when you're playing this game, what's more important is the narrative.
Are you dependable?
Are you reliable?
Do you get stuff done?
Right.
Are you driving the business?
Are you a go-to for information?
Like, what is that narrative about you that adds value to the company?
Well, I think brand is like power in that it's a tool and it's for what are you using it?
So I always start with why, why are we doing this?
Why am I building my brand?
Why am I telling my story?
Why am I trying to get this power?
Is it for something as simple as I need that promotion or I want that promotion or I want that title or is it I want freedom?
I want options.
I want security.
And this book was so powerful for me because I thought I had put those pieces in place to get security and freedom and options.
And I realized that, yes, I had done the work, but me doing the work presented the illusion of security and freedom and options because I lacked the small yet powerful
element of power.
I think one of the things that I regret in my career, and I hate to even have a regret around career, like, cause at the end of the day, the day gone year.
So I'm just like, I don't want to have regrets about work.
Cause at the end of the day, this isn't going to mean anything.
This isn't the meaningful thing.
When I take my last breath, this will not be the meaningful thing.
However, comma right now, as I am in the market.
looking for my next role.
The regret that I have is that I didn't curate a network that has more power.
I feel like half of my network right now is unemployed or being threatened to be unemployed because I have people that are my friends that work for the government.
No security, no freedom.
know the options.
And then I look at myself and I'm like, wow, because I don't have power.
I can't give somebody a job.
That's where I was just like, something's got to change and we've got to move differently, especially now more than ever.
I mean, I am tired of unprecedented times.
Let's go back to boring.
I wanna go back to boring, predictable, you know?
Like, I don't even think people are using pips anymore.
I think they just firing people.
Just, you're fired.
We don't care about your performance, we don't care about nothing.
We just fired you for no good reason.
At Wilkinshire.
So when I read the book, I wondered if it was still applicable.
Is it still applicable?
And I realized, yes, because to your point, the day has not ended.
So I still, in my next opportunity, have the ability to go in, clean slate, and really put these tools into place.
But the really powerful thing, at least for me, was
When I read this book, I could go back and I could do a post-mortem on my entire career.
And I knew exactly where I had messed up.
I knew exactly where I said, like the part where he said, don't work harder, essentially work smarter, do less work, network more.
And I said, because I had been brought up to believe in a meritocracy.
show people what you can do.
They'll appreciate you.
They may not like you, which again, get over the likeability piece was in there and I was like, I nailed that intentionally or otherwise.
I nailed that piece.
That's an element that we as women have to deal with because at that time in my career, I had babies.
And so yes, I have a phenomenal spouse who had, said, Hey, I need to go to this happy hour.
He'd have been like, yeah, I got the kids, it's fine.
Or my mother, when she retired, she moved down here, she would have said, yeah, I got it.
But I was tired.
But you know why I was tired?
Because I was working and doing the work and doing those things.
And I also loved in this book that he said, do the extra stuff.
So essentially what this man said was, don't do what they hired you to do, do what you want to do.
And I said,
I missed that because I was doing what they wanted me to do for a paycheck where what I should have been doing was what I wanted to do for my end goal, which was freedom,
security, and options.
we're gonna dive deeper into that because I think some people are gonna be like, what?
So when we get back from this quick break, we're gonna go into what does it look like to do what you wanna do at work when we get back.
Hey guys, so we're just beginning the new season.
We're off to a running start, but we have digital tools that accompany each episode to help you work through some of the tactics and strategies that you need to put into place
so that you're thriving at work.
So go to TrillMBA.com and if you haven't already, sign up for our freebies and you'll get access to not only these digital tools that go with these episodes, but you'll also get
access to every digital tool I've ever created that's free to you to help you in your career.
Now let's get back to the show.
So how would you have done what you wanted versus doing quote unquote your job?
So again, my job was to manage PNLs or to manage products or brands.
that's what I, I actually enjoyed that.
But again, I liked to commute.
I liked dealing with the community.
liked being part of an ERG community.
An example of this was, I joined, whether it was the Black Champions Network or Beacon or whatever it was called at the organization.
I joined it and in some cases as the executive, I...
I didn't always make the organization acknowledge that.
So I didn't get credit for those things.
As a black woman, I should have been a little bit more strategic and said, sure, I will head up an ERG, but I'm going to head up the ERG that's headed by this person who has
power.
I'm going to pick the one
This is somebody that I can't ever get on his calendar.
I can't ever get to talk to him, but I know he's active in this ERG.
I may not be part of that community, but I'm a learn to be part of that community because it's going to give me exposure to that person.
That's how I would reconfigure what I did.
I would have focused also not just on
the things that made me comfortable, but the things that gave me power, the access, the visibility, the person who was going to speak about me because they knew me in a different
way.
Everybody knew Breana was going to launch that product on time.
Everybody knew Breana was going to come in under budget, but you may not know that Breana also speaks three languages.
Because Breana showed that off here or you may not know which came into the likeability piece because we all know Sometimes we're not viewed as likable for whatever reason
because I couldn't be likable when I was coming in under budget and driving this but it gave somebody a different purview of me which Facilitated the power so that's what I meant
by that
Yeah, I want to give people an example.
One of the companies I worked at when I was more junior, there was a black woman leader and she was a great manager, like good people manager really took care of her people.
And she should have been promoted way sooner than she was.
In fact, our little nickname for her was Sweet Baby Jesus because she was just so kind.
Ooh, I never gonna make it to the top.
And it's not that she's not gonna make, she's still working and stuff, right?
It's not that she's not gonna make it.
It's just that the critique that she would get is that we don't know if you're gonna be able to show executive toughness or some mess they made up, right?
But they deemed her for being nice.
Which is in the book.
I don't know how many times I went through highlighted, underlined, put little nasty notes next to the part where he said, it is better to be feared than liked.
And I said, Another place that I went wrong.
Right.
Went out of my way to be perceived as pet, not threat.
When maybe I needed to give you a little bit more of that bite.
Thread
can't be full out threat, but I can give glimpses or how am I doing it?
And funny enough, when I read it, I thought of Kamala Harris.
She was perceived as too nice.
The smile, the kindness, you know, people talked about that.
And I was like, she really needed to come out there with a little bit more bite.
Okay, so this is the conundrum.
Let's talk about it, right?
Because on one hand, as a woman, you feel like I'm gonna get dinged if I show up in all this masculine energy and I give it back to you what you're putting out there.
Now you're gonna be mad at me for putting a mirror to you.
And so we felt the effects of that.
That's happened.
That's a lived experience for a lot of women in these spaces where you have to have some
grip and some power.
So then you retreat and you're like, okay, well, I'm to show up as the nice person.
I'm going to be nice.
And then your competence is questioned.
And he talks about that in these books.
Like if you're nice or you're amenable, then they'll question your competence.
And I'm like, what?
And then she got them little cute comebacks, but like she didn't really get down and dirty with it.
And I think what happened was people didn't respect that.
They actually respected this ugly, vile language and narrative this fool created for her, even though she was 20 million times more educated and accomplished than he could ever be.
So instead of her coming down and speaking in that language, because that's what it feels like, right?
It feels like you're dumbing yourself down.
But
look at your audience.
And I think that's a big lesson we can take.
Look at the landscape.
How does your company operate?
What is your company culture?
Right?
One of the things he says in the seven rules of power is he talks about not showing up as likable to be likable, but showing up how people need you.
And it's funny, cause I thought about you and I was like, Breana doesn't say it this, but you said it in the context of managing people.
Like,
be the manager that that person needs, not the manager you want to be.
like, this is what he talks about, because we've talked about this authenticity, right?
He's like, throw that authenticity BS out the window.
Show up to gain allies.
Like show up with a purpose.
And I think that's no different whether you're managing up, managing down, managing side to side.
You have to show up how people need you to show up
so that you can drive your narrative with them and get to your end goal.
But the first thing you have to do is you have to have a plan.
And so we're going to talk about that.
We're gonna take a quick break.
When we come back, we're gonna talk about your plan to apply these principles when we come back from the break.
Okay guys, like we're talking about today, you need to make a plan.
And I have just the perfect tool for you.
I have it on discount right now.
If you go to TrillMBA.com, you can get to my session about building a career plan using the PI model.
So we talk about getting your performance, your image, and your exposure up and why all of those things play into your plan for power.
So not only do I want you to use the free tools that I've made available to you for the seven episodes of Power, but I also want you to spend some investment on yourself and go
through this course and create your pie model plan to manage your career in Power.
All right, now let's get back to the show.
right guys, welcome back.
Before we wrap up, we're going to get into some high level thought processes on how you can implement some of these rules of power as a black woman in corporate.
And if you're not a black woman and you're watching or listening, thank you for joining.
These rules apply to you too.
I mean, these rules apply to reason.
Everybody can't be successful is because everyone's going to interpret it differently.
So I think when you're putting your plan together, the first thing you got to think about is, must this mean for me?
So you can't go through here again, these seven steps, amazing, but you can't go through these seven the way that you've always gone through, or you would always go.
So the one about getting information.
You know, I'm always big on getting information.
If you haven't been able to get information or the information you've gotten previously hasn't worked for you, you got to think about how am I going to change that?
So I personally think these would be easier to implement in a new job and a new career and a new setting.
But you don't have to, you just have to tweak and not do what you've always done.
You have to unlearn to acquire that power.
So that speaks to rule number one in the seven rules of power.
Get out of your own way.
This whole, don't want to build a personal friend.
I'm not going to break rules because I'm scared.
I just want to work and get paid and go home.
I don't want to go to the happy hour.
I just want to be left alone.
Then you're going to be left out to slaughter when the layoffs come.
be a little bit more blunt.
What you're doing isn't working.
So doing your job gets you a paycheck, but it does not get you your end goal.
It does not get you freedom.
It does not get you security and it does not get you options.
It likely doesn't even get you visibility.
Or if it does, gets you visibility as the person who gets stuff done, not the person that they want to bring into the inner circle.
Right.
So you have to rethink that and you have to say, yeah, I'm tired.
Why are you tired?
You're tired because you spent 10 hours responding to emails.
Stop responding to all those emails.
Respond to the ones that matter the most first.
Yeah.
That's this whole book.
This whole book talks about
Your job is actually the vehicle by which you are going to gain power.
So how do you leverage your job to get what you want?
And if you want a paycheck, keep doing what you want to do.
And again, no judgment, love things.
But if you are saying, I am not happy, I am dissatisfied, I want a seat at the table, then you have to rethink how you are thinking about work.
That's one.
Now let's go another direction.
If you want to keep a steady paycheck, if you want to build a better sense of stability, then you need to gain power.
Because you only focused on getting that paycheck, it will be the fastest way that you lose that paycheck.
And you'll be scrambling to try to figure out another paycheck.
And you won't, you don't have any power, you haven't built any power.
So now you stuck.
And I'm speaking from some personal experience here, right?
Like I hadn't built power.
And so what that means is I am not having the career that I should be having in my mind or the career that I thought I was going to have more stability, more predictability, because
I don't have power to create that in my career.
I again, I've been the senior VP, I've been the head of marketing, I've been the CMO.
My resume is not going to get me my next job.
My next job is coming from, hey, I heard about you, or I know you worked with so-and-so on that project, or so-and-so spoke well or spoke glowingly about you because you had a
conversation here.
And so...
Again, it's not the what I've done.
It's the how I've leveraged what I've done to put me in the right spaces.
That's what power is for me.
Yes, that is so...
Listen, Breana, I could talk with you all day, but before I let you go, I need two last questions.
One, what do you wish people reading these books will do differently the next day after they finish?
What is the first thing you would want somebody to implement or start?
Where do you want people to start?
first thing I want people to do when they read this, if it hasn't already happened as you were reading it, is again, go back and do that.
Really go through and honestly look at where did you go wrong?
Was it you should have turned left when you went right?
Or was it you didn't go far enough?
But think about how you did not achieve that step.
so that you can go in and achieve it and change that for the next time.
Perfect.
And then where can people connect with you?
As Felicia said, I'm on LinkedIn and I'm one of those people who went, you know, typical, had a job, was radio silent, didn't care about building my brand.
I was too busy building other people's brands.
But recently I've said, why not?
Somebody asked me, why was I hiding?
So I've decided to come out from the dark.
Breana Jones on LinkedIn.
Feel free to connect, follow, please engage.
I have time.
And I have some future projects coming out.
I am previewing this on here for you, Felicia.
I don't even think you know this.
This is exclusive.
The underachieving overachiever.
I'm so excited.
is this a book, a newsletter?
Definitely going to be a book of essays.
Yes.
We're putting some things on sub stack
I'm so excited.
Okay, so if you don't know Breana Jones, you know Breana Jones now and check out her LinkedIn guys.
She's forever dropping gems every day, it feels like.
So make sure you connect with her and do me a favor.
When you connect with her, if you're trying to connect in her network, let her know that you found her on this podcast.
Don't just click connect randomly and don't have any context.
I don't know why people do that on LinkedIn.
Give me some context.
The is I have a rubric for who I connect with and how quickly I connect with them.
So if you can put some context and you say, Hey, I found you through Felicia.
I found you through Trill MBA.
Then I am much quicker to respond.
Yes, please do that.
And so guys, listen, we're all we got.
Breana, I appreciate your support.
I appreciate the lessons.
I appreciate you sharing the lessons with my audience, everybody out there.
Let's give it up for Breana John.
All right, so if this conversation resonated with you, I want you to go back and listen to any of the episodes in the Seven Rules of Power series that just wrapped up last week so
that you can deepen your understanding about how to enact these rules and how to engage and gain power in your career, which is more important now than ever.
The other thing is I want you to share your biggest takeaways on this conversation and on these seven rules of power in social media.
So if you're watching us on YouTube, share in the comments, like your thoughts, let us know.
What are you struggling with?
Ask us questions there and let us know how you're applying these insights to your own career.
So.
let us know what's going on.
And that also helps us as we continue to talk about, and I continue to bring on people who are working to not only enact power in their own careers, but helping other people enact
power in their careers as well.
So this season is all about power, guys.
We are going to take back our power.
We're going to take control of our careers, and we're just going to be badasses all year long this year.
OK?
So.
Thank you for watching the show and until next time, keep it real.
Well guys, that's a wrap on another great episode of the Career Management Podcast for Black Women.
Yes, girl, this show is just for you.
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Ask for help when you need it.
Please, please, please ask for help.
And as always, keep it true.
I'll see y'all next week.
Make a mends