In this episode, Chris McMartin sits down with Janine Rogan, author of The Pink Tax, to spark an interactive conversation that can change how you look at money for good. Janine will share how the pink tax is deeply ingrained in our society and financially puts women at a disadvantage, continuing to widen the wealth gap.
Key Topics in this Conversation:
- The importance of women in building wealth and achieving economic equality.
- How women can invest, negotiate, and take control of their finances to build wealth and make a positive impact on society
- The need for allyship, especially from male counterparts, to create a supportive and inclusive environment for women in the workplace
Tune in to this episode to hear Janine discuss the significance of continuous learning, advocating for oneself, and building a strong support network to achieve success in the financial and entrepreneurial realms.
You’re listening to the Scotiabank Women Initiative MasterClass series. I’m your host, Chris McMartin, and I lead the Scotiabank Women Initiative for small business across Canada. In this series, you’ll hear a collection of inspiring interviews with women who lead and own businesses and want to share what they know. Let’s break down the barriers together.
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McMartin, Chris
Thank you so much for everyone joining us today. I am so excited to be able to introduce Janine Rogan, who's with us today. The author of The Pink Tax, which I'm very excited about, as well as the CEO and owner of the Wealth Building Academy. So thank you, Janine, for joining us today.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited for this conversation.
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McMartin, Chris
Excellent. So Janine, I always say that I think an individual can introduce themselves better than anyone else can. So with that, I'm going to turn it over to you to introduce yourself, tell us about yourself, about your business and about you personally, maybe just a little intro.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah, for sure. So my name is Janine Rogan. I live in Calgary and I've grown up in Alberta my entire life. I'm a CPA by trade. And really when I was doing my designation, the financial literacy piece of my life kind of started to come together. So I've been in the financial literacy space for about 12 years now, and really in the past few have been focusing on women and the impact that they have when it comes to building wealth within our society, and that is ultimately what led me to write my book, The Pink Tax, and spend, I guess all of my time focusing on teaching women how to invest and build wealth so that we can ultimately get to economic equality within our society.
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McMartin, Chris
I love that. Thank you, Janine. And let's dive right into that book that you've written, because I'm really excited about this. I know that officially the book launch is coming up, so maybe tell us a little bit about your book and where we find it and the launch. And let's chat about that.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah. So I started reading this book when I was eight months pregnant, which I joked that I don't know if that was like, the best idea I've ever had. But we were in the middle of the pandemic, so it felt like the right time and really why I started writing the book was because I was sick of mhe financial literacy space being dominated by men and those men telling women to, you know, just skip the latte or avocado toast is the reason you can't have a house or just don't have a shopping spree as the reasons why women weren't able to build wealth and don't get me wrong, like there is a place for budgeting, there is a place for, you know, looking at what you're spending. But I really wanted to dig into the economic inequalities and economic injustices that women face when it comes to building their wealth. So everything from you know what we're told as children all the way up to the conversations we have with our financial advisors, with our spouses, with our coworkers and, you know, continuing on into women negotiating and investing. So it really is kind of the I always say, the micro and the macro economic coming together to paint a fuller picture as to why women have less wealth, why women are paid less and ultimately that translates into, I guess, why women have less power in the world financially.
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McMartin, Chris
I love that. So. So give us a sneak peek to me. Give us give us your top two most impactful. You know topics that you're talking about in this book and why we need to run out and read it.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah, I mean, I feel like there's a lot of really impactful bit.
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McMartin, Chris
Yes, you know, like there's so much more than two.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
I think the way I've looked at it is you know there are things that individuals can do and you know this is everything from learning to invest because I think building wealth is so, so important. Negotiating from an individual lens. I think those are huge things. But then when we start to look at what companies can do and if we're in leadership positions, that companies, what changes we can impact and then also globally what we can do is also really important. So who we vote for the policies that we're putting into play, things like, you know, universal, affordable and accessible childcare is huge for keeping women economically in the workforce, which ultimately you know is going to lead to more economic equality and their bank accounts. So I mean, there's a lot from the individual standpoint. I always say like the two biggest ones are investing, building your wealth, and ultimately negotiating so that you can, you can take that wealth and actually do something with it. So whether that's investing or purchasing from small business owners or hey, maybe you become an Angel investor and you only invest in women owned or minority owned businesses. When you have that financial power, you get to decide kind of how you can impact the world with your dollars.
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McMartin, Chris
Fantastic. And so, I mean realistically this this concept, it's not a new concept, it's not new information, but your book is different. So tell us why it's different. Tell us why this is this is different from what we've heard or read in the past because I can state it definitely is. So give us an explanation as to why it is different.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah. So I think traditionally, personal finance books to war aimed towards women and have had those things that I mentioned, you know, save money, don't spend and they don't take into account all of the factors that impact society. So if we look at the wealth gap, we know that women, white women, have only 30% of the worldwide wealth. If we look at what causes that, we can, you know, look back to the wage gap. So we know there's a wage gap, so that impacts it. And then the pink tax, which is actually the title of the book, extends, I believe, far beyond what it was originally coined as, but originally it was coined as the gender pricing difference between two items. So razor, shampoo, all of those things. So women now are earning less, they're having to spend more because of things like the pink tax, and then that leads them to having less money to save and invest, ultimately leading them to have less wealth. So when we look at all of these issues, I believe that there are incredibly multifaceted and there are a lot of layers to them, and we have to start to peel back those layers to understand what's going on in our society before we can actually make changes.
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McMartin, Chris
And what made you to decide to write the book? I know you said, like, you know, in the pandemic, 8 months pregnant. And you said maybe it wasn't a good time. I mean, I think it was a great time. But what made you decide to finally say that's it, I have to get this book out there?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah, I think I was just sick of all of the advice and I kept going back and forth, but I knew I had a lot to say. I've been in this space for a long time and I've gone back and forth between, you know, is it one book? Is it two books? And originally when I was chatting with the people there like it kind of sounds like personal finance is one, and like women, as another book. And I was like, I just feel like they have to be combined because there's so much that crosses over when we're looking at this stuff. It just is everywhere, and we don't necessarily connect how some of these things impact women's bank accounts. And I think we have to start if we're going to get to economic equality.
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McMartin, Chris
Absolutely, and I know that that your book definitely is, you know focused towards an adult conversation. But as a mother of a daughter, you know, can you give some advice as to when these conversations should start to happen for our younger generations?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah, I think they can start to happen. Obviously, like every conversation has to be age appropriate. So you're not gonna be talking to a 3 year old about like, oh, here's the wealth gap. But I think, you know, having those conversations around, you know, different jobs and different roles and where we traditionally see women, movies are a great way to have conversations with younger children around kind of the roles that men and women play in these in these movies and what that means. I mean, we know that teaching and nursing are predominantly women, or mostly women in that workforce. And so maybe even starting to have that conversation around school with school aged kids, about men can be caretakers, and women can also be in the C-Suite. I think those are kind of the age appropriate conversations we can have when kids are younger and then obviously as they become teenagers and early adults, then I think having conversations around salary transparency and you know what it costs and all of those things that impact women is incredibly important.
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McMartin, Chris
Absolutely, absolutely. That's great advice. And so let's pivot the conversation a little bit in the sense that we know that a lot of the individuals on the call today are listening in on our entrepreneurs and or women leading businesses in their space, and so how specifically does the pink tax affect entrepreneurs?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Or we know that from a VC funding perspective, only about 3% of I think it's actually 2% now. Only 2% to 2 to 3% of businesses that are women led get funded by VC's, which is terrible. And as soon as you add any level of intersectionality, so whether that's race or if you're an LGBTQ or BIPOC, that just makes it worse. So we know that women and women with any level of intersectionality are not getting funded, and so that is a huge conversation to have. And that is one of the reasons I'm such a big advocate for women building wealth is so that they can then turn around and say these are the businesses that I want to invest in. The whole society does need to shift on how we fund certain types of businesses, but that's not going to happen overnight. So from an individual perspective, I think that's super important. The other piece I would say is women tend, especially if they're doing their own business, tend to underpay or not pay themselves as entrepreneurs. And I think that we're doing a disservice to ourselves by not doing that, because if a man was running a business and he was going out to get VC funding, he better believe that his salary is going to be one of those- his probably 6 figure salary is going to be one of those line items when he's going to go get funding for his business. So, you know, women paying ourselves and charging what we are actually worth and not kind of what society has told us, is really important as well. When it comes to running our own businesses.
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McMartin, Chris
Amazing. That's really insightful. What specific advice would you give as those, you know, tangible, you know, one or two steps to an entrepreneur starting out a brand new business, what would be some advice, tips that you would give?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah, I love Mike Michalowicz profit first method for new businesses. It really breaks- I'm an accountant, so I'm a little bit of a nerd when it comes to this stuff, but it breaks it down into, like, your revenue, and it specifically carves out a salary for the owner of the business. And I think from day one that's so important because then you need to look at your operating expenses because that's kind of carved out as its own category, and making sure that you can run your business in a lean way to ultimately also pay yourself. I think that's so important. And then I think, you know, being like obviously you need to do your market research, but don't be apologetic about your prices because we need to make sure that we're charging in line with the men that are running businesses we're charging in line with the market and we don't need to apologize about that. Either we're charging for our knowledge, our work on or our products and how much time and effort has gone into that, not just from an hourly basis, but if you've been in the field for 10 years, it people aren't just paying for one hour of your time, they're paying for all 10 years of that expertise that you've built up. So I would say charging your worth and then getting your finances organized and making sure that you pay yourself as well.
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McMartin, Chris
So it's a great tips and when you say you know, getting your finances in order, can you dive into that a little bit and give us some actual like I said, tangible steps of like where do we start with that? So I'm an entrepreneur, I've got my feet on the ground when it comes to my business, what does that mean to get my finances and order? What are your suggestions?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah. So I'm gonna go back to the profit first method again, just because it is so simple for new entrepreneurs to lay out. It's really like you set up five bank accounts for three or four savings accounts in one kind of checking account where all the revenue comes into and then every month you're going to go in and separate out the revenue you've earned into your operating expenses into your, what you're paying yourself, saving some money for taxes. And you can Google the book, there's a lot of worksheets online. You don't necessarily even need to read the whole book, but it gives you percentages for how much you should be allocating to running your business at under $1,000,000 or if you're 5,000,000, how much should you be aiming? And it's not to say that this is the be all and end all. Obviously every business is different, but it's a great way to start looking at how we make sure we pay ourselves and that we're running a lean business, so we're not spending too much on overhead and kind of on that note, if you find yourself paying a lot every month for let's say services for your business, it might be time to also kind of look at how much you're spending and are those subscriptions serving you to the best of your ability? Can you negotiate those services? Can you say goodbye to them for now and maybe revisit them later if you don't necessarily need them? There's a lot of ways to kind of trim down and we're seeing businesses run more lean, especially post pandemic when there's kind of less funding, less sponsorship from companies, so I would say that those would be great ways to get started and then I would say absolutely being involved in your finances, you can outsource your bookkeeping, but you still have to know what's going on at the end of the day in your business. So you need to know how much money your business is making. You need to know if your products or services are making you money, or if they're costing you more than it's worth because then it might be time to have that conversation around cutting those products. I think it's so important for entrepreneurs to understand their business. You don't like I said, you don't need to necessarily know how to do the accounting, but you have to know your numbers so that if you are, you know, looking for funding or looking for a loan or looking to grow, you have the ability to have those conversations and know that you're a profitable business.
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McMartin, Chris
I love that and I love that you mentioned that it's OK to outsource some of those things. Like for example, having a bookkeeper. It is there when you were building your business, it is there particular team members or advisors or a particular you know network that we're so valuable to you and not necessarily by name, but what sort of experts did you think that these are the ones I really needed to have and you know, maybe these are the ones I didn't need to have or could have gone without for a little bit like you said?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
So I'm gonna accountant and so are my parents, so I didn't really need help in the accounting. My husband's also an accountant, so we just like to keep it all in the family, so didn't really need help there. I also was in corporate tax. So I do know how to file a corporate tax return. Those two things most people need to outsource. But for me, some of the social media aspect. I need help with the design. I'm not a super design person, so having someone even just help me with some of the branding colors was to make them cohesive was really helpful. Having a sales coach was something that has been invaluable to me to encourage and push me and make me look at how I sell different things and the words I'm using. I was I was brought up in the CPA world where everything is like very to the point, no fluffy language and that's not how you sell to people. You sell through emotion. So that was something that I needed to kind of unlearn and it may be that the opposite for you depending on kind of what your background is. And maybe you grew up being able to do design and so you don't need that customers for that. In addition to that, I always, always recommend people have, whether you're in business or in corporate, I call it a personal board of directors. So people you really trust and that if they said something to you, you would absolutely take to heart. We don't want to take people's opinions that you know aren't necessarily in it don't necessarily know and are just there to cause negativity. But we want people that we trust and that are actually going to give us honest feedback, and those can be people from different industries. Those can be people you've come across in your life and you don't even need to ask them to be on your personal board of directors. Those are just the people you have in your mind that you trust that if something goes bad in your business or you were faced with a tough decision, those are the people you would call. So I think being really mindful about who you surround yourself with as you're building that business or as you're going through your corporate journey is also really important.
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McMartin, Chris
For sure, my love. I love that you started by, like, identifying what your strengths were, what you had as you know what section you were the expert as. And like you said, that's not gonna be the same for everyone. But filling in those, you know, gaps with other experts. So I love that the, you know, the self-awareness of here's where I can be the expert on my team and then bringing in the other expert. So I think that's great. Really quickly. Janine. We did get a question in the comments. Just. I'm sorry, could you say again the name of the book you recommended?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Oh yes, it's Profit First by Mike Michalowicz.
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McMartin, Chris
Perfect. Thank you.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
You Google it, there's a whole bunch of work sheets and stuff. He's great for, for small business entrepreneurs.
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McMartin, Chris
Amazing. Thank you for sharing that again. I appreciate that.
So, uh, we often talk, obviously being the, you know, the Scotiabank Women Initiative where we're Scotiabank. And so we talk about our advisors because really they're amazing with our clients and with our small business entrepreneurs and we like to say that we want to be part of their team. So that goes to what you were talking about is building that team and if banking is that section where you're not the expert, that's where you bring in your banking expert to, to help with that. And the other thing I want to point out is that they can sometimes help also refer you to other experts who need. So obviously our banking advisors, while they are experts at small business banking, they are not experts at taxes, they are not experts at accounting, they are not expert lawyers. They are not- However, they may know those in your community that they work with that they may be able to refer you to if you don't have that network. So I think it's also important to speak to those you do trust like you were saying build that circle of trust and then talked to those individuals too, right, to build your network.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Absolutely. And. And you know, that's one of the biggest things even when I was in corporate, and let's say I was applying for a new job and let's say in the job description and this can be entrepreneurship as well. This is entrepreneurship every single day. You may not have that qualification that you're looking for. And I've always approached it as like I may not know the answer or I may not know how to do that. But I know that I'm smart enough and resourceful enough to be able to tap someone else on the shoulder that I trust and say, hey, can you introduce me to someone that you might know that is a good accountant or that knows how to set up the back end of a website? Because let's say I can't. I'm not good at that.
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McMartin, Chris
Yeah.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
But that has always been my approach as I don't need to know everything. I just need to be confident enough to ask someone else for help. And I think as women we really do a good job of that. And so I would just continue to encourage entrepreneurs, anyone in corporate to make sure that you are asking and reaching out for help from people you trust to make those introductions, to teach you how to do something new, or even just point you in the right direction.
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McMartin, Chris
Absolutely. And when you are starting as an entrepreneur and really building that, that trusted board of advisors like you spoke about, was there anything in particular that you did or events you attended or ways that you expanded that network? Was there some suggestions you could give to those just starting out?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah, I'm a big advocate of networking in person. I'm an extrovert though, so that definitely speaks to that. But finding women's groups within your own networks and cities is so important. So a couple I've been a part of for a number of years, young women in business, I think they have chapters all over Canada. W North, if you're more of a corporate field, though, they do help entrepreneurs as well. Umm, who else? There's a ton in every city, and I think being a part of some of those.
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McMartin, Chris
Just a little plug this Scotiabank Women Initiative. That's it.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Not totally. I mean, if, if you're not part of that already, absolutely. But finding like my Ace Collective was the other one I was thinking of, they focus on entrepreneurs. But I think when you find those groups of people, it's again kind of camaraderie, but also the ability to tap people on the back and say, hey, I really liked what you did with your website. Who did it for you? Right. So I think especially as women, we need to make sure that we are engaging in community and helping. I love helping other women succeed. Whether that's giving money to their business or using them as services, or even kind of bartering services if we're at the beginning of our journey. Hey, I can do this for you. I can help you with your finances if you're able to help me with my website or whatever it is. But yeah, finding those women in your network to support and to be able to tap on the shoulder is such a great way to build community. And like I said, there are so many women's groups out there, it’s just finding kind of the one that fits right for you.
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McMartin, Chris
Absolutely. I think that's great advice. In your, you know, career as an entrepreneur, obviously you, you know, you had the wealth building Academy and that was you were obviously an expert in that area. And please do correct me if I'm wrong, but I mean this is the first book you've written. So I don't think you were an expert author you know, when you started this journey. So what made that pivot for you and how difficult was it?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
So I've been a writer for probably 10 years, so when I was in university, I kind of started a blog, but then that kind of- as I went into the corporate world, turned into writing for a number of financial institutions on money. So I've always written articles, written blog posts. So I would say that the writing part from the wasn't that hard because I knew what I wanted to say, and I'm a pretty quick and concise writer. Editing was a hard thing for me and it was such a process, but I really made sure that the publisher I was working with was really in line with my mission and vision for the book. And it's, you know, it's a smaller publishing house out of Vancouver that's run by two women. So they're so in line with my vision for the book and my mission, and they support it. And again, I think whatever project you're taking on or maybe you're starting a conference or whatever it is you're doing with your business, I think finding people that are advocates that will say your name when you're not in the room and advocate for you and are just really excited about what you have to do. Those are the people you want in your circle. And I know I've digressed from how hard writing a book is. It's so much work, but I think it is so, so worth it because so far it's been very positive feedback. I know the book goes out into the world and two and a bit weeks. I'm looking at my calendar.
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McMartin, Chris
It’s so close, so close. No, I love that you took it back. Because I love that the conversation we're having it. It seems to always revert back to that community into that network and to that board of advisors that you know, I love that it always reverts back to that because I think it's a good point that we have to do it together. And so I think that's wonderful that it keeps coming back to that.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
And I mean the first thing I did when I was kind of in the midst of finding a publisher was I talked to two women in my circle, one who went with a very, very traditional publisher, Harper Collins, and one who went down the self-publishing route. And I just kind of said, hey, do you have time for a coffee or zoom chat? Can I ask you a bunch of questions about this? And I would say most people, most women that are maybe a few steps ahead of where you're hoping to be are more than happy to sit down and have that conversation, to share the knowledge they've learned. Like we got- I mean, one of them is an accountant. So I mean, her and I were just numbers all day. But, you know, down to like what advance to expect from a publishing company. And I think that those conversations again are so important because you might go in thinking one thing, but if you don't have the data and you don't have the knowledge it, you could be undercut or undersold for some of those things. So again, I would say if there's, you know, if there's something you want to do, find someone that's a couple steps ahead of you and ask for that mentorship again. Most people are willing to help you sit down and have a coffee with them.
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McMartin, Chris
Ah, I love that. And so you mentioned look for that mentorship. Are there any specific mentors that you've had along the way, whether early on in your life or as an entrepreneur? Was there any specific mentors who have really made the difference for you?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Well, I've had a lot of mentors and very few of them have actually been from my corporate job or corporate jobs along the way. There was one, but I've always kind of, I guess, leaned towards women that were entrepreneurs and doing really cool, amazing things. There was one woman who spoke at a conference when I was in university and she completely flipped the narrative for me on what, like being a traditional accountant looked like. I think she saw in me that I was never going to be sit at your desk for 15 hours a day and crunch numbers. And that's not to say that. I mean I- God bless those accountants because I was not cut out for it. I did it for a number of years and then just had to make a switch. But her name is Courtney. She really changed kind of how I looked at what my life might look like instead of, I used to be like, let's plan it out like 8 years. I'm going to do my designation that I'm going to become a senior manager and then become a partner and what have you. And I think she just saw in me that I would be able to do that for sure, but I think she knew that it wouldn't fill me up and make me fulfilled and happy.
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McMartin, Chris
Right. Right. I love that and do you now mentor others? Is that something you enjoy doing and tell us a little bit about that?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it was a little bit hard throughout the pandemic. And I think we're all sick of zoom calls. I know they give us a lot of ability to do things like this, but for one-on-one, I definitely prefer meeting people in person. That being said, I've mentored a lot of individuals. I mentor people that are going through the CPA program. I'm mentor people that are newly graduated. I kind of have just found them along the way or they’ve found me when I’m speaking at conferences or events like this. And yeah, if we hit it off, we hit it off and I'm always happy to share information, whether it's informal through Instagram, someone asking me a question, I'll send him a voice note back. Or if it is sitting down for lunch and having that the conversation that way about their career, I'm always happy to help people out and give information where I can because people have been so generous to me in terms of the opportunities, the conversations and the information that they've shared with me.
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McMartin, Chris
I think it's great that it's your way of paying it forward and I can definitely vouch for that, that when we got connected, you know, you were very open to anything you can do to help entrepreneurs, to help. You've helped some of our campus programs to help them speak to some of the interns. And like, you're always open. So I do appreciate that, definitely. And I love that you're willing to pay back what you received when you were starting out. So I think that's wonderful. So I'm gonna flip it just a little bit and that we've got some questions from those that have registered asking about, you know, being at that space, whether you're an entrepreneur again or you're, you know, leading your way in leadership in corporate world, either one, but you're at that space where you're looking to get into investing and you don't know where to start. So can you kind of walk us through some suggestions of where even to start and what that looks like?
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah. And I always preface this with it can be extremely overwhelming to start something that we're not taught in school it there is a completely different language in a sense to be in the financial space. And as a CPA, what I noticed while I was going through my CPA program and working at a firm was there were people that knew how to do corporate taxes for multimillion businesses to, you know, advocate and help those businesses go public, but they didn't know how to invest in their TFSA. And that's not a knack against them. It is something that I'm so passionate about that we do not teach in schools that we absolutely need to need to need to start doing. And CP Alberta is actually doing some really great work. I'm involved with them, so hopefully.
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McMartin, Chris
Amazing.
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Janine Nicole Rogan
Before I leave this earth, it will be in the schools, hopefully way before that. Hopefully when my son is in school, it will be in the schools. But I wanna say that it can be really overwhelming and so I always tell people that you only need to do 1 right thing at a time. And what I mean by that is you don't.
0:30:43.480 --> 0:30:45.500
McMartin, Chris
I love that. Do1 right thing at a time.
0:30:44.230 --> 0:30:55.180
Janine Nicole Rogan
You don't even do 12 things in a month, you just need to pick one. And if you pick one thing every month, you'll do 12 things by the end of the year and your finances will be in better shape than they were, which is fantastic. So understanding that you need to take action is the first step. There is a lot of studies that show women tend to hold their money in cash, which as we know with the inflationary times we're living in, is not doing a lot for you and is not helping you build wealth. If you think about what you need to retire, you know a couple of million dollars is what experts estimate these days to actually earn and save that amount of money would take a really long time. And so investing is kind of, I don't want to say the shortcut because it is a long term game, but it is the way you're gonna do that. So understanding that you need to take action is the first step and then taking that action is the second step and you can start with as little as like $25 when it comes to investing and you can just start to build the habit as you're learning because $25 is not gonna be bankrupting you at the end of the day. But if you're doing $25.00 a month, maybe as you start to get your feet wet, you can move that up to $50.00 and you can use services. A lot of banks have, robo-advisors, or kind of predetermined portfolios that you can use. I know many, many financial institutions have them now you can look at a DIY, you can look at going to a financial advisor and there are lots of different options, but the best thing that you can do is get started. And then from there it's, I mean I'm know everything either, so continuing to read books, take courses, ask questions, talk to people.
0:32:28.270 --> 0:32:30.560
McMartin, Chris
Keep learning, yeah.
0:32:29.490 --> 0:32:35.520
Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah, you know, lifelong learning is something that I'm a big advocate for and I think no matter what, we're all going to have to continue to do it.
0:32:39.680 --> 0:32:48.170
McMartin, Chris
Absolutely. We've got a question from one of our participants asking is do you invest as your business or do you invest as yourself?
0:32:49.380 --> 0:33:3.160
Janine Nicole Rogan
So currently I personally invest as my self and that is for a number of reasons I think probably depending on your situation every individual is going to be different. That being said, there are also some tax implications that you have to look at, which obviously are very specific to every person in every corporation, but it would be beneficial to talk to a tax advisor depending on where you want to invest and also depending on how much. Because if you get to a certain threshold within your business, there can be punitive taxes on those investments. So just be mindful of that. You don't need to know all the Inns and outs of that, but that's when talking to a tax specialist would be helpful, but right now, personally I invest as myself, I'm hoping within the next few years we can start to also invest and build some wealth within my business as well.
0:33:47.280 --> 0:34:16.990
McMartin, Chris
Thank you. That's very helpful. And again we bring back to that, that network that having those experts and I love that because it it's so true. It's funny, I love working with entrepreneurs and the last 10 years I have and I always said that the reason people ask me like why do you love working with entrepreneurs? Because it's so individualized. Every entrepreneur story, every entrepreneur's path, every entrepreneur's journey is so different. And so obviously there is no one, this is the right way to do it. This is the right path. This is the right answer and and I love that. And then reading through your book, I got a sneak peek. So in reading through it, I could see that like there was no, it's just this is the way that that's not how it is it's not this is the way it's these are the things that have to be taken into consideration and these are the you know the steps to find out the information you need to find so I love that, but it's so individualized.
0:34:50.130 --> 0:35:19.940
Janine Nicole Rogan
And I think you know that probably is my general issue with most people in society is that everyone wants black and white. And I have found in my life journey that most things aren't black and white. We all fall somewhere on a spectrum. So another question I was get is should I pay down debt or invest? And it's again it depends. And I think there can be a mix of both. Two things can be true at the same time. But also you have the right to change your mind if something's not working for you. And I think that that's also something that we don't give enough credit to is if you try something and it doesn't work or you don't like it or your circumstance changes, you can change your mind and do a different thing as well. So I think, yeah, everything is kind of on a spectrum. Shades of Grey is kind of my approach to entrepreneurship, to managing money. And I think you said it, you said it exactly everything is individualized because everyone is so different in their journey.
0:35:49.400 --> 0:35:59.140
McMartin, Chris
Absolutely and along those same lines is what I would say is that as much as you can change your mind, you can change your path. You can change the way you're doing things. I think there's also uh, you know, a season for some of the individuals or the experts in your life. So you had mentioned that right at the beginning. So sorry, I'm kind of going back to that. But you would mention, I believe it was when you were talking about certain services for your business when you said, you know, maybe now's not the time for that service, not that that service is not needed ever. But maybe now's not the time. Do you have any examples of your path where you said, you know, now's not the time, but a different time was perfect for it?
0:36:34.680 --> 0:37:6.770
Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah. So when I was building my e-mail list for example, this is a really quick example. You know, I spent some time Googling. You know what Internet provider is best, blah blah blah and went with one that was, it actually was far beyond what I needed. It was likely for someone who has hundreds of thousands of subscribers and sales sequences, and it was a lot. And it was OK. I learned how to do it, but it was also expensive. So when I was looking at my business with like, a critical lens of you know is there. Is there something that is not for right now? Can we say goodbye to that and maybe pick a service that was maybe more in line with the number of subscribers I had what I actually needed it for. So that's an example of something that was easy for me to go, hey, this is far beyond what I need. I'm going to go with something a little bit less right now and that doesn't mean that I won't need it in the future sometime.
0:37:31.400 --> 0:38:2.680
McMartin, Chris
So I think that's a perfect example and I love to you that it shows another example of how you've taken your own advice is that you can make those changes and you can change those that path or journey and maybe it's not for right now, but it doesn't mean it's not forever. So I think that's great. I think that's great. So I just want to welcome anybody that's listening in anybody that's on the call with us. Feel free if you feel comfortable and wanna come off mute and ask a question, you're welcome to do so. If you don't feel comfortable and you wanna write it up in the chat, we will make sure to chat about it so that Janine answers your questions. I know we've gotten a couple, but I just wanted to encourage that if anyone wants to get something asked, please go ahead and do so. I do have one question that was submitted by one of our participants by e-mail, so I'll share that with you. Do you have any specific financial strategies specifically unique for new women entrepreneurs that would be different for women's specifically?
0:38:35.70 --> 0:38:37.260
Janine Nicole Rogan
Different for women's specifically. I mean, I'm always an advocate of raising your prices because I think we undercharge and I think in general society expects us to charge less, I think.
0:38:49.700 --> 0:39:4.230
McMartin, Chris
Why do you think that is Janine? I'm. I'm curious of your personal opinion. Just with your experience. Because it's something that you've mentioned several times. So why do you think we undercharge even undercharge for our own services, under charge for our products? Why do you think that is?
0:39:4.960 --> 0:39:5.430
Janine Nicole Rogan
I think our systemic aspect of how women have been brought up in general would lead to this, so things like being greedy is bad for women, if you want to have a lot of money then you know that's kind of taboo. The term gold digger, you know, all of these things that we've coined as names for women have, I think subconsciously caused us to maybe not necessarily charge our worth or think we're not able to charge as much because then we'll be seen as greedy or a whole host of other names that we probably shouldn't say while we're being recorded, and I think you know, there's also an aspect of unpaid labor that comes into this. Globally, if we were to pay women just minimum wage for all the unpaid work. So childcare, eldercare, all of you, you name it. All of the unpaid work women do, we would add $12 trillion to the economy. And so I think there's also- maybe society thinks that we should also just give things away for free. I think I just saw that comment come through which jogged my memory, but we're expected to just do things out of the goodness of our heart. And it's like, well, the goodness of our heart doesn't pay our bills. So I think there's a lot there. There's also studies that show and this one really gets me going. But there's a wage gap in children's allowances. When we look at how little kids are paid, little girls are typically paid less by their age than little boys. So I think it starts young, I think-
0:40:46.410 --> 0:40:48.140
McMartin, Chris
Really? That’s something.
0:40:49.810 --> 0:40:52.350
Janine Nicole Rogan
It's so systemic that we expect women and girls to do all of this unpaid work are for less, and so I think those are the things that cause us to, you know, not think about what someone else is charging. And this is where conversations with male coworkers or male entrepreneurs asking them what they charge, I think is such a great practice because then we're able to be like, OK, I can also charge that because I'm just as qualified or I am in the same line of work as that person. So yeah, that's a long-winded answer, but-
0:41:22.470 --> 0:41:35.40
McMartin, Chris
No, I love that. And actually that was a really good lead in to something I wanted to speak to you about is that so with Scotiabank, obviously we have a massive focus on allyship in general. So it's speaking about, you know, speaking to our male allies, you know what would your advice be? And you just gave a little tidbit of that is you know how we can, you know, collaborate with our mail allies. But is there any further advice you can give on? You know, it's not just yes. We wanna work with other women and yes we wanna support other women but we need our allies as well. So do you have any advice when it comes to allyship?
0:42:5.400 --> 0:42:12.750
Janine Nicole Rogan
Absolutely. And I think that it is so important we won't be able to reach economic equality without the men, as much as I would like to. I'm kidding but, you know, some of the biggest advocates in my life have been men that are in line with my mission. And so I would say that men absolutely have a responsibility to have conversations about salary, about what they're charging with their female counterparts. I also think that speaking up for women and advocating for them when they're not in the room is something that's so important. So if, hey, oh, I think Janine would be interested in this, is really important. I also think this one has been coming up lately, especially as women become mothers, there is a conversation to have around when you do social events because most, I'm generalizing, but more often than not is the woman who's picking up their kids. So whether that's school ending at 3:30 or daycare ending at 4:30 or five, having an event at 4 to 6 drinks after work while it's fun, not a lot of women can participate in that, and that is typically how you start to build relationships and get promoted and have people advocate for you. So I think men can also look at creating places to network that aren't necessarily at those times where maybe a mom is putting their little one to bed. And that's not to say dads aren't involved, but like I know from 5 to 7 like it is really hard. I want to spend those hours with my son. Like it's really hard to get me to do something during those hours that I'm not a hell yes, for because I would be giving up time with my son. He's at daycare all day, so I think those are some of the things that men can do. I think also taking on some of the, I call them non promotable tasks, but social committees, International Women's Day celebration events. Typically those are planned by women and unless you have this outlined with your manager or your boss, those typically don't help you get promoted per se. So having men involved with those as well to normalize is so important as well.
0:44:25.250 --> 0:44:57.40
McMartin, Chris
I think that's a great point and I'm the same as you. I'm a mom of four, so I'm the same as you. I'm pretty much available to anyone that needs my assistance, answering emails, online on socials. I am available almost always, but it's very difficult to get a hold of me between 5:30 and 8:00 o'clock. That's my short window of time when I am fully dedicated to my four children. And I agree with you, it makes it difficult at times. If there's that event or that networking session or maybe that impromptu let's dinner, drinks, whatever it is, it makes it that much more difficult. So I would agree with that for sure. I would agree with that. So instead, in saying all of that and I, I love the way that you look at allyship and the way you, you know, highlighted how important it is, has there been any allies specifically in your life that have been so impactful for you or specific things they've done that you know you could share? Because I know we do have some allies listening and that they could do for someone that would really make that difference?
0:45:34.600 --> 0:46:4.530
Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah, I think in my life there have been men that have really tried to make connections for me and get me in front of audiences that need to hear what I have to say. And that has been, as a speaker and an author, that is kind of my bread and butter, right? That's probably the biggest way I earn revenue. So having those introductions, having men say like this is someone you need to talk to or like, this is who we're going to put you in front of. I think that has been the most helpful and I've had a number of men do that for me. I would also say like I would not be able to do what I do with a 2 year old without my husband and he is probably more of a feminist than I am honestly. I joke about that because I think he is the one who really challenged me in some of these spaces and has been such an advocate for me doing all of these things and traveling all over the place and without an equal partnership, I definitely would not. I don't know what I would do because my child would probably have a meltdown like he did yesterday while I'm would be speaking to a room of people like this. And so, you know, having an equal partner, whoever that is, I think is so important.
0:46:50.220 --> 0:47:4.460
McMartin, Chris
I love that. Thank you for sharing that. We're coming close to wrapping up our time together. Janine, is there anything that you haven't, you know been able to share that we haven't asked about that you really think that you wanna make sure everybody gets to hear?
0:47:5.620 --> 0:47:9.980
Janine Nicole Rogan
Oh my God. I mean, I wrote a book on this. I feel like I could. I could keep, like, I think-
0:47:7.670 --> 0:47:12.250
McMartin, Chris
Yeah, we don't have time to read the book, not this moment.
0:47:13.600 --> 0:47:43.450
Janine Nicole Rogan
Yeah. I really just think the more we start to talk about these things, even if they're considered taboo, the more we start to move the needle as to what's acceptable. And so if that's, you know, talking about money, we see not as many women talking about money as men. If you walk into any tech company, there's guys being like, what did you invest in this weekend? And that's great. But we don't see women doing the same thing. So if you're nervous about it, even talking to a friend or someone you feel comfortable with, I think is so, so important and having those conversations around things like the wage gap, the wealth gap, the pink tax, all of those things that we start to normalize and have conversations with men and women I think is #1 priority because we can't change anything if we don't know about it. And there is so much to learn. And so I would say also, you know being like I said, a lifelong learner. I'm always taking classes and I'm always taking courses. And I think the more we know, the more we can support and build a society that works for everyone, because at the end of the day, I think that's the goal. Why would we continue to grow and continue to build our businesses if they're not going to support the lifestyles that we want to have? And I think that's what's number one most important.
0:48:31.920 --> 0:48:59.930
McMartin, Chris
I love that. I love that I I'm a firm believer of, you know, knowledge is power and continue learning. So after we're done this this chat, everyone's gonna go and preorder The Pink Tax. So it's ready to go for them in in just short of two weeks. But after we're done reading the pink tax, what's your number one recommend on reading what are you reading right now or what do you recommend that as leaders as entrepreneurs? What should we be reading?
0:49:0.820 --> 0:49:7.110
Janine Nicole Rogan
So I'm a little bit of a nerd when it comes to economics, so I'm always reading economics books, so that might not be the most interesting but one book I'm reading right now is Pay Up by Reshma Saujani, she's the founder of Girls Who Code, and it's a little bit US centric, but it does really focus on what we can be doing in the workplace to support women. So I think that's a really great read. The other like philosophical read that I'm reading right now is Four Thousand Weeks and it really dives into the fact that we only have 4000 weeks-ish on the planet. And what we do with that and kind of talks around the time management that our society has built. So if you're looking for a little bit more philosophical, I would say that. In terms of personal finance books, I love Happy Go Money by Melissa Leong. I have these, I think most of these listed on my website if you check out the page.
0:49:53.740 --> 0:49:57.760
McMartin, Chris
Amazing. Amazing. We'll make sure to share the link for your website.
0:49:57.840 --> 0:50:14.540
Janine Nicole Rogan
Sure, yeah. But she is wonderful. Lesley Scorgie based out of Toronto. Wonderful woman, also Canadian. So there's a lot of great Canadian female authors that are writing books and changing the narrative around how we approach things, so I think diving into some of those really anything that interests you, whether it's listening to a podcast, taking a course like I said, or reading a book, I think that that those are great options.
0:50:26.500 --> 0:50:46.330
McMartin, Chris
Amazing. So before we wrap up, I'm gonna ask you the question I asked everyone because I just think it's fun. So what's the one thing that you do every day, and it doesn't have to be financed, related career related, but what's the one thing that you're like? I just gotta do it for me, it's I've got to have my coffee in the morning. But what is it for you? What does that one thing that you can't get through your day without?
0:50:47.660 --> 0:51:7.630
Janine Nicole Rogan
This is like so silly, but I have a lemon water in the morning like I cannot deal with my day without lemon water and ice and it's like a big tumblr and it's almost like I don't know what it is. Maybe it's like before I have my coffee, I have to do it and I don't know without it, I just like, I like crave it and think about it all day.
0:51:7.730 --> 0:51:36.520
McMartin, Chris
I love that. I love that. Hey, whatever kick starts your morning in the best way possible. Janine, on behalf of the Scotiabank Women Initiative, I can't thank you enough. Thank you so much. We will make sure to share all of your contacts. Please go now if you haven't already pre-ordered The Pink Tax. Follow Janine. I follow on LinkedIn, on Instagram and there's great content. So please do so. Thank you so much, Janine. And thank you everyone, for joining today. I hope you have an excellent rest of your day.
0:51:37.0 --> 0:51:38.310
Janine Nicole Rogan
Thank you so much for having me.
You’ve been listening to the Scotiabank Women Initiative MasterClass series. We hope you enjoyed this latest installment.
The Scotiabank Women Initiative is a signature program that breaks down barriers to increase economic and professional opportunities for women to be successful now, and in the future. For more information and more inspiring MasterClasses, please visit www.scotiabankwomeninitiative.com. Let’s stay connected.
