Bozoma St. John doesn’t shy away from the spotlight.
St. John, 48, was Netflix’s first black executive to serve as chief marketing officer. She became Uber’s first chief branding officer and was tasked with restoring the rideshare company’s image. And in 2016, she says, she made waves when she took to the stage at Apple’s annual conference, even though she didn’t look like a typical “Apple fanboy.”
St. John’s career moves are as bold as her personal style. And she thinks she has some well-meaning but misguided advice to thank for that.
“An early manager told me to never wear red lipstick or red nail polish,” St. John told CNBC Make It when asked about the best career advice she ever received.
“She did it with good intentions, like, ‘I’m coming into the room, but I don’t want to be too bold. I don’t want people to tell me what I think before I open my mouth,'” St. John said.
But “it made me question my appearance in the room. As a very tall Black woman with a bold wardrobe, I found it really shrinking.”
Ms. St. John says she ignored that advice and decided to flip it on its head in order to be “the most colorful, the boldest, the sharpest, the wittiest in the room, and very confident about it.”
“I was successful because I didn’t take that advice,” she says.
St. John is the first-ever CEO of her hair and beauty brand, Eve By Bo’s, and continues to seek big changes in her career, recently adding “reality TV star” to her resume as a cast member on Bravo’s “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” and co-host of NBC’s “On Brand with Jimmy Fallon.”
And she wants you to follow that big career move, too.
As people start the new year with new career goals, St. John says now is a good time to pursue what you really want to do with your career. “Transition can happen at any time,” she says.
Here, St. John draws on his career and experience managing thousands of people to share the signs it’s time to quit your job, how to develop your professional brand, and the big red flags when interviewing with companies.
When you know it’s time to quit your job
My advice is that if you feel scared on Sunday, you are definitely in the wrong place. If you come back from vacation and your stomach hurts and you don’t want to go back to work, or you’re so scared that you can barely sleep, I think that’s a pretty big sign that you need to quit your job right now.
Big mistakes when trying to get a raise, promotion, or retirement
If you want to get a promotion or gain more work experience, set a timeline for achieving that goal or decide when to retire. Create a timeline with your boss.
People often approach conversations about promotions and raises from a very egocentric standpoint. What the company and your manager want to hear is how it will benefit the company and the broader community of colleagues.
So, if you position this as “I would like to be promoted to position X by March 1st, so that I can take on more responsibility or perform my duties to help the company achieve its X, Y, and Z goals,” you have some building blocks and a timeline by March 1st.
When you’re mid-career and looking to take the next step, you’ll want to make sure you have a plan in mind to ensure you have a conversation with your boss, keeping your schedule in mind.
It’s a big mistake to think that this is all you are and that you have to put your ideas into how to move forward. If you don’t include your manager in your timeline, they won’t know what goals you’re trying to achieve.
By the time you have that conversation, lay the groundwork so that everyone is well aware that you have achieved your goal of a raise or promotion, and that if you do your part and don’t meet your goal by March 1st, everyone is on the same page that you’re quitting.
How to manage your own professional brand
Whether you’re on TV or sitting in a private room, I believe your personal brand is important and, to some extent, out of your control. Therefore, it should be controlled as much as possible.
If you’re sitting in a cubicle with an open floor and someone isn’t appreciating your work, your responsibility is to make sure your brand’s story about yourself is that you’re hard-working, you’re creative, or you’re a problem-solver. Just like in front of the camera, do everything you can to communicate that brand.
No.1 quality she adopts
This is the most important thing. Express yourself fully. Don’t try to cut off your ends so you can blend in better. To make yourself memorable, you have to actually be memorable.
There is so much that is beautiful and unique about each of us, our experiences, our history. Weaving it into your answers and conversations will actually remind someone of you.
As humans, we often think that we need to have similar interests and preferences to someone in order for them to get along well with us and want to hire us. And I think it’s actually quite the opposite. The curiosity of wanting to get to know someone because, “They’re from this place, or they have this experience, and I don’t have that experience, so that could add to the job,” is actually how you want to be perceived in the interview.
The biggest red flags to look out for when interviewing with a company
If you’re in an interview and the person you’re talking to sounds like they’re looking for someone just like them, run away. Run fast and far.
You want to be in a place where the unique contributions you bring to the job are valued and loved. And it’s not just your business experience. It’s about your cultural experience, your personal experience, and your emotional experience.
You’re one of them, so bring it.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
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