Unapologetically Heard: Owning Your Voice at Work with Monique McKinney

In this powerful episode of Breakthrough Conversations with Rhoda & Co., Rhoda sits down with Monique McKinney for an honest conversation about voice, perception, and the workplace experiences many Black women continue to navigate every day. 

Together, they unpack the harmful labels often placed on confident women, especially Black women, when they speak directly, advocate for themselves, or lead with conviction. Monique shares a personal workplace experience that sparked deeper reflection around bias, communication, and authenticity. 

The conversation explores:
• Why Black women are often labeled “loud” or “aggressive”
• The emotional and professional impact of those stereotypes
• How workplace culture shapes who feels safe to speak
• The pressure many women feel to soften themselves to be accepted
• Practical ways women can confidently use their voice at work
• What leaders must do to create healthier, more inclusive environments

Monique also discusses insights inspired by the book I'm Not Yelling by Elizabeth Leiba and why owning your voice matters now more than ever. 

This episode is a reminder that confidence should not be mistaken for aggression, and authenticity should never require shrinking.

Memorable Takeaway
“Your voice is not the problem. The environment that mislabels it might be.” 

Listen, Share, and Join the Conversation
If this episode resonated with you, share it with a woman who needs the reminder to speak up, take up space, and lead unapologetically.

Welcome to another breakthrough conversation.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hey, what's your secret? You got the kind of that leads to a speech that could be model multitasking.

SPEAKER_01 0:08

Welcome back to Breakthrough Conversations with Rhoda and Company. So today's conversation is real, y'all. All of mine are, but this one is necessary. And it's one many women, especially black women, know all too well. So I'm joined by my guest, Monique McKinney. Welcome, Monique.

SPEAKER_00 0:27

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 0:28

Oh my God. Monique, who she's using her voice to challenge this narrative that has existed in workplaces far too long. The labeling of black women as loud or aggressive, when they are simply being clear, confident, and direct. After a personal experience in her professional life, she leaned into this topic even deeper, exploring the patterns, the biases, and the impact it has on how women show up at work. So the journey led her to a book, I'm Not Yelling, by Elizabeth Libia, which speaks directly to navigating these experiences while still owning your voice. So today we're talking about what it means to speak up anyway, what it means to challenge the labels, what it means to not shrink, lead without shrinking. So Monique, I want to welcome you and thank you for bringing forward and suggesting this very important and necessary topic. Absolutely. Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:30

I know we we started talking about it a little bit. We could talk for hours on this subject, but um I'm very happy to be here. Thank you for asking me to join.

SPEAKER_01 1:38

I am so excited. So Monique, you mentioned a personal experience that sparked this conversation. What happened?

SPEAKER_02 1:44

Yeah, sure. So in 2024, I was working um in a senior leadership role um and in a hospital. And I was working with a new leader, and it was at the time of like a performance review. And so as I was getting prepared for the performance review, you know, like I'm an HR professional, so I'm supposed to be a Smeed um into understanding how to give um effective um performance reviews. And so I sat down with this leader, the president, at the time, and um I was going through the review, and then the he at the time pulled out a separate sheet of paper and had all of these different incidents and um sightings and information in it above and beyond what we'd ever talked about or anything that I had seen, nothing we had had never talked about. So I was in shock. Right. But not only was I in shock, I was also becoming very frustrated and because I was thrown off guard. I didn't know why we were having this conversation about things that weren't true at the review time. Yeah. Right. And so I was a little discombobulated. I pulled off of my 20 plus years of experience at the time, and I asked to ask to end the meeting and so that I could um digest the information that I was just presented with in that meeting, and to then give um my rebuttal to that information after I was able to kind of you know processes and and really absorb the information that I had just received for the first time. So that was my personal experience. And what I learned from that was um, you know, with all of my 20 plus years in human resources, it it should never be that time at the performance review that you learn of new things, right? My old boss used to call that uh he would call that the two by four effect. Well the non-two by four effect. I would say that because you usually see a two by four coming if it's swinging. Right. Um but if it's not, which was this situation, it kind of makes you a little unsettled and throws you up. Yeah, yeah. It was a little, it was breathtaking. And so that experience um in of itself, um, I I separated from the organization. I was in a contract, so it eventually ended. And um I look back on that experience as a life lesson to then um begin talking to students currently at WashU through the CAPS program about how nonprofits, um, but anyone, any business um should, you know, create what isn't an effective uh performance review and what's an ineffective performance review, mostly centered around um, you know, constructive uh and appreciative feedback, right? Which I think carries itself throughout the course of you know a professional career or you know, your job, right? You would you would think that you would just have these natural conversations with your employees. And so that was a pivotal moment um that sparked. Um, and then the words, there was something in the kind of that off to the side that talked about a conversation that said that I was yelling and that the um um uh that the uh behavior seemed aggressive. And so that was breathtaking. And so then being the me, I like to research and really try to understand um how we like we like uh Michelle would say, how how or a Kamala said, how did we get here? Right, let's start how did we get here? And so those words took me back, and I just started looking at things on LinkedIn and I just typed in the title uh about uh what you know, black women being called loud and aggressive, and this book showed up. Wow and it was like, oh my God, like why didn't I already have this prescription um before I went into this meeting? Um, but my experience in that meeting led me to understand how to deal in that moment and grab my power back to be able to say, I'm not just gonna, you're just not gonna give me no any kind of information. There's no HR person this is this season. So um, so that was that was a pivotal moment. That's what's working.

SPEAKER_01 6:38

That is, I'm sorry that happened, but that is uh very common. Um two things is probably multiple, but the two things I really keyed on when you were sharing your story is one, the performance process and how broken it is. It really boils down. I I tell people all the time, at the root of any issue in a corporation or organization is usually leadership. Sure. It's a problem in leadership. So that stood out to me that that leader held on to all of that and thought it was appropriate and okay to save it, didn't fact find, didn't talk to you, didn't add to your side of the story, nothing, and presented in your performance review.

SPEAKER_02 7:23

But and and thinking about it, um, if I was, you know, of if I was a Caucasian woman, right? Of one that, you know, looking at the leadership team at that um at that location, and wondered to myself often even now, would I have also have received um, you know, the same type of kind of side note, you know, um uh tallying of incidents, but then also the same type of adjectives being described in my behavior because of the the tenor and tone of my voice. And so for me, it just brought back something that um someone said to me in high school, bro. In high school, and it was like Monique, you have a really distinctive voice and you it's carried, it's stayed the same my entire life. Like, and so when I when I talk and people hear me, I was in Schnooks one day and they were like, Monique. They knew who you were. They're like, they knew exactly who I was. It's like so, and I think back to where I wanted my career to start with, I I wanted to be uh a news anchor. Right. And so it was always this, I think, um uh the tenor and in my tone of my voice came from definitely from my parents. Yes. But definitely the confidence um was in still to me in the household. I wasn't raised in a household where I had parents or a dad that was shush. Right. Um, and so we were always um able to speak our minds in a in a in a respectable way, of course. Um, and and when I was growing up. And so that led me to not being able to have to shrink it in the workplace. And so uh that situation taught me that um I, you know, again, we don't have to shrink, right? So to bring it full circle, um it was one that was pivotal that that led me to start talking about and teaching to students how to do it the right way.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

Right. Right, right. So Monique, I know you say you eventually left that organization, but how did that moment impact how you saw yourself at work? Because I know some like you said, it knocked you off your feet, and sometimes these things scar us. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:53

And it did. So if it it made me feel like uh at the time, like I was being an imposter, right? Like I was being separated and judged differently or measured differently than my peers. And and having peers that all that some of them, you know, sporadically, some of them that look like me and talk like me as well. And so that that kind of shocked me. And so I began to re um re reflect um, is this really the truth? Is this really how I am seen on the outside? Because I'm very conscientious about that. And I think that that just comes with um, it came with our line of work as being in NHR, um, but then also working in very conservative organizations as well. So having to take headshots for jobs, things of that nature. So always very conscientious about how I showed up, how I presented. So um I just didn't, I was like, I'm just not gonna take that. Like this is just this is one um one very heavily weighted criticism that um from one person. This wasn't a 360. It wasn't something that was um adopted and used from top to bottom in the organization about how we deliver feedback or how we measure performance. And so it um not even something that I trained about at that organization. So I was really, really shocked um that this was the way that I was being um chosen to be um rated against everyone else.

SPEAKER_01 11:42

Right. Something you said about is this the truth? I love that you asked yourself that question because and the other point you made, it was one person's synopsis based upon whatever feedback uh that person had gotten, which is not necessarily fact. Sure no.

SPEAKER_02 12:04

Yeah, and so doing a more deep dive into that, right? We I learned um, especially being called loud and then it coming off as we just talked about as aggressive, was because of it, it's just different. Um, and I had to think, I was like, that's not how I show up. I've been, you know, an HR and professional, I've never received feedback like this ever. I've part of multiple organizations and I can talk, you know, top to bottom to people from presidents down to you know line staff. And I've always gotten good reviews and been in the the top. So I really started to not to try to not self-doubt my myself, my word, um, just based off of one opinion. And we often, I think as black women, we do that. We'll we'll like as you just said, you said one person. I love numbers because I've been doing this for over 20 years. And I was like, that's not how you do a performance review. Why am I thinking that this um is really who um how I'm showing up? Right. Um, and then being labeled that way. So I also wanted to make sure that I was careful around, um, as I had an old boss around, he would say, be careful around the adjectives in which you are described as um a woman. But for me, it's also as a black woman. Right. And so I I've I have begun to verbally say, we're gonna change that adjective and we're gonna describe it as this. Right. And I've learned that through um using going through a lot of personality assessments, um, being assessed myself through predictive index or through this. So really understanding um things that may be triggering words for me that may uh you know get a certain reaction, but also really being self-conscientious and understanding how I show up in the work.

SPEAKER_01 14:15

Right. That's powerful too. Um, I love that you use that technique to call it out and let's change it because that's gonna hear that, hopefully it raises awareness.

SPEAKER_02 14:29

They stop, they'll pause, yeah, and then I'll give them another word. So one of the words that came up in my disc assessment in my S was rigid because I was uh it rated a little lower than my my D. I'm I'm a true D-I-S-C, right? And so I was like, oh, I just don't, I don't like that word. There's just something about that word that did not rest well with me, but I understand it. I understand the definition of it. And so I just began to change it um over the years to um to just something to describe it just very differently as it showed up, um, as it's shown up, um kind of more my dominant element in my personality to just someone that is very confident, um, very assertive. And I think as a as a black woman, there there's absolutely nothing wrong with me being able to say that, right? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 15:24

Or being that. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:26

And so I love the fact that after that, um landing, you know, working where I am now, um, having a culture that loves and embraces that. And so it feels different now.

SPEAKER_03 15:39

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:40

I love that you're in that environment, first of all. I'm like, does it exist? Yes, it does. That's amazing. Yes, I love this. So, what do you think people misunderstand most in those types of situations like the one you were in?

SPEAKER_02 15:54

Well, I think it is definitely how um society just tries to describe women, um, especially black women. And so in this book, it talks, she talks, um, Elizabeth talks about the imposter syndrome, but she also goes into a deep dive about how we just from you know psychological studies um that are done, and and just independent studies that are done on black women, how we even before we enter the room, we're already raised with biases. And and you and I are sitting here having a conversation, and we and you it could be they could be this different color, yeah, and we're still called loud and aggressive, but it is um how society has deemed and and and treated and how we've um allow things to show up to to to to narrate how we look um as black women and and not to accept that. Um to just be quite frank about it and just not accept those words and and the the description of um uh as being described as a woman. And I think um forcing, pushing individuals, especially men um or anyone um to use better words when trying to describe behavior. Um, and so for me, I I take these words as is as criticism, not constructive. Right. Um, because what it did to me was it it was very, you know, I felt demeaned and I felt all of this work that I had put in was just you know superficial and it wasn't valued. So it was very um uh, you know, being called that in real time uh was very different. It I I would say it it's the the modern day N-word for for black men, right? And um I just I didn't like it. And so I said, you know, my grandmother was like, well, if you you don't things you don't like, you change them.

SPEAKER_01 18:07

Right, right. Do did do did you get a sense if that leader that did that got any awareness, any received any of this as education or learning moments?

SPEAKER_02 18:21

Yeah, I think that I would say no. Um, because one thing about it, I mean, uh, you know, St. Louis is so small, right? And um I just I've been doing recruitment and HR for so long again. So my roots run deep in St. Louis. And so what I did know to be true was what good leadership looked like and also what poor leadership looked like. And after that, um, I think the definitely the organization um internally began to kind of look at things, but I don't know how deep of a dive they look um in just the the leadership component because you know we say the fish rot from the head down, and so that really was some hard things that they would have to look at that organization starting from the top down, and this was just only a subsidiary of a much you know larger organization. So um, you know, that takes some internal movements and pushing. And I don't know that they're ready for that.

SPEAKER_01 19:30

Um because at the end of the day, effective uh work in diversity, equity, and inclusion space is it's an inside out job.

SPEAKER_03 19:40

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_01 19:41

And what I mean by that is individual. This is an individual journey. So those individuals have to decide, choose to want to look inwardly. Right. And then challenge those thoughts and biases and seek out the education and increase the awareness to make different choices, especially when it comes to words, right?

SPEAKER_02 20:05

Because I think, you know, an edge, a very educated person, um, knowing that um, you know, very working with, you know, multiple cultures and multiple industries, these this wouldn't, these would not be the chosen word to describe any woman or or anyone for that fact. When you're really in in this moment, just really trying to um give feedback or really try to um give some type of measurement to performance, which made it not really effective because it wasn't things that we knew about. It was the first time I was hearing about it.

SPEAKER_01 20:47

New information, yes, yes, new news. So why do you think black women are often labeled as loud or aggressive in these professional spaces? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 20:58

I think a lot of times it's from what um we, you know, things what we what we read, what we how we see uh women depicted on television, how we um also allow, again, individuals to describe us in in in spaces um and and not changing the narrative. Um for me, it is um using my voice um as power to speak in micro or large spaces around things that are uncommon or uncomfortable. And so for me, this um really brought home uh a lot of relevant things to make sure that um if I sat down and I wanted to talk about this book, that I was able to um have some relatability um, you know, to someone that may have experienced something like this and um be able to be. Authentic, right? To be able to talk about it. Um, and um, you know, again, just help change the narrative.

SPEAKER_01 22:07

Yes. Yeah. I'm not yelling. I'm those that are listening. This is the book we're speaking on by Elizabeth Leber. I might have to check this out. Yes. And these uh words, loud, aggressive, hostile, um, I've experienced a lot of this myself being an African-American woman in the workplace and working in HR. And I had a vice president of HR. I was giving feedback around about one of her leaders who had acted unseemly in a meeting. And I was giving uh, and that leader happened to be African American, but the leader I was giving the feedback to was a Caucasian lady, and I was telling her about this person, and she stopped me and said, Is that a black girl thing? And I say, Is what a black girl thing? You know, the head rolling and the hostility and the aggression. I'm sorry, did I offend you? I say, it is absolutely not a black girl thing. It's a human thing.

SPEAKER_03 23:06

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 23:07

Um, so yes, you have to be able to call it out.

SPEAKER_03 23:11

And right there in the moment.

SPEAKER_02 23:12

And I did, and so in that moment, knowing that I could also um take the time to end that conversation with that leader, again, taking my power back in this situation to change the narrative, to change his, you know, with his criticism um into something that was didn't have any relevance or any factual basis at all. And so for me, it was taking the the my power back, but it also brought up this um this this the author uh Zora Near Hurston. Um one of the quotes that she's often quoted and saying, if you are silent about your pains, they'll kill you and say that you've enjoyed it. Yes. And so in that moment, I wanted to make sure that I taking my power back, but then also offering that re giving that rebuttal to saying, I'm not gonna be silent about this. And I'm gonna speak up, and you're not going to ever, ever call anyone loud and aggressive in these meetings again. Right.

SPEAKER_01 24:26

And you're not going to be able to say that I enjoy the killing. Exactly. I want you to read that quote again.

SPEAKER_02 24:32

Yeah, so if you are silent about your pains, they'll kill you. Say it, they'll kill you and say you enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_01 24:46

That is so powerful. So I'll say that again.

SPEAKER_02 24:48

If you're silent about your pains, they will kill you and say you enjoyed it. Wow. So to me, I don't want to, I don't want them to think that I've enjoyed any pain. I don't think that I wanted to be enjoyable, enjoy calling, being loud and aggressive because my voice is different, or I look different, or I show up different. Or I'm just different.

SPEAKER_01 25:18

And that's what it is. We're all just different. That's so true. That's important to note that number one, that should inspire us the more to speak up and call it out in a moment, no, because it costs us too much.

SPEAKER_03 25:32

It does.

SPEAKER_01 25:33

There's a whole debate going on right now on social media from the Kevin Hart roast and all the jokes that were affiliated with that. So I was kind of like on the fence a little, but then I was like, nope, it wasn't right. And I'll tell you why. Because what we allow becomes the culture. And when we allow things like that, disrespecting, using our trauma against us and disguising it as jokes, then when those things happen again, because another George Floyd or similar is gonna happen again, then we don't really have a leg to stand on to call anybody out. It wasn't funny when they talked about Rodney King.

SPEAKER_02 26:21

And so I don't I don't take pleasure in and think anything is ever funny about someone being deaf or um being abused. And so I I I personally did not like it. And so this book sparked um Elizabeth um inner um thought, and uh it was around George Floyd killing. Right. Um and she wanted to really understand why she had these experiences in college that led her that had so much fury um around, you know, really needing to get her voice out. But then when it when it did come out, she got called loud and aggressive and saying, oh, you don't have to yell when we're just simply here. Oh, it's so it's so good. It's so good. So for me, it I I don't I don't take that lightly. And I would agree with you, Rhoda. I I saw the roasting and um I did not uh take light of the fact that, you know, um the reference around George Floyd. Um I'm also raising um have a young um a son that is 21 and he's still my baby, but he, you know, he's a young man. And at the time, um he was still in high school. And so um I I just I don't I don't think that that's funny at all. And so I don't um I also don't allow that energy to consume me because you have a comedian that uses this platform, this is his performance and how he gets paid and how others get paid. And so for me, I just show up in I I just be in different spaces speaking about it. Right, right. Uh, because that's not something that I don't think. Yeah, absolutely not.

SPEAKER_01 28:17

Yeah. But what we're for those that are listening, the reason why this came up and the reason why we're talking about it is because we need to use our voice to advocate for ourselves, to educate others in the moment so that we can increase their awareness and they will pause and minimal pause before and think about the words they're gonna use and the things they're gonna say. Absolutely. And also, it's also important because these labels have an impact on confidence, career growth, opportunities, mental well-being. Yes, it is. To the quote you just read, the killing part is the breaking of the spirit. Yeah, it breaks you down and it can impact you the rest of your days. And so, what do you believe the impact of those labels have on confidence, career growth, or mental well-being?

SPEAKER_02 29:13

Well, I it we we see it every day in the workplace. We know, um, and Elizabeth talks about in the book how we as black women carry this country on our backs. And so we are worked the hardest, we are paid the lowest, we are, you know, raising kids um in single family households and with a village, um, and and most of the times minus that. And having, and so let's go even back further than that, from um, you know, um the point when we had chattel slavery, and we were having to produce things for the family and having to work the long hours and you know, eight, nine months picking cotton. And so they thought that, and and they still think that black women can endure, you know, more pain than anyone. And there was a study, you know, she talks about the um the study that was done on black women that um tried to replicate that we can withstand more pain and agony. And I just and I cringe um when I when I think about what was happening in, you know, the early 1900s when gynaecology was being established and we were being used as test rabbits mostly. Yes. Um, I what comes to mind is um um uh uh the uh Behind the Sheets. Yeah, um Harriet, uh Henrietta Lacks book, um, where you know they took her cells, um, but she was being treated at Johns Hopkins in the basement getting radiation treatment. Um, but then how her cells have helped cure so many things and it's still they're still doing the work. So when you asked that question, I was like, man, like what kind of I I just gave you three or four examples of why we may as black women show up um stressed and overworked, and then our behavior sometimes may come out as aggressive or edgy, or um, I was even and even heard the word at one time huffy, which I that was a new one for me. And I was like, oh, okay, that's a new one for me, huffy. Uh and so um again, for me, it is changing, you know, showing up and changing the narrative on how um I'm being described in that behavior, and then making sure that it is factual, right? Um, but then also making sure, like you said, calling it out, calling it out in the moment, right?

SPEAKER_00 31:57

Yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 31:58

Because one of the questions I was gonna ask you is when we say use your voice, how does that look in practice? Yeah. One way is calling it out in the moment. Absolutely. You're your own biggest advocate. Yeah, you are.

SPEAKER_02 32:10

The other way is um for me has been to be uh expressive as I can in what is most comfortable for me. So as I did, I I took it as a a teaching moment. Um I sit on a board and it just, you know, just off of just, you know, networking and having the background to be able to speak power into um effective performance reviews. I was tapped on the shoulder by a professor at Washu to say, hey, we want to pull you over here to speak on this topic, also based off of your personal experience. And so I turned it into a passion project to make sure that um young leaders and future leaders, but even also professionals, um, are in organizations delivering effective performance reviews and that they're describing behaviors not to be criticism, but using constructive and appreciative feedback to describe those behaviors, but then also making sure that those um those performance reviews are based on facts and not fiction. Right. You know, things you've had conversations with employees um multiple times about things. It wasn't the two by four effect, you didn't catch them off guard, you didn't slide out a piece of paper from the side, you know, above and beyond the standard performance review, um, which would be relative to a note to file, which is something that could be used in court. But you know, it's discoverable, right? It is discoverable. Um, and so it's also something that you have to speak to to be fact or fiction. And so um for me, I, you know, I am very comfortable and confident being able to speak about this because it was something that has um helped shape me personally. Um, and um I will continue to, you know, to help shape others about this topic as well. So that we don't use it wrong.

SPEAKER_01 34:11

No, you use that experience, which I love, and turned it into something positive. And I love that you're going back to the younger, yes, emerging leaders of the future in the col at the college level and articulating this and giving them that insight because that's not standard curriculum. That's correct. That's correct. Yes. It needs to be. It should. Right. Because they're getting it right.

SPEAKER_02 34:36

So they're getting it right through this program. And what I love is that um they're so engaged and have practical questions about real reviews that they've um actually had to either uh have even been given or that they've had to deliver as a leader, young or old, right? And so it's so powerful hearing the stories and now hearing um along this journey that you know what, Moni, you you're not the only one that would recall or were treated with biases in this way. And so um when I when we talked earlier about, you know, this one person, right? It it it made it full circle for me to say, you know what, you're you've been doing this right all along. Right. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 35:25

And you took your power back. And I took your power back. Yes, yes. So when um when leaders hear this feedback and we're sharing with them these new words or different ways of giving feedback or describing behavior, how should leaders respond when they hear the feedback from their employees?

SPEAKER_03 35:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:46

So it should be, I as a as a practitioner, right? Um I as a and also as a leader, um I would use that time to listen. Um because it takes vulnerability for employees to really express themselves um in a very vulnerable time, in a very vulnerable situation. So for me as a leader, it would take me to give me some pause to listen, to to to sit back, to be reflective of what the employee is actually giving me, to understand, to digest it, um, and to not provide any excuses in that moment, to just, excuse me, to just listen and absorb the information that the employee is giving to you um to try to understand it and and really acknowledge um the vulnerability that the employee is giving in that moment. They're taking their power back, right? And so I think that that is also very encouraging for a leader in that moment um to be able to speak um power to an employee where you are delivering some uncomfortable um feedback, or it's you know, all on either side. On either side.

SPEAKER_01 37:14

I love that. I also would love to see leaders become curious, sure. Yeah, ask when when I did or said, etc. And get understand where they're coming from. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, why did that trigger you? Yeah, how could I have said it differently? Sure, sure, et cetera. Yeah, yeah. So we see these patterns in the workplace. What do you think needs to stop in the cultures and these workplaces to break this pattern? Sure, sure.

SPEAKER_02 37:43

Well, for sure, we again um need to um understand biases, we need to understand stereotyping, we need to understand how that affects people. Um, we're all human. Um, and we want to really make sure that we're sensitive um to the fact that um words can hurt. Yes. Words sometimes words can be more powerful uh than actions to me personally. Right. And so I think that um for sure for me it is again um rolling it back to changing the narrative. And I'm gonna stay there because I want, you know, especially for black women to use this book and navigate, use this guide to navigate in spaces that may have left them uncomfortable. Yes. That gives them um some type of guidance in a workplace, um, words of affirmations, you taking your power back, you are more than what you see, things of that nature to really um help the workforce begin and the media and radio um to really start to get in to see black women um described differently. And then us in these intimate conversations, being able to talk about this subject as well. Right. Um, whether it's in small spaces or in large spaces, I think that it's it's all very relevant and all very, very important.

SPEAKER_01 39:18

Yes, it really is. Again, for those listening or just tuning in, I'm not yelling it's the book. And I think that we should start a book club or something around this and maybe build a workshop because it's that important idea. It's that important. Yes, it is. So um, I'm gonna move to the rapid firearm, Monique, and I just have three questions, and whatever comes to mind I want you to answer. Okay. So the first one is one word that describes your voice today. Relevant. Relevant, yes, it is. A phrase women should stop saying at work.

SPEAKER_02 39:53

Oh, and I had to get this one some thought. Um a phrase women should stop saying at work. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_01 40:03

Yes, apologizing for things we don't know. Overapologizing.

SPEAKER_02 40:08

Yes, I'm sorry. Because I we we apologize, but we're not sorry.

SPEAKER_01 40:15

No, no, no. So we should stop saying that. So one thing you want every woman to remember before speaking up.

SPEAKER_02 40:23

Yeah. I want women to remember before speaking up that they always have a village to support them and whatever they want to do. Yes. Um, from top to bottom. You that you have a village somewhere. And so for me, it was this was my village. This is what spoke to me at the moment um working through that situation being labeled um this you know, unfavorable term um as a black woman. And so that's what I would that's that would that that's what I would get.

SPEAKER_01 41:01

Yes. Monique, this what you this passion you have around this and the work you're doing, going to the University Wash U and talking to the students and part of the CAPS program, and all the consulting work that you do around St. Louis. I've talked to a lot of women on this podcast and otherwise, a lot of women groups in St. Louis. I've not heard anybody talk about this. And this is something that resonates and is applicable across the board. You cannot live in brown skin in this world and not have experienced this. I agree, I agree.

SPEAKER_02 41:43

And so what what what that also speaks to me and says that it is an uncomfortable topic to talk about, though. And I get it because it was uncomfortable for me to be called that. Right. And so I so I just have learned that, you know, like my girlfriend would say at this big age, right? That um bringing um power to my voice is very important to me now in this new season, you know, becoming of a certain age, right? I'm saying I'm gonna call it my Jubilee year. And um, and my grandmother would always say, because she was an entrepreneur, and I looked up to her. She was a hairdresser and I loved her dearly. So my passion comes from her. Yes. Um, being that, you know, she went to school and had to leave school in sixth grade, but would built a business, a salon business, raised an amazing family. My mother is amazing, powerful women that um, you know, I'm definitely standing on shoulders of women that feel like they may not have their power in their voice as of yet. And so I want to be able to continue to do that.

SPEAKER_01 43:03

Yes, and you are, and I want to thank you for that. Thank you. Because this is mission work, and we need this, and especially our younger black girls that are coming up in the climate that they're coming up in. We didn't even, we didn't have social media to contend with. They had all of that stuff that's coming with social media, they have the current political climate, all the division and all of that. This this can become something really big. So I will talk more about this. Yeah, I just want to thank you for coming. Absolutely. This conversation matters, and because too many women have been conditioned to shrink, to soften, or silence themselves just to be accepted. We are not yelling, we are passionate, we are not hostile, we are confident. And the truth is your voice isn't the problem. It's not your voice, the environment that mislabels it may be the problem. So thank you. Monique for bringing honesty, courage, and perspective to this conversation. And to those that are listening, if this episode resonated with you, share with another woman who needs the reminder to speak up and take up space. And remember this: you don't need to change your voice to be heard, you need to use it. I'll see you next time. I'll break through conversations with Rhoda and Company. Thank you so much. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 44:26

Hey, what's your secret? You got the kind of eye that leaves you in speechless. It could be model, multitasking genius. Yeah, you got it all. Hey, what's your story? It can't catch mom and forty under forty. It's soccer practice in your high heel glory. I you do it all.