Hello, hello everybody and welcome to a brand new episode of live with Dr. Andre.
Hey listen, thank you guys so much for tuning in to our show tonight.
I want to give a special shout out to my pack buddies who are listening from Middle Georgia.
Stephanie, Steven, Jason, Michelle.
Michelle, I know you're not listening, you're probably in the bed, but I love you anyway.
Shout out to my friends and family in Georgia and Puerto Rico.
Edwin, Nott, Peff, Brian, Butch.
I also want to shout out my friend Reggie as well.
I think he's listening.
Reggie is a good friend and mentor.
He was my executive coach during a critical time in my career when I was deployed overseas.
And his mentorship played a huge role in helping me to develop the mindset that would help me attain
and sustain the success that I'm enjoying in my career today.
So thank you Reggie.
And if you're interested in executive coaching for yourself, reach out to me.
I'll get you connected with Reggie.
His services are not cheap, but it's definitely money well spent and an investment in your personal development.
Let me give one last shout out to my international audience.
Wherever you may be listening from tonight, thank you so much for your listenership and for supporting the Artist First Radio Network.
And hey, listen, I'm going to try something different.
If you guys want to interact with this live broadcast with a comment or question,
text the show.
A lot of you have my number already.
Text the show at 678-549-2763.
I got my phone set up right here.
I can see all of your messages.
So text away.
I'm going to try not to get too distracted with it.
But yeah, if something's on your mind, shoot me a text and I'll shout you out or at least try to.
Okay, so in case you missed it earlier this month, I made a guest appearance on the February 10th episode of the Author's First Radio Show.
It's one of the oldest shows on the network and has been featuring and promoting independent authors since 1997.
That's the year I graduated high school.
I'm getting really old.
But nonetheless, it was a pretty interesting interview.
I got an opportunity to talk a little bit about my background and some of the life experiences that led me to becoming a published author of three books, including the controversial How to Data Married Man.
We talked at length about that.
I'm actually working on a sequel to that book, which should be out like late this summer.
So more to come on that.
But it was a great interview.
The show was hosted by the great Scott Zalasko, aka Z-Man.
He wears a lot of hats on this network.
He's essentially the mastermind behind the Artist's First Radio Network and somehow manages to engineer, host, produce most, if not all, of the plethora of radio shows on this network.
He's very mysterious, though.
Like, I've been a member of this network for about four years now.
And do you know I've never met this man?
I don't know. I don't even know if he's real.
He could be a hologram for all I know.
He's kind of like the Wizard of Oz.
I've only heard his voice.
I can't find a picture of him anywhere.
We live in the same state now and I've still never laid eyes on this man.
I'm just going to show up to the studio one day, unannounced, and see what I can find out.
I need to know what's going on the more I think about it.
Make sure I'm not part of some weird cult organization.
And if I come up missing, y'all already know what's up.
I went digging around, found out some stuff I wasn't supposed to find out and got messed up.
Just go to artistfirst.com and find the address to the studio and tell the authorities this is where I went.
Or go to the site and click on the Project Eurancia link on the website.
Maybe one of the Project Eurancia people got to me.
I'm just saying there may be some clues if I come up missing.
Start first with Artist First and Project Eurancia and then go from there.
Anyway, I'm so easily distracted. Y'all, what was I talking about?
Oh, yes. Y'all need to go listen to that interview I did on Artist First.
It was really good and I enjoyed it.
I don't normally talk about my personal business, but whenever I do, it's for a good cause.
I really want people to as much as possible learn from some of the mistakes that I've made.
In that regard, I'm not special or unique. We've all done dumb stuff in our lives.
We were grace of God, made it through some really brutal traumatic things and lived to tell about it.
That's kind of the why behind all of my books.
And granted, it may not be a book for you. It may be something else, a YouTube channel.
It could be a blog. Hell, it could be stand-up comedy or being a motivational speaker or just a mentor.
Maybe it's a combination of all of those things, but at any way it goes, I encourage you to in some way try to be of service to your fellow man
and lend your talents and live your life experience to try to improve the lives of others.
So if you'd like to listen to that interview, go to artistfirst.com and then scroll down a little bit.
And on the left-hand side of the page, you're going to see weekly program schedule.
And to the right of that, you're going to see Click for All Music Specials in Artist First Shows, or Authors First Shows, rather.
The words, Authors First is going to be in a blue hyperlink.
Click on that, and it's going to take you to that show's home page.
And you should see my book featured at the top of the page.
If it's not, all the interviews are in alphabetical order, so just scroll down to the Jays and look for Dr. Andre Gerry,
and then click the link, and then there you go.
Okay, so let's get down to business.
So for tonight's show, the topic I was going to cover was supposed to be the new trend of underconsumption.
And we're still going to talk about that in the next segment, but first I wanted to talk about a hot topic in the news that's been trending,
and it's actually impacting many of my colleagues in federal civil service.
So as many of you know, there's been an onslaught, an unprecedented onslaught of executive orders coming out of the current administration,
and several of those executive orders have directly impacted federal employees.
Among the first of these executive orders was a hiring freeze across all federal agencies, meaning anyone with hopes of joining the federal workforce,
or those who perhaps have already started the hiring process.
If they weren't fully onboarded by January 20th, they're not going to be hired.
Then there was this second wave of executive orders.
I started calling them executive attacks because that's how they started to come across.
But this second wave of executive orders was the return to work order.
So that made all existing telework agreements that were in place null and void.
So any existing telework agreements that were currently in place, they had to be terminated.
It doesn't matter really if you were hired onto a telework position.
All of those agreements were terminated.
And we all had to return to work by the February 6th deadline.
There were no exceptions to this.
So as you can imagine, this caused a lot of angst and a lot of confusion in the workplace.
And our leaders were struggling.
And truthfully, they're still struggling with this, with trying to find adequate space for everyone to return to work simultaneously.
The majority of us have, you have to remember, we've been on some sort of telework or a hybrid telework status for almost like five years.
So this was a very sudden change from our normal posture.
And it was a huge undertaking for our senior leadership in terms of trying to reach full compliance with and implement the president's executive order on such a tight expense.
But somehow we were able to make it over that hurdle.
We got everyone back to work.
We all agree that it sucks coming back to work every day.
But we all made whatever arrangements we needed to make and, you know, we returned to work.
So we're doing our best with it.
It sucks.
But we understand that we were spoiled for a long time.
We had it good, you know, but it, telework is over.
So we got it.
But before we could really settle back in and adjust to our new normal, we got hit with it.
We got hit with another executive order.
And this time it was the deferred resignation program.
Now the deferred resignation program was rolled out by the Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE.
Is it DOGE or DOGE?
But their main objective is to cut as many federal jobs as possible.
You know, so they understood that having people return to work would result in a lot of resignations and early retirements and all of that type of stuff.
So the deferred resignation program was their way of sort of incentivizing early retirement.
So they were basically saying, okay, listen, we know a lot of you guys don't want to return back to the office.
So here's what we're willing to offer.
If you accept the deferred resignation program, we won't make you return to work.
We'll just put you on administrative leave status.
We'll pay you your full salary, but you must resign in September of this year.
No exceptions.
And you know, actually I thought that was a pretty good deal.
A lot of people took advantage of that program.
Because think about it, you get, what is it?
It's almost March.
You get paid to stay at home or do whatever you want to do for seven months and do nothing.
Get paid your full salary.
I almost took it.
So I mean, if you were someone who was retiring this year anyway, then you know, that's a pretty good deal.
So a lot of people opted into that.
But I guess the powers that be, you know, they didn't quite hit the numbers they were hoping for.
So the administrative came out with another executive attack.
And this one was laying off all federal employees who were in a probationary status.
Okay, meaning employees who don't have a, they're in a non-protected status.
And they have less than 24 months of creditable service with the federal government.
So that's around 75,000 federal employees who are slated for termination.
Of that 75,000, about almost 20,000, I think it's about 19,000 worked for the Department of Defense alone.
And out of that 75,000, 12,000 have already been terminated as a result of this executive order.
And it didn't stop there.
For those of us who are left, I'm sure you heard on the news about the now infamous OPM email.
OPM is Office of Personnel Management.
It's kind of like our central HR department for all federal employees.
But this infamous OPM email that went out to all the remaining federal employees,
and it demanded that we send five bullets outlining our accomplishments from last week.
Okay.
This email was sent out over the weekend.
Some people got it on different times.
Mine came on a Sunday at 3.03 a.m.
And oh, by the way, the email stated that we were to reply by 11.59 a.m. on the following day, which was a Monday.
So it was just weird.
The tone of the email was very childish and informal and unprofessional.
It almost came across like a tweet, like an impulsive tweet that someone sent from their phone or something.
Any government, any official government email or correspondence of this nature,
and with this type of sensitive directive, it should have been sent during business hours and on a weekday,
not during the weekend, not on a Sunday.
Secondly, there was no signature.
Like, who did this directive come from?
What's happening here?
You know, we were also confused.
And understandably, the federal workforce is kind of like in a state of panic right now.
No one really knew exactly what to do with that email.
We didn't know if it was a hoax.
We didn't know if it was a cyber attack.
We didn't know whether we should respond or not respond.
A lot of people, they were afraid not to respond because in the email,
it stated that a non-response would be considered a resignation.
So initially, we were told by our local leadership to stand down to not reply and to await, you know, further guidance.
Shortly after that, very early in the week, we received some clarifying guidance from the Secretary of the Air Force and the Under Secretary of Defense
that, one, a non-response to that email would not be considered a resignation.
So they clarified that.
Two, if individuals did respond to the email, that's totally fine.
Not going to be penalized for it.
Three, for those who have not yet responded to the email, you are still directed to hold your responses and not send an email or a response back.
You know, so that's the current guidance that we have about that weird, strange email.
And in my opinion, I think what's happening right now is there's a sort of a power struggle that's going on among some of the federal agencies in terms of how, you know,
directives to the workforce are taxed down and, you know, under what authority are they taxed down.
You know, and to be quite honest, I think a lot of our senior leaders are just getting sick of all of this.
They're getting sick of it because they're the ones who are having to manage and implement all of these rapid-fire executive orders.
You know, and many of those orders are calling for immediate implementation.
And so our senior leaders, they're the ones who are having to field all of the hard and difficult questions that are constantly coming, you know, at them from the workforce.
About what's happening, you know, you know, how's this going to impact me and my job? Do I still have a job?
There's so many questions. And a lot of my colleagues in the Department of Defense are really concerned, mostly about their livelihood, sure.
But also about our military readiness.
You know, the work that we do in the Department of Defense, it directly supports our military and it keeps our country protected from all sorts of threats.
We oversee activity across all of the armed forces.
We're talking about the Army, the Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, the Space Force, as well as some intelligence and cybersecurity operations.
So I say that not to minimize the contributions and the work that employees and other federal agencies do, but the DOD is unique in that our work directly supports national security.
So, yeah, there's a lot of fear and anxiety gripping really the nation right now.
And in my opinion, this is exactly what they want. I think they want fear and panic and chaos and confusion.
Certain people, certain types of people thrive on that type of environment, you know, because if someone can make you fearful, then they can control you, right?
So keep that in mind when you're witnessing all these things that are happening right now and when you're watching the news, which I really wish you wouldn't.
You know, and I talk about that in my new book, Unlocking Your Best Life, 10 Power Moves That You Can Make Today.
It's available now on Amazon. I really encourage you to go and get your copy.
In this book, I talk about how toxic news programs are and how you can quickly improve your life and really your overall well-being by doing something so simple as just stop watching the news or at least significantly reducing your consumption of it.
And I know a lot of things, you know, a lot of the things that people will say is, how am I going to know what's going on? You know, the same stuff is going on.
You're not going to be missing anything. It's a bunch of misinformation and disinformation and fear mongering, wildfires and crimes and layoffs and climate change.
What else? Inflation, unemployment, that's what's going on. You're not missing anything. It's just a headache.
And let's say you do watch the news every day and keep informed about what's happening. How do you feel? Do you feel better?
Can you realistically do anything to change any of this stuff? Besides worry about what's going to happen next? What's going to happen to my family? What's going to happen to my job? What's going to happen to my investments?
All this stuff, none of which you can change. Whatever is going to happen is just going to happen.
You know, people make themselves physically and mentally sick, meditating on all of this fear. And like I said, that's exactly what they want because then they can control how you move.
You know, you're going to cling on to that job that you hate because you're afraid of not having a job and being able to pay your bills.
You're not going to invest your money because you're afraid of the stock market crash or the economy crashing and stuff like that. You're not going to invest in real estate because you're hearing that there's a housing market crash coming or a recession.
And some of that stuff probably is going to happen. You know, I think that's what all of this is sort of driving towards.
I think they're trying to manufacture a recession with all of these layoffs and inflation and misinformation and cutting all of these programs that help people and, you know, all these things that cause further division and chaos and confusion.
Just start reading Project 2025. I know people are so tired of hearing about that, but in your spare time, just read through it so that you know what's coming down the pipeline.
Don't be caught off guard by it. They put it all out there for you to see. There's nothing hidden anymore.
So just take some time and educate yourself about it so you can understand what the agenda is, the new agenda is this country.
And remember, this is what the people want it, right? This is who we collectively elevated to power again. So whatever happens, just, you know, it just happens and no one should be caught unawares because it was all out there for us to examine.
We had over a year to look into this stuff, you know.
So I want to talk to my colleagues in the federal workforce for a second. For those of us who still are left and have our jobs.
Okay, so listen, the writing is on the wall, folks. It's only a matter of time before they find some type of way to terminate us all.
If you read Project 2025, part of this administration's agenda is to quote unquote drain the swamp.
The president has been talking about doing this ever since he was campaigning for office the first time. And a lot of you just look past it and support him anyway.
But he planned to come for the federal workforce. It's all been a part of his plan for a long time. You know, I don't understand how people can vote against their own interests.
But, you know, because there are so many misinformed and, you know, a lot of people are just hateful in this country.
We're all having to endure and suffer the consequences that are going to come with having this type of administration.
So to my federal civil servants, according to their playbook, they fully intend to eventually replace federal civil servants with appointed positions.
Okay, that means in the very near future, there's going to be no more federal civil service as we knew it.
Right now, they're in the process of phasing all of us out. And there's no sense in clinging to the hope that our jobs won't be impacted.
It's going to be impacted. It's going to be impacted.
So for my colleagues out there who've inclined their ear and don't want to be caught off guard during this unprecedented time,
I'm going to talk about five things that you probably need to do this week to make sure that you're prepared for an eventual layoff.
Okay.
First thing you want to do is print out all of your personnel documents.
Even our leadership sent out guidance saying this.
You know, your SF50, all of your training certifications, your civilian career brief, your performance appraisals, your personal development stuff, all your certificates,
print all that stuff out, all of the HR documents that you wouldn't have ready access to without your login credentials.
Print all of that stuff out and put it in a folder and keep it with you at home.
Second thing you need to do is update your resume.
Some of you have not updated your resume in almost a decade.
Resumes are stressful enough to try to put together.
The last thing you're going to want to try to do is rush to put together a half-assed resume that's outdated.
It doesn't have the proper keywords and it is poorly formatted.
Matter of fact, if you haven't updated your resume in about three or five years, just don't even fool with it.
Use AI tools to help you write it or you can hire someone to write it for you.
I think Siteslight indeed has a resume writing service.
But listen though, if you do that, you have to read and study and know your resume.
The hiring managers are going to make you talk to what's listed in your resume.
You don't want to be embarrassed in your interviews.
If you have someone else work on your resume, that's totally fine.
That's what most people are doing nowadays unless you're just a stellar writer.
No shame in that, but just know what's in there and be able to talk to it.
Third thing, update your LinkedIn profile.
LinkedIn is the place to be if you're looking to get hired, especially in the private sector.
Every job that I've gotten in the private sector since 2017 have been from initial contact on LinkedIn.
Corporate recruiters, they love LinkedIn because it makes their job easier.
They're able to pre-screen applicants much more efficiently than the old way.
On LinkedIn, you can review a person's work history, their background, their education.
You can see what their affiliations are with other professional organizations.
They can analyze your posts and read your comments and just try to determine up front
whether this person is an idiot or they are big.
Do they have some messed up views that aren't aligned with their company's values?
They can see your picture and get a more holistic view of a prospective employee.
By now, we all know that DEI is no longer a thing, diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Thanks to our current administration, they did away with that.
If a company is actively looking to hire more minorities or less minorities, you never know,
then they can clearly see from your picture whether or not you fit as their ideal candidate that they're looking for.
It's just a very useful and popular tool for recruiters now.
I'll be honest with you, if I was a hiring manager or a recruiter, I don't think I would even entertain hiring anyone
who didn't have an active LinkedIn page because then what are you doing?
You're looking to get hired, but you have no visibility on the top platform for networking and job searches.
Okay, all right, thank you. Another one is nd.com.
I mentioned that one earlier.
nd is actually the most visited job search website in the world.
It has a vast database of job listings across various industries.
If you're looking for a job in virtually any industry, then you definitely want to start there.
It doesn't have the same networking component that LinkedIn has, but this should be like your go-to website
for finding out what jobs are currently available in your industry.
Another one is clearancejobs.com.
Now, clearancejobs.com, they should be paying me for this. nd, clearancejobs.com.
What's the other one? LinkedIn? Y'all need to be paying me.
clearancejobs.com is the number one network.
It's a career network for professionals that have an active security clearance with the government.
This is where recruiters can connect with job applicants and candidates who already have security clearances.
These recruiters, they're trying to bring in people on behalf of employers who have required
classified work that they need to have done.
The applicants either have a secret, top secret.
What's the other one? A TS, SCI, polygraph, various levels of clearances that government employees have,
depending on the work that they do.
So, for clearancejobs.com, these are going to be your jobs that are in defense, intelligence, cybersecurity,
government contracting, anything dealing with very sensitive, classified information.
People like myself and my colleagues in the Department of Defense, it's very similar to LinkedIn in that
candidates can work with recruiters and you can work with them directly and you can receive direct job offers
and you can sort of bypass traditional hiring processes.
So, it's a very valuable tool if you have an active security clearance.
So, don't sleep on that.
And by the way, let me say this, if you already have an active security clearance,
I wouldn't worry too much about all these layoffs and stuff.
I wouldn't be concerned about finding a job in the event that you are laid off.
Your security clearance actually makes you extremely marketable in today's environment and in the private sector.
I know a lot of people have been wondering with this current climate that we're in,
with the government cuts and all the layoffs and stuff, if defense contractors even steal a hiring, they are, they definitely are.
Here are just a few of the defense department contracts over 7.5 million that were awarded recently on November, not November,
child, February 19.
Okay, I looked this up earlier today.
Most of these contracts are going to require some component of people and support and staffing.
Okay, so we got the Army, their contract was 317 million plus.
The Navy, 337 million plus.
Missile Defense Agency, 99 million.
DoD Chief Information Officer, 44 million plus.
DLA, the Defense Logistics Agency, 140 million plus.
All of these contracts, they're going to require people and support and staffing.
So even with all of these cuts and everything, contracts have been let.
Companies still have to honor the contract awarded to them.
And the Department of Defense and these agencies, they still have to honor those contracts that they let.
And the defense contractors still do have and will continue to have personnel turnover.
They're going to continue to be hiring.
So these defense contractors are not going anywhere anytime soon.
So definitely start networking with recruiters and HR professionals.
Start applying for jobs now.
It's always easier to get a job when you already have one.
Start taking interviews now.
If you remember in a previous show, I told you all about a former colleague of mine who shared with me that he regularly took interviews while gainfully employed.
And you know, he'd get offers.
And you know what he'd do with those offers?
He'd collect all those offers and he'd leverage them during his performance reviews.
And he'd use them as a negotiation tool for salary increases and sometimes even promotions.
And I just thought that was brilliant.
You can learn from anyone.
This guy was like 10 years younger than me.
You know, but because he was able to demonstrate to his current employer look,
here are job offers from some of your competitors who are willing to pay me ex-salary.
Can you exceed this or at least match it?
What are they going to say? No.
So, you know, and obviously this is only going to work if you're a top performer, which he was.
He was a top performer for sure.
And this is not going to be as effective of a strategy in the public sector because of course your salary increases are confined within your grade and your steps.
But once you transition to the private sector, you're going to be better able to negotiate your salary and your raises.
So leverage your experience and your security clearance and ask for the salary that you want.
And go ahead and start networking now and keeping your eye out for contracting jobs.
Talk to some of the contractors on your team or the ones that work in your area or your building.
Find out what company they work for and just ask them, hey, how do they treat you guys?
Because a lot of them will be straight up with you and they'll tell you, oh, my company sucks.
I'm trying to get on with another company.
Or they'll, you know, say, hey, my company is great. I love it.
But the point I'm driving at is you need to take advantage of your employee status now.
Because like I said, it's so much easier to get a job when you already have one.
So start laying the groundwork now. Don't wait until you've been laid off.
Because then you're going to be operating from this place of lack and panic.
Your energy is going to be off. Your energy is just going to be different.
And the recruiters are going to pick up on that.
And they're going to know that you're recently laid off.
They're going to know that you're desperate to reenter the workforce.
So your negotiation power is going to be diminished.
Because their point is going to be, look, if you don't accept this offer,
there are a thousand other laid off federal employees who will.
You know, you get what I'm saying? So get your resumes together.
Okay. Start applying now for jobs while you're not under duress.
Start taking interviews. Use the interviews as practice.
You know, ask for the salary that you want now.
But you have to do your research.
Research what the average salary for the job title and the position is.
And factor in your years of experience and education.
I typically like to ask for 20, anywhere between 20,000 to 40,000 above whatever the average is.
Because they're going to negotiate you down. They just are.
So always shoot for higher than the average salary.
The next thing you need to consider doing is putting together an action plan
that details exactly what you're going to do,
what steps you're going to take in the event that you're terminated or laid off.
Because if it happens, it's going to be instant.
So here are just some basic things that you're going to want to do.
You're going to want to file for unemployment immediately.
The state unemployment agencies, they will be very familiar with what's happening
with all the federal layoffs and all of that.
And they should be able to expedite your approval fairly quickly.
But while you're on unemployment, you need to maximize your time on unemployment.
Take advantage of those courses and those workshops and those certificates that you're able to get.
They have a lot of different tools for people who are re-entering the workforce.
So take advantage of those.
Apply for jobs every day, at least three to five applications you should submit a day while you're on unemployment.
Use that time to network.
Okay. There's a lot of networking opportunities with fellow people who are trying to enter.
They can kind of put you on to, hey, I heard this company was hiring.
This person is looking for, they're not looking for low justitions,
but I heard that they need engineers, that type of thing.
Talk to people.
A lot of people will be in your same situation and you can kind of glean from each other and help each other.
I already mentioned this, take interviews.
Even for jobs that you know you don't really want, the point is to use them as practice.
You'll get your spiel down.
You'll get your flow down.
So when you really have an interview for the job that you actually want,
you'll be so much more relaxed because you would have been in countless video interviews, panel interviews, phone interviews.
You'll just have it down pat.
You won't be so green and new.
Okay.
Another thing, volunteer your time.
And this one is important because recruiters and hiring officials and HR people,
they don't really like to see gaps in employment when they're looking at your resume.
You know, they're not going to necessarily know or care whether you were fired, laid off, had an illness,
took time off to care for a child or an aging parent.
All they're going to see is that this person has a three-month gap in their employment history.
They're going to think something's wrong with you.
I'm just telling you how they think.
They're going to think something's wrong with you.
They're going to question your suitability for employment.
They're going to question your reputation.
You know, what's wrong with this person?
What do they do?
They're just going to question your overall employability.
And so, you know, a lot of times you'll be looked over for jobs without actually realizing that you were looked over.
You know, the hiring managers would have to take a special interest in your application or overlook that gap
and say, look, I'm going to call this person in for an interview so that you have the opportunity to explain that gap in your employment.
But all of this can be avoided if you would just volunteer a little bit of your time to like a nonprofit or something
or another organization shortly after or preferably before you get laid off.
So that way, you know, instead of having this glaring gap in employment on your resume,
you can demonstrate that you remain productive and active, you know, while exploring other opportunities.
Not to mention, a lot of times these volunteer positions can serve as networking opportunities themselves.
And they can kind of put you in the forefront and in front of some key connections
that could very well lead you to your next big opportunity.
Like it says in the word, for who has despised the day of small beginnings, I love that scripture.
So don't look down on volunteerism and giving your time.
That stuff can small hinges swing big doors is a quote that I love.
Okay, so another thing that you can do is you can start a business or a hobby or even a YouTube channel.
That might be the route for you. A lot of these content creators on YouTube,
they're bringing in like on the low end $1,000 a month up to $5,000 to $10,000 a month just through like ad revenue using YouTube's partner program.
You know, that may be something you may want to look into. I'm looking into it myself.
Blogs are still very popular content right now. People aren't watching TV like they used to.
I know I'm not. You know, many folks are, they're, they're gravitating to different things now.
They're gravitating to real people who are sharing real stories about their journey on their YouTube channels.
And I've seen it. Some of these, some of the number of views these people get are insane.
And you know, these people are getting paid. Folks are making a really great living just sharing their lives with people.
So I'm not going to go off on a tangent about that, but it's certainly something you could, you know, take a look at.
It may be something there for you. This is one of the more important things you need to, if you ever get laid off, you need to, you need to do this anyway.
But particularly if you get laid off, you need to make a budget and you need to significantly reduce your expenses.
That's just common sense. If you're losing a source of income, even if it's temporarily, you're going to have to cut back on a lot of things.
And that leads me to the next topic that we're going to cover in the next segment, which is the underconsumption trend.
That's been, it's becoming really popular with a lot of people, especially in this current environment.
I can't wait to tell you guys about it. Let's do this. Let's take a quick break. I talked for 45 minutes straight. Wow.
Let's take a quick break and listen to one of the tracks from my new album, Wish You Were Here.
It's available on all streaming platforms. So just grab a glass of wine. We're probably going to go over today.
Go grab a glass of wine. Enjoy this song. We'll be right back.
Blue sky from paint.
Can't tell if we feel
From a cold still around
A smile from a bell
Do you think you can rest?
Did you betray your heroes ago?
Hot ass is the tree
Hot air for a cool breeze
Cold cover for a chain
Did you exchange
Walk on part in the war
For a lead role when I came
How we, how wish you were here
We're just two lost souls
Living in a fishbowl
Year after year
Running over the same old ground
Whatever it is
Like the same old feet
Wish you were here
We're just two lost souls
Living in a fishbowl
How we, how wish you were here
We're just two lost souls
Living in a fishbowl
How we, how wish you were here
We're just two lost souls
Living in a fishbowl
How we, how wish you were here
Fall so you think you can tell
Heaven from hell
Blue skies from pain
Can you tell a green field
From a cold steel rail
A smile from a bell
Do you think you can tell
How we, how wish you were here
We're just two lost souls
Living in a fishbowl
How we, how wish you were here
We're just two lost souls
Living in a fishbowl
How we, how wish you were here
We're just two lost souls
Living in a fishbowl
How we, how wish you were here
We're just two lost souls
Living in a fishbowl
How we, how wish you were here
But no, thank you for staying with us through the break.
If you're just joining us, we've been talking about these mass layoffs
that's been hitting the federal government sector hard lately.
It's been impacting tens of thousands of federal workers across numerous federal agencies.
It's part of a broader initiative by the current administration to reduce government size and spending.
These layoffs are being implemented by the Department of Government Efficiency, also known as DOGE.
And it's led by everyone's favorite billionaire.
I'm not even going to say his name. I'm not going to say his name or the other guy's name on this show.
I said it before, I'm not going to say it today because when I say the names, it pisses me off.
So you all know who I'm talking about.
Right before the break, I spoke candidly to my colleagues in the federal workforce.
And I offered some advice on how to pivot.
I think we all need to try to just accept what's happening.
We need to pivot from what I consider to be the inevitable termination of our current positions.
Okay, it's going to happen.
I talked about having a plan in place for steps that you're going to need to take in the event that you're terminating.
And you don't necessarily have to be a federal employee to implement these.
I mean, they apply to everyone who happens to be laid off.
I'll just recap briefly for anyone that may have missed it.
If you laid off, you need to do this immediately.
Okay, file for unemployment, maximize your time on unemployment by taking their courses and their workshops, get your certificates, get brushed up on your Excel word, all that good stuff.
Network, you know, take interviews, volunteer your time, consider starting a business or a hobby or a YouTube channel.
You want to keep your mind engaged because it's very easy to fall into a depression when you've experienced a layoff, trust me.
And then most importantly, make a budget and significantly reduce your expenses.
Now, I'm going to argue that that last one is the most important, right?
Particularly when we're talking about a situation where you could be terminated or laid off.
I was laid off back in 2018 when I left the federal government the first time to work for one of the big four accounting firms.
And let me tell you, that was a devastating ordeal because I had so many overhead expenses.
I had car payments, plural.
I had car insurance, car maintenance, house maintenance.
I had a mortgage. I had my condo and PR in Puerto Rico.
I had to pay rent on it in the associated bills with that.
I had my mom's rent. My mom was a widow. I was taking care of my mom financially.
I had a business venture that was a money pit.
Not because it was a bad business concept, but because I had a bad, bad business partner.
And that was my fault. That's a whole other hour long show.
I might do a show about that next month and talk about that because, like I said, I only tell my business if it can help other people.
So, yeah, that might be the next show, but because it was a cautionary tale for anyone that's an entrepreneur and that goes into business with so-called friends.
But anyway, I said all that to say I had a lot of financial obligations during that era, and I just simply was not prepared for a worst-case scenario like being suddenly laid off.
And so I certainly don't want that to happen to you.
Being laid off can be really detrimental to your finances and to your health and to your family if you're caught off guard and caught unawares.
So for my colleagues in the federal workforce who may be listening tonight, this is not the time to sit idly by and hope that our jobs won't be impacted.
Your job is going to be impacted. It's going to be impacted, okay?
I'm not trying to be a pessimist, but I see the writing on the wall.
And like I said, this administration fully intends to replace all federal civil servants with appointed positions.
So they're slowly phasing us out. It started with the hiring freeze, right?
Then after that, it was the return to work order.
Then it was the DEI stuff.
Then it was the deferred resignation program.
Then it was the termination of probationary employees.
Then what was it after that?
That weird email, what did you do last week?
Is this to lump all government employees together in one stereotype and write us all off as lazy and feckless and inept and unproductive?
Some of the most intelligent people I know work in government.
Are there some lazy, feckless, inept, unproductive government employees?
Yes, absolutely.
Mostly at Robbins Air Force Base.
Andre, that was terrible.
You are terrible.
That was so terrible, but I'm telling the truth.
Tell me if I'm lying.
The point that I'm making here is the current administration is going to keep going with this until there is no more federal civil service.
It's going to be something like federal appointed service.
You know, I'd give new jazzy names and stuff like DOGE.
What is even that?
So my whole point is like, what is the next phase?
Who are they going to go after next?
Is it employees that are on training or developmental programs like the PAC program, which is the program that I entered the federal workforce in?
You know, Copper Cap, or there's a ton of these developmental programs.
Are they going to come after those employees?
Are they going to come after underperforming employees?
Are employees with disciplinary issues in the past year or two years?
I mean, where are they going to go with this?
Employees with less than five years of credible service?
They're just going to keep on going until all of us are gone.
And I know I'm probably beating a day of horse here, but I just really want you guys to wake up and get this.
These people who are in power now, they don't care about you.
They don't care about your families or your bills or your extenuating circumstances.
Nothing.
They don't want you to be middle class.
They don't want you to be financially savvy and financially free.
They want you to be poor and sick and dependent on the government.
They want you to be unenlightened and lazy and just mentally lethargic.
They want you to be in debt, fearful of your future, fearful of your neighbor, anxious, pessimistic, divided.
That's just the real truth, guys.
We've got to wake up.
America that we used to know is done.
We're not going back.
It's just a different type of order and structure.
And that's taking place right now.
We're watching it unfold.
So we need to wake up and pay attention.
Let me go ahead and talk about this under consumption stuff really quick because we're at 9 o'clock now.
I'm not going to over glamorize this.
It's nothing new.
Everyone's saying it's the latest trend and all of that.
It's nothing but good old fashioned frugality and common sense.
Stop buying stuff you don't need.
Stop consuming.
If you got Kanye West money and Jay-Z money, okay, all right, bet, consume.
Consume all you want.
But if you're middle class or upper middle class, definitely if you're low income or in a fixed income situation, you got to stop buying all this necessary stuff.
Be mindful of what you're consuming.
This is not the time.
Right now everything may seem okay.
But very soon we're going to be in a recession.
I think we're going to be in a recession like we never have been in before.
And I'm talking about food shortages and crime, inflation, worse than what we're seeing now.
It's going to get really bad.
So now it's the time to quietly stop pal kenguas and water and non perishables and learn to grow and cultivate your own food.
Even if it's just a few tomatoes and herbs in the backyard or something on your porch.
And I know we're not accustomed to food shortages and stuff like that in this country.
But if I were you, I'd start preparing now.
And here's another thing.
If you don't already have your passports for yourself and for everyone in your household, now's the time to start working on that.
Because government agencies right now, they're hemorrhaging manpower and hemorrhaging personnel.
So relatively routine tasks like processing a passport application is going to kind of be more arduous and a bit more delayed.
You know, on a good day, it took them forever to process a passport application.
So you can imagine now, you know, how prolonged the process could be with all of these doge layoffs.
And another reason why I feel like it's important to make sure that you and your immediate family has your passports is so that, you know, in the event you need to quickly get out of dodge.
When it starts to really get bad here, everybody's going to be scrambling and trying to get a passport.
And it could be nearly impossible to get one, you know, or we may end up in, you know, a more dire situation where passport access is temporarily restricted or unavailable.
So really start to think about those types of things and put together a disaster preparedness plan.
I know I sound like a doomsday theorist.
I know, I know, but just hear me out.
Trust me, I know what I'm feeling and sensing.
Okay, so back to under consumption.
This is something that I had to learn the hard way because like I mentioned before, when I was laid off the first time, I had so many unnecessary financial obligations and I just was not well positioned for an emergency.
Yeah, I had like six months of savings, but when your income suddenly stops and you have all of these bills, that money is going to get depleted fast.
And so my whole thing is I don't want this to happen to you.
I've lived through this.
If you don't already have three months of reserves and cash that can sustain you temporarily until you sort of get back on your feet.
This should be like priority one.
Really quick.
If you don't know how to put together an emergency fund, go to YouTube, YouTube University, figure it out.
But basically all you're going to do is you're going to total all of your monthly bills that absolutely have to be paid without question.
Your mortgage, your rent, your car payment, your car insurance, your groceries, not credit card, fuck the credit card, Netflix, Amazon Prime.
Forget all of that when you're struggling.
Total all of your necessities only.
Say it all comes to $2,000 a month.
Okay.
Get to three months of that.
So start building to $6,000.
Once you get three months of reserves, your next goal should be six.
After that, work on 12.
Haven't been laid off before and haven't, you know, gone through the worst financial crisis in my life as a result of it.
But with the help of God, I was able to rebuild it, you know, better than I was before.
But I promised myself that I would never allow myself to be in that type of situation again.
And not that I wouldn't get laid off or anything like that again.
That can happen to anybody. That's the type of stuff that's beyond our control.
But what messed me up was that I was over leveraged in terms of debt and I was ill prepared for an emergency.
I thought I was invincible.
So let me just give you a few under consumption strategies that I live by now.
Because when I first read up about this a few months ago, this so-called new trend,
I was like, this isn't new. I've been doing this.
So anyway, drive a used car that you can pay for in cash.
Car payments are just too high.
Y'all remember when car payments used to be like reasonable, it used to be like $2.37, $3.34, maybe $4.25.
But car payments now are like, you got a good car payment if it's five something.
Like car payments are like $7 and $8 and $900 a month.
And in that dimension, you got full coverage, insurance is high if you're going to go for a new car.
At this point, I didn't have the car. I didn't have all of that. I don't need to impress anybody.
I wouldn't got me some cash cars. Right now, I'm down to one car. I sold a truck.
Yes, Peppy, I sold a truck. I sold it. I don't need two cars. It's just me. Why do I need two cars?
So yeah, I'm downsizing. I live right across the street from Wright Patterson Air Force Base.
I can walk if I want. Why do I need two cars? I'm not going to do this.
Another thing I do, live where you rent. Rent where you own. I know you guys have heard that before.
Right now, I live in a modest one bedroom apartment. It's right across the street from the base.
Nothing glamorous, but very low overhead. The house that I own, I rented out.
I've had a tenant in there for years. That's a revenue stream.
Rental properties help you to offset your tax liability.
So, you know, if you're a high wage earner, you know, they're going to be coming for you with the taxes.
So, you need to have something that you can hedge against, you know, the tax bracket that you're in.
Having a rental property is one of the best ways you can go about that. You can put that in your toolbox.
Another thing you can do is buy and bulk. If you've got a SAMS card or a Costco membership, use that.
Buy items that you get frequently in your home that you know you use. Buy them and bulk.
Because that way you can hedge against pricing increases. You don't have to worry about, oh, this week eggs are this price.
Or this week toilet paper is this price. You buy them and bulk. You pay one price for it. You're good for three, four months.
You know, so it's going to cost you a little bit more on the onset, but in the long term you save money.
And you're going to save gas because you're not running to the store every week. You get it?
You know, just simple stuff. I don't buy designer clothes. Bump the designer clothes.
You know, I'm not even embarrassed to say I bought 20, maybe 20 shirts this past weekend. Guess where they came from?
Goodwill. I don't care. You will never tell. Those shirts look good. I got them all from Goodwill.
I know how to shop. I know how to save money. I shop at Goodwill. I shop at Marshalls. I shop at TJ Maxx.
You will never be able to tell because I sit on that and you just, you kind of spend money and splurge on pieces.
Buy you a nice watch. Buy you a nice hat. Where LaCoste glasses are, like right now I have on my metal Ray-Ban glasses.
I can spend $300-400 on that because I got 20 shirts for $70. You know, buy you some nice shoes.
If you got nice shoes, a nice watch, nice glasses, nice hat, people ain't going to be studying your clothes.
Just make sure they're clean and make sure it looks good. You ain't got to be flossing for nobody.
What I want to pay for these labels for? Fuck these labels. I'm trying to save money. I got goals that I'm trying to do.
You know, if you have to wear a uniform to work, khakis, white shirt, you know, it's not a fashion show. I'm over all this stuff.
Another thing you can do is leverage your situation. If you are blessed, and I'm telling you you're blessed, if you have a two income household where your wife got a good job, you got a good job,
you got a good job, y'all should not be living off of both of your salaries. Take one of those salaries and invest it and live off of the other spouse salary.
That's how you really do it. If you have a two income household and you can't cover all your bills with one of y'all salary, you're living above your means.
Take one of those salaries, pay down your student loans or your other bad debt, or if you don't have any debt, then invest all of that money and just live off of that one income.
You'll get rich so fast, I'm telling you.
Invest one salary, live off of the other, and like I said, use one salary to pay down debt, live off of the other. That's how you do it.
Meal prep, I only eat out once or twice a week. Just buy groceries, just cook. Just stop being lazy and just do it.
Don't fall in this crap and get you a partner or a spouse or a husband or a wife who isn't materialistic or vain and someone who shares your values and your long term goals.
Someone that, they just get it. We're not going to be wasting our money on depreciable assets.
We're going to be investing in real estate and investments that we'll appreciate over time.
We're going to be paying down bad debt. We're going to be a blessing to others as the Lord leads us to.
So get you someone that gets it because when you have a spouse that's a spin thrift and you're frugal minded, it's just going to be hell.
You just might as well get a divorce now. It's just going to be hell.
So that's just a few things. I don't want to go off to, Z was so nice to give me some extra time, but I want to abuse it.
Listen, I'm going to go ahead and wrap up for tonight. That's pretty much all I wanted to cover for tonight's show, but I really appreciate you spending a little bit of time with me this evening.
I hope you were able to take away at least some good information that's going to help you and your family in the event of a crisis.
These are some really interesting times that we're living in, but remember that God is in full control.
We just have to accept whatever He allows. His ways are higher than our ways.
So a lot of times we're not going to understand why He allows certain things to happen or why it sometimes appears that the wicked continue to just do evil without consequences.
But don't let your faith be tested in this season.
No weapon formed against you shall prosper. Stay resilient and expect good things.
Even with all this crap going on, expect good things to happen. Expect God's goodness and for Him to continue to shield and protect you the way He has your entire life.
He shielded and protected you your entire life.
So what are you worried now? So 40, 50 years, He's just all of a sudden just going to stop taking care of you.
That's not God's character. He got you to this point and He's going to carry you on through. So don't acquiesce to fear, okay?
Listen, I'll be back next month. Be sure to join us every 4th Wednesday at 8pm Eastern, right here on the Artist First Radio Network.
Alright, I love you all. Good night everybody.
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