Introduction

Women have been left out. In school, we learned about long division, the Pythagorean theorem, and even the rules of dodgeball. But how to effectively manage and invest our money? Nope! Didn’t make the curriculum.

When you start working, you’re focused on establishing your career. As you earn more money, you realize you have a variety of financial goals you want to hit. But these goals have competing priorities. How are you supposed to enjoy your life today and navigate investing for the future? What’s a good investment anyway? Where do you start? So you set out on a search to get some answers.

Here’s what you find.

You start talking to some friends, but it gets uncomfortable because you don’t want to share all your financial details.

No problem, you think. The internet knows everything. So you turn to Google. You find a popular article on investing, but as you’re reading, you come across a term you don’t know. You open a new tab to Google that term, but then you come across something different you don’t understand. Before long, you’re twenty articles deep, and it feels like you know less than you did when you started. With everything buried in financial jargon, it’s worse than homework.

Overwhelmed, you decide it’s time to consult a professional. But then you discover you don’t qualify to work with a financial advisor because you don’t meet their account size minimums. You can work with a fee-only planner, but they’ll charge you anywhere from $2,500 to $5,000 for a personalized plan. This plan doesn’t come with free ongoing conversations or unlimited Q&A sessions, and you have plenty of questions. You try talking to your local bank but quickly get discouraged because they’re immediately trying to cross-sell you products. They jump right into investment features. They don’t even ask any questions about who you are and what you value.

I’m going to guess you picked up this book to try and make sense of it all. You want a clear, step-by-step roadmap to achieving ALL your financial goals. You want to move from overwhelm and confusion to clarity and confidence when choosing investments. You want to know how to pivot your financial goals when life happens. You want to automate your financial life so you can spend more time doing the things you love. But you don’t know where to start. You’ve put in hours of work, and you’ve ended up in the exact place you started. Frustrated and tired of going in circles, you feel like giving up. Don’t give up just yet; I promise, you are in the right place!

Investing Is Still a Man’s World, but It Shouldn’t Be

In 2004, I started my first job in the financial industry at Smith Barney, now Morgan Stanley, in one of the largest retail branches on the East Coast. Female coworkers were scarce, and I could count the number of female financial advisors on one hand. Since then, the financial industry has made intentional efforts to create diversity in the workplace. But women are far from representing half of the current financial workforce.

The industry is also enhancing its marketing and offerings to appeal to women, which is a fantastic trend, but the reality is, women have been left out of financial conversations for generations. Traditionally, men went to work and handled the money, while women served as homemakers. Although this has dramatically changed, it’s been ingrained in our culture that it’s rude for women to discuss money. In fact, according to a 2018 Merrill Lynch study, conducted in partnership with Age Wave, “Sixty-one percent of women would rather talk about their own death than money.” Add all that up, and you have the perfect storm for leaving women behind.

On the flip side, a 2015 Fidelity Investments study revealed 92% of women want to learn more about financial planning. Despite wanting to learn more, many women don’t take action because of a lack of confidence in their financial knowledge and not knowing where to turn for financial guidance.

Although change for women in finance and as investors is on the horizon, real change takes time. Do you want to wait for the industry to catch up with you, or do you want to take matters into your own hands?

Whether you’re conscious of it or not, you make decisions daily based around your money. That means you are at the forefront of this cultural shift. However, change must happen within you before you can influence the larger community. As with most things in life, you need to help yourself before you can help anyone else. Flight attendants remind us every time we fly, “Please securely fasten your face mask before assisting others.” In order to change the overall trends, you need to start with your own financial empowerment.

Financial Empowerment

Financial empowerment is the ability to confidently make informed decisions with your money. The side effects that come with being financially empowered? Confidence. Clarity. Freedom.

When you’re financially empowered, the process of reaching all your financial goals will no longer be confusing or overwhelming. You know you can’t achieve your goals overnight, but you have a clear plan for reaching them eventually. You’re confident you can have the lifestyle you want, now and later, because you have an easy-to-follow plan. You can see the results on paper.

You know how to talk about money, and you know how to evaluate financial risk. Financial jargon that once made you shut off is now digestible. You are comfortable speaking with financial professionals because you know what questions to ask and how to interpret their answers. You can also effectively communicate with your friends and family and at your workplace about all things money, and you even inspire your close friends to follow in your footsteps.

Perhaps most important of all, you develop a new understanding of money. You recognize money is not your ultimate desire but a tool that allows you to freely pursue your true passions. You can confidently walk on your path to fulfillment and build a life in which you feel purpose and motivation to work each day.

With this book, your financial empowerment is my goal. I don’t want you to just survive financially; I want you to thrive. Are you ready to jump on the path to financial empowerment?

What This Book Will Teach You

In this book, you will learn how to effectively manage money to build and keep wealth without making it a full-time job. By following my three-phase process for creating your Empower Plan, you’ll walk on rock-solid financial ground so you can spend time following your passions.

In Phase 1, you will build a strong financial foundation. In Phase 2, I’ll introduce you to the major investment strategies and essentials you need to know. Finally, in Phase 3, you’ll bring it all together in order to create your own Empower Plan and turn your goals into reality. With this Empower Plan, you will create the time, energy, and money you need to pursue what you find most important in life.

Through the course of the book, you will:

• Explore how your childhood money culture influences your financial decisions today and learn an easy-to-follow three-step process for overcoming financial roadblocks.
• Discover what you truly want from life and create clear financial goals that bring you fulfillment.
• Gain transparency on where you stand today financially.
• Break down the walls of financial jargon and build an understanding of the investing essentials everyone should know.
• Get an inside look at retirement planning and find out what all the professionals know that you were never taught.
• Make your goals reality by exploring the adjustable elements of financial goal planning and learn how to pivot your investments as life changes.
• Set your financial life and investment strategy on autopilot so you can invest like a professional money manager without putting in hours each week.

One of the biggest challenges of any book on investing is figuring out how to translate the strategies and concepts into your daily life. To help you see how all the tips, tricks, and rules of this book play out in real life, I’ve created three imaginary characters. Let’s meet them now.

Jessica

Jessica is 35 years old and single with no kids. She works in medical sales for a Fortune 500 company. She’s tall, athletic, a high achiever, and ambitious. She makes everything look so easy. You know who I’m talking about. She even looks good after running. I mean honestly, who looks good when they’re covered in sweat? Jessica does. I know, I know—you already want to not like her, but she’s kind to everyone. It’s not possible to dislike her.

Ashley

Ashley is 36 years old and lives with her fiancé. They plan on getting married sometime within the next 2 years. Ashley works for a large company as a creative for a lifestyle brand. She thrives when surrounded...