EP99 Career Growth Beyond Survival Mode with Miriam

What does it take to break free from survival mode and start building real wealth? Miriam Simon, CEO of Mi Si Coaching and Consulting, reveals her 25-year journey from entry-level positions to corporate executive leadership.

She shares her powerful philosophy of honoring "your yes" – making decisions that align with your own values rather than others' expectations. This principle guided her from difficult beginnings to creating new leadership roles and eventually founding her own company.

She share her practical strategies for career growth for Latinas, that helped Miriam secure eight different promotions and significantly increase her income. She shares insider tips on customizing resumes, researching salary ranges, leveraging employer benefits like tuition reimbursement, and effectively using LinkedIn for professional networking. 

Whether you're just starting your career, feeling stuck in survival mode, or ready to leverage your professional success to build wealth, this episode offers both inspiration and concrete strategies to help you honor your own "yes" and create the financial stability you deserve.

More on Miriam Simon on the blog!

Chapters

• 1:36 Welcome to Money Chisme Podcast
• 3:04 Miriam's Journey: From Entry Level to Executive
• 10:59 Career Decisions: Going Higher vs. Wider
• 19:22 Navigating Promotions and Building Skills
• 33:00 Finding Your Worth and Giving Back
• 42:45 Tattoos and Pearls: Life Marks as Leadership Tools

Transcript

Violeta Sandoval: 0:48

Hola, hola, welcome to another episode of the Money Chisme podcast. One of the things I usually talk about is how I use, you know, my current job to fund, like, my investments. But in order to get to that point, you want to first get that nice job and get out of that survival mode in order to, like, get financially stable and start taking those wealth building steps. With me today I have medium Simone to share some tips and tricks on trying to navigate that. You know, either a corporate job or a professional job.

Miriam Simon: 1:28

Thank you, violeta, for having me. I'm super happy to share my story and super happy to be able to, you know, give some tips and tricks of strategies that I've learned throughout all these years 25 years of corporate experience and navigating entry level all the way to executive level, now being able to do all the other additional things, using money as a tool, which is one of the main things that should be. Everybody's goal is to use money as a tool, but in the beginning you know I'm not. It's not always this easy and it doesn't always come right away for not, at least not for people like us, people from my background. It didn't. I had to earn my way there people from my background.

Violeta Sandoval: 2:16

It didn't. I had to earn my way there. Yeah, I am in the military and I've been in the military for 14 years, and so now I've decided to leave and now I have to go find a job and you know, I haven't had to find a job in 14 years and of course it's military side, so the corporate side is going to be interesting. But before we get into that, I'm going to let you introduce yourself for those that may not be familiar with you.

Miriam Simon: 2:42

Yeah, so my name is Miriam Simon and I'm the CEO and founder of MeSee Coaching and Consulting. So I started my own company last year in July, on my daughter's birthday, because she's an entrepreneur. She became an entrepreneur before me and I was thinking to myself, hey, maybe that's something I can do. And so I started it, because I was thinking Misi is not only the first two letters of my first and last name, but it's also overarching theme of how I started and how I was able to continue and how I was able to find my calling and find what was important to me. So the me, see, stands for my yes, right. So my yes, my theme is honor you. So in order for you to do that right, you need to figure out what are the yeses that you want to say to, not the yeses from other people. Yeah, we have people who tell us, you know, give us advice or tell us things on how to work or where to go or what to do, but the reality is that it has to work for us, and so that's what's been a common thread throughout my entire career and even through motherhood, even through my relationship with my wife, and what I started to do was.

Miriam Simon: 4:10

I worked my way up from entry level to corporate executive, and then now I've been able to use my skills and development that I've had as a coach.

Miriam Simon: 4:22

I became certified last year too, and that has given me the opportunity to say you know what, maybe I don't want to reach higher, maybe I want to reach wider right. So I was thinking how can I reach wider and reach other people? If this is working in my organization, how can I extend myself to my community? And that's exactly why my CE coaching and consulting was started, and you know, that's how I got into authorship as well. I'm also an author, and I have my book Tattoos and Pearls coming out in April, so I'm really happy and excited about that. But before that, I was participating in two anthology series Latinas 100, leaving Our Legacy and Inspiring the Next Generation, and the other one is Hispanic Star, the New Face of Power and I've been able to write stories about triumph and achievements that I didn't have anywhere else that I could put them in, and these books anthologies gave me the opportunity to do so.

Violeta Sandoval: 5:34

Yeah, I want to go a little bit back to because it kind of triggered something I wanted to talk about. It is something that, like, I've been dealing with recently, because you said, I don't want to reach higher, I want to reach wider. And I think that's one thing that I've been dealing with is like I don't really need to go, you know, higher. I don't need to be like the very top person, one like that's a lot of responsibility, especially like in my field and stuff I'm in, like occupational safety and health field and and going higher and higher. That's like so much more responsibility.

Violeta Sandoval: 6:09

And, like you said, what is it that you want to say yes to? And I'm kind of like a little bit stumped right now because it's like what do I want to do? Like I don't want to go to these high management positions, uh, because I don't want to have to be on call. You know, I want to be able to enjoy my daughter she's I have a one old, so like I mean, and I fought so hard to get her, so I want to make sure to enjoy every little thing that she does and I don't want to have to be at work for, like usually they're like 12 hour shifts and I'm like and like I don't want to, I don't want to. So I'm glad that you are like showing that that it's okay to not have to go super high, especially with our community. That's like driven into us. So I kind of want to go a little bit into your thoughts on that, on what, like you know, what's your advice on somebody that is kind of like struggling with that?

Miriam Simon: 7:12

Yeah, what's interesting is that that's a. That's a common distinction people need to make as to whether they want to become an individual contributor, meaning that you're able to do your own job, your own task, and don't need to supervise other people Right. And then the other part is do you want to be a manager? If you want to be a manager, there's a way more responsibility on top of that right. So you're not only overseeing a team, but you're also overseeing tasks, and there's a such thing as a working manager. So you have your own work plus everybody else's work that you need to pay attention to. And then thinking about the industry that you want to work in Right, so I work in AV, I was working in the aviation industry, so I'm in transportation and in there it's a 24-7 operation. So there was a crossroads where I said do I want to work as an operations duty supervisor manager, or do I want to work more in the staff department where I can go, transition into HR right, and then work differently? I don't need to be available 24 seven to the 24 seven operation, right. So my wife is a 24 seven operation. She's a manager for an aviation right. So what she does today she's actually on a 12 hour shift and she works days and nights, rotating back and forth, right.

Miriam Simon: 8:50

So for our relationship it was important that one of us was able to stay home and stay close or at least be available to say you know what, if I need to leave work, then I can go and pick up my kids when they were in school.

Miriam Simon: 9:06

Now my kids are in their 20s, but that was a consideration back in the day when they were in school, and actually that's one of the stories that I wrote, the decision that changed my life, because I was thinking should I go to work in New York? I live in New Jersey, I worked at the airport 30 minutes away, my kids were going to school five minutes, right across the street, and was there an opportunity for me to go work in New York, which was an hour, two hours away, and who was going to come back and get the kids right? So those are different considerations, like the life work. I don't like to say life work balance, I like to say life work pendulum, because if you're here you're not there, right. So you have to figure out which way you're going, left or right. But I think that those there's so many different considerations to make when you're thinking about career moves and when you're thinking about what kind of work do you want to do?

Miriam Simon: 10:13

And then, of course, you know, as mothers, as women, we always have other people that we're paying attention to or we're taking care of, and that comes into consideration as well and our support teams. Do we have the right support?

Violeta Sandoval: 10:28

It's definitely a lot to think about, which I didn't really realize at At the beginning, when I decided that I was going to leave the military, I thought I'd just, like you know, get a job. But now it's like, with my daughter's changed, everything is like I don't want to be there for long hours. I want to, like you know, a nice slow life now. And it took a while to get you know to this point because I know, I understand that you know a lot of people don't have that, I guess, privilege and you know ability to just nitpick what kind of job they want. So I do want to go over you started in what was your journey?

Miriam Simon: 11:10

So I started working back when I was like 14 years old, part time in a doctor's office, and that was because my boyfriend at that time, his sister, was working there and she needed somebody to just step in, so that that was like my first job.

Miriam Simon: 11:28

Then I went to work at World of Science at the Garden State Plaza Mall and that was fun. That one I actually got scouted. I was walking out of Arapastel with my grandparents, we went to buy like school clothes and jeans and sweaters or shirts, and the lady was standing right outside the mall on a table and she said hey, you know, would you like, are you looking for a job? Would you like to come work, are you looking for something? And that was actually my first job before I was 18. She even wanted to make me a manager, but I was so young that I didn't have the age and I couldn't. And then, um, after that, my aunt helped me get a job at the airport. She was working security and so then I was able to do that.

Miriam Simon: 12:17

I was going to college, I didn't have any kids yet. I was like straight out of high school, only 18 years old, working at the airport. I had three kids, so I fell in love and I put it in quotations because that was not a good relationship for me and it was not even the right relationship in no, no way, shape or form. But I had three kids and they were sick. My first two were getting sick in the very early stages, like before they were five. My son almost had a near death experience as well. So I needed to quit college. I couldn't go to work and I couldn't go to school and I couldn't be a mother at the same time. So I needed to make the decision to quit college and put that dream on hold, right, and so I became a mother. I kept my job because I still needed to work, and what's interesting is that this person actually asked me not to go back to work after having my kids yeah, the first two. And what was interesting is that my aunt said to me Miriam, you need to go back to work. Like you don't know where this is going. You don't know if this is going to. You know, help you out. You need to figure out how to take care of your kids, like there's nobody else that's going to take care of them but you. And so I listened to her advice, right, and I went back to work when it was time for me to go back. After. You know, you're cleared by the doctor.

Miriam Simon: 14:00

So then after that I worked there for about 15 years just making sure I took care of my kids and that was the main priority. You know, I really didn't think I had any options. I was just really focused on getting paid, really to make sure that I had a roof over my shoulders and I had enough food for them to eat. I was doing okay. But then the opportunity presented itself where somebody said, oh, there's an opportunity across the street, working for a good organization, you need to test in and interview and follow all the protocols and entries right in. So I said, okay, fine, it wasn't just me, it was a few people. I passed the test, I get in, I get offered two jobs. They offer tuition. My goal, my dream of having a degree, is now back in my hands. Like now I can feel it and I said, yes, you know what? This is my opportunity. My kids are bigger, right.

Miriam Simon: 15:05

That old relationship has been there and done that and gone. I've been with my wife now for almost 20 years. We've been together two decades with my wife now for almost 20 years. We've been together two decades. So she helped me raise my kids and she's always been a great support system, and so we talked about it and she said you know what, if that's something you really want to do, go ahead, go back to school, sign up, we'll make it work. Then, at the same time that I was going to school, working full time, raising my kids my kids are now teenagers, go back to college and I also get promoted every year, year and a half.

Miriam Simon: 15:43

So what I noticed was the fact that everybody that had left to this organization was making 10, 15, $20,000 within, you know, five years, like they were almost doubling their income within five years. So then I said to myself you know what, maybe that's the goal. It should be for me too. Like, why can't I double my income? And that's where I started to say you know what? What are the, what are the jobs or what's the career path I need, what are the skills I need?

Miriam Simon: 16:18

And then I started pulling all the jobs Actually from school. There was a first course like fundamentals of, of some career fundamentals, and I needed to research a job, and in researching a job, I found out how much salary they made, what was important to me, what did it? You know, what did it fit my skills, what was I missing? And so I did a full assessment of it and then I realized, you know what? This is a path that I can take. And so from there, I started to pull all the bulletins from the different jobs that were coming up and then I started to say, okay, this is my starting point, what do I need to do and how do I get there? And so then, every single year, year and a half, no matter what it was, I just kept applying to the jobs and just kept on applying, and I was told no many times, but there were times where they said yes, and so that's what helped me Right, and and I've learned so much, because doing the interviews you gain experience on interviewing, I imagine.

Miriam Simon: 17:26

I had never I hadn't interviewed for over 15 years and all of a sudden I was doing it every year, year and a half.

Violeta Sandoval: 17:32

Oh, wow, that's what I'm scared of the interviews. Yeah, and don't be, because you know what You're there.

Miriam Simon: 17:40

What I always tell people is that you're interviewing them as well, because you want to know is this a right fit for me, right? Yeah, they're judging you. Yeah, they're checking you out, right? Yeah, they're checking to see your skills. Yes, they want to hear what you have to say, how you're going to do certain work, what are the competencies? Right, they want to know how you do things right. So you should come prepared with examples of how you show leadership, how you show teamwork, how you show all communication, how do you work with others all kinds of different things and so what you can do is you can prepare before that. So before I wasn't preparing, but then, now that I knew what was needed, it was easier for me to prepare and I was like, oh, I'm an expert, now I can really go ahead and go for it. So I ended up getting like eight different jobs titles until I got to the one that I have and I didn't just double employment workshop, and they talked about like you know, resume and interview and stuff.

Violeta Sandoval: 19:00

We didn't get to practice. A lot of interviews they talked about like give tips and things like that. So I just haven't done it in like so long. And and I still got talking about myself because like I try to be like humble and and you know I suffer from that Uh, I can't think of it right now where, like I'm just too humble or I don't think I'm at that level yet, like in my mind I'm not an expert, even though I've been in my field for like six years. So I have to overcome that. I'm still working on my master resume. I had to go back all those 14 years on what I did because I wasn't doing it. So I will say that's one tip Make sure you're keeping something throughout your time, because lesson learned for me that now I have to go back and try to remember everything I did. Luckily the Navy we do. I'm not sure if in the corporate world y'all have like a yearly review. Yes, a yearly review.

Violeta Sandoval: 20:03

And it has all that, so we have that one in the military as well. So I get to go just pulled all those forms out and it says everything I did for that year. So luckily I have. That is one thing that I didn't know some jobs offered was that you were able to get tuition from your job. So can you tell us a little bit of you know how you got that? How does it work?

Miriam Simon: 20:29

Yeah, so the organization is provides that it's part of their programs.

Miriam Simon: 20:35

It's part of how they help their employees, their benefits, and so that's important for people to look for jobs that have tuition reimbursement right. So those are some of the considerations. If that's important to you Because some people don't need it or don't want to further their education, that's perfectly fine too. None of my kids went to college. They're all doing different things and they're all making money, but if you do, it's very important to look for that. So that could be a consideration too.

Miriam Simon: 21:04

When you're pulling your resume together you know you're getting yourself ready to apply to different jobs is to go look at the benefit section and take a look and see if they offer that, and so what I did is I was able to. If you had a hardship, you could request the money ahead of time, or you can work with the college and they'll give you a letter saying the grades you received at the end, and then you submit the payment and then the company reimburses you a percentage, and so for me, I was very happy and grateful. If I got an A, I got 85% back, so that's not bad at all. It was a good way for me not to get into loans and not to get into debt, so that worked out really well for me for the five years that I went to school. That time and tuition reimbursement was the way for me to be able to do it without all that debt and taking out loans.

Violeta Sandoval: 22:03

And then you were able to use that as leverage to like, go get more, more promotions. And and I think that's one of the um, the things that some people can, some people can learn, is to, you know, take and go out there. The good thing is that we have the Internet, like nothing is pretty much hidden. You could go to websites that tells you like the market value or salary for whatever job that you're applying to, and sometimes even the ones for your job there might be public. It depends especially, I think, in California, if I remember, I think they have to have like the salary, so when they have a job posting, some states have that so you could check that. And, yeah, I think in this time you can really do a lot of research to help you, you know, get that promotion. How did you?

Miriam Simon: 23:01

navigate that, yeah. So part of it was checking okay, if I want to get to the higher level business manager or whatever manager position, it was, what are the skills that I need right? So at one point I needed the degree. Are the skills that I need Right? So at one point I needed the degree. And so the degree I needed to hurry up and double on my classes so that I can get the degree in order to apply, because there was one position that I did want and I couldn't get it. I was rejected because I didn't have the degree yet, even though I was very close, but I didn't get it.

Miriam Simon: 23:33

And then the other piece too, going back to the resume, is making sure that any job that you go for, you rework and customize your resume right Based on that job description. So what you want to do is if, if there's top of skills that are on the job description that maybe are at the bottom of the resume that you currently have, then you should really put them more higher to the top and also make sure that it's relevant to the job, because sometimes you may not need to put every single skill that you have right. It may be that it just needs to be the relevant skills for that job, and so you always need to customize it to the position that you're applying to. You're not going to, you're going to make sure that you have that experience, but you're going to customize it to make sure it matches the job description, and so, therefore, people can see that you have the skill set for those jobs. And so that's what I did. I started pulling up the job descriptions. I paid attention to the market reference ranges.

Miriam Simon: 24:45

So the salaries what are the salaries? Does it make sense? Is it a lateral move, meaning is it like the same level to the same level? Is there a salary increase for that? Is it not?

Miriam Simon: 25:00

Some people go for the same job title. If you go for the same title within a organization, it may not include a salary increase. So you need to pay attention to that as well. Salary increase. So you need to pay attention to that as well. If it does, then you need to say okay, what are the promotional parameters? What's the salary increase Like? What's the possibility?

Miriam Simon: 25:27

So, a hundred percent, taking a look at what the salary ranges are and what they pay for that organization, and also knowing the differences between private sector and public sector. Because, even though they may have similar titles, they may pay differently because one is private and the other is public. So those are key differences as well. And then sometimes too, like veterans, sometimes they have veteran programs or they have different types of programs that help them, or entry level positions, or I would even look for employee business resource groups. There may be some of those, and they may be able to also help with some navigation help or career development. You never know. Some of these organizations have EBRGs, which are employee business resource groups, or employee resource groups that also offer additional resources.

Violeta Sandoval: 26:27

Yeah, when you were doing this research, what kind of thing did you just use like the company website, or were you looking at like I guess, uh, what kind of websites are out there for someone that is, you know, thinking about doing this what? Where can they go?

Miriam Simon: 26:44

Yeah, so there there's some. There's a glass door that people can use where you can pull it up, right, and nowadays some of the organizations do have public uh, knowledge, like the salaries are posted. So if they're posted, that's an easy way to just look up the job title and then you can pull up how much people are making currently in those roles or the year before, because it tends to be the year before. And then, like you mentioned, in some states it's required that they post the jobs right, and so it's important to see, well, if they begin at this and they end at that, right. What are the considerations as to how I would be considered at the lower range or the higher range, right? So you need to think about your experience and how many years you've been in the industry. What do you bring in addition to things like that? Because if you get close to the higher, it may be harder to you, may be overqualified, or it may be harder for you to even get that job because there's no promotional opportunities. If you're looking for it, if it's totally fine, then it works for you. So there's definitely a lot of considerations, but I would say look at the online, do your research, pull the job titles that you're interested in and then, through there, you'll receive more and more links.

Miriam Simon: 28:13

I would also go into LinkedIn. You'll receive more and more links. I would also go into LinkedIn. So LinkedIn I have a lot of people that I'm connected with now because I've been pretty active there, and there you can build your profile based on your skills and then there you can start to either connect with other people and maybe even do some interviews and find out and say, hey, you know, I see you're in this industry. Would you mind talking to me for a few minutes? I'm thinking about going into this job title. You know anything I need to know? You'd be surprised how many people want to help you. Some may say no, but there may be some people who would be willing to help. You can find different coaches or different career coaches, just different people. You know, based on the title, there's plenty of people that will be willing to help.

Violeta Sandoval: 29:07

I'm barely getting started in LinkedIn and I'm kind of like overwhelmed. But, like most of these jobs that you find is through networking, and so LinkedIn is one of the great ways. But I'm kind of like lost with. Linkedin is like what do I post there? Like how do I do it? So I'm curious to what kind of tips would you give to someone that is, you know, trying to get into LinkedIn?

Miriam Simon: 29:35

Yeah, so you want to make sure it's a career focused right. So you can talk about milestones, right.

Miriam Simon: 29:42

So I talk about like oh, today, you know, I have something with the book going on, or I participated in a career panel, right? Or I went to an employee business resource group event. So in the beginning, what I tell everybody is, if you're not going to post right away, it's okay, right? Just start to see who you are interested in, right? What are the topics or industries that you're interested in? What are the topics or industries that you're interested in? And then you can start to say, oh okay, this is the way that I can participate in this social media outlet, right, Because LinkedIn is very different than Instagram and very different than TikTok, right? So you're not going to post the same things on on all of them, but you can have similar, similar posts, but they come from a different voice or a different perspective. A little bit Like on TikTok, you can have a little more fun, Right, but on LinkedIn, you, you're going to be a little more professional in the way that you say things or you're going to keep it clean, Right. In other places you may not, but you're going to keep it clean, right. In other places you may not, but you also have to be careful, because nowadays. I don't do it, but people say they do. This is what I hear, that they do. Take a look at what the other social media. You know what you have out there on social media.

Miriam Simon: 31:11

But what I did in the beginning because I was the same way, no-transcript that you want and then, based on that, those can come into your inbox automatically, Right? So I created a profile and then you think about OK, is it for a manager, for a supervisor or for a job title? It could be analyst, let's say, if you want an analyst job, Right. So then you put in your experience and your profile, you add your about what is it that you're about and what you're interested in doing, and then you can go to the job titles, like what you're looking for, and then you can actually look up analysts and then those will start to come into you. You'll start to see all the different opportunities. It even asks you like remote, hybrid, in-person things like that, so it can really customize your experience on there.

Miriam Simon: 32:28

So in the beginning it was really just to get a feel of it and I do have different jobs coming in. So I look at, like director jobs what are the jobs out here? You know, in New York, in California, in Canada. What are the differences? What are those job descriptions look like? What are the differences in them? What are those job descriptions look like? What are the differences in them? In case any you know, do I want to work for this kind of company? What else is on their company page? Right, you can find out a lot about them just through LinkedIn and the job postings.

Violeta Sandoval: 33:01

Thanks for the tips. I'm definitely going to go, like you know, adjust my LinkedIn. You were mentioning, like you know, at the beginning of the podcast, that you were talking about going wider. Like, what does that mean to you?

Miriam Simon: 33:14

Yeah, so what that's about is the fact that once you get to a certain level, it's a little harder and it takes a lot longer to continue to go higher. And so what I was thinking about is the fact that I wanted to reach my community and I wanted to reach other people. I wanted to be able to help, I wanted to give back. Right For me, it's always been about impact, and it came to a point where I recognized my worth, where I recognized my worth. And so in the beginning you're kind of like I don't know, am I good? Like you know, you think your life experiences aren't important. But then you start to gain the accolades and people start telling you and you start seeing the results. And so I I'm also a Hispanic Achiever Award recipient and I'm a senior advisor for an employee business resource group. I started with the administrative professionals and now I moved to the Parents Working Together group.

Miriam Simon: 34:20

And so I created that role, right. So I created that role and I was thinking you know what I think the other resource groups would benefit from that. How can I get that going? And so I began advocating for it, just like I began advocating for the administrative professionals networking group. I noticed there was a need and I began advocating and then I said, okay, we got that created Okay, done. Now. The next one the advisor Okay, done Now. The next one the advisor okay, created, now, done, right.

Miriam Simon: 34:56

So then I was thinking, how do I keep? How do I keep creating the spaces and the roles that don't exist and give other people an opportunity, right? So the important thing about being a leader is that you realize you're in the room. About being a leader is that you realize you're in the room, so you have different opportunities to bring for other people, right. And so I said, okay, let me think about this. And, um, first I said let me show them how. So I did it first. And then I started to say this is working. This is really, you know, showing the data behind it, the professional development programs too, showing the data behind it, the professional development programs too. And now I have about 60% promotional rates from the programs that I ran. And so then I recognized my worth and I said to myself you know what? I can really take this externally and I can help other people and I can reach more.

Miriam Simon: 35:49

And I just kept thinking my high school and I kept thinking about the kids, because I went to do career week there and I remember how somebody was really talented I started talking about tattoos and pearls and he had his art in his notebook. And another one said he wanted to do like media. Right, he wanted to do cartoons and he wanted to do all this other stuff. And I said to him oh, you know, so do you have a computer or an iPad that you can use these different programs? And they didn't right, and these are high school kids. They weren't even like little kids, they were high school kids.

Miriam Simon: 36:34

And I just remember that and I just kept thinking to myself like, wow, miriam, like this is where you came from, right, you need to go back and you need to start giving back to the community and reaching our people and reaching and letting them know that there is a way out, there is more to this world, right? I just remember when I was in school and I remember reading in the history books about transportation and that's probably what led me there and I remember people saying I mean, in the textbook it would say that transportation gave you opportunities. So, because you were able to take the train to another city, to where the work was, you were able to jump on the train and go, right, and so that's my commute, three days of the week, every week, and that's what also helped me get into New York, right? So it's just that, and so I think sometimes we just need to show other people that, yeah, we came from this, yes, we're immigrants. Right, I'm an immigrant, I got here, in six months.

Miriam Simon: 37:39

I wasn't born here and I was raised here. And then, yeah, I didn't have a lot of money. No, things weren't handed to me, I needed to work for them. Have a lot of money? No, things weren't handed to me, I needed to work for them. And then, once you get to a certain point, you can turn around and help others. And so I reached that point where I knew that it was time for me to start helping and start reaching out and start showing others the path forward and, you know, continuing on for the next generation, that's what one of the reasons I advocate for building wealth and gaining the financial stability through finding a nice corporate job or whatever it may be that's going to get you there.

Violeta Sandoval: 38:24

That's financially stable because you're kind of like in a tunnel vision just trying to survive, pay bills and all this stuff. And once you start being able to get that financial stability, you're able to pull back and then you keep building. You know your income and now you could actually start. You know giving back and I think that's an important thing in our community. You know to help our community because you know, of course, we're behind so we have to try to accelerate. You know catching up and I really love that we have so many. You know women like yourself and you know other people that I see in the community. I've been I think that's one of the best things of doing this podcast that I've been able to kind of like see how we are coming together to help our community and that's like the real wealth right there. But I'm finding ways to give back in the community. I'm still working on. You mentioned your book. I want to talk a little bit about your book because I know it's coming out soon.

Miriam Simon: 39:31

Yeah, yeah, and and don't underestimate the experience that you have, because the knowledge is key. Right, that you are best equipped to help a younger version of yourself or a previous version of yourself. And and even the podcast is is is 100% your voice and 100% reaching other people. Right, because that's why I started my podcast to Latina Mic Drop podcast, because I wanted to be able to share my voice and my expertise. And guess what? It was minimal investment for me to do it. And guess what? It was minimal investment for me to do it. I barely had to spend any money. I did take a course to be able to figure out how to do it, because I was able to pay for it and that helped me exponentially. You know, move forward, but those are don't underestimate what you have gained, that life experience that you have gain, that life experience that you have, maybe the difference between you know just talking about it and helping it and sparking uh and and momentum in other people, and that's super critical and being able to do that, yeah, um, and, and I, I love using money as a tool, so that's the best part right now is being able to use the money that I make. So that's how I became a Forbes coaches council member, right? So, because I can participate in that. Now I'm able to talk about different coaching experiences or leadership experiences. Now I can't even believe that I'm part of an expert panel who contributes to these articles. And you see it on Forbes and it's in their leadership section, right? And you think, oh my God, like me, somebody from like me doing this, you know, but once you get to a certain point, you can start to leverage it and use it, and I think about your voice is just so critical and so important, and sometimes it's just a fresh take that people need to hear. So don't ever underestimate. I always, always, always focused on the experience that I had. That really was that life experience, and that's actually what Tattoos and Pearls is about. Because Tattoos and Pearls is about how you're marked for life, like the different experiences that happen to you. That's the tattoo part. Marked for life, like the different experiences that happen to you. That's the tattoo part. How you live through life.

Miriam Simon: 42:17

And some things are very hard and in our communities we don't like to talk about those hard things. We like to, you know, keep it in the closet or, you know, don't air your dirty laundry to anybody outside the house. And so I said you know what? I think it's time for me to be able to talk about those things and give people the opportunity to see and say you know what, I'm not alone in this. I know that I can come out of it. And then that's where the pearls of wisdom come right. How do you turn all those experiences that you've had into your leverage, into how you execute, into your success? And that's been like.

Miriam Simon: 43:02

The main goal is to show people that, yeah, we may have had it hard is to show people that, yeah, we may have had it hard, but what we bring to the table also counts and it also helps us succeed. And leadership does look this way too. And that's important, because I wasn't always chasing a title and I wasn't always. I always didn't need a title to be the leader. I was a leader anyways. I was a leader anyways in so many different leader anyways in so many different ways. Why? Because I'm first gen, because I needed to stick my neck out right for my family when I was a kid and there were so many different ways.

Miriam Simon: 43:38

And so I talk about a lot of different stories and then how you can use it to your advantage in leadership and leading your own life, which is important, and hearing your own calling and your own life, which is important, and hearing your own calling and your own, your own importance and and noticing that worth, right, and and kind of like taking everybody else out of the equation for a hot second. We're going to take them into consideration, we love them. We there's our support teams, right, we love them and everything like that. But there comes a point where you need to say hold on, I need to sit with myself and I need to figure out what's good for me, and if it's good for me, then it'll be good for everybody else.

Miriam Simon: 44:17

And we're taught the total opposite to take care of everybody else before we take care of ourselves, and that hurts us in the long run and that's not, it's not, it's not going to help you and everybody else. You know it's just not. But it can, but then it's at your expense in a way, right. And then you're like thinking I'm not happy, I'm not doing anything that I like, nothing sparks joy for me, but then in this way you can, and that's that's one of the reasons why I wrote Tattoos and Pearls, and also because we're so many people that think, oh, the odds are stacked against us, the statistics are this and that, and I say you know what that means there's more opportunity. The opposite of that is opportunity, and that's how I see it.

Miriam Simon: 45:08

I've always said you know what Okay means there's more opportunity. The opposite of that is opportunity, and that's how I see it. I've always said you know what? Okay, only 3% of Mexican women or Mexican background have a degree. Well, guess what? I'm going to be one of those 3% people Now, it's like think up to 20. And that was back in the day when I first started. So imagine that it's incredible just to see how far we've come and how far more we can go. Like there's so much runway out there for us. When does your book come out? Yeah, so it'll be on Amazon, and people could find me at MiriamSimononline, and I'm an author, miriam Simon, on social media. So YouTube, my own YouTube channel, and Instagram on Facebook, and then Latina Mic Drop. You can find me at Latina Mic Drop podcast on IG.

Violeta Sandoval: 46:00

And I will have all her information down in the show notes or the description, depending where you're listening or watching this podcast. And yeah, go get her book. I know I'm going to add it to to my little stand over here and excited to read it. So thank you so much for coming on here and sharing your expertise and your story, which I always get so hyped up after, like interviews like this. So I'm so motivated out. So thank you so much for coming on here.

Miriam Simon: 46:30

Yes, thank you so much for having me. And that was the other reason too was the fact that I didn't have a Latina mentor or sponsor or anything like that. In the corporate spaces. It was always other people, and so that's why I wanted to become that big sister for people, or mentor or whatever it is that they need, so that they can say you know what I can call Miriam, and she's going to understand me, she's going to get it. Yeah, yep, thank you so much, and thank you for your service too.

Violeta Sandoval: 46:59

Oh, thank you, thank you, um. Well, that's it for this episode. I will see everyone in the next one. Bye.