Episode 04: The Ask

If you picked up all three episodes on launch day, you have spent the last two weeks naming what you have built. You have done the inventories. And somewhere in those two weeks, a conversation probably surfaced. A number you have been circling. A room you are about to walk into.

Here is the part nobody tells you: knowing exactly what you are worth and actually asking for it are two completely different skills.

In the fourth episode of Earned Equity, Angelia Williams Graves introduces Vivian. She has been with her organization for 11 years and is running a function with three official titles above her. She trains the people who get promoted past her. She knows her number. She knows her case. And she has been putting off the conversation for 14 months.

Vivian does not lack information. What stops her is the story she has been told about what asking means, and about what kind of woman makes demands versus what kind of woman earns her way. That story is not hers. But she is carrying it, and it is costing her more than any negotiation ever would.

Williams Graves draws on her years as a Realtor, sitting across from sellers who wanted her to discount her fee, to reframe the ask as information rather than aggression. She names the three barriers that most often stop women from asking and lays out what making the ask actually looks like.

In this episode:

• Why knowing your worth and asking for it are two different skills
• The three barriers that stop the ask, and why none of them are weaknesses
• Why the ask is information, not a demand
• The three parts of a clear, grounded ask
• Three specific actions to take in the next two weeks

New here? Welcome. This episode stands on its own, and Episodes 1 through 3 are waiting for you at YourEarnedEquity.com whenever you are ready.

Get your free Episode 4 worksheet at YourEarnedEquity.com/worksheets. Click Worksheets and it is yours right away.

Episode 5 drops October 6, and Williams Graves is bringing in Dr. Ruth Jones Nichols, C-Suite executive and Founder and Executive Director of the IAMRUTH Foundation.

Your earned equity is rare. And rare is valuable. Don't forget it.

New episodes every other Tuesday. YourEarnedEquity.com

Earned Equity is hosted by Angelia Williams Graves, Virginia State Senator, founder of Plinth Advisors, and real estate entrepreneur. New episodes every other Tuesday. Visit YourEarnedEquity.com to access episode worksheets and learn more about the show.