On Fresh Baked Bread and Finding The Medium of Identity and Career Aspirations

Image description: A picture of fresh-baked herb focaccia bread. The bread has been sliced into squares.

As a melanated person, a Black person, in white-centered workplaces, I speak from experience when I say a great deal of energy and a sense of grounding and peace comes from not caving into the "norms" and demands of white supremacist workplace culture ideology as a means of survival. It is liberating to work toward finding the medium in your career that allows you to maintain your identity while thriving personally and financially. With that said, I can also say that by doing so, you open yourself up to a great deal of uncertainty in your future employment opportunities.

Everybody isn't going to be too keen on you maintaining who you are, even those who claim that's why they hired you. They'll expect you to be someone different, to change yourself, and make yourself "acceptable." They will verbalize these expectations, putting your job on the line and leaving you feeling like you're inadequate or a "bad" employee. There will be times when you decide to change yourself to protect yourself. Those moments will hurt, and you might find yourself harboring some resentment, anger, or disappointment toward yourself because you won't feel as protected as you thought. You might not feel protected at all. You may feel more unsafe than ever in your workplace. You'll feel alone.

But you're not alone, far from it.

So many people are flipping that same coin every day because of the world we live in and the workplaces our society has cultivated.

Please know that you are not alone. Please know that I do not judge you because I've been in your shoes and see the weight you carry with your decisions. If anything, I wish you the space and energy to find ways not to shrink who you are and what you bring to the workplace into a trail of crumbs instead of the fresh, robust focaccia you genuinely are. It's not easy, but I promise it is worth it.

Sending you energy and love as you navigate the quagmire of career employment.

P.S.: Yeah, I just compared you to bread. Focaccia, to be exact. Your future and needs are decadent fuel for your soul, like focaccia. You know what? Maybe you should have some focaccia and dipping oil and call it a day. You deserve it.

On Job Duties, Burnout, and Being "Grateful for the Opportunity"

Workplaces pay people $15 or less per hour and expect the equivalent of a $40 per hour employee's work rate and workload in return with no "guff" from those employees.

Workplaces pay people $40 per hour and expect people to give them the equivalent of absolute subservience while being willing to have no boundaries around separating their work from their life and needs with no backtalk or asking for a lighter load.

Neither situation is equitable.

No position should ever feel so overwhelming that people are in a constant state of burnout.

No position should ever be set up in a way that makes employees feel like if they speak up about how their role overwhelms them, they'll lose their job or face retaliation.

No one should be made to feel they should be "grateful for an opportunity," so they should "earn their pay" and overwork when companies could take the time to distribute job duties among multiple positions to mitigate burnout.

Companies need to quit actin' as if they own us when we agree to work for them and have the right to drain us.

Companies need to build more equitable job descriptions that factor in what a legitimately reasonable workload looks like for a position.

And that has nothing to do with whether you're paying someone $15 or $40 an hour.

On "Quiet Quitting"

"Quiet quitting."

"Quiet."

"Quitting."

Bruh.

That's just having boundaries, clocking in and out on time, and not answering emails and phone calls after you clock out. I do that every day.

That's what you should be doing. That's what we all should've been doing for decades.

They're saying that "quiet quitting" is doing the bare minimum by clocking out on time and not answering emails and calls after your working hours are done. Um, what? That isn't doing the bare minimum. That's called doing your job. That's always been technically called doing your job.

Do you mean to tell me y'all created jargon for doing your job, going home when it's time to call it a day, and not answering random emails and texts at 11:33p on a Saturday night? Did y'all legitimately go out of your way to create buzzwords for not overworking and being on 24/7? Are we really at a point in our collective existence where doing your job and clocking out on time is seen as rebellious?

What an abusive relationship we've inherited from those generations before us. What a toxic relationship we've cultivated with the concept of work. Oy vey.

Image description: a screenshot of a tweet. The tweet says, "A portal to hell could open tomorrow, and financial publications would still run an article like 'Thinking about skipping work because a crow is eating your entrails? Here's why that's a bad call.'"

"A portal to hell could open tomorrow, and financial publications would still run an article like 'Thinking about skipping work because a crow is eating your entrails? Here's why that's a bad call.'"

Whew, chile. I'm trying to detect the lies with my handheld lie detector, but it keeps coming back with a "no lies detected" message.

[Image description: a screenshot of a tweet. The tweet says, "A portal to hell could open tomorrow, and financial publications would still run an article like 'Thinking about skipping work because a crow is eating your entrails? Here's why that's a bad call.'"]

On Clout, Copy-and-Paste, and "Taking a Chance on Him"

"I hired someone with zero experience. He had never worked in this specific role. I thought he would be a great fit with our culture, so we took a chance on him. He ended up being my top performer. Sometimes all people need is a chance. Agree?"

To the 8,500+ "recruiters" and "hiring managers" out there on LinkedIn who think it's a good idea to copy and paste that above paragraph for visibility? Two things:

1. We don't believe you. You don't think we believe you, do you? Do you honestly think posting this paragraph for clout looks good when 82 other people post it on the same day at the same time? Don't you think people scroll through their feed and see at least eight of these posts a week? You have no credibility. Stop it.

2. I've legitimately pushed for and hired people with little to no experience in a position because I could see their transferable and intangible skills and had faith they could find success in their way on their terms. I've been doing this for years. I was doing this well before my career in Human Resources and recruiting. And I've never felt the need to brag about it. Why? Because I don't do what I do for clout, likes, follows, or reshares. If you were advocating for folx the way your copy-and-paste post says you do, you'd know that it's not about clout or pats on the back. It's about doing work you can be proud of and impacting lives without expecting gold stars and cookies.

   Real G's move in silence like lasagna.

Some of y'all ain't G's, but y'all sure as hell need to be quiet. These posts are literally becoming a meme. You're a meme now.

I guess you're getting the visibility you were looking for! Bully for you!

[Image description: nine screenshots of various LinkedIn influencers posting the exact same words: "I hired someone with zero experience. He had never worked in this specific role. I thought he would be a great fit with our culture, so we took a chance on him. He ended up being my top performer. Sometimes all people need is a chance. Agree?"]

Image description: nine screenshots of various LinkedIn influencers posting the exact same words: "I hired someone with zero experience. He had never worked in this specific role. I thought he would be a great fit with our culture, so we took a chance on him. He ended up being my top performer. Sometimes all people need is a chance. Agree?"