82 | Negotiation as a Tool for Equity with Shawna Samuel

In this insightful episode, Shawna Samuel, an executive leadership and productivity coach for women and host of The Mental Offload podcast brings her extensive experience in corporate leadership and feminist coaching to discuss how negotiation can be a powerful tool for achieving equity both at home and in the workplace.

Join us as we examine the mental load women carry, the impact of invisible labor, and why addressing inequality at home is crucial for achieving equality at work. Shawna also provides practical strategies for negotiating household responsibilities, understanding partner stances, and leveraging values-based negotiation to create a more balanced and equitable home environment. 

This episode is packed with valuable insights and actionable advice for anyone looking to lighten their mental load and foster a more collaborative household dynamic. Press play to join the conversation. 

And join me as I extend an open invitation to you—to be part of the "100 Hours of Listening" initiative. Whether you're a friend, past client, silent listener, or a fellow professional, your voice matters. This isn't a sales pitch or a consultation; it's an opportunity for you to be heard, without cost or obligation, in a non-judgmental space.

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Transcript

Intro: Welcome to A Pleasant Solution, Embracing An Organized Life. I'm your host, certified life coach, professional organizer and home life expert, Amelia Pleasant Kennedy and I help folks permanently eliminate clutter in their homes and lives. On this podcast we'll go beyond the basics of home organization to talk about why a clutter-free mindset is essential to an aligned and sustainable lifestyle. If you're someone with a to-do list, if you're managing a household and if you're caring for others, this podcast is for you. Let's dive in. 

Amelia: Welcome to Episode 82, “Negotiation as a Tool for Equity with Shawna Samuel”

Shawna is an executive leadership & productivity coach for women, and the host of The Mental Offload podcast. She’s the founder of The Mental Offload, a boutique coaching & advisory practice for women who want to align demanding jobs and busy family lives, without losing their minds. She climbed the ranks of corporate leadership to lead teams across 20 markets, and she holds an MBA from Yale in addition to Advanced Certification in Feminist Coaching. She’s also a passionate advocate and speaker on issues of women’s leadership and gender equity in the workplace. She currently lives with her husband and 2 children in Paris.

Amelia: So welcome to the podcast, Shawna.

Shawna: Thank you.

Amelia: You and I, we had the pleasure of meeting via Kara Loewentheil's Advanced Certification in Feminist Coaching and quickly learned that we both have a few things in common. We both attended Wellesley College and were both drawn to the impact of invisible labor and the mental load and how it impacts women's lives at home and in the workplace. Your expertise was built in the boardroom and mine at home. And I adore talking to you because we really think in similar ways. So I'd love for you to tell folks a little bit about yourself.

Shawna: Thanks so much for that lovely introduction. Just before I introduce myself, I want to say, I also, every time we talk, I feel like it's not just a meeting of the minds, but also I learned something really new from your perspective. So I'm honored to be a guest here today and to have what I think is going to be a really good conversation about the mental load and the household. So a little bit about me.

I’m Shawna. I founded my practice called The Mental Offload coming out of about 20 years of experience in academia and finance. So like you said, a lot of what I've learned has been forged in the boardroom. And what I do now is, you know, I'm a real proponent that we all deserve to do our best work in the world. And that's only possible if we have the time and the bandwidth and the skills to be able to put that into place. So I do leadership coaching with a nice side serving of working on the mental load and the things at home that allow us to do our best work in the world.

Amelia: I just love how simple you make that. We just want to do our best work. This is such a big topic and we're going to dive in here in a moment. Our goal is to break it down and make it more accessible and lift women in particular up. But at the core, it is about being able to do one's best work.

So I love to start all of my conversations by asking, what did “organization,” look like for you during your childhood?

Shawna: I love this question. I, you know, as I was thinking about this, Amelia, I think maybe my childhood looked a little bit different from some people's. My father was an immigrant to the US from India, but he grew up in a, frankly, a very privileged, well -off family. And he grew up with a lot of household help. A significant number of people in the household helping to do the things. So the way that I grew up was, it was kind of normal that my mom stayed home to take care of us, but was not expected to do a lot of the “household drudgery,” you the cleaning, the cooking, et cetera. We had some, not extensive, not like my dad back in India, but we had some pretty extensive help. 

And so I think I just grew up with the belief that organization was about having a team to support you and that you weren't responsible for doing it all yourself. As strange as that was in terms of upbringing, perhaps, I'm really grateful that I've taken that belief system with me into adulthood.

Amelia: And what just came up for me there, because I've been thinking a lot recently about sort of the glossiness of social media and magazines, and I've been on a few retreats lately, and just the idea of what's missing in some of these images, which is the work of running the household, the work behind creating a beautiful domestic space. 

And so when you were talking about having a team, first off, I think there is dignity in being a housekeeper, house manager, cleaner, gardener, all of those support roles. Yet that is the fact that some of us do it on a daily basis within our homes and some of us have a team of support, but just acknowledging that whether it is you yourself or you have that team of support, that there is the time and the effort and energy that goes into making things run as smoothly or efficiently as possible in our homes.

Shawna: Absolutely. Yeah. I often say it's like we've inherited all the Victorian standards without the Victorian staff. And so even if you're just a fan of Downton Abbey, just seeing a little bit of the behind the scenes of what it actually takes to maintain something at that level, I think is super helpful for all of us to know and recognize.

Amelia: So I would love to start unpacking this topic by talking about why inequality at home is the biggest obstacle to equality at work. And I notice, I'm in these circles, right? This topic is gaining traction. It's being made more visible. We're talking about it more and more. 

Yeah, so, for so many of us, and listeners as well, the inequality seems like just the way it is, that women are the default household managers and caretakers. And that's just the way it is and it's disconnected or unrelated to our performance in the workplace.

So I would love for you to make the connection for everyone about unpaid work at home and how it has a very real impact at home.

Shawna: Yeah, absolutely. And it really is starting to become recognized. But even when I started my practice a couple of years ago, I think there were a lot of people in the leadership and executive coaching space who didn't want to touch the topic of what goes on in the household with a 10 -foot pole. And that's, unfortunately, it's still true today. And I think it's such a miss because the reality - especially if you're trying to hold a demanding job that requires a certain amount of input of time and effort - the reality is that the mental load, it requires an enormous amount of bandwidth. 

If we just look at the statistics, like women on average are doing in most countries, this is a global study, an average of about 10 extra hours of work in the household per week versus their partners if they're in a heterosexual relationship. That's a lot of work each day and 57 % of women, so the majority of women, whether or not they're in senior level roles or not, believe that their career growth is limited by the work and the caregiving responsibilities that they have at home.

As much as I would love to say that we will find a way to create more than 24 hours in a day, at the moment, we've got to make choices about how we're spending our time. And the mental load does require time and effort and bandwidth. And it's really hard to smash the glass ceiling if you're too tired to pick up the sledgehammer, you know? Climbing the ladder, whether in corporate, academia, or in a nonprofit role, this requires stamina and it requires bandwidth. And this is exactly what the mental load drains from us because we don't have the time, the energy, the executive functioning left to be able to advance our work in the paid workforce.

Amelia: Yeah, and that is at the core of what's termed the motherhood penalty. And so, especially once you choose to have children, right, things can change in terms of just, I mean, let's be real, like there's the physiological changes that just result. But in terms of time, off of work and then returning to work, that's when the pay gap begins to widen, the expectations change, and we are often stuck making a choice about where that bandwidth goes.

Shawna: I would just add, I think you're absolutely spot on that the moment when we choose to have kids and go back is the moment where we start to see that chasm appear in terms of women's pay and promotion availability. All this stuff starts to open up at that moment when women come back from maternity leave. And I think the one thing I would add here is there can be some element of bias in the room. We know that mothers in particular are viewed as being less committed and less capable at work once they have children. So there can be that external bias in play, but there's also the very real considerations of how much time and bandwidth we have available to put into the work that we really want to, in most cases, do and do well.

Amelia: Yes, which is back to that idea of being our best self and doing our best work. So often what we see is when our eyes are opened and we start to feel the strain, resentment builds, right? We get irritated, we get angry, all natural emotions in response to what is happening in this imbalance that additional 10 hours spent on household management, draining our bandwidth, draining our energy. 

And so oftentimes we approach our partners in an effort to rebalance the load at home. And because of human nature, and socialization, the initial reaction from our partners is often one of resistance. And I think it's beneficial to expect this response, the resistance. So I would love to know how you encourage folks to handle that initial resistance?

Shawna: Yeah, so this is such a good question because the initial resistance, I think for many of us, we can take it personally. We can think like, they don't see my point of view, they don't care, they're not a good partner, right? So we can have so many thoughts about what that resistance means.

And I come at this from a little bit of a different perspective. So very early on in my career, I worked at Princeton's Center for Health and Wellbeing, where I got to work and interact with one of the foremost researchers in the space, Danny Kahneman. He went on to win a Nobel Prize in economics. I had nothing to do with that, clearly. But one of the things Danny really pioneered in terms of research is this idea of loss aversion, that as human beings, we are wired to feel losses much more deeply than equivalent gains.

And let's face it, when we're asking our partners to step up and do something in the household, they're usually losing two things from their perspective. They're losing some privilege that they have to normally not be involved in if it's not part of their traditional gender role or self-conception. They're also typically losing time that they could otherwise spend doing what they like, you know, going to the gym without having to make sure that someone's taking care of the kids or, you know, just having time to play a video game at the end of the day. So, I think when we understand this isn't necessarily personal - this is human to feel this sense of loss and to feel it strongly - it becomes really clear that resistance is going to be there. And frankly, if I were on the other side of the equation, I sometimes have resistance when I'm asked to do things that feel like a loss.

I usually tell my clients to think of it a little bit like you're cooking with a pressure cooker, right? So, you know, if you've ever cooked with a pressure cooker, you know that there is a certain moment where you gotta let the steam out, right? The pressure is building up and you gotta let that steam out. And your goal when the resistance, when the steam comes out is not be directly over the steam so that you do not get burnt. It's good to know that the steam needs to come out, to take a step back, let it come out, and then you can get inside and stir up your vegetables and your meal. So it's really about letting the resistance come out, let it be there, knowing that that's the first step to opening a productive conversation.

Amelia: Yes, and expecting that response. And first off, as you were talking about loss aversion, my brain just naturally built the parallel to when we're decluttering and having to let go. And so for listeners, it's the same feeling that you have when you think about parting with an item that you might truly have some feelings about. 

But yes, losing time, losing privilege, I often call one partner the default partner, default house manager, and the other the privileged partner, because that is the individual who has a bit more time, a bit more bandwidth. So that idea of when you're bringing up this topic, having that initial conversation, expecting a little resistance, expecting defensiveness, and just allowing it, giving it some space, and then maybe looping back to the conversation or topic at a separate moment when it's had time to sink in and instead of that emotional initial response, allow cognition, you know, rational thinking to come back online for your partner in between time.

Shawna: Yes, exactly. Don't assume the resistance will always be there and that it's just the first conversation. So allowing it to be there and being willing to come back and have the conversation rather than stopping when you meet the resistance, that's usually the key to getting traction on these issues.

Amelia: Which brings me to, I've spoken to plenty of folks who, again, during this process, feel also irritated and resentful that they are the ones who have to do this work, right? That we have to bring this topic to our partners. We have to open their eyes. We have to educate them on why this is an issue to begin with. And I'm sure you've had plenty of these conversations as well. So just any tips or observations that you've made about being the one to open the door to this conversation to begin with?

Shawna: Yeah, so I think that you are so right that for many of us, it feels like extra work, extra burden. Now on top of managing it all, I have to manage the conversations around it too. And I'm super sympathetic to that because the reality is that it is an extra load to kind of manage these conversations. So I don't want to deny the reality of that, but I'd say two things. 

I think first, it's about kind of thinking about the long-term benefit rather than the short-term cost. So you want to do that cost-benefit analysis like we would in corporate, where we've got the long-term benefit. That's where we want to place our focus.

But I think the other thing is my personal view on resentment has changed a lot over the years. I used to think of resentment as a bit of a poison for a relationship. And the truth is it can be a poison if you kind of leave it to fester and don't deal with it. But I like to think of resentment and the resentment that can come not just about the tasks that we do, but having to manage the conversations around it. 

I think of it more as a check engine light in your car. It's that warning indicator that comes on that we can feel in our bodies where we're like, something's not working quite right here. And it's just our clue to investigate what it is. I was really surprised to learn a few years ago that resentment, I used to think it was just a form of anger, but when emotion researchers look at it, it's actually a very close cousin of envy.

And I thought about that and I was like, that is so spot on, right? Because when we're feeling resentful, it's usually that we see someone else in the household getting privileges, getting time, getting space that we don't feel that we're getting. And so I think that check engine light is a real indicator to just ask yourself, what is it that you want?

What is it that you're not getting? And to know that you have a right to it, right? Because we're socialized to believe we owe everyone else our time, our support, our unpaid labor, that we're naturally better suited to be the default parent and everything else. And I think that's a really good indicator to just say, what is it that I want? What is it that I need more for myself? And to deeply know

that we have a right to…

Amelia: This is just why I love you. It's amazing. You just hit on just the question that I encourage women in particular to revisit time and time again, which can be a challenge if you have not practiced it recently, which is, "What do I want?" In this moment, in this situation, and with the dynamic of we're going to get into a moment negotiations between partners in the household just acknowledging one's feeling of resentment potentially envy as well as understanding that you have the power to move forward and initiate change or to learn more about the dynamic of your partnership and relationship.

Shawna: And I just add, I think your work here is such a model of this because you do such a good job of always centering that question of, “What do I want? What's right for me now?” And I think you do such a beautiful job of putting that forward as a key question for us all to ask.

Amelia: Thank you, because I think it is a model for our children, a model for our relationships, just a model for our community, because I think once we know what we want in any scenario, we show up as our best self to do our best work, right? And there's less of that challenging energy and more openness to the situation at hand. And that's how we replenish our own energy and make sure that we can do our best work. 

So Shawna, you have a background in negotiation and have worked in high-pressured corporate scenarios. I would love for you to share with us a few of the strategies that you found adapt well for the home environment, including negotiation, because you did this amazing episode on your own podcast about this topic. So I'd love for you to share some of those ideas with listeners.

Shawna: Of course. I'm happy to talk about this. I think it's so important and something that isn't normally talked about when we talk about equalizing the mental load at home. I am a former corporate negotiator, but I should say up front here, I'm a very reluctant negotiator. 

And so all of this work really comes out of the fact that in my work life, I was known as being able to build consensus really well. I had a background in diplomacy. I was good at bringing people together and getting agreements on stuff. And so one day in a role that I was very reluctant to take on, I was asked to start managing our partnerships with some big billion dollar corporations, you British Airways, Delta, Amazon, right? And find common ground with key corporate partners on everything from pricing to how we handle differences of opinions about customer issues, right? 

So I didn't necessarily put my name in the hat for that. I wasn't keen on being a negotiator. I like consensus. So I learned how to do this work in a way that felt good and it brings people together and didn't feel like I was a conflicted lawyer battling it out with other people. And that's what I think we all can bring to this work. So let me kind of take a step back and talk about how I see partner stances and why it's important, where we tend to go wrong. 

So one of the things that I've learned and observed is in the household, we and our partners tend to show up with certain stances. Now, I'd like you to kind of think about this as a spectrum. So on one side of the spectrum, you have the people who show up as an ally. They're cooperative. They say things like, “That seems fair” when you talk about divvying up chores.

These people tend to be the least entrenched in traditional gender roles. And so they're pretty easy to get on board. Now on the other side of the spectrum, you have partners who can sometimes show up in a hostile fashion. They tend to be highly entrenched in traditional gender roles and show up as unsupportive or can even belittle requests to divide things more fairly at home. They'll say things like, “Well, I don't see why they should fall on me.” And I wanna be really clear as I kind of talk about and paint this spectrum.So when I talk about “hostile," I wanna draw a really firm line between what is unsupportive, unhelpful and downright backing away from the issue as a partner versus what falls into abusive territory. 

Amelia: For sure.

Shawna: In between though, this is where a lot of our partners fall. They're not quite an ally. They aren't going to be like, “Yeah, sure, of course I'll take that on” when you propose something. And they might not be fully hostile either. So a lot of people fall into this middle area where you've got people who show up as clueless. 

So they seem oblivious to what's needed or the amount of effort it takes to get a particular chore done. And so this is, they just don't notice. They just don't notice. And when they're on it, they might tend to do the bare minimum. And they like to say things like, “Well, why didn't you just ask for some help?” So this tends to be in the clueless part of the spectrum. And then you've got people who show up as a little bit more resistant. They tend to enjoy their own privilege.

Amelia: “I just don't notice.” Right? They just don't notice.

Shawna: But they don't want to be seen as the jerk either. So this is where you find a partner who will say all the right things, but their actions tell a very different story. And this is also the space where we're most likely to see weaponized incompetence, right? So that phenomenon where someone says, “Okay, I'll take it on” and then they try to do it so badly that they're just not asked to do it again.

And it's really important to get a sense of where your partner tends to show up on this spectrum because different techniques work very differently depending on what partner stance you're facing. Now, I always call these stances, right? Because they're not fixed. It's not a personality type.

It can depend on your mood and outside circumstances. Like at work, you probably know that if you approach your boss when they're coming out of a really tough meeting, you're more likely to get a no, right? So we time our requests for when they're in the best stance. And this is the same at home. Our partners probably don't always show up in the same stance, but yeah, of course.

Amelia: And I want to pause just here for a moment because I think that this is part of essential pre-work that listeners can do before even engaging in a conversation or perhaps during that pause between bringing up the topic to begin with and then looping back after that initial resistance. So I love this because of the internal work that we can do through observation and noticing a skill we're so good at. I say with the slightest edge of irony of noticing what stance our partner might take at the moment of engagement around household labor.

Shawna: Absolutely. And I think when you start to notice that and think about where your partner tends to show up, then it becomes really clear why certain techniques are going to be more or less effective. So for someone who's clueless, they're a little bit oblivious, education and sending them articles can help them kind of see what needs to be done. That same technique is going to fall flat with someone who is resistant or hostile. This is where negotiation influence becomes extremely important to getting the traction and the buy-in that you want to have in your household.

Amelia: So talk to me about how we know, what are some of the beliefs that we need to have to kind of ground ourselves in that stance of negotiation? Because I can hear folks listening, wondering like, “What kind of power do I have or bargaining do I have?” to negotiate with someone who is a bit more hostile.

Shawna: Yes. So I'm going to give you one belief that I think it's really important to have and one that I think it's really important to lose or to at least challenge for yourself. So the one that I think it's super important to have going into this is that you're already a talented negotiator. You're probably negotiating for things everyday.

And certainly, like, I don't know about your children, but we have very strong opinions as toddlers on what to wear, for example. Like, mommy, I don't want to go to school if I'm not wearing, you know, my leggings, even though it's 120 degrees out. So as parents, we get used to negotiating with toddlers. We're like, “Alright, I hear you, wanna have some control over what to wear. Here are a couple of choices that will get you out the door, not in pajamas, and also be appropriate for the weather.” 

We already do a lot of negotiating in our home, and if you can negotiate with a toddler, you're already a very talented negotiator.

Amelia: Totally, I 100 % agree.

Shawna: So that's a key belief that I think we should all take on right away. The belief that I would encourage people to use, and I say this because I have noticed so many strong beliefs that women in particular have about negotiation. I think for many of us, human beings of all genders, probably our biggest negotiations in life are things like, buying a house, for example, we're used to like, okay, you want 500,000 for this apartment and I'm willing to give you 475, right? So we're used to a sort of win-lose negotiation where either I give you more money and I get less money or vice versa. There's one winner, one loser. 

And unfortunately, I think there have been some really, really terrible bits of advice given to women to negotiate in the same way at home. We think, well, okay, if I get more chore time from this person, then I need to give them more sex, for example. This is a terrible belief about negotiation that I want us all to drop because the reality is that negotiation in the household is not this sort of win-lose tug-of-war.

It is really about coming to it from a place of our values. And in these conversations and negotiations, when we do a values-based negotiation, we're both looking to, say, have a good amount of free time and raise the best possible children and make sure that we're eating healthy, for example. If those are our values, then we can put multiple options on the table for how we solve that. And in a values -based negotiation, the more options that you have, the better your outcomes tend to be. And that's something that we can all take away just by shifting how we think about negotiations.

Amelia: So very helpful. And it brings me back to the work I often do with Fair Play clients when I'm facilitating. Folks love to jump straight to who's doing what and breaking down all of the chores and responsibilities within the household. 

But the couples that are most successful, we spend a lot of time in that values-based space, telling stories about what we observed growing up, what we would like something to look like in our household, defining our family mission or vision, creating that common ground so that it is a win-win for both parties, not a lose-lose or not a lose-win but that we're stepping forward and meeting one another closer to the middle and finding that equitable balance. So I love just this idea of one, understanding that you are a powerful negotiator right here and right now, and that you don't have to necessarily seed ground or give anything to get your partner on board. It's about aligning with values, using storytelling and understanding what your shared sense is together to kind of open the door to lightening your mental load and helping the privileged partner see the benefits

to them coming on board or to the table around this conversation because of the privilege, right? The privileged partner gains by showing up more at home, becoming a more present caretaker and dedicating more minutes to running the household or contributing. And that's the benefit that we can help them see.

Shawna: Yeah. Absolutely. And I think it's no accident that taking that upfront time works. What we do as best practice in corporate negotiation is we typically spend several months of just preparatory work. First, on ourselves, thinking about our values, what we want to achieve, and then initial conversations with our partner are really about values and the bigger objectives before we even get into the nitty gritty. And that's just really good best practice for getting two people to the table who are really willing to dig into some of the thorny conversations. 

But the other piece of this is that, again, knowing that the people who create the biggest and broadest set of options typically do best. This requires a lot of emotional self-regulation, right? Very hard to generate good options for how you're gonna tackle chores if you are overflowing with anger, with resentment, with bitterness and recrimination. So doing that work to be able to come to the table and deal with those emotions as they come up and regulate yourself. That's what allows us to move through these conversations in a really productive fashion. 

And I think the last thing I'd add here is that oftentimes our partner on the other side of the table, this work requires them to really not so much rethink their values because our values stay whole, but it requires them to rethink their role and how they've been socialized, how they should contribute to the household. And that can take a little time to unwind. So I think for all these reasons, doing that upfront work is never wasted time. It's actually the best investment of time you can make.

Amelia: We are totally on the same page and back to that idea of the long-term gain and benefit, understanding that shifting the dynamic within your household takes time and is very valuable for that long-term benefit. So if you're listening and you're like, “I don't know if I can have one of these or multiple difficult conversations,” keep your eye on the prize, which is the long-term benefits to the health of your partnership and your home. 

So thank you so much, Shawna. I would love to close us out by asking, what's one creative way that you employ organization now as an adult, because I know you're living with your family in Paris. 

Shawna: I'm not sure if it's creative, but let me say it's what works for me. For me, being organized is about just offloading the things that I don't want to spend my mental bandwidth having to think and worry about. And so I know that when I have stuff in the place that I can find it, or when I've got my schedule organized so that I know where I need to put my time in a given week, this allows me to just stop thinking about it and stop worrying about it. It's like, I know that it's taken care of, and now I can turn my focus and my energy against the things that I really want to do with my time.

Amelia: Yes, it's just that basic sense of knowing what to expect and eliminating maybe the unpredictability and just settling into the routine of each day. So I love that.

Shawna: Thank you.

Amelia: Well, it was such a pleasure. I would love for you to share with folks how they can connect with you. I know you're very active on LinkedIn and you have a podcast and, you know, learn more about your one-to-one coaching, speaking, and advising.

Shawna: Well, thank you so much for having me here today, Amelia. This was just a really wonderful conversation and I think it's such a needed topic. So I'm delighted as always to have a really good conversation with you. And for those who want to learn more about my work and connect with me, as you mentioned, I'm really active on LinkedIn. I love connecting with people there. So I am Shawna Samuel on LinkedIn. You can also find my podcast, The Mental Offload Podcast. This is all about balancing and aligning work and life so that you can do your best work in the world. And you can find me as well on my website, thementaloffload.

Amelia: Thanks so much.

Shawna: Thanks again for having me here today. This was a wonderful conversation.

Outro: If you're new to the Fair Play Method and want to learn more, head to the show notes to grab your own set of printable cards and activity guide. Be sure to send me a DM on Instagram @apleasantsolution with your questions.