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Amplify with Jess Ekstrom is a top rated business podcast designed to help you amplify your ideas, influence and income. We have a special focus on amplifying women's voices, but this show is open to everyone. Tune in every other Tuesday to hear from Forbes Top Rated Speaker, Jess Ekstrom as she talks to speakers, authors and entrepreneurs who are crushing it in their own way.
Kwame Christian: [00:00:00] You know, we can only be inauthentic for so long, right before it starts to leak out. And then you get these little passing like passive aggressive comments. You get a little bit of hostility and you're like, where did that, this person's so nice. Typically, where did that come from? Do they not like me?
And then the relationship starts to deteriorate down the road, and it makes you look very unlikeable in the process. Yeah. And so the reality is that. One of the best things that we can do for ourselves is set and maintain effective boundaries and advocate for ourselves because if we don't, it's a situation where we will destroy the very relationship we're trying to protect with these behaviors.
Jess Ekstrom: Welcome to Amplify with Jess Ekstrom. If you're ready to amplify your ideas, your influence, and your income, then you're in the right place. Today's guest is a dear friend of mine, Kwame Christian, and he is someone that I met on stage years ago. I don't even remember how long it [00:01:00] was. And you know when you first see someone that is like, their thing is negotiation and even, I'm not gonna lie.
Kwame, when you post like Jim stuff, I'm like, this guy is like, kind of looks like a hardass. But when you meet him, which you all are about to, you realize like, oh, he is one of the kindest, most like nice people that I have. Just genuine person that I've ever met, which makes me believe that in order to be a great negotiator, it doesn't mean that we have to alter ourselves and put on our boxing gloves.
It's actually more about intuition and listening. And Kwame's gonna tell us a lot more, but I just want you to know that my first impression was like, oh, negotiation. And he is. Proving that narrative wrong. He is the Cee O of the American Negotiation Institute. He has a number one podcast called Negotiate Anything, which I have loved being on.
His Ted [00:02:00] Talk has over 600,000 views and he is a LinkedIn top voice. Kwame, my friend. Thank you for being here. Thank you for
Kwame Christian: having me. I appreciate it.
Jess Ekstrom: Kwame, like I was saying, um, which I'm sure you were like, I wasn't, didn't come on here to be called a hard ass and then soft in the same introduction. But I would love to know like what got you started here in being this negotiation expert and um, let's start there.
'cause then I have a lot of questions about people pleasing to becoming a common negotiator. Yes.
Kwame Christian: Great place to start, Jess, because I forget that most people are introduced to me now, like after the evolution, so they don't know the full story. Yeah, so I was actually presenting to a, a client LinkedIn the, the other day and they said, were you always like this, this confident, or were you that kid on the playground that everybody liked?
And I asked, is this a plant? Because this is where this all started. So for me, I, I'm a first generation Caribbean American. We grew up [00:03:00] in Tiffin, Ohio. And if you're asking yourself, where's Tiffin, that's the point of the story. And not surprisingly, there was not much diversity. My joke was always, um, there were only four black P people in Tiffin at the time, me and my mom, my dad, and my brother.
And so we were just so different. And I know after years of code switching, now I can, I can sound American, but I had my. A really strong Caribbean accent at the time. So we stu stood out. So I remember in first grade there was an incident on the playground. I was six years old and this really shaped my life in ways that I didn't even fully understand until I was an adult.
And I remember on the playground one time, it was during recess, I was going to different groups of kids on the playground just trying to get somebody to play with me. So I went with one group and I said, Hey, can I play with you? They said no. Went to another group. They said no, and then went to another group.
They said no, too. And then the bell rang.
Jess Ekstrom: And so my heart, I'm about to cry. Yeah,
Kwame Christian: it's, and, and I did. Yeah, I did because I, I went into [00:04:00] school and I talked to my first grade teacher and she should, she just saw me bawling, just burst into tears. She's like, what's wrong? And I said, nobody would play with me.
And so at age six, in first grade, I made the decision. I said, I will never. Ever allow myself to feel this way again. I'm going to be everybody's friend. Everybody's gonna like me. I'm gonna figure this out. And so when you fast forward through like middle school, grade school, high school, it looks like a success.
It's like, oh, the most popular kid in school, everybody. Yeah. You
Jess Ekstrom: figured it out.
Kwame Christian: Yeah, I figured it out. Right. We had a small school. I would literally greet everybody as a senior freshman to senior. Everybody by name going through the hallways. Mm-hmm. You know, but again, very small school. But the thing is that event made me a people pleaser.
So I would compromise and sacrifice a lot in ways that people couldn't see or understand in order to just get along and not stick out anymore. And so, even though I was becoming more successful in terms of how many friends I had and how much people liked me, there were a lot of [00:05:00] times where I didn't like myself.
And I would compromise inappropriately. And I studied psychology and that helped me to understand the root of the fear, like the fear of abandonment and um, rejection. And then I said, okay, now I understand what the problem is. How do I get over this? And it wasn't until I discovered negotiation in law school that I figured it out and that's when everything changed.
So I did these negotiation competitions after doing the class, and my partner and I, we won the competition at the law school. That gave us an opportunity to represent the school in, in Ottawa, Ontario, in the American Bar Association competition. And we won that too. And I just learned this like weeks before and I realized this is a skill, not a talent I could learn.
So for me, I, I joined, I went on this path so I could help other people because I realized that other people have the same struggle. So for me, I recognize that the best things in life are on the other side of difficult conversations. So I wanna make the world a better place, one difficult conversation at a time.
Jess Ekstrom: Damn. Like I have. Is this the first time you've told this story? I can [00:06:00] tell. You know, you it like the childhood story actually reminds me of, I think when we first were on stage together, I wasn't yet talking about my uncle. I. Being Bernie Madoff, which do you even know that?
Kwame Christian: I remember you told me off stage and I was like, you need to tell this.
Jess Ekstrom: I know it took me a while to, to get there, but one of the stories that I tell about it was like, I asked him the same thing. I was like, how did this all begin? Like how you didn't one day just decide you wanted to create the biggest like fraud in history. And he said that he. It started when he was growing up in Brooklyn, New York, and kids wouldn't play with him.
Wow. And he would go from door to door with a nickel and he would like pay kids to hang out with him in nickels. And he goes, that was the start of realizing like I could buy people's attention to play with. Wow. Yeah. [00:07:00] And it was, and it just never stopped. And I think like so much of our kid years, I'm so glad you brought that up, is really formative and just.
We all wanna be liked, and it's not self-centered. It's not conceded, it's actually evolution. It's survival. Like wanting to be liked meant you had access to food, water, shelter. But then it becomes, okay, well what is enough and why are we wanting to be liked? And now we're in this like. I mean like pandemic of measuring our likeness with others, you know, whether it's followers, like it's more perceived.
And so I think that this people pleasing thing has gotten, um, in the way of us being actually true to like what we need and what we want because we're in this pandemic of wanting to be liked. Is that something that you find? Wanting to be liked helps in negotiation or hurts you? [00:08:00]
Kwame Christian: Well, it depends. It depends.
Yeah. I, I, I just wanna say I hate that answer as a lawyer. It's cliche, but it truly does depend. We'll roll with it. Yeah. You know, we have to lean into our strengths when it comes to like the, the. Positive sides of people pleasing because I don't think it's necessarily a negative thing to have that as your base.
You know, because you can build on that with skills and understanding how to be more resilient and things like that. And when it comes to negotiation, building rapport, creating relationships, helping people to trust you, empathizing those elements of myself that can be on the softer side are very, very beneficial.
But I recog I need to recognize those times where somebody is infringing upon my boundaries, taking something that is mine that they do not deserve and taking advantage. And when you think about this through the, uh, the lens of the psychology of personality, I. We have the big five personality traits.
That's my favorite one to, to re refer to. So we have openness to experience conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism, which is [00:09:00] now called emotional stability. Because neuroticism sounds like an insult. It's better for the acronym. Yeah, exactly. When people are on the agreeable side, when they're more agreeable, they are not just likable.
It's pretty easy for them to make friends because of their disposition. But the challenge is that they like to be liked. I. They like to be liked and they don't wanna do anything that could potentially get the other side to dislike them or the decisions that they're making. And so they'll make compromises in benefit to benefit other people in order to be liked.
Mm-hmm. But then you are not getting anything tangible in, in the moment, so you're making an emotional decision and then you are left with an emotional hangover where mm-hmm the emotion fades, but the decision remains, and then you feel bad about yourself and feel bad about the outcome. Because you didn't stand up for yourself when it matters.
So for me, yeah, you also
Jess Ekstrom: start to resent that person. You know? Yes,
Kwame Christian: yes. And so here's the thing, 'cause I, I call it people pleasing pressure in the moment. We feel the pressure to please the [00:10:00] person who's in front of us. But then the thing is the, the pressure, we think we're alleviating by giving something up.
But the pressure just builds in the form of resentment, like you said, Jess, because it's not their fault. They're advocating for what they wanted, they're doing their job. You should do your job, which is protecting your own interests. Yeah. And so we are blaming them when we should be taking responsibility for ourselves.
Jess Ekstrom: Yes, my husband and I, you know, we both have the same business coach that we work with and, you know, he runs operations for mic drop workshop. And so we, one day were like, you know, we should do a session together so we can work better as a team, but also as a couple, because don't get me wrong, having two kids under two and running a business together is like a recipe for disaster.
And what we were finding was that. He was trying to in at work, um, please me, in that he wanted to lighten my burden and he was saying yes to things that then he was ending up resenting me for because he's like, I gotta do this, [00:11:00] I gotta do that. And so I was feeling this kind of like, hostility and I was like, I would, we, we came to this, you know, conclusion.
I was like, I would rather you hold a boundary and be. Happy about it and me figure it out. Then you say yes, not mean it and build up resentment towards me. So I think like the people pleaser in us, it's actually kind of doing the opposite sometimes when it can damage the relationship when we're not holding, I.
Our boundaries. Is that right?
Kwame Christian: Yes, absolutely. And I'll, uh, I'll give a quote here, please. One often meets their fate on the path they take to avoid it. Mm-hmm. And that, of course is from Kung fu Panda.
Jess Ekstrom: I'm like, please tell me that's yours. Okay. But that's even better from coming. I wish.
Kwame Christian: It's so much better.
Right? Yeah. But it, it's true. Like the thing that we, that people pleasers often do is they make these sacrifices in order to be liked, and they think they're doing it for the sake of the relationship, but as a result, they [00:12:00] ha they don't. Remember, or appreciate the fact that there are two people in this relationship and you're doing everything for them and doing nothing for yourself.
And a lot of times the person on the other side doesn't even recognize the compromises you're making because as a people pleaser, you don't want to voice displeasure. But then the reality is that, you know, we can only be inauthentic for so long. Right before it starts to leak out, and then you get these little passing like passive aggressive comments, you get a little bit of hostility and you're like, where did that, this person's so nice.
Typically, where did that come from? Do they not like me? And then the relationship starts to deteriorate down the road, and it makes you look very unlikeable in the process. Yeah. And so the reality is that one of the best things that we can do for ourselves is set and maintain effective boundaries and advocate for ourselves because if we don't.
It's a situation where we will destroy the very relationship we're trying to protect with these behaviors.
Jess Ekstrom: So can we get into the tangibles of how to do that [00:13:00] kind of override the people pleaser in us? And how do we either set a boundary, negotiate, which I think some of times, especially me, my mind says negotiation means disagreement.
Which really, it's like probably something more positive than that. But what are some of the, the steps that we can take?
Kwame Christian: So a couple of things. First of all, when it comes to business and personal life, the, the tips are exactly the same. We just change the tone based on the circumstance. So do you hear
Jess Ekstrom: that honey?
Change the tone when I'm talking, like it's not what you said, it's how you said it. Yeah.
Kwame Christian: And we will come to that specific point, Jesse. Okay. I'm glad you said that. Yeah. I'm gonna send this to
Jess Ekstrom: Jake when we're done. Yeah.
Kwame Christian: Because when it comes to negotiation, we have to recognize that the definition is kind of warped.
So one of my goals is to redefine it. So I define negotiation as anytime you're in a conversation and somebody in the conversation wants something, and when you realize that we're, we're negotiating all the time. All the time. It's nonstop. And it recognizing this helps us to [00:14:00] be more aware because a lot of times these tough conversations happen and we just label them arguments, debates, annoying conversations, whatever.
But since we don't label it as a negotiation, we don't have that signal to use the skills that we're gonna talk about. Right? So number one. Is awareness. And then when it comes to the setting of the boundary, we wanna keep this as simple as possible. I like to use a really simple yes no yes framework. And so the first yes, is to what I'm committed to, which is the reason why I'm saying no.
And the second step is a very short, succinct no. Because the longer your no becomes, the more vulnerability people can see in it. They'll start to attack it. And then the last one is a yes to the continuation of the relationship or the continuation of the conversation. So let's say somebody says, Hey Kwame, I wanna hang out, I wanna grab lunch on Tuesday, April 1st at noon.
And I say, first step is yes, actually I've already committed to hanging out with my buddy Jess on, on the, on that at that time. So. Fortunately, I can't do it. So that's my quick, no, but listen, I really value this relationship. [00:15:00] Let's find another time to make it happen. And so you can see how you can flow really organically and set those boundaries.
And then if somebody keeps on, encroaching on the boundary, it is not your job to entertain them. You do not need to diversify your response. I need one reason why I'm saying no, and that's it. It doesn't change no matter what angle you come from. And so if they want a different answer, they should stop asking the same question.
So when it comes to setting boundaries, it's really simple, but really it comes down to not just setting the boundary, but maintaining the boundary and then continuing to teach the person how to treat you, because that's really what assertiveness is when it comes down to it.
Jess Ekstrom: Ooh, assertiveness is teaching the person how to treat you.
I feel like, you know, so many of our listeners are women. Obviously Mic Drop workshop is for women speakers, and assertiveness gets such a bad rap when it comes to women because it comes across as like being bitchy or being bossy, or whatever it might be. So talk more about. Teaching people how to treat you, [00:16:00] and again, going back to the people pleaser in all of us, how do we do that without appearing bossy?
Or is that just not our problem? I.
Kwame Christian: It's a little bit of both. So we, we need to be mindful of tone, but, but also we have to recognize that we are not in control of the perception of the other person because we understand that women get a, a, an assertiveness penalty that men don't get for the exact same behavior.
So we have to recognize that. And when I think about, 'cause my undergrad degree is in psychology. So I spent a lot of time thinking about how bias impacts negotiation. And for me, it's important to not think about bias as a limiting factor, but bias as a strategic consideration. What are the potential biases against me?
How do I circumnavigate through this conversation, recognizing that? And so you, you gave the examples of what it is for women and for me as a black male, there are the similar biases as well. Mm-hmm. So we think about intelligence and as, and, um, aggression are two of the biases that come to mind too. So I'll navigate the conversation.
Checking those boxes to make sure that those [00:17:00] biases are subtly put to the side. So for me, it's like, yeah, I'm a you, you know me, I've, I'm a very smiley, happy general person, right? But then I recognize that sometimes it's more strategic too, to make the other person feel more comfortable. 'cause I realize that as a, as a larger black man, it's my responsibility to make the other person feel more comfortable in that conversation.
And now people might say, is that fair? Or is it right? Answer to those questions. Don't care. 'cause what I wanna do is be effective. You know, whether or not it's fair or right is, is irrelevant to the task at hand in this conversation. If you wanna run a program later about helping people overcome their biases, now you can deal with it at that time, but we have to fight the right bias at the right time and approach the conversation in the right way.
Jess Ekstrom: Is it fair? Is it right? Don't care. Wanna be effective? I think I need that on a bumper sticker that I can put on there. And you know, it reminds me of one of your other videos that I watched and you said the more you think, the more you lose. [00:18:00] That's like the opposite of how I feel like the mental gymnastics I take, you know, I had a gig come in yesterday for, you know, next year and it's not even kind of in the ballpark of what I'm usually doing, and I'm just like, okay, how do I do, you know, how do I let them down easy and da da da.
Talk about like how overthinking can. W work against us.
Kwame Christian: Yeah. So here's the thing. If overthinking is your kryptonite, if that resonates with you, then it means you've probably given enough thought to the issue at hand. And so,
Jess Ekstrom: so you can just go ahead and stop listening to this podcast. Yeah. Because I think that's probably 99% of the people that listen is probably Overthinkers like myself.
Yeah.
Kwame Christian: Right, right. I mean, think about the, like the Under Thinkers aren't listening to this podcast, first of all, you know, so the, so the people who are performing at a high level, the solution isn't, Hey, think more. [00:19:00]
Jess Ekstrom: Right? Right.
Kwame Christian: That's not it. So the thing is, we reach a point of diminishing returns very quickly.
So unless I'm trying to de develop a PhD thesis, which now is done quickly with a ai. Yeah. But let's say hypothetically, this is three years ago and it's still hard to do. So if we're doing something like that, yeah, it'll take me a few years to think through this due to the complexity and and gravity of the situation.
Yeah. I can understand how that takes time. Yeah. But you know what your numbers are. You know what your schedule typically looks like. You can understand within 60 seconds of receiving that what the decision needs to be. Now, the other hours we spend or days thinking about it is just. Us either using overthinking as a manifestation of our fear with better branding.
Instead of just saying, Hey, I'm afraid. Oh, I'm concerned. No, no, no, no. I'm gonna actually think that this is vitally important thought, even though it's the same thoughts that I've been circling over for the last, uh, 48 hours. You know? And so for me, I have a shot clock that I put in my [00:20:00] mind when it comes to difficult decisions, and I don't think about it so much as the decision that I'm making.
As much as I think about it in terms of mental training. So I'll say, okay, based on the complexity of this decision, I should be able to make a conclusion, come to a conclusion. In three minutes, I'm gonna make a conclusion. I'm gonna be done with it. And then to make it even easier, because fear feeds on time, the more time you give it.
Mm-hmm. The more the fear grows. I'm just gonna run my idea, my decision through chat, GPT or whatever AI platform you use. And I think about the fears or concerns I have about the perception of others. And I say, Hey, I'm afraid they might think this. I'm afraid they might think that. I don't want them to think this.
Here's the message. Make it up. Then it does it in 15 seconds and I send that message and I'm done. And so I don't think about it as in terms of trying to get the optimal decision. I think about it in terms of learning how to be decisive and training my mind and body to operate through that so I can make more decisions down the road.
But we spend so much time making one decision that, and trying to make that perfect that we don't [00:21:00] realize that in the course of the week where we were freaking out about that decision, we would've been better served just making like. 32 Okay. Decisions. And we would've been in a much better place.
Jess Ekstrom: Yes. I mean, this is probably a bad example, but I just got a new car.
It's a minivan I've crossed over to the dark side. Um, I'm in my suburban mom era, but I, and don't get me wrong, it was a huge purchase. I put some, a lot of, uh, some homework into it, but then there came a point where I was like. The outcome is not gonna differ if the more time I spend in this decision, it's not, it's not gonna differ enough to have it be worth it to me.
Like the range of minivans that I'm looking at, it's like, okay, what size is the cup holder? What's the, you know, it, it's not gonna be that much different of an outcome if I keep stewing in this overthinking. So. When it comes to, you also said something else that when it comes to stage fright, that considering that we're all, a lot of us are aspiring speakers or [00:22:00] active speakers here, you said that you're never gonna get over stage fright and that's a good thing.
Can you expand on that?
Kwame Christian: Yeah. So I'll put on my psychology nerd hat really quickly and take it off. Okay. Psychology nerd. So when you're thinking about, um, fear and phobias and things like that, you have to recognize that our body has a limited amount of responses that we can have. So if I'm seeing something that's.
Scares me like a spider or you know, some scary movie or something. The response physiologically is gonna be heart rate going up. You might start to sweat or perspire that you might feel something in your stomach, something like that. And then let's say you are watching TV and you, you see your favorite heart throb, and then you just turn.
There he is. Right? He's there In real life, what's your body gonna do? Your heart rate will elevate, you'll start to sweat, and then you're like, yeah, the biggest moment of my life, and I'm looking gross and sweaty, right? Your, your, your body responds the exact same way. It's just how we frame it. One is fear, one is excitement, or anticipation or, or just like the [00:23:00] crush, right?
Love, lust, whatever you wanna call it. And so for me, I want to reframe this. The nerdy version is cognitive reappraisal. So we talk about the feeling that we're feeling, and then we have a more positive spin on it. So for me, when I feel that, I say, okay, it's game time. It's time to go and I'm going to listen to loud music.
I'm gonna allow myself to feel this, and I know that I. Once I get up there, everything is gonna be okay 'cause I've done it a ton of times. But what ends up happening when they look at the studies and what I, I'm sure all of us have experienced is that we feel this. We identify it as fear, we label it as fear.
And they say fear isn't good, so let me try to get rid of it. And so the counterintuitive reality is that the more you try to stifle those emotions, the more they start to bubble up and it actually makes you more fearful and more nervous. So if you just accept it and recognize that this is part of the flow, then you can actually put it into practice.
Yes. And and be successful on stage.
Jess Ekstrom: I remember the song that you created from [00:24:00] AI for your like hype up and I was like, this is brilliant. And I wanted to hit on this before and I forgot 'cause I started talking about minivans, but I wanna close 'cause you are always like. You are always steps ahead, I feel like from what other people are doing, and I feel like you are an early adapter to ai.
How are you using AI in negotiation or how can someone who's listening use AI to be more, uh, a more confident or effective negotiator?
Kwame Christian: Yes, I use ai. Every day, hours, every day, and study it for hours every week. It's so important. And for me when I think about it, is I recognize that I am a human. I'm not above bias.
I have my biases too. Mm-hmm. So one of the things that I would do is I would tell it what I want it to be at different times. So be my negotiation coach, be my business partner, be my business coach, whatever it happens to be. So. With some of these difficult conversations, what I'll do is I'll prompt it.
Hey, be my therapist. I'm just gonna rant. I don't want you to tell me I'm [00:25:00] wrong. I just want you to validate everything that I say. Yeah, we all made that right? So, you know, it's like it is. I want this friend who doesn't have needs, so I'm just gonna be like, this is what I think, this is what they're doing.
This is why it's wrong, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Until I start to calm down. Now I'm stabilized. And so I say, okay, great. So now I want you to be my bus, my negotiation coach. How are you seeing this? Objectively. Mm-hmm. I don't want you to be biased towards me. I want you to be in just basically objective so I can create a clear, coherent strategy.
And then I'll ask, what are my blind spots? What are my potential biases and assumptions? And then I realize, oh my gosh, I'm very human. Im very flawed. There are a lot of things that I missed, and so it's. Puts me in a position where I can stabilize and manage my emotions really effectively, get to a point of clarity, create a really cohesive strategy, and then be in a mental state where I can actually execute it.
And the reality is, one thing I realized, and especially I talked about this in my first book, finding Confidence and Conflict, is that in the negotiation space, we've been giving recipes [00:26:00] to people who are afraid to get in the kitchen. A lot of times people know exactly what they need to do or say, but they can't figure out why they can't do it or say it when it matters most.
And so for me, when I take this time to go through this process and calm myself down, now I'm actually in an a mental and emotional PA place where I can execute. I. Cleanly and coherently, and I don't get charged with tone. You know? Yes. That happens to everybody. And understanding the, the reality that our emotions will leak through our tone and beli our goals in this conversation is really important.
And when we understand the psychology of mirror neurons, that helps us to fully grasp it, because if we're in a room and somebody yawns. Most likely other people are going to yawn. That's because of mirror neurons, which are nerve receptors that reflect back the emotions that they see. So if I come in here and I've got an attitude and my tone is off, Whitney might be at baseline normal and okay.
Having a good day until I come in and then all of a sudden, and my attitude, yeah, now she gets an attitude and now my mirror neurons are saying. You see that [00:27:00] attitude now you're upset now. Now everything is falling apart before we even get to the substance of it. So that's how I use AI to counter my, my humanity.
So I wanna balance it. I wanna be empathetic and human, and so we need to still have those communication skills, but then we could use AI to amplify our humanity so we can overcome the fragility that we have psychologically and emotionally to communicate and connect at a much higher level
Jess Ekstrom: using AI to amplify humanity.
I feel like that is another Ted talk for you because it's so like counterintuitive to how we're thinking about ai. AI is threatening humanity, but I love, like where are my blind spots? Like, you know, a lot of times we don't have the kind of person to person relationships. I. Where people can tell us where we're wrong or what we're not thinking about.
And so if we can access that, then we can come to the table with better self-awareness. So I love, love, love these tips. There is a reason [00:28:00] why you are the goat Kwame, and for anyone who wants to book you to speak. Who wants to learn more about the American Negotiation Institute? American Negotiation institute.com.
Definitely follow Kwame Christian on LinkedIn. One of my favorite follows, top Voice, but Kwame, anywhere else that people can find you to work with you.
Kwame Christian: Yes. So yeah, follow me on all the socials. Follow me on LinkedIn here. That's where I am most often found. And then I've got something for you. Yes. I will send you, Jess, the, uh, the gift that we have.
I wanted to check my team to see if it was up yet. It is not. Oh,
Jess Ekstrom: perfect. Yeah. We'll send it out when we release the episode, which will be perfect in a little bit. Okay, great. Because it'll be and,
Kwame Christian: and, oh, go ahead.
Jess Ekstrom: Oh, no. I say there's people in the chat that are ordering your book, um, name of your book so people can go find it.
Kwame Christian: Awesome. First one is finding confidence and conflict. The second one is how to have difficult conversations about Race.
Jess Ekstrom: Beautiful. Kwame, you are the best. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for the earplugs and thank you for [00:29:00] all of the nuggets along the way.
Kwame Christian: My pleasure. Thanks for having me.
Jess Ekstrom: Yeah.
Thanks everyone.
Thanks for listening to Amplify. If you're a fan of the show, show us some podcast love by giving us a rating and review. This episode is brought to you by Mic Drop Workshop, where you can learn how to become a better speaker. How to land paid speaking gigs. And become a keynote speaker. This episode was edited and produced by Walk West.
I'm Jess Tro reminding you that you deserve the biggest stage, so let's find out how to get you there. I'll see you again soon.