One thing that my friends always say is, I don't know how the
hell you got all that done. And I know that I'm very passionate,
I know it's probably, you're rolling your eyes being like
she's passionate about productivity, I am.
Busy as a bee seems to be the best way to describe many of us,
we seem to have more and more that we are juggling, which
makes it seem like it's impossible even to have a little
bit of time for ourselves. So let's chat like old friends at a
quaint cozy cafe, talking about our lives and sharing
productivity, time management and organization tips. I have
been a single mom for 20 years to went to college, climb the
career ladder with two babies and is now a program manager at
an IT consulting company. It either went to business school
while raising my grandson, and is now here to share everything
I have learned on how to be productive with a full plate
with you. Welcome to the Productivity Pie Podcast.
Hi, everyone, my name is Shevonne and I am the host of
the productivity pie podcast. This is the first episode. So I
am so happy that you're here checking out the first episode,
I am not gonna lie to you. I'm a bit nervous. But I wanted to
create this podcast to share the productivity tips and hacks that
I have learned about by reading books, blogs, and just other
people sharing their advice and how I've adapted it to my life,
which has really helped me especially in my career. So I
wanted to share that with you and also introduce myself. So I
guess let's go ahead and get started with the introductions.
So before having kids, which was 20 years ago, I was so
disorganized, messy, if you would have seen my car, you
probably would have fainted, I had a horrible credit score,
because no one really taught me about personal finance. So
basically,
I was a young 20 something and you could say that I was a hot
mess. When I found out I was pregnant, I knew that I had to
change my life, I had to change my outlook. And I had to make
sure that I was able to be successful in order for my child
to not need for anything, which was very important to me. So I
sat down, I started reading as much as possible. Back then it
was the beginning of the internet as we know it now. So
there were not that many articles online in 2001. Or I
guess it was Yep, it was 2001 because I guess has 10 months.
So it should be like 2001 or 2000 when I got pregnant, but
I just sat there and just try to learn as much as possible, how
to have goals that I was able to feel how I was able to start
getting everything done that I needed to get done in order for
my son to have a good life. And as well as get out of the
horrible debt and just the low credit score that I had. So that
is exactly what I did with the resources that I found. I
created a vision for myself five year plan, and then I broke it
down into a yearly plan. So at that point I did not know about
like breaking it down even smaller than yearly plan, but at
least I broke it down to a year. And with everything, you're
always going to get better. Like if you continue practicing it,
learning and understanding a topic you'll get better, which
is what I've been able to do. So that is exactly what I did. And
then by daughter was born, so I had two kids. And I finished
college. And it was kind of funny because I would go to on
campus and I went to George Mason University it in Virginia.
And man, those little seats that they have were not made for
someone who's pregnant, of course, like it's not like a
bunch of pregnant women go to college, but I had to sit
sideways and it was so uncomfortable. But I did it
because I knew that I had a reason to do it. And so
Underneath people's desks to try to help them with their computer
issues, which sometimes you had to do.
And I saw, I remember there was like a nother group. And they
were like a group of technical writers. And for some reason, I
thought that they were the cat's meow, I just thought they were
the best thing ever. And I knew that I wanted to eventually be
like them. And so after I went to college, which I went for
English with a specialization in technical writing, I became a
technical writer. And then after I
think, like five years or so I was working at khaki, and I got
the opportunity to be a business analyst. And I love that because
I was able to provide the feedback or the requirements to
design a solution for people and help them in that way. And so I
really loved it. Like, I just love the fact that it wasn't
just like writing documentation. On top of the fact that I was
doing that I was also helping guide people and be that liaison
between the stakeholder and the IT team and build the solution.
So I thought that that was really fun, and I loved it. And
I did that for a few years. And then the opportunity came for me
to be a project manager. And I really took my time to make that
decision. Because
grow their business, grow their careers, help them on the career
path, and just be a mentor for those people. So it wasn't
something that I just took lightly. And it irks me so much,
when I see someone in a management position that just
got there because someone liked them. And they are a horrible
manager. There's nothing wrong with being an individual
contributor, people sometimes go into management because they
think, oh, I'll make more money. I have seen some individual
contributors, I've make way more money than managers. So it's not
something that is, eventually you have to take that path, you
can be an individual contributor if especially if you suck with
people. So
now, it's been like over 10 years, got my PMP have my Scrum
Master certification even got the foundation ITIL
certification, and now I'm a program manager. And I'm very
proud of myself, because
the majority of the people, there's like 50, plus people on
the team, they're all majority of them are men. And then on top
of that,
I think that out of the 50 people, there's probably like,
two women of color. No, there's three, there's three women of
color in on that team. And I'm one of them. And I'm one of the
program managers, which makes me feel so grateful, and sometimes
makes me feel a little teary eyed to think that I went from
being this young woman pregnant had no idea what the hell I was
doing, what was a total hot mess. And now I'm a program
manager and IT consulting company with almost an 800
credit score, I am very proud of myself. And
that is something that I always try to remind myself of,
especially when I'm feeling down, everyone is always going
to have a moment where they're feeling down, you can be the
most happiest person, you're still going to have that moment.
And that's when you have to remind yourself that you've
gotten as far as you have.
And throughout my career journey, I have tried so hard to
be present as a mother, I had my kids in multiples, boarding
activities,
also had like, different summer camps because I wanted them to
experience different things in order to get an understanding of
what they want in the future. So I was constantly driving them
around to different activities. Just trying my best. And now
that I'm older, one piece of advice that I can say to parents
is
there is no perfect parent. And yes, it's great to read
parenting books. I did, Lee I still do. But I've now realized
that there is no perfect parent and you have to do what's best
for you and your kids, which is something that when I was
younger, I didn't I always felt tons of guilt. I always felt
like I wasn't doing enough. I saw all these like two parent
families and the dad helping out and unfortunately my kids didn't
have that and then
That I felt bad about. But now I've realized now that I did the
best I could. And I shouldn't keep beating myself up because
yes, my kids did a lot. They went to a bunch of
extracurricular activities. I've always tried to get them tutors
if they were struggling in school, I champion getting them
IEP s, especially my daughter that it was just a horrible
experience trying to get the school to approve an IEP for
her. I've had them in therapy, especially my daughter, who is a
survivor of sexual abuse, which
I found out years after it had happened. And that is something
that we're still struggling with. She was diagnosed with
Oppositional Defiant Disorder, which I found out later, that is
the childhood version of the personality disorders, which is
borderline personality sociopath psychopath in narcissism. No one
had ever told me that we've had some just really bad experience
with different therapists. But even even with that, I still am
an advocate of a therapy. But we've definitely been around the
wringer. She wasn't able to deal with her trauma. So she was
constantly running away. So I was dealing with that as well. I
had to deal with her constantly running away, trying to get her
in different mental health programs, her not wanting to do
it. And eventually, one thing that I realized was, I don't
want to keep pushing her to do that. And she gets to the point
that she hates therapy so much, that when she gets older, and
she wants to do it, she still has in the back of her head that
she hates us so much. So I stopped pushing her on that. But
it's been a journey, it's been very hard at times, she became a
teen mom, she decided she didn't want to be a mother. And so now
I've taken custody of my grandson, and I'm raising him.
And I have definitely learned through that, that people tend
to blame the parent, and say, like, Oh, that's why their kid
turned out that way. And now I've realized that that's not
usually the case. There's different factors that play into
how a kid develops, how they grow into an adult, and the
decisions that they make. I'm not saying that I was perfect.
Like I said before, there is no perfect parent. But I also know
that I really tried my best, and I tried to get her the help that
she needed. The only good thing that has come out of it is that
I now have this amazing little grandson. And I'm definitely
applying what I've learned with my kids with him. I will see.
But yeah, so even with all that, trying to climb the career
ladders, I was able to get it all done. And it was because of
all the productivity hacks, all the tools, all the stuff that I
learned through
just different avenues. And I know one thing that my friends
always say is, I don't know how the hell you got all that done.
And so
I know that I'm very passionate I know is probably you're
rolling your eyes being like she's passionate about
productivity I am because if it wasn't for being productive, I
wouldn't have been able to be present at work be present for
my kids, especially one who was deaf, desperately needing it,
and also now being present for my grandson. So this podcast
will be all about what I have learned. I'll be talking about
productivity time management organization. I'll probably also
sprinkle in there what I learned as a leader, what I learned as
an online student, so I did do an online MBA program. So I want
to share that. I want to hear from you all
here. Any questions that you have any topics that you want to
discuss. I would love eventually to have people be guests on the
podcast, I've
listened to a bunch of podcasts. And I love when they bring
guests in who have another level of expertise that the host
doesn't have and they're able to teach as well from that angle.
So I think that's great, and that's definitely something that
I plan to do in the future.
I think that this podcast is for that busy professional, who is
just struggling feels like they just don't have any time for
themselves. Feels like they're in a hurry.
hamster wheel and they're just spinning, spinning, spinning,
spinning, spinning. And when they wake up, they feel like
they're on Groundhog Day. And they feel like there's never an
end to this mundane life that they feel like they have. And I
don't want you to feel that way, I want you to wake up and smile,
doing what you love to do, being surrounded by the people you
want to be surrounded by. And so that this podcast is for you.
The promise I will make to you is that I will be open, I will
be present. And I will be honest. And believe me,
I don't ever want you to think that I have got everything in
check 100%. And that's why I shared everything that I shared
right now. Because everybody's life, they're dealing with
something. And so the thing that we need to recognize is that we
are dealing with with stuff, it can be anything, but we just
need to learn how to deal with those things, and be able to
still strive to have the life that we want. So that is my
promise to you on this podcast. So this upcoming month, I want
to start talking about the different productivity apps that
I've used, the different methods that I have heard about and I
have tried to apply and if they were successful or not. And just
overall, what I have also done as a manager of a 50 plus team,
and what type of productivity tips I have done an apply there.
So that is what this upcoming month will be about. But I am
really excited. And so I know that I'll just keep improving,
improving, improving. It won't be perfect at first, but I'll
eventually get there, please. I love feedback. Give me your
feedback. And I'll make sure to apply it because if you give me
that feedback, and I'm able to grow from that, that is all I
can ask for. So I will talk to you next week. Thank you for
listening and I'm excited to start this journey with you.
Thank you so much for listening to the productivity pod podcast.
Be sure to visit productivity pie comm to access the show
notes, check out the videos, check out the other content. And
also, if you can, please subscribe, give it a five star
rating and also review and I will talk to you next week. Bye
for now.