S1E12
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Hey, y'all. It's Nikki. Welcome to another episode of the Working Mamas podcast. This is episode 27. This is a career convos episode.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I have been doing a ton of episodes about the CPA exam, and it was very much needed. But as many questions as I get about the CPA exam and study tips and advice and all of that, I get just as many questions about career tips and leadership development and people asking how to stand out at work or advance in my career. So I'm certainly going to put out more episodes under the hashtag career combos just so y'all can get the answers that y'all are looking for as y'all are moving and grooving in corporate America. So it is almost 3 o'clock in the morning right now. Yeah.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I know I'm a night owl, so this is prime time for me. The house is quiet. Everything is cool and calm. I got my essential oils diffusing. I got my lime water here with me, so it is totally a bath.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I actually just put my kids to bed not too long ago. They have been up. I usually give them a day where they can just kinda stay up, like, do whatever they wanna do. But, you know, kids, you give them a inch, and they take a country mile. If I say y'all could stay up for extra hour, I'll go in the room at 1 o'clock.
Nikki Winston, CPA:They both are still up on devices, playing the game. My daughter's choreo doing choreography while she's watching movies. It's just they are just something else. But anyway, this episode I've been wanting to do for about a week or 2 now. I it's really inspired by this post that I made on LinkedIn last week, where I posted about the best career advice that I ever received.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And just in talking to the people who commented on the post and responded and shared some of the career advice that they also received, it took me back to that era, back to that time when I was fresh out of school. So I said, you know what? I I got some more to say about this. I need to do an episode. But, of course, my episode was further delayed because I spent the last several days really just consumed with my ancestry.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And learning about my grannies and pawpaws and great grands, and I've gone 6 generations back. As of right now, all the way back to 18/25. And so the last 3 or 4 days, I have literally not really did a whole lot of work. I paused everything because I was so intrigued and curious and flabbergasted and amused and sidelined some of my ancestors. Like, what was y'all doing?
Nikki Winston, CPA:What did y'all have going on? But on the flip side, I learned a lot about them. I had some conversations with my parents. I had talked to them several years ago about just different questions I had because my except for my paternal grandmother, my other grandparents passed away when I was too young to even understand what was going on. But just revisiting those conversations with my parents, and laughing about things and raising my eyebrows about other things was like, okay, what did they have going on?
Nikki Winston, CPA:But anyway, I I do wanna delve a little bit deeper, the career advice because I get a lot of questions from people on the regular on LinkedIn every week. But also, just people will randomly email me or message me and ask me questions about certain things. And so a lot of this advice I share because these are a lot of things that I've experienced in my career. And a lot of the learnings came as a result of me making a misstep somewhere. So if anything that I've gone through that I can share so that it helps somebody else not make the same missteps I did.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I'm all for that. And I just really it it feels really nostalgic. It wasn't even that long ago, but it feels nostalgic to go back to that place of when I got my first job. That feeling of graduating, becoming a professional in the accounting industry, something that I had went through my undergraduate life, at the Maxim Fisher College of Business at the Ohio State University, of course. Having gone I remember going through those those years and all those classes and lectures and labs and projects.
Nikki Winston, CPA:It's like, man, when does this shit gonna be over? I just wanna go to work. I'm done with school. I'm I'm over it. And just going back to that time in 2,000 4, those first few weeks between me walking across the stage to get my degree to receiving the verbal offer from mister Knowles.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Like, that was so surreal for me. And in just a matter of weeks, I am being relocated, house hunting with the realtor that the company assigned to me, and I'm preparing to put these 5 years of accounting studying to use. So I used to always have these these thoughts and trying to picture in my mind what my first job would look like. Like, it's gonna be a new job, corner office, but my ass, corner office, and I'm just out of school. 22 year old with a corner office, but a girl could dream.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Right? But corner office is some swanky office building, these floor to ceiling windows. I have this beautiful view of some large metropolitan city with warm weather, lot of traffic, just a whole bad. And I would have that job where Lord Jesus. Let me get some water.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Water with a splash of well, not even a splash. I got water and the juice of 2 limes. So my water is like super crisp right now. But what was I talking about? What I thought my first job was gonna be.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Yeah. So, you know, high rise corner office, swanky building, and I would get to travel throughout the airport, meet people at the other offices, and really just enjoy the perks of being in the accounting industry. And in my first job, I did I traveled to different offices. I met a lot of people, But the office that I worked in, I don't know if I would call it an office. It was more of a, office like structure.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And I I say that because my first job was in manufacturing. So the yard was more like this this plant, the actual manufacturing facility on one side. And then there were the railroad tracks, which was kinda like the street. And then on the other side of the railroad tracks was the building. The little building where my desk, not my corner office, but where my desk would be located.
Nikki Winston, CPA:So, it was it was really interesting. So nothing like what I expected. The other reason why it was nothing like what I expected is because of really just the whole attire, the dress code thing. So when you think about a manufacturing facility, there are pallets, there are rail cars going back and forth all day, there's dust, there's hard hats, there's just drums. Not like music drums, but like drums of, like, chemicals and containers.
Nikki Winston, CPA:But nothing like that swanky office building, but I still, despite all of that, showed up on the 1st day wearing a pencil skirt, button down shirts, stilettos, rock and freeze curls. And if if y'all go back with me for a second to the 99 and the 2000 when cash money took over, Freeze curls were the thing. If you had short hair, it was short with freeze curls, or it was finger waves, or if it was long, you had a French roll, or a bun, or something like that. So, with me rocking my short hair, my freeze curls were everything to me. And I got my hair done every week.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Some days or some weeks, I got them done. I got my hair done twice a week because if I was working out and my hair is sweating out, I had to go get my hair done again. But I remember walking in the building with that outfit and just getting this blatant side eye for my new boss. So I was a financial analyst. My boss was the controller.
Nikki Winston, CPA:She was easily at least 3 or 4 decades older than me. So I'm going around the office, meeting all these people. Now I meet the accounting department, which is only 2 people. I've had never seen another 2 person accounting department after that. But these 2 ladies, not as old as my boss, but still a good 25 years older than me.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And I'm saying hi, and I'm shaking their hands, and I'm kinda looking them up and down at the same time. Like, okay, they got them jeans and sweatshirts and gym shoes. And here I am, this corporate millennial, dressed like I'm about to go walk on work on Wall Street. And it was just awkward. So to say that it was a, fish out of water experience was an understatement.
Nikki Winston, CPA:But that was that was also me just being comfortable with me and who I am, and I've never been that person to assimilate. And I've never been that person to say, well, just because everybody's doing this, I'm gonna do it too. Or when everybody goes right, I'll go left. So I didn't I felt like I still could've came into that role, even though it was a manufacturing facility, and be who I wanted to be. I like to dress up and wear skirts and dresses and look like I was the boss.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And so it was, it was awkward for me just seeing them. Like, wow, they are really, like, underdressed. But then I was the one that got the rude awakening. We'll get to that in a minute. But, I mean, even at 22, my my goal was to be the best.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Yes. I felt awkward in my new workplace, but I also wanted answers. Because I'm the youngest person. I'm the only black person. And here I am, this black girl from Cincinnati with hella ambition.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I was chosen out of all the other new grads who interview for this job. And I know that just in my experience at Fisher, there was not a lot of black students, and I knew I was up against a lot of other people that didn't look like me, didn't talk like me, didn't dress like me. And I asked my boss. My first couple days on the job, I asked her why she picked me. And just knowing the type of person that she was, she was very all about the business type of thing, and she could be very abrasive at times.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And so when I asked her, I just braced myself for that abrasiveness in her response. I didn't know what she was gonna say, but she ended up telling me that it was a tough decision between me and the other person. And when she made the decision, it came down to the details. And she thought I was the burst the best person for the job, and she appreciated my attention to detail. And when I tell you, I was floored because I just felt like something mean or something sideways was gonna come out of her mouth.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And so, I was just humbled like, wow, like, thank you. And let's just back up several weeks prior, and and we'll talk about, what she meant with the details. So I relocated for this job because it was 2 hours or so away from from my house in Columbus. And when I went to the interview, I had to leave super early because the interview was 2 hours away. So I drove 2 hours.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I did the interview, Drove 2 hours back to Columbus. And before I went back home, I stopped at the store. I went and bought a box of thank you cards. And I opened them up. I'm I'm doing all this for sitting in my car.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Opened up the thank you cards, hand wrote her a thank you card, and I took it to the post office because I knew that with me being a couple hours away, it was gonna take her a day or 2 to get my mail. So I wanted it to go out that same day. And when she talked about details, it was really that that handwritten thank you cards spoke volumes. Not only from the feedback that she gave me, but what really just blew me back was I was sitting in her office. And, you know, when you in this new space and you trying to get to know somebody, you just kinda looking around.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Y'all, this lady had the thank you card that I sent her propped up on her desk, like it was a trophy. Like, propped up on the corner of her desk, like it was a trophy. And so I was like, wow. Like, I I I like her now. Like, I think me and her girl will work well together.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And so the takeaway from that is just know that details matter. The difference between me and the other person, She she said that it was a a bunch of people they interviewed. They narrowed it down to 2 people. It was me and this other guy. And I interestingly remember when I went to do my interview, there was a guy sitting in the in the visitors lounge or whatever, and that probably was him.
Nikki Winston, CPA:But the difference between me and the other person getting that job was the thank you letter that I sent to her. The thank you letter that I mailed, not emailed, that I handwrote and put in the mail the same day to her. And so from that day forward, I was just like, you know what? Let's just put all the BS aside. Forget everything else.
Nikki Winston, CPA:It's time to go to work. Let me show this lady that she made the right decision when she picked me for this job. And, I mean, from there, I hit the ground running. And I was a person who I had always been intellectually curious, and I never really shied away from asking questions of anybody. And I tell people all the time, I would much rather be that person that somebody is like, Nikki is so annoying.
Nikki Winston, CPA:She asks a 1,000 questions. But at least I got the answers that I needed. I'm not gonna be that person who's gonna sit there and wonder or make what I what I wanna call them? Make avoidable mistakes. I'm not gonna be the person to make avoidable mistakes out of my fear of not asking a question.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And so just being this new professional, new environment, I'm transitioning from being a student to a professional. I had a lot of questions. Not only questions about accounting and how things get done and how we take the liquid that comes on this railcar, and then a couple days later, it becomes something sitting on a pallet that's being shipped to a customer. I'm trying to understand that. I'm trying to understand balance sheet reconciliations.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I'm trying to understand questions that might be asked of me during the close by my boss's boss, who was like the global controller or something like that. And I just will start just asking her random things about shipping, about the audit, about production, about just everything. Like, I'm thinking about that kid on Home Alone who was in the back of the truck who asked a thousand and one questions. But, I had asked her one day, like, what is this polyamic resin? Like, it was something that the production team Jesus Christ.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Hold on water. Where that came from? But, I asked her about polyamide resins because it was something that I saw, the production sheet from the night before. And I'm like, what is this? Like, what what what does this mean?
Nikki Winston, CPA:What what do they make how do they make this? What do what does this become? And all the questions I have been asking her, like about the company and about the people when in Florida at the corporate office, like, she would answer those questions. And I would ask her about balance sheet racks and where to find certain things, and she would answer those questions. And then when I asked her about the polyamide, it was like I thought she was being irritated.
Nikki Winston, CPA:But her response was like, I can tell you what it is, or you could go out there and figure that for yourself. And I was just like, okay. Well, maybe she's tired of me asking her questions. But then I said, well, you know what? I kinda do wanna figure it out on my own.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And so I told her like, yeah, I I would like to go out to the plant and figure it out. So she gave me this to do list for the next day, which was like, okay. So you come tomorrow, instead of coming to the office, go to the plant, ask for this person, you're gonna do this, this, and this. And then she said, which I can laugh about now, she's like, and wear your steel toes. Because I had already bought steel toe boots because I was told during my onboarding, like, you're gonna need these.
Nikki Winston, CPA:You're probably gonna have to go out to the plant, etcetera, etcetera. And I knew that was her little slick way of saying, don't come in here tomorrow with no skirt and no and no shirt and no pumps, no no stilettos because this ain't that type of party. This is a plant. We manufacture things. There's chemicals.
Nikki Winston, CPA:There's dust. Like, don't do that. So Chiyo can hurt my feelings with that, that shade. But again, I knew that it came from a place of sincerity. So I was just like, you know what?
Nikki Winston, CPA:Let me get out my feelings. Let me get out my feelings and forget about the way that she said it and just focus on what she said. I mean, I'm still just at the point where I am elated by her having my thank you card propped up on her desk. Like, I I have never forgotten that out of my whole career. So from going from that point on, I was just like, you know what?
Nikki Winston, CPA:Anything that Sandra says to me, I'm gonna take it because I realized that she meant Will. And she also told me don't be a clock watcher, but that's a whole another episode. That's another story for another day. Okay? But just know that the next day, I was more appropriate.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I had on my jeans. I had on my Ohio State sweatshirt, my steel toes, and my hard hat that crushed my freeze, girls. Like, I remember when I used to put that hat on, and I used to try to put the hard hat on slow, so it wouldn't do too much damage. But once you put a hard hat over some freeze curls, it is a wrap. Okay?
Nikki Winston, CPA:But the next day, I showed up a little earlier than usual. I had my notepad ready to go out into the plant and ask these men who don't know me a thousand and one questions about their job. And I spent the ride to work. It was like a 35 minute ride to work, but I spent that ride thinking about, like, what should I say? How should I say it?
Nikki Winston, CPA:Would they what would they think of me? Would they say, like, who is this new girl coming in here trying to be the overachiever? And then I said, again, all the bullshit is sad. Let me just focus on doing what I came here to do. So whatever you wanna think, whatever you wanna say, whatever you wanna whisper when I'm not around, you can do that.
Nikki Winston, CPA:But I need you to explain what a polyamic resin is, and I need you to tell me about any production downtime from last night. And I need you to answer all these questions that I have because these questions these answers are answers I need to do my job when I go back to that office like structure where my desk was. So get out of your own head. I don't know if those were things that they actually thought or said, but that was just me creating challenges and creating things that weren't even there. So get out of your own head.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Sometimes we can be our own worst enemy. It was when I got out of my own head that I started this podcast. So but it went on like that for almost a year. That role, my title was a financial analyst. That that role lasted for about a year before the company got put on the block.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Air quotes on the block. When a company gets put on the block, that means that they're being put up for sale. So this particular division was the chemical division of a larger publicly traded company. And so it was like, I don't know how this is gonna go. This is my first job out of school.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I didn't plan on having to look for a job, and it's been less than a year, and just all these things going through my mind. But I was like, you know what? Whatever happens, I learned a lot from this. And I I learned a lot from Sandra, and I got over my fear of not fitting in. And I had a lot of these moments throughout that time with Sandra, where I felt like I was ready for something that she would throw at me and I wasn't.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Right? I felt like I was, but I wasn't. But after working with her, I was ready. So I certainly appreciate that she pushed me to develop thick skin, 1st and foremost, and to not be a clock watcher. Again, another story for another day.
Nikki Winston, CPA:But she taught me to just go for it. And to be a well rounded business person and to look beyond the work that is happening on my little financial analyst desk, but to understand the entire business. And for me, being a black girl, being a black woman, now being a black woman in an industry where I represent not even 1% of the industry, black black CPAs as a whole represent about 0.7% of the entire CPA industry. If we further break that 0.7 down to black female CPAs, it's way less than that. So number 1, I'm glad I got that teaching, and I'm glad that I got it early as part of my first experience in the corporate world.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Because when you go into these new jobs, all of the hiring, the onboarding, the paperwork, there might be some training if you get lucky. A lot of companies are just like, look, just just walk in the door and figure it out. There's not a lot of training, or really official onboarding processes that happen anymore. But even if it is, even if you get the training and the experience and all of that, there's still all of these unwritten rules of corporate America that you really only learn by doing or seeing or immersing yourself in it. And so one of the reasons why I want to focus more on my conversation is more of my episodes about career development and hashtag career combos, is because there is so much that I've seen, that I've done, that I've been a part of, but there are also a ton of missteps that I made in my career, and I learned a lot from those missteps.
Nikki Winston, CPA:So if me sharing career advice based on my actual experiences. If something that I went through, if I can talk somebody through what not to do and help them avoid those missteps that I made, then I'm I'm super happy with that. And there's not a lot of people, a lot of black people in corporate America who are gonna pull you to the side and say, hey, welcome to the company. Let me tell you about a couple of things that might not be written in the company handbook. Here's what you need to do when you are the only woman in the room, when you are the youngest person in the room, when you are the only black person in the room And dealing with the politics of corporate and trying to duck and dodge all of that, but then still looking at it like I'm here, I'm a force to be reckoned with regardless of my title, regardless of how many years of experience somebody has on you.
Nikki Winston, CPA:It's all about what you bring to the table, as far as your authenticity, as far as your value, as far as being confident in your skill set. And so the best advice, the best career advice I ever got was to do it yourself. So do it yourself. Don't sit down and wait for somebody to drop something in your lap, come and hold your hand, and tell you how things are supposed to be done. Get up, go out, and figure it out, because a lot of companies or a lot of roles, as you advance in your career, that's gonna be a lot less, or little to no hand holding.
Nikki Winston, CPA:When you're just out of school, yeah, you might get a mentor, or some extra teaching and onboarding and such. But as you move from if I'm speaking from the accounting space, if you come into a role as a junior accountant or staff accountant, there's gonna probably be a lot more hand holding for you. But as you move into a senior accountant, an accounting manager, and all of these other roles, there's an expectation that you know what you're doing to the point where you can be self directed. And there's not a lot of time or energy and effort, my t my t e e. There's not a lot of time, energy and effort that the company has to invest in you because they feel like you should know what to do.
Nikki Winston, CPA:So a lot of that and a lot of the way that I move is because of what I learned working working under Sandra. And so it's not an intimidating experience for me to be across the table from a c suite executive. I don't have a problem picking up the phone and calling somebody in another department that I don't know and asking them questions if that's what I need to get my job done, if that's what helps my team. And you just have to get to the point where you gotta put the emotions aside, you gotta put the feelings aside and understand that this is about the business, this is about the work. And that's the thing I took from Sandra, is like, as abrasive as her words were sometimes, I I certainly appreciate them now.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I couldn't understand that first. Some of the things that some of the things that she would say. Like I was so stuck on the delivery that I was missing her message. And I remember having those moments where I would go home and talk to my husband. Well, he was my fiance at the time, but I would talk to him and say, like, I don't know why this lady has it out for me.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I don't know why she's always on my ass and this, this, and this. And I mean, I don't I don't know if I can deal with her. But that was the 22 year old in me speaking, the young professional in me speaking, not really understanding what this lady was doing at the time and how she was investing in me. And it wasn't until several years down the road where I would occasionally think back to that experience. And I'm like, oh, I didn't get it at the time, but damn, I get it now.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And I so appreciate what she was doing when she told me to go out here and figure it out on my own. When she would say, you're not gonna get very far in your career if you're a clock watcher. And a lot of times we or I won't say we, I'll speak for myself. A lot of times in relationships whether they're with significant others, whether it's with family and friends, sometimes there's this communication issue that's at the root of a lot of the problems where it's like, I don't I couldn't even catch what you were saying because I couldn't get past the way that you said it. And that's where I was with Sandra.
Nikki Winston, CPA:Like, a lot of times, things that she said just I'm just like, does she really just like fix her mouth to say that like that? But you gotta you gotta let that go out the window and and realize that it's about the work And it's not in most cases, it's not anything personal or a ding against you. It's just that's the nature of of at least the accounting industry, and you just gotta be alone for the ride. And I actually, I had looked Sandra up a few weeks ago because this was this was only 15, 16 years ago. This was 2,004.
Nikki Winston, CPA:So while it wasn't a long time ago, there was no social media. And so I still would think about her occasionally because I don't think she realized the impact that she had on my career. I've had people tell me that I'm very ambitious and I work with a sense of urgency. And like I said before, I don't have a problem working cross functionally, not afraid to interact with leadership and big wigs, if you will. And a lot of that I learned from her.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And it wasn't until later that I realized going out into the plant, talking to these people, asking them these questions was my first experience with working cross functionally. Accounting impacts every aspect of a business. So if you work in accounting and you're listening to this, you have to be able to work cross functionally, whether you're making a phone call to an operations leader, whether you're talking to IT, it can be marketing, looking at their p and l. It can be so many things going on. And so there's just a skill set that I don't I don't wanna call them soft skills, because there's nothing soft about them.
Nikki Winston, CPA:But there's a skill set that you have to develop beyond technical accounting and debits and credits to really be effective in your role. And even with Sandra and this whole clock watcher thing, like, we would spend some days after hours. To me, after hours is like, if it's 501 and I'm still in the office, there is a problem. Okay? But for her, she she didn't care about what time it was.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And we would be in her office reviewing the p and l on speaker phone with the FP and A team in Jacksonville, asking questions to the plant team about production. So many things that I've learned from her that set the bar so high for my career. And, of course, that post that I put on LinkedIn made me think about that. But also, when I think about all the questions I get from people on LinkedIn, and then the people who just randomly reach out to me on social media or email me and say, hey, how do I how, you know, how do I move up in my career? There was they'll talk about some situation they're dealing with that work and asked me for suggestions, or how do I advance in my career.
Nikki Winston, CPA:And interestingly, the people who asked me for advice, there's not like one group of people. These are everybody from new professionals to season, people who have several years, decades of experience, they work in different industries, they're at different levels in their career, yet they all ask similar questions. And the gist of growing and advancing in your career is, think about where you are now, think about where you aspire to be, and you have to fill in the space between those two spots. The thing that makes people cringe or run away is the fact that there's work to be done in the space between those two spots. And there's not a point a and a point b and a straight line between the 2.
Nikki Winston, CPA:There's point a over here, there's point b over here, and there is so many twist turns, ups, downs, lateral moves that you're gonna take before you even get to b, to point b. And so the thing where a lot of people or the place where a lot of people stumble was that they don't wanna do that work. But there is no skating around it. I have said that ad nauseam at this point. There is no skating around the work.
Nikki Winston, CPA:There's no shortcut to the top. And you just have to embrace that, put your emotions to the side, and keep it moving. So I am curious to hear what the best career advice is that you have ever received. So definitely, if you're listening to this, share it, or message me or email me on social media, and let me know what what some career advice that you've received. And I I think this is a conversation that we need to continue, because even with a lot of companies pivoting to work from home, there's a whole another set of rules and such, a lot of career advice that's still applicable, but then we have to add another layer to it because now you have to think about relationships and going virtual, and how you still have to ensure that your presence is known even in a virtual environment.
Nikki Winston, CPA:So this is a subject that we can easily talk about on 2, 3, 4 more episodes. But for now, I'm gonna pause there because this has been this has been fun. I actually was flashing back to those moments as I was doing this episode. But that was just an amazing first experience, a first job to have. I couldn't stand it at first.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I couldn't receive the message at first, but I am so glad that I did. And it really just define how I moved in my career after that. So I just I appreciate it. It was it was priceless experience. So if you have a career question you want me to answer, hit me up on social media at nickwinstoncpa.
Nikki Winston, CPA:You can also send me an email, nikki@nickwinstoncpa.com. Happy to talk about this further and help y'all get to where y'all wanna go as y'all are moving and grooving in these corporate streets. So this is probably one of my longest episodes. It's almost 40 minutes, and that's more than enough time. So y'all be good.
Nikki Winston, CPA:I hope y'all enjoyed this episode. There will be more of these to come. But for now, y'all be good. I'll talk to y'all later.
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