How to Get What You Want
Your career isn’t built by waiting for someone to notice your value. It’s built by learning how to advocate for yourself with confidence.
You’ve been told your work will speak for itself. Yet despite doing everything asked of you—and more—you’re still feeling overlooked and uncertain about your next step. Leadership isn’t just about managing a team; it’s navigating the complexities of internal relationships and consistently advocating for your growth.
On Get What You Want, Susie Tomenchok is your silent partner, empowering you with the mindset and tools to negotiate your career—and life—with intention.
Unlike podcasts that focus on climbing the ladder or hustle culture, this show is for women who want to own their careers authentically. You’ll learn practical strategies for everyday negotiations, from asking for what you deserve to confidently handling tough conversations. Because negotiation isn’t just for raises or promotions—it’s how you navigate every opportunity in your career and beyond.
Susie is a negotiation expert who understands the challenges of being in a male-dominated industry and the struggles women face when advocating for themselves. She’s helped countless professionals unlock their potential and will show you how to do the same.
If you’re ready to stop waiting for your career to happen to you and start creating the opportunities you want, hit follow and join Susie each week to build your confidence, advocate for yourself, and finally Get What You Want.
How to Get What You Want
Listening Between the Lines with Amy Bell
Ever wondered how top executives read a room? Amy Bell, a seasoned telecom executive, joins me in this episode to uncover the secret language of non-verbal communication in the workplace. From state fair demos to virtual boardrooms, Amy shares her insights on how to listen between the lines and adapt your leadership style in an ever-evolving industry. Discover the power of unspoken cues and learn how to navigate both physical and digital spaces with confidence.
In this episode, we talk about the following:
1. Amy's career journey in the telecommunications industry.
2. The importance of non-verbal communication in leadership.
3. Adapting to virtual meetings and reading digital cues.
Connect with Amy:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/amybell2/
The Negotiator's Toolbox is now available!
Get $100 off when you use code TOOLBOX at www.negotiationlove.com
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Ready to continue your professional growth?
Here are a few resources for you:
- Get my Book: The Art of Everyday Negotiation without Manipulation
https://susietomenchok.com/buy-the-art-of-everyday-negotiation - Join my Newsletter: The Monday Minute
https://susietomenchok.com/email-list-opt-in - Hire me: Learn More About my Services
https://susietomenchok.com/servicespage - Connect with Me: Find me on LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/susietomenchok/
[00:00:00] Susie 2: Hey, welcome. I'm so glad you're here, especially today, because I am here with a very close friend of mine, Amy Bell. Amy, I'm so excited to have you here today. We, our history goes very deep. We worked together when you were right out of college and actually you worked in my team, which I'm proud because Amy has since gone on to hold some very significant executive.
[00:00:26] Susie 2: Roles through your career. So tell us a little bit about you, Amy.
[00:00:29] Amy 2: Thanks, Susie, for having me. And thanks for bringing the energy. You're always have such great energy around you. So it's easy to model off of that. I think. But yes, we, we go way back. Susie was my first boss in this industry that I have. Been in for gosh, well over 25 years and and, you know, it's just been a whirlwind of a ride where I started and where I'm at and the areas that I'm in kind of don't show a really linear parallel path, but to say, I've been able to find great mentors.
[00:01:02] Amy 2: And kind of lean in and have them help guide me along, along my path has been great. I've been on the operator side. I've got to work on the programmer side. I came back to the operator side different, very different operators in terms of size and, and scale. Scale and company size really. And it's just been great.
[00:01:22] Amy 2: And now I find myself at wow, wide open West, a smaller operator, and I'm happy to be part of the senior executive team there and work for a great female leader and you know, just trying to figure out kind of where I want to navigate next. So mostly, and I'm on the marketing side now, but I started an operation with Susie.
[00:01:42] Amy 2: So,
[00:01:43] Susie 2: So marketing and you've had big teams that have worked for you. You've an operator for people that aren't in the industry. We're talking like a Comcast or a charter is an operator. And on the content side is somebody like discovery or stars. So you've been on both sides of those both sides of the tracks, I guess.
[00:02:03] Amy 2: right. That's right. It was, it's been, it's been a really cool, cool ride. It's an industry that provides a lot of innovation and entertainment. And the content side of the business has changed dramatically since we started the idea of content. Just that idea was, was not even really part of, of the industry when we started.
[00:02:28] Amy 2: So, you know, I, I remember one of the first things I did on the marketing side of the business was go into state fairs, the Minnesota state fair, and we were launching the first high speed internet service and the demo of it all was. That, you know, don't, don't do dial up, do this, it's click and go kind of thing.
[00:02:48] Amy 2: And, you know, the speeds were 14 megabytes blazing fast or something like that. So, yeah, that's, that's how old I am and how long I've been around, but the evolution of it all is really interesting. And I think that that's probably true for, for many industries out there, because if they, if they don't evolve, they die.
[00:03:05] Amy 2: So, it's been a fun ride in this industry. No question.
[00:03:09] Susie 2: Yeah. And so your leadership has evolved too, just like the industry has had such an evolution around technology and so many industries have your leadership as well. And one of the topics I, well, the topic I wanna talk about today is feedback. And not just the typical feedback, but what feedback do we get that's not.
[00:03:29] Susie 2: Right out there. It's not words, it's observations. It's, it's looking at non verbals and, and how has that been something? I think over time for me, really understanding what that, those messages mean, what those signals mean. Takes time and experience. I mean, what's that experience for you?
[00:03:48] Amy 2: I think the nonverbal is probably more important than the verbal, quite honestly because it's, you know, when you walk into the room, you can feel energy. Anybody can feel the energy or the tone that's in the room. Are people quiet? Are they interacting? You know, is there, is there a sense of light heartedness about their banter or their discussion?
[00:04:06] Amy 2: You know, does it feel, does it feel like people are sitting forward and, you know, Pulled into their chair, the casual and sitting back, you know, and so I think that especially when you're entering physically entering a room, you can take stock pretty darn quick and you can, you can kind of guide how this discussion is going to go and where you need to start your energy level or your comfort level in terms of casualness or formality, you know, and it can be, it, it, it doesn't always have to do with the level of people that you're working with, you know, in the company, meaning senior executives versus not.
[00:04:40] Amy 2: I. I've walked into several rooms where the senior executive is way more relaxed. And, and informal than, you know, a, a marketing manager or marketing coordinator who's starting out, for instance, early in their career. So, I do think there's some nuance in the level of, of way you communicate with different levels that need different care and feeding.
[00:05:00] Amy 2: But I do think it starts the minute you walk into a room with cobit. It's gotten harder because we're all at home. We're at home. And that was a big shift for me. And so. You know, are there more people on camera than not, you know, when you enter a call, do they come on camera because you're on camera, you know, like, certain things like that.
[00:05:20] Amy 2: Certainly are cues now and kind of a virtual or a hybrid situation that we're in. And, and it's harder to read people, I think today than the energy in a room, but I think there are still those little things that you can, you can pick up on.
[00:05:33] Susie 2: Oh, I'd love to hear more about that. And what I heard from you is you're very intentional. You're very thoughtful. And in the present, when you walk in or you click into a meeting because you've learned over time how important those nuances of understanding the room are to your success in that meeting.
[00:05:53] Susie 2: So,
[00:05:53] Amy 2: Yeah, I think so. And I think it's also kind of, if, if you feel like. You know, there's this idea of be brief, be bright, be gone. Or if there's this idea of, hey, let's explore. And those are two very, very different meanings. And very different kind of ways people show up in a meeting and so kind of knowing that or knowing even your intentionality about where you might want to guide it because you might show up into a room.
[00:06:22] Amy 2: That's be brief. Be bright. Be gone. But you need people to kind of. Be a little bit more comfortable and be a little bit more open to ideas and thought and imagination. And so trying to kind of change that dynamic, I think, is a skill you learn. I, I, I don't know that it's, it's always something that's inherent in people necessarily.
[00:06:45] Amy 2: I certainly am a different walking into a room. Now, than I was 20 years ago, you know, that comes with confidence, certainly, but also just kind of sitting back, listening, being a fly on the wall, you know, and just really trying to kind of look across the room or across the, you know, block of of faces in a, in a virtual meeting and and see what's happening there, you know,
[00:07:10] Susie 2: Yeah. All right. This is great. All right. So I'm going to challenge you when we come back to tell us a story and give us some context around maybe before you had this, this radar or you know how it's really helped you. So when we, we'll be right back and Amy, we'll put you on the spot.
[00:07:29] Amy 2: okay.
