The Art of Asking For More: Negotiation Tips for Women and Entrepreneurs ft. Alexandra Carter
Victoria Jenn Rodriguez sits down with the incomparable Alexander Carter—master negotiator, professor at Columbia Law School, bestselling author, and negotiation trainer for the United Nations. If you want to level up your negotiation game, own your executive presence, and build a brand with impact, this episode is a must-listen.
Here’s what went down:
Special Guest Spotlight: Alexander Carter
Negotiation Powerhouse: Alex shares her journey from negotiating for others to discovering the importance of advocating for herself—and why it matters for all women (especially women of color!).
Author Moves: Find out how Alex ran her Wall Street Journal bestselling book launch like a "military campaign" and how she built her network from scratch. Pro-tip: leverage your strengths and your community!
TED Talk Secrets: Did you know Alex almost didn’t do her viral TED talk? Her behind-the-scenes prep, practice tips, and how she lost (and saved!) her voice will make you want to rehearse smarter.
Negotiation Tips You Can Use Right Now:
Prepare Your Questions, Not Just Your Pitch: Instead of rehearsing a speech, prep powerful open-ended “Tell me…” questions to encourage collaboration and curiosity.
Claim Your Value—For Yourself & Others: When you negotiate, you’re not just advocating for you—you're also paving the way for those who come next. Don’t undervalue your worth!
Handle Objections Like a Pro: Surface concerns early in the conversation. Alex shares language for repeating objections back and responding with confidence (and a dash of humor!).
Executive Presence & Branding: Your superpower might be the very thing people criticize—OWN IT! Alex encourages you to lean into what makes you different and practice your presence until it becomes second nature.
Standout Moments:
Victoria’s Big Question: “What are some things you pay attention to during a negotiation?” (Spoiler: nothing is small talk—everything is a clue!)
Personal Growth: Alex shares how learning to swim as an adult helped her conquer old fears and why it’s never too late to try something new.
Real Talk: How to deal with “ego strokers,” distinguish yourself in a crowded market, and even practice your poker face.
This week Victoria Jenn sits down with the incredible Alexandra Carter, master negotiator, Wall Street Journal bestselling author, Columbia Law School professor, and renowned keynote speaker.
Victoria and Alex dive deep into the realities of negotiating as a woman, especially as a woman of color, and break down actionable strategies for building confidence, holding your ground, and securing your value, whether you’re walking into a board room, going for that promotion, starting a consulting biz, or navigating tricky conversations at home.
Alex shares her journey from mastering the art of negotiation for others to advocating for herself, tells behind-the-scenes stories about her viral TED Talk, and drops game changing advice on executive presence, personal branding, positive boundary setting, and what it takes to become a Wall Street Journal best selling author.
No matter what stage you’re at in your career, this episode is loaded with gems you can’t Google. You’ll hear all about:
How to prepare for a tough negotiation—beyond scripts and straight into self-discovery
Why open-ended questions (think: “Tell me more...”) make you more money
Moving from undervaluing yourself to owning your worth
Managing pushback, handling objections, and responding to “BS” with humor and tact
Leveraging authenticity and executive presence to win in business (and life!)
PLUS: Alex gets real about her own personal growth journey, how motherhood fuels her mission, and why nothing is ever “small talk” when it comes to building lasting relationships.
Full Transcript:
What's up everybody? Welcome back to Banking on Cultura. I am your host Victoria Jenn Rodriguez. I am coming to you live from our New York City studio after spending about two weeks in Puerto Rico. Yes, I did go see Bad Bunny. Yes, I did get a banging tan, but it's kind of fading right now, which I'm sad about. Yes, I did do a lot of hanging out in La Placita and doing all the things. But I'm back now. And I think the best part of returning is knowing that we're kicking off a new season for the podcast. Y'all, what's insane is September 2025, we make two years, 80 episodes later. Like, we're doing this, y'all. We committed. We've been consistent and I just want to thank you all for continuously tuning in, for supporting, for sharing. I'm always reading messages in our DMs saying, "My friend told me about your podcast. This is amazing." Or if I had the opportunity and honor of meeting you guys in person, you're telling me how much you love the pod. So, thank you because this is truly a labor of love. Okay, honey. A labor of love. There's a lot of work that goes into this podcast and it means the world to know that we're actually providing real value and that you guys love the content. So, thank you. And I'm really excited about today's guest because I met her on Clubhouse. You know, back in the day when Clubhouse was popping, you know, during the pandemic where we actually like cared about people and love people and just were yearning for communication and human interaction. I heard her speak in one of the clubhouse rooms and I was like who is this chick? Like she was dropping gems and she spoke about a topic that is significant especially when it comes to women, especially when it comes to women of color and that is all about negotiation, right? And how we are able to competitively ask for more money. How we are confidently entering rooms where we might be the only, right? and we are talking about something that kind of freaks us out a little bit or makes us uncomfortable, which is money. But most importantly, also kind of got the ick a little bit whenever we know we're kind of glowing into a room where we got to negotiate. We got to like stand our ground. So, I'm really excited to have Alexander Carter to Banking on Cultura. I'm excited to have you cuz I got questions, girl. I got questions because listen, some of these rooms I walk into, I'm like, did I do this right? Is there something I could have done differently? So, I'm really excited to have you here and I just want to go through, you know, this laundry list of accolades because when I got your bio, I was like, "Holy crap, this woman is like a superstar." So, first things first, what I know is very near and dear to you is your baby girl, your daughter. Um, I love your relationship with your daughter, by the way. I saw that you kind of have taken her under your wing and delivering keynotes with How old is your daughter? She is 14 and today is her first day of high school. I am not coping. Okay. Not coping at this moment. Wow. First day of high school. Remember that? I I do. Can you remember that? Do you want to know what I did on the first day of high school? Okay. I got dressed in the dark and packed my bag and went to gym class and discovered that I had one high top sneaker and one low top sneaker. Wow. Oh yes. That's that's what started my high school off on a fantastic note. I'm like, it's all up from here. That is funny. Um, but but I love how you incorporate her in the work that you do. Uh, you also have a hubby. I watched your TED talk last night and it said 18 years back then. So, where are you guys now? We have passed 19. Looks like we're going to make it to 20 in June. Amazing. I guess that really does speak to your negotiation skills, huh? Well, we'll discuss it. They married for 20 years. I know there's a lot of negotiation going on there. By the way, your TED talk was amazing. It's now at I think 1.5 million views, which is like insane. I I can't even contemplate that. I I almost didn't even do it. We can talk. Yes. I almost didn't do it because I thought maybe this isn't going to be the right type of talk for me. I love to interact with people. I love to play off what I see on people's faces or think about what they want and adlib in that moment. And the idea of memorizing and standing on that red dot in front of this giant arena. Yeah. I have to tell you, I speak all the time. It was intimidating to me, but it turned out to be like the most fun 13 minutes of my life. Wow. You looked completely comfortable up there, by the way. Like I could not sense a nerve whatsoever. Everything came out organically. There was no ums. There was no stuttering. Like how much did you practice for that talk? I practice so much that and I made myself so nervous that the day before, no joke, I'm in Nevada. I'm ready to go to this, you know, speaker preparation day. I have no voice. I lost my voice completely. So, they got me a doctor. I took steroids. I had all this stuff. And I had to practice that day totally silent on complete vocal rest. So when I got up on that red dot and you see my voice come out, that was me being like, "Oh, okay. It's here. I can do it." My voice. And it was it was pure joy from there. But I practiced so much, including in front of the mirror with my gestures because I wanted to think about how is this going to look to people at home. This was the first time, Victoria, I wasn't speaking like to you in person. I was thinking about somebody, usually a woman, right? Like sitting at home thinking about how do I stand up for my value and I was thinking about what's going to make this compelling to her watching on a phone or listening in her car. So that's what I was thinking about when I did all of that prep. Interesting. And would you recommend before going into what might be perceived as a tough negotiation to prepare as much as you did for that TED talk? Absolutely. But it's a different kind of preparation. So when I was preparing for the TED, I was memorizing every word. But when you're preparing for negotiation, one of the most important things you can do is actually not to rehearse what you're going to say, but to rehearse questions to ask. And first, the first thing you have to do is ask questions of yourself. Because so many of us, I would say, especially women, right? Right. And I just want to say, right, I'm here today as a white woman, okay? So I don't have a firsthand lived experience as a woman of color, right? But I've interviewed a lot of people. I've made it my mission to understand as much as I can. And especially for women of color, right? You're going to get more push back and you know this, right? And more blowback when it comes to claiming your value. So, it means really going inward to ask yourself some questions about what is it that I'm looking to do here? What are the things that I need to make this engagement worthwhile for me? What are the things that I'm worried about? And let me in fact write down all of those emotions on a piece of paper so that I can start to release them so I'm in my power when I go into the room and I'm actually then making the case for my value. So all of that happens before you get in the room because fact is we have to do more work to be ready for the increased level of resistance that we're going to be met with as you know. One of the things that I took away from your TED talk which I thought was like so spot on was making sure that those questions are not they're open-ended questions so they're not like yes or no questions. And I like how you positioned it and you said the question should be tell me. Yes. Like tell me how. Tell me why. Tell me what brought you to this. And I actually used it earlier today. Did you? I did. I did. I'm like I'm the tell me queen now because I just I think that it just allows people to take down their defenses. And to your point, the curiosity comes out and people feel like, "Oh, we're collaborating now. like she's not interrogating me or she's not like against me like she's genuinely interested. Yes. A lot of it is fear. You know, people go in and they're ready for a battle on both sides, right? And so, anything we can do to take that down and set the conversation off in a different direction is not just going to make it feel better, it makes you more money. People who ask open-ended questions make more money. So you have a lot of entrepreneurs that listen to this show. Imagine instead of going in and saying, "Hi, I'm Alex Carter. You know, I'm a speaker. I'm a trainer and here are my packages and my credentials and the way I like to work with people." That is so incurious, right? It it makes it sound like it's all about me. But you know what else that does when I'm saying I I I it makes me sound junior, right? Think about it. It's like the little dog in like a fight with the big dog trying to puff itself up, right, to look bigger. You actually look much more senior, seasoned, and in command when you're starting with questions like Victoria, tell me about your company. Tell me about you as a founder. You know, tell me what you're looking to do out there in the market. What are you worried about? What are you excited about? Then I have a much better sense as an entrepreneur of the problems you want to solve. And instead of then saying I I I can go in and say, you know, Victoria, you've done an amazing job at this company at penetrating this market and here's what I think we can do together. You hear how much more powerful, collaborative, senior, relaxed that sounds rather than I I I give me a shot. This is how you do it. It's collaborative. If you're a woman of color, it makes it much less likely that you're going to get that fragility, that blowback, and it keeps you grounded, powerful, and confident. That's a clip right there that's going on social media going viral with that one. I've never heard it positioned that way that it's junior. That makes complete sense, doesn't it? When you hear it. Yes, it does. Ooh, spicy. I like that. Okay, so why can Alex speak to this? Like, what you got going on? So let's go through the accolades, shall we? So she is a master negotiator, Everett B. Burch innovative teaching clinical professor of law and the director of the mediation clinic at Columbia Law School. First of all, what is this ever Burge innovative teaching professor? I I have to tell it just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it? Yes. So natural. So, so when you're a professor, once you've been at an institution for a certain amount of time, you might be gifted a named chair. And in this case, it is the Everett B. Burch family that has sponsored my chairship as a professor. So, just wanted to share my gratitude to the Birch family. But, um, it's it's meant to be an honor as somebody who's been on the faculty a certain amount of time. I used to just be clinical professor of law, but now um they selected this chair for me because I love innovating with my teaching and so they collaborated with the family on this. I love it. So the family has a history of law or or Yeah. So they have a history of law and ties to the school and so they they made this gift to help uh professors and I was the recipient of it. I love that. Okay. You also are a Wall Street Journal best-selling author of Ask for More, 10 questions to negotiate anything. How do you become a Wall Street bestselling author? Like journal, Wall Street Journal bestselling author. How does that happen? Okay, Victoria, I ran it like a military campaign. And I have to tell you, it was I'll just lay my cards out. It was really important to me to make a best-seller list because not that many negotiation books have been written by women and none of them solo authored by a woman had ever hit the Wall Street Journal business bestseller list. And so I did two things. Number one, I called every woman I knew at a large company. I did not ask closed questions. I said, "When could you have me in to speak? How many books might you be able to buy? Who else could you call that might be a match for this message?" And I looked all over the country and I connected with powerful women in my network. And I had a captain in Atlanta. I had a captain in New York. I had a captain in San Francisco. And I built it woman by woman across the United States. That was the first thing I did was to make sure that I was speaking at lots of companies because speaking is a strength of mine. It's something I do a lot and I knew that I could sell books that way. The other thing I did, so for those of you who are thinking about launching a book, is I created a launch team. I individually emailed thousands and thousands of people from my LinkedIn, from my personal network, and I asked them to be part of my launch team. And what that meant was if you bought a copy of the book early and sent in your receipt, we gave you through Simon and Schustster a locked digital copy of the book that you got early. And then I held a couple of Zooms to teach people how to apply some of the lessons from the book so that they got value from being on the launch team. I had nearly a thousand people on my launch team. And so that alone was a thousand pre-orders that went in before the book was even launched because my book came out May 2020. My entire in-person book tour was canceled. I was supposed to be on Mel Robbins. I had speaking engagements all over the country. Everything canled. And so it was the preparation work I did with all of those speaking engagements and all of my launch team that enabled us to make the bestseller list. Anyway, how many books do you need to pre-sell to make the list? It depends from week to week. Okay? You know, back in the day when I did it, I had at least 7 to 8,000 pre-orders. And I have to tell you that at the time, I had 2,000 followers on Instagram. I had maybe 4,000 followers on LinkedIn. and I built a website only like in the six months before the book came out. When I landed my book deal, I had no website, no real social media. Um, and so I built all of that. And so if you don't have a huge social presence, you have to use what you do have. That's a lesson for everything. You always start with what you have. And I thought to myself, okay, I don't really have social. I don't have a website. What do I have? I have a big network of women. And I was nervous to call and ask them at first. Do you do you know what those women said? I am so glad you called me. Thanks for the honor of helping you with this. Right. That's how it should be. And so it was on like it was those women lifting me up that enabled this book to hit the list. I love that. Very cool. Okay. First, let's start with what's gene because you know we like to start this show with some tea. Give us something we can't Google about you. Uh let's get behind the scenes a little bit. Sure. Okay, Mihee, I've got the perfect freebie for you. So, I just dropped a 17page workbook to help you get your mind right, especially in this climate of so much uncertainty. So, if you are an aspiring or current entrepreneur and you're just feeling stuck, you're not feeling too good about what the future holds and all the turmoil, the politics, all of it is just throwing you off your game, this workbook is actually going to act as a journal for you. It covers goal setting, efficiency tips, how to manage your time, financial management tips, strategies on how to wrap your head around the next big thing that's coming down the pipeline to bring you consistent revenue in your business. It covers what you should be doubling down on in terms of your well-being. And it is just my favorite jam-packed journal full of marketing and sales strategy to help you get clarity, but most importantly to help you secure the big bag. So, make sure to tap on the link in the show notes. I've linked it there so that you guys can get really clear on the top hacks that you can put into play to set yourself up for success. I hope you love it. So, when I was a kid, I had severe asthma. I was in and out of the hospital a lot. I had breathing problems. I couldn't do anything athletic. And you might know because you you um were friends on Instagram that my daughter is a competitive swimmer. And I decided a few months ago that I wanted to be brave and try learning how to swim and put my face in the water. And I had been panicked to do so my whole life because it made me feel like I was having asthma again and I couldn't breathe and I would panic and not be able to do it. And I signed up for swim lessons this summer. I have learned to swim. I just did one of my last lessons yesterday and I'm joining what's called a master's group which as my daughter would say means old people. So other old people like me group means old people. Old people. I was like I think it means that we've mastered life. It's called seasoned. Seasoned. Thank you. Wise, right? Aged like a fine wine. Hello. Hello. So, I am I'm joining a master's group for the fall where I'm going to swim once a week uh with some other uh moms my age. That is so cool. Congratulations. Thank you. Congratulations overcoming that fear. Yeah, I really wanted something that was for myself that wasn't career and wasn't my child or my family. I love that. So, how did you enter this space of negotiation? Like, did you say there's not enough women in this space? I want to do this. Did something happen in your career that you were like, "Okay, this is it." Like, I'm going to make sure this never happens again. Yes. So, I had been trained in negotiation, you know, in college and in law school, but I was the type of person who loved negotiating for other people and hated doing it for myself. And there came this moment, you know, early on in my career, I was in all these jobs where you actually didn't negotiate your salary because you went in as large part of a large program like an investment bank or a law firm, that type of thing. Whereas like a fixed salary, you can't fixed salary. Exactly. So all of a sudden I have to negotiate for myself and I do a little bit of research. I have a number in mind. I go in and they give me an initial offer that's better than that number. And I had this crisis inside because I thought maybe this feels pretty good. Maybe I should just take it. But I had just enough sense to say, "Thank you. Let me run my numbers." I called a senior woman in my field and I asked her, you know, I got this offer. What should I do? And she said, "I'm going to tell you what to do, Alex. Get back in there and ask for more." And here's why. Because when you teach someone how to value you, you are teaching them how to value all of us. And so if you're not going to do it for yourself, I want you to do it for the woman who's coming after you. Do it for the sisterhood. I love that. You know, it's interesting that you say that because, you know, right now, unfortunately, we're in a climate where a lot of folks are getting laid off. Yep. But also, fortunately, a lot of folks are thinking about reinvention, right? They're thinking about that next chapter. They're thinking about legacy, which I love. Uh but a lot of people are entering the consulting lane, right? Yes. And it's been interesting in my conversations uh where I'm negotiating speaking engagement fees and all that jazz of the response that I'm getting. Well, we found someone who fits our budget, right? And their budget right now has been dramatically decreased. And what that tells me is that there's someone who is accepting below market rate. Maybe to get their foot in the door, maybe because they struggle with negotiating their value, who knows what it is, but it's bringing the overall market down. Yes. So, I love that response that this woman gave you about do it for the other people that are coming up behind you because if you don't, then people are just going to naturally assume, oh, we can find someone to come in at a lower rate. What's the point of paying someone at at a higher rate? Yes. you know, the speaking market for speaking and consulting, as you know, there's such a vast range in what people charge for their services. And so, if people are out undervaluing themselves, and I have a lot of sympathy for it because I've done it, right? I mean, probably you've done it at one point. We've all done it. And so, I have a lot of sympathy for it. But then what happens is it doesn't normalize it, right? And then it's a it's a race to the bottom. People don't often understand the value. Part of what I like to talk about with entrepreneurs is really being able to communicate value, you know. So, I will say yes, absolutely you could find a speaker, right, who who is less. But let me ask you this question, okay? So, here's my fee. If one person in your audience of a thousand or 2,000 people, if one person applies one thing I teach them, what's that worth to you? Because I'll tell you, I've ballparked it. And I'm pretty sure that if one person applies one thing I've taught, it's going to be at least six figures for the company. My fee is a rounding error. So, so that is how I think about it when I'm going in. You also have to get yourself to the place where you so rock solid believe the value in what you're offering that if they say no you're like okay I remember that day that I went in and for the first time I thought I have this number and if they can't do it like energetically I cannot do this engagement I don't want to resent you don't want to get less than my absolute best that's a disservice to both of us so when I went in I here's what it is. Here's how I think about the value, right? And if this is a match, great. If not, I've got a ton of other stuff that month. And so, you know, I'm sure you'll have a really successful event. I like that response. Right. I like that. I like that a lot. It's almost like providing them the opportunity cost of what it would be. Yeah. Um I think there was someone who had shared with me another great response is um something along the lines of you are making the decision to go left, which I love, but when you're ready to go right, call me. [Music] Yes. And I was like, "Oo, that's spicy. I don't like that." Right. Uh but in terms of preparation and going back to what we shared earlier, that's why it's so important for you to do those rehearsals with yourself. So you have responses to any rebuttals or you have responses uh to any type of push back or however whichever lane they move into, you can adjust. Yes. Right. So when I'm prepping, I like to think first I go deep on myself because it's most important for me to understand, you know, what my goal is for this interaction or for this contract, what I need to make this work for me. And I make an extensive list of what I need. It's not just the monetary, you know, with clients sometimes the money can work, but yes, right. There's something else like they don't they don't give you autonomy. They don't give you respect. You want to micromanage everything you do? Yes. They don't hold boundaries. You know, Victoria, I know our engagement is up, but could you just Right. So, all of that, you need to make sure that you're thinking about that in advance because a lot of that you can negotiate for upfront, right? It's not just the speaking. It's also how many prep meetings are you willing to do? Do you want a client who's going to call you every week and say, "We want to change to the deck or we want to add something." Right? So all of those needs can get translated into deal terms that make it worthwhile for you. So that's the first thing I'm doing. I'm going deep on myself because that's most important. From there, then I'm starting to think, you know, what are the problems that I think they might be facing? What are some of the concerns that I think they might have? Again, I'm going to ask them all of those questions once we get in, but I want to start to put myself in their brain first. So yes, so that then I can have at the ready thoughts about you know what they've shared. But if you have good questions coming in, I want to teach you guys something else that can be really useful. Let's say you go in and you ask them for example, all right, so what if any concerns do you have about engaging me or my company? Great question to ask because you want to overcome those objections in the meeting rather than have them come up after the meeting and you don't get the deal. So, you've asked about potential objections, they share something and you need a minute. What do you do? You repeat back. Let me make sure I understand, Victoria. So, you've said um your big concern is hiring an outside trainer because you have an inside training team and you're concerned that they're going to see this as a message that they're not good enough or they did something wrong. Do I have that right? Okay. Imagine the power in you've asked a question and then you say to somebody, "I want to make sure I've really heard what you've said." Talk about bringing the heat down in the room. They feel so heard and you have bought yourself at least 30 seconds to a minute to think about okay how do I want to address this by the way I've gotten that objection I I'm going to ask you what is your response because that is a common objection yes okay and so here's what I would say I you know I'm so glad you asked that you're not the first person or the first one of my clients to ask that I wonder if it would be helpful if I included in the proposal a list of the places where we were the first outside trainer that ever came in. And I wonder also if I could help you with the messaging because we're talking about negotiation. Don't your learning and development people deserve to be equipped to negotiate for their own careers? Don't they deserve the same kind of help, support, and investment that the rest of your company gets? And I also wonder if it would be helpful if I shared some ways that we've utilized or showcased their expertise in the course of doing this training. H mic drop. Okay. Right. So that's the type of thing where when you surface the objection and you can handle it in that way, we landed that gig. Right. And the inside training people actually pulled me aside and said, "I'm so glad you're here. I've been really wanting a promotion or I've been, you know, wanting, you know, more money and I'm not sure how to ask. Benefit for everybody. This is a great takeaway because often people shy away from objections personally and professionally. I was actually on a date last week and I literally asked a gentleman like, "What are some of your concerns about me?" And he was like, "What do you mean?" And I'm like, "What are you concerned about?" because obviously we all have our concerns. We're all kind of judging, especially like in the dating scene, we're all kind of like, you know, oh yeah, everything is under assessment. Uh but it taught me that that is a really great way to not only get further insight, but to bring the defenses down and normalize having that type of conversation. Yes. because it doesn't matter how wonderful somebody is. You know that uh that client that I talked to you about, we had been vibing. When I tell you the conversation to that point was so good, it was like a love fest. And it would have been so easy for me to just get off the call and be like, "Hey, I'm I'm the woman, right? I'm going to land this deal." But when I tell you I asked that question about what concerns you have, they looked at each other like as though they'd had this thing on their mind. They were scared to say it. And then I invited them to and we just everybody relaxed in the room. And I got to tell you, as somebody who's been married 20 years, I I know I'm not a perfect person, right? My husband could say there are things that I could improve. I'm sure I I can't think of any right now, but I'm I'm sure they're out there. It's not a long list, right? And and the same way he he likes to say that I give him constructive feedback all the time. You know, I tell him that's a sign of my investment in him as a person, right? But it starts with that kind of open communication. And may I just say as women, the more we can practice this at home or in our personal lives, the easier it gets at work. And in fact, the types of boundaries and structures that we set up at home are what enable us to maintain those boundaries and structures at work. Like the better I've gotten at really expressing myself to my husband or the people closest to me, it's empowered me to be able to do the same at work. What are some things that you are mindful of observing, paying attention to during a negotiation? Like is it body language? Is it like eye contact? Like what are you paying attention to to give you some clues that might suggest what's coming out of their mouth is actually not the truth. Okay. So, first of all, I I try to pay attention to everything. There is no small talk in negotiation. Okay. So, I mean, I do like to get to know people in part because I'm looking for changes from their baseline. Okay? So, if for example, you and I are chatting like this, okay? And right now, you're kind of leaning toward me, you're nodding, you're looking super engaged. If I asked you a question and all of a sudden you sat back like this or you did something with your hair or maybe you fixed something with your sweater, that might be a clue to me that we had touched a hot button, right? That maybe something was coming up that was either important to you or made you a little nervous or upset. Sometimes the body language cues can be obvious and people don't realize they're doing them. I can't tell you the number of times because I work in my day job at Colombia, my students and I actually go into the courts of the Bronx and we are helping everyday New Yorkers negotiate their way out of really important disputes to them. And sometimes we'll say to them, you know, so how does this number how might this number work for you? And the person says to me, yeah, Alex, that's it's totally fine. That sounds great. And I'll say to the person, you know, your words just said yes, but your face said no. So, you might is there a concern there that we haven't covered? Let's let's talk about it. Right? So, all of that is communication. A lot of times, too, you can tell, especially around numbers, people give these little verbal leaks, right? So, you're saying, "Listen, you know, it's going to be whatever $25,000 is the investment for me to come in and speak to you." just as an example. And um and somebody might say, "Well, you know, um that seems a little high, but they're writing the number down on a piece of paper." If somebody's writing a number down, they're really thinking about it and and it might be a bluff. And even if they're telling you it's out of the ballpark, you're closer than you think, right? So, you want to pay attention to all the little words that people use. The other thing I would say is what are the words that people repeat, right? So if you're talking to a client and they keep talking about, for example, growth mindset, that's something that's really important to that client. And so I will start then to think about how could I work this into what I might talk about with this client, right? Or, you know, they're just repeating something that's very important to them. That's something you don't want to ignore. You want to pick up on that and reflect that back to them. You know, here's how what we might talk about relates to growth mindset or like, you know, how do you see growth mindset connecting to your goals for the business? That type of thing. So, it's all important body language from tip to toe. If we're in person right now, you know, I can see all of your body language. So, sometimes people will be great from here up, right? And that's what you're seeing on this podcast, right? You're seeing me from the waist up, okay? But maybe if we're in person, you can see under the table that my leg is shaking and I look so relaxed up here, but my leg is shaking and you're thinking, "Ah, she's actually more nervous than she's letting on." So, it's all of that. I would say for Zoom, one of the things I like to do is pay attention to the background, if they allow you to see any of that, right? So, what do people have in the background? what matters to them, what do they have up on the wall? You know, sometimes I'll make conversation around that because it's a clue as to who somebody is or what they value. I want to go back uh to something you mentioned around small talk. So, would that not be considered small talk if you're like, "Hey, why do you have, you know, Roberto Kabali behind you?" So, that is what the world would consider small talk. Okay? But it's not small for negotiation. It's big. It's first of all, it's relationship building. Okay? Because, you know, especially culturally, you know, here in the US, I feel like our default is kind of like, oh, hey, how you doing? Let's get down to business. It's not that way everywhere around the world. You know, people value building relationships. You know, you and I were talking before we went on air about the fact that I teach in Brazil a couple of week, you know, weeks a year. Personal relationships are very important there. If I just went in and said, "Okay, so how much are you gonna pay me?" I come off so crass, you know, so self-centered. So I always spend time building a relationship first. So when you said there's no room for small talk, what did you mean? I meant that nothing is small about it. That's what I meant. I meant it's big. Okay. What's in the background of your office is big. It matters to you. Therefore, it matters to me. Got it? Right. It means it shows me what you value, shows me a bit about how you live and all of that. Yeah, I love what we call small talk. I just don't see it as small. I see it as central to the negotiation process. Got it. So, what would be your advice for someone like me who does not have a poker face? So, like your face is using its outside voice. Yes. Yes. And I'm like, I don't even recognize it sometimes. So, and I know how that can play against you during a negotiation. So, what are your thoughts on that? Okay. Can you tell me a little bit more about how this might come up for you? Right. Like, for example, if I'm if I'm hearing [ __ ] okay, I might look away. All right. So, what kind of what kind of [ __ ] are we talking? Can we get granular? Um, let's give an example. when someone says, "Oh, you know, I spoke to my executive director and they actually are the ones who are suggesting someone else to speak and I might know in the background who their executive director is and I know that's bullshit." So, that's an example. Ah, okay. All right. So, here you have somebody where you think it's just outright deception, right? like somebody's like telling you something that is just not true because there's different flavors of [ __ ] right? Sometimes [ __ ] is just stuff that people, you know, they're trying to undervalue you or whatever, right? So, there are a couple ways you can handle that. If if you want some flexibility, you can practice in the mirror. Okay? So I do this sometimes with my law students because when we go into court if somebody is sharing something really personal with us like for example we've mediated a lot of love triangles where women are fighting over a guy and let me just tell you the guy has almost always cheated on both of them multiple times and you just want to look and be like this is what we're fighting over right um but you have to work you know we want to respect people right and So I want you to think first of all what's tactical for you. Okay? I'm not here to tell women don't feel angry. Please feel as angry as you would like to feel. Right? Don't feel annoyed. Don't feel ragy. There's a lot happening right now that makes me feel all of those things. Okay? So the feelings are all valid, right? What's tactical for you to express might be different. Okay? So only you can decide how much you want to show on your face and how much that's going to be tactical for you. Okay? So if you decide that in certain situations it's not tactical, then I would literally role play with a friend and have them throw the craziest [ __ ] at you that you can possibly think of, tape it, and then watch your facial expressions and modulate from there. Okay? So that's if you would like to do that. Okay. The other thing you could do is just name it at the beginning and to say, "Alex, so I want you to know what you're getting with me." Okay? My audiences love me because I come in and I am a Puerto Rican kicking the ass in the most loving way possible. All right? I talk with my face. I talk with my body. And people are going to leave hearing truths they've never heard before that are going to change them forever. Right? you let people have it upront. And so then when when your face is talking later on you're like up and there it is. You might be wondering why I just look like that. And the reason is I'm hoping we can speak candidly. I know your executive director. That's Mara, right? Yes, I know Mara. And we've had a lot of great conversation. So I' I'd love to hear more about what the objection is. Actually, I'm wondering if we could speak frankly. See what I mean? It's a little bit of like humor. It's not so serious. I'm not totally coming after you, but also cut the [ __ ] right? I love sometimes a little bit of humorous naming it. Takes the edge off so that then you can cut through some of the BS. I like that. Good. I like that a lot. Fun fact for you, I wanted to be a lawyer when I was a little girl. I could totally see it. I wanted to be a lawyer when I was a little girl and then I did an internship with the Queen's District Attorney's Office. Oh. And I would go to the courthouse and I would review cases and then I saw how much detail. Oh, it is. And how much reading and I was like, "Oh, no. No buo. I can't do it. It's too much. It's too much." It kind of like took out the excitement for me. Yeah. And then I went on another path. But I did really really want to be a lawyer or a judge. And you know what? I can I can see it because I think you'd be great speaking to juries. I think you would have phenomenal courtroom presence. I could imagine your clients having a lot of trust in you. But the the other part of the job is right. It's like tons of reading and grinding and detail. You know, there are lots of careers in the law just like there are lots of different types of careers in what you're doing. And for me, I landed in this place where I love teaching and I love So, what I do at Colombia is called mediation. It's assisted negotiation. So, people have tried to negotiate, the negotiations have broken down, there's conflict, they're in court. And so what they're trying to do is figure out could we start up a conversation again with some help so that we don't have to have a judge decide this for us. That's mediation. Could not be a more perfect career for me. I love human beings. I love being in an area where like psychology meets the law. So a lot of it is thinking about who you are and how you might be able to bring who you are to a role that you're interested in. Interesting. Yeah, I could just see myself in a courtroom and again my face telling no telling a different story. I It's funny because you're not the only person. Like I said, you know, we're in the courts of New York City and sometimes you can see people's face talking as um I've had to learn how to train my face because right Puerto Rico, Southern Italy, okay, we also speak with our faces. Okay. I mean, there are times when I think I'm camouflaging my face and my husband's like, "You're not." And I'm like, "Well, I gave it the office. I'm fresh out of you know whats, right?" I come home and and my face is talking. So, I've had to learn because I hear a lot of wild stuff, right? And but I really want to treat people with respect and as though they can share whatever they need to share. So, I don't know if you've seen So, Cardi B is on trial right now. Yes. And she is hilarious. And I just think if I was in that courtroom, I don't think I could hold it together. Oh, you'd be like, "Order in the court." I know because you'd be cackling, right? Or you'd be like, "Hey." Right. But it's like those examples where there could be things that can throw you off your game and completely derail you. Yes. and and especially I have to say once again for women of color. I'll never forget really powerful woman I know was the head of DEI back when that was uh more of a thing at a major multinational company. Okay. She's going in to discuss her uh compensation with the CEO. This is a seale woman. Okay. She goes in and she says, "Yes, you know, I'm here to discuss my compensation and here's what I've done for the company this year." The response, "Don't be silly. Your husband makes more than enough." Wow. Okay, let's just take that. Let's just wish this was tequila, right? Okay. Don't be silly. Your husband makes more than enough. And here's what I train people to do in that situation. Okay, you're taking notes and then you look at the person and you say, "Okay, you know, so thanks for the meeting." Um, so I just want to make sure I have this right. We're here to talk about my compensation, right? Uh, and how that ties to what I've achieved for the company this year. Uh, so we talked about that. And then, uh, you said, "Don't be silly. Your husband makes more than enough." Do do I have that right? Dead pan. Okay. Sometimes people hear their words coming out of their mouth and they choke and realize, "Oh, did I just violate a law? Maybe I should rephrase." Right? Um maybe I said something out of pocket and and I'm going to walk that back. Right? And totally deadpan. It's a way of just putting somebody's words right back there. another friend of mine, very powerful woman, black lawyer, one of the, you know, we had a decent number of black students in my law school, but not a ton, you know, and she's operated in very white spaces her whole life. And she's become the master of asking people, "Oh, what do you mean by that?" Right? When when somebody says, "Yeah, it's just not going to be a fit. Oh, tell me more. What do you mean by that?" And it's a way of just are they going to say the thing right and it's just a question you keep your face neutral and positive and uh sometimes makes people reflect a little bit. That's a good practice that you mentioned earlier about having a friend just throw out triggering things like the most random things so that you're prepared in those moments to just Yes. You said XYZ. Did I get that right? Yes. I like that. Yes. Right. And and think about it. In so many situations, it helps you keep your calm. You can do some deep breathing, right? I actually, you know, we were going to talk a little bit about executive presence. If you are thrown off your game or somebody has done something like that, great thing to do, especially if whether you're in person or on a Zoom screen, put your feet flat on the ground. Okay? Hands on your thighs. This is a grounding position. This is something that my colleague at Ask for More, Ann Marie taught me. She's a former off Broadway performer, executive presence trainer. She does what we call grounding down, right? Because it's going to help you regulate your nervous system when somebody is doing something that can feel so deeply like an attack, right? Or you get a curveball. So, just know that there are tools that are available to you. I like to focus on the words because that's my specialty, right? asking questions, reflecting back what somebody has said, right? But you can also use physical tools to ground down and give your body the message, it's okay. I can handle this. I've handled this before. I'm going to handle it again. Right? This is not about me. This is about them. I love that. Grounding exercises, y'all. So, let's talk about egos, because that comes up a lot during negotiations. And uh you know it happens with women and men. I experience both. Oh yes. So if you are negotiating with someone who you know loves to ego stroke themselves or their pride/ego is driving the conversation. How how do you respond? How do you manage that type of situation? Okay. So I have techniques I use to manage it and you can decide how much you want to deploy these. But when you said ego stroke, what we do in mediation, one of the things that we can do to take tension down and to deal with somebody who yes is doing what I would call making a bid for recognition like please recognize how awesome and amazing I am and here's all my wonderful accomplishments. I call that person a stroking opportunity. I like to find something truthful that I can compliment that person before. It can't be [ __ ] Okay? So, I'll give you an example. We, you know, in one of my previous jobs, we had a man who was chair of our department would regularly talk over women in meetings. Okay? One day, one of my female colleagues, actually, one of the few black women in our department, spoke up and said something and he said, "Wow, that's a really terrific idea." Do you know what I did? I pulled out my phone in that meeting and under the table I said, you know, dear Bob, I just wanted to say how powerful it was that you spoke up on behalf of our colleague Victoria at the meeting. You know, when you speak up, people listen and everybody instantly gave credibility to her idea because you amplified it. I just wanted to thank you for really, you know, speaking up for the women uh in your department. Do you know what happened? he started doing it more. Right? It's a little positive praise. Okay? So, I'm not going to thank somebody for being a champion of women if they're not doing it. But I can go and say, you know what, Bob, when you speak, people listen. And I have this idea and I wanted to ask your advice on it, right? Because, you know, I know that if you think this is worthwhile, other people are going to think so, too. Okay. So, this does a couple things. one, it gives somebody the opportunity to call forth their better self, right? Because when people are praised for something, they're going to do more of it. It's like basic um behavioral modification. Okay? But also, if that person doesn't engage, right, if if if you make interventions of that kind and the person is like whatever, then you know you've tried and you got to find another way around, right? So that's one thing I like to do is called stroking. Find something truthful that you can handle somebody for if the person says something out of pocket. My personal go-to is humor. Okay? Because I find that humor is a way, right, that gives everybody in the room, it it releases some of the tension, but it also sets a boundary. So, there was one time I was conducting a mediation and I said, "Please, let's go around the room, tell me your name and how you'd like to be addressed." This man, okay, with I should have known because the pocket square was speaking to me. Anytime somebody's got a pocket square with more than three points on it, I'm like, "Oh, this is this is going to be a thing." Okay. There were four points on this pocket square, so I knew he was trouble. And he went around and he said, "You can call me big guy." Oh, wow. And I looked at him dead in the face and I was like, "Well, that's my husband's nickname, so you're going to need to pick another."
Everybody laughed in the room. My students were like, "And we moved on." Wow. Love that. Right. So, little bit of humor, little bit of spice, and sometimes they're like, "Okay, maybe I'll quit my BS now." Yeah, I like that. I like that a lot. So, executive presence, personal branding. Uh, when you were about to launch your book, you said you had, you know, 2,000 followers. Now you have what, over,000 followers. You got these 1.5 million views on TE. like you're known, you're on top podcast, you're commentating on all the top news. Talk about top podcast. I mean, you're on banking on cultura. That's what I'm saying, bro. You know what I mean? You're doing good things. So what are some of the thoughts around building a strong executive brand in this climate? In this climate of a lot of ingenuess, in this climate of people yearning for authenticity, but you not being junior. Yeah. Understanding that authenticity can work for you or against you. Yeah. Right. We all know that certain people get to be authentic in the workplace and others don't. Yes, that is correct. So, what would be your advice to entrepreneurs who are looking uh to springboard their next project, who are looking to elevate, who are looking to expand, what would you suggest? Yes. You know, so when I was first building my website and my brand, I went through this really interesting exercise where I I worked with a an agency that was doing branding for me. And they asked me for five words that summed up the best of who I am. And you know, sometimes you're too close to yourself. You know, I had to ask around. Um, and these days I actually teach personal branding and it goes along with business development, right? Because business development starts with a deep understanding of who you are at your best and then thinking about the types of people that you're called to serve, you know, and what you can help them do. But it starts with you. So I thought about five words that described me. And this is an exercise that I teach people to do now. And so I would say to your audience, ask your family, your friends, your colleagues, when I'm at my best, what are a word, what's a word or a few words that you would use to describe me? That is the core of your executive presence. When I teach executive presence at companies, I teach three C's, okay? Clarity, confidence, command. There's an additional C that I like to cross out and throw in the trash, and that C is conformity. Okay, this is not about being a version of me or a version of you, right? This is about you being the most powerful version of yourself. Yourself at your highest and best. That is executive presence. Okay? And I would actually say that yes, there might be some people who see you standing in your full power as who you are and they're like, "Oh, that's not for me." I'm sure there are people out there who've looked at my presence and they thought, "That's not for me. It's a big wide world out there. I'm interested in attracting and cultivating the relationships with people who are meant for me where we're going to be a match and I can serve you and you're going to be able to advance me. So, it starts with those words. Right from there, there's a lot you can do, including investing in yourself if you can with a coach or looking at podcasts or reading books to learn how it is that you can speak and carry yourself with the most power. So, for me, this was a lot of leaning into my natural strengths. Do you know early on, I got a lot of negative comments about my voice? I am uh you can't really see cuz I'm sitting down, but I'm 5'2 in sneakers. Okay, I'm mini, right? I have a very loud, powerful, deep voice. And early on in my career, I had a judge tell me that my voice was too big for my body type. Wow. Okay. I know. I was like, "Wow, sir, that is what my daughter's kindergarten teacher would have called an inside thought. We keep that one in here. We don't say that one, right?" But sometimes the things that people knock you for are actually your market differentiator. They're your superpower. My voice fills arenas. I make no apologies for that now. Period. Period. Right? It's part of who I am. It's what makes me powerful. I lean into it. Right? So it starts with you. And then from there, right, it's about how relaxed can you be when you're communicating your value or having a conversation with someone. And there are lots of techniques you can use for that including practice. This is one where I would say right practice as much as you can. Public speaking and executive presence doesn't have to be something you're born with. Not all of us got those lessons at the kitchen table growing up. It is something you can develop. Practice with a friend. Practice with a partner or spouse. and really work on repetition until you feel like you could give that presentation or you could say that question no matter what. So, I have a follow-up question to this and it's along the lines of you suggesting that your superpower is what people may negatively quote unquote say about you. Mhm. So for the woman who is known to be aggressive, known to be strong, known to be uh maybe salesy, maybe they push, uh and known to um not accept [ __ ] right? What would you suggest to her if she is thinking that that's not a superpower? That that might be something that would uh disengage people. Okay. So, this is going to be very individual, Victoria. But I'll tell you how I handle it and how when I'm uh coaching women to negotiate or stand up for their value, you know, if somebody's like, "Whoa, Victoria, you're really, you know, you're coming on strong here." You could be like, "Oh, Bob, sorry Bob's out there. This is the word I use, you know, for for bad behavior." Um, Bob, if you think I'm tough, wait till you see how tough I'm going to make your salespeople. You have no idea, right? So if you think I'm tough here, just wait till we're working together. O, you're going to have all of that toughness on your side. Right? So, so I like to use a little bit of humor and remind them that that strength, right, what we're calling aggressive, right, is really just it's assertive. It's somebody who knows what she wants and is ready to deliver that for you. Show them how it's going to work for them. You know, every time you're negotiating for yourself, you're showing a company what kind of negotiator you're going to be for them. You know, when somebody says to me, "Oh, Alex, you know, really, that's what you charge to speak?" And I might say, "Listen, you're having me come in to train your whole company in negotiation. What kind of trainer would I be? If I weren't practicing that in my own life, you shouldn't hire me." Love it. I have tons of more questions for you. Maybe we need to do a part two. Oh, I would love it if you would uh spend more time with us. Of course. But tell the people where can they learn more about you? What do you have coming up? How can they engage with you? How can they hire you? Yes. Thank you for that question. Really appreciate how you're always promoting other women, by the way. Right. Ever since Clubhouse. I know that about you. Yep. So, and we all know if it happened on Clubhouse, that was that was the real real right. Exactly. Back in the day. So uh you can f so I deliver uh keynotes and trainings all over the world. Uh you can find me at Alex Carter asks.com. This year really exciting because of all the budgetary pressures on companies and because I always want to create opportunities for other women. I created the ask for more group which is a diverse group of trainers that can serve people at varying investment levels. You can find us at ask formorgroup.com. And you can't avoid me on LinkedIn. I'm there every day and Instagram. And Instagram is where you're going to see a lot of the mom content. So if you'd like to see me screaming like an absolute fool at swim meets all over New Jersey, you head to Instagram and you can find me there. By the way, when I went to your LinkedIn profile, you're like at 100,000 plus connections on LinkedIn. I did want to ask, okay, this is my real final question. Yeah. Okay. Do you have a company that's helping you like grow? Like how are you doing this? I do. I work with a company called Yap Media, uh, womenowned and founded, um, Halataha. And I will say that the growth is all organic. So, you know, it's a fake world out there. People pay for all kinds of stuff. And I decided that I didn't want a single fake follower. I don't need that to look in the mirror and feel good about myself. And here's a lesson for entrepreneurs, okay? I showed up on social media every day for years. Nothing happened. One day, something I posted went viral and I went from 19,000 followers on uh Instagram that I built person by person on Clubhouse to over 120,000. Wow. Okay. So, sometimes it's just keep doing what you're doing and one day it's going to pay off. It's that consistency and that investment. But yes, I did invest in having help because I have to figure out where I can best spend my time, right? And so we collaborate to take, you know, speeches I've given or talks I've done and to translate that into free content so that people don't have to be behind the boardroom doors of a company or at the United Nations to get highquality negotiation advice. I love that. Thank you so much for joining us and giving us your time. I know we've been trying to get this to happen. By the way, Alex does not do in person interviews. She prefers virtual cuz she ain't trying to go nowhere. Okay. So, the fact that you're in studio, thank you. And thank you to Danielle who has been a pleasure to work with. Danielle, my amazing EA. Yes, she's been a pleasure to work with. Uh, so thank you for making the time and for showing up in person and for dropping so many gems today. Thanks for being who you are. I'll come back anytime. Thank you. And shout out to all of you for tuning in. If you appreciated today's episode, if you learned something, make sure to leave us a review. Make sure to give us some feedback. Reach out to Alex and say, "Hey, I heard you on the banking podcast. You're that girl, right?" Uh, let her know uh that you came to her community because you found her here. And as always, thank you so much for joining us. I'll see you in the next episode, guys. Besitos. Hey guys, if you enjoyed this video, I'm pretty sure you're going to love the next one. 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