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October 3rd is Latina Equal Pay Day.
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And to celebrate, we have Joanna Gonzalez,
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financial educator, author and content creator to help empower us vouch
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for ourselves and our finances.
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Welcome Joanna. Thanks Daniela.
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Thank you for having me.
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we're so happy to be speaking with you today.
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So for those who don't know what is Latina Equal Pay Day
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And just to note it is not a celebration.
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It actually acknowledges the approximate day when Latinas earn the same as
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white non Hispanic men made the previous year.
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So essentially, it takes us almost two years to earn just
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as much as our white male counterparts.
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I'm not celebrating that.
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Nope. So I feel like it's super ingrained in our culture
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to kind of be grateful for what we have.
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And like working somewhere is,
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is a blessing. How can we protect ourselves from this mentality
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financially and emotionally? Oh,
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it's important to acknowledge that those are our cultural values.
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But if you want to advance in corporate America,
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it's important to understand that that cultural value is not respected in
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corporate America. The value that is in high regard is when
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people self advocate, when people speak up and are able to
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say the work that I'm doing is tying back to these business
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goals. Therefore, I am valuable to this company and I
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deserve more money so you can be grateful and you can also
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aspire for more. They're not mutually exclusive.
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What advice would you give a Latina who is maybe scared to
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negotiate her salary or her pay or compensation?
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First, I think it's important that we need to acknowledge that
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it is scary to do things for a first time,
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especially if we weren't taught to do it,
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right. So the best way to get comfortable negotiating your salary
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would be if you're taught by somebody who has been there before
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like a mentor who can teach you the ropes if you
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don't have a mentor,
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I love linkedin as a platform where you can build your professional
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network and possibly connect with the mentor there.
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You can also follow thought leaders that talk about the specific topic
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about salary negotiation skills.
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And they also have linkedin learning courses where you can actually learn
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the skills needed to advocate for yourself in the workplace and ask
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for a raise going off on that.
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I also feel like discussing one salary kind of a taboo topic
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Do you have any advice on how we can kind of
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open up this conversation about money and,
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and normalize it. Yes,
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I do have one trick that I love to share with my
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followers on my social media community and that is to get people
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when they're exiting the company.
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So if they're exiting on good terms,
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because they are going to a competitor or another company,
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that's a great time to talk about their salary.
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Sometimes when you work with them,
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it might be too competitive.
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But when they have 1 ft out the door,
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who cares? I'm not going to work here anymore.
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So the way that I like to approach the conversation,
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especially with my male colleagues is by saying something like,
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in light of the Latina pay gap and to kind of reach
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parody, are you open to having a discussion with me about
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what your salary history has been with this company just so that
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I can have more transparency about what's available with each role.
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And anytime that I've tried that they have just like over,
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shared over and this was my bonus this year and then I
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got this raise the other year,
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you know, so it's not just like this is my current
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salary that I'm leaving,
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but they will share the whole history and that can be one
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way to get transparency around that.
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And where can we follow and keep up on social media?
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I know you mentioned you're super connected with your online community.
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Yeah, so I am on linkedin.
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You can find me under my name Giovanna Gonzalez.
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I am also on Instagram.
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My handle there is Gigi the first gen mentor on tiktok.
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The handle is the first gen mentor and you can also check
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out my book at your local library,
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your local bookstore. It's called Cultura in Cash Lessons from the
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first gen mentor for managing finances and cultural expectations.
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It was endorsed by Eva Longoria,
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I love that. That is,
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excuse my language. Thank you.
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Well, thank you so much.
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This is such a powerful conversation so I really appreciate it.
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It was so nice to meet you.
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Thanks for having me,
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Daniella. Thank you.
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