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Codie Sanchez is one of my favorite people to listen to on the topic of money and business. She's been through an amazing career graph – from investment banking at Goldman Sachs, to striking out on her own as an entrepreneur who buys and sells small businesses. I recently caught up with her to pick her brain on building a great career.

There’s no roadmap to being an entrepreneur, and with the lack of proper guidance, most people follow the beaten track, choosing college and taking on massive amounts of debt, thinking that’s the only route. Most others get sucked into thinking that the only option is to work on one incredibly hard problem till it pays off.

But Codie gave me five incredible pieces of career advice that anybody can fit into their career to build wealth, expertise, and a fulfilling job that you can look forward to every day. Here they are:

1. You can’t fight the tide

Codie started her career at Vanguard. If you’re not familiar with Vanguard, it’s the company that's probably made the biggest impact on Americans trying to build wealth. They started low cost index funds that help people invest in the stock market without wasting money in huge fees. Vanguard is not just good to its investors but also its employees – they pay a decent wage and promise a secure life.

While Vanguard changed the face of investing, the company optimizes for stability and minimizing downside more than maximizing profit. This makes sense if you’re looking to work and retire in the same company, but if you’re a driven young worker motivated to build wealth, there’s a mismatch.

Codie recollects how she introduced the idea for a new investment fund which was enthusiastically received. But at the last minute, her manager pulled her aside and said that while they were going ahead with idea, Codie wouldn’t be heading it – because she kept her nose to the grindstone, worked too hard, and hardly attended any office parties. She wasn’t a “team player” in the Vanguard sense of the word.

Codie was disappointed, but she realized that you can’t fight against the tide and thrive in a culture that doesn’t fit your personal philosophy. If you’re trying to hustle, you should work in a place where hustling is celebrated. If you want a work-life balance, you should look for a company that encourages that sort of lifestyle. Codie then joined Goldman Sachs, where her drive was appreciated, and she thrived.

2. Why and how to work for a big company

How does one break into a big company like Goldman Sachs? Codie says she focuses on the “who”, not the “how.” Most financial firms outsource their recruitment to third-party recruiters, who are paid tens of thousands of dollars for every placement. Because they have skin in the game, these recruiters have incentive to help you succeed and Codie was even coached by the recruiter she reached out to.

But why does working for a big company make sense?

It's an experience that gets a bad rap, but it gives you a business education for free. You get to see how companies are organized, you learn the vocabulary of money, and you come into contact with high-impact projects. Of course, this isn’t the case if you don’t actively find the best projects to work on, but learning on the job gives you much more proof of work that you can leverage.

3. Find the thing that puts you into flow state

Everyone has a few things that feel like work to others, but feels like play to them.

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Naval @naval What feels like play to you, but looks like work to others? 2:46 AM • Dec 11, 2020 839 Retweets 9989 Likes Read 2166 replies

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While working on the thing that’s uniquely suited to your sensibilities and skills, you enter a flow state where you can get much more done than the “average person”. For me, this was making interesting videos about personal finance and money.

Now I find joy in making the Iced Coffee Hour Podcast as well, because talking to interesting people and learning is something I really love. Codie found that she wasn’t big on socialization but she was able to intensely focus on analyzing data, understanding businesses, and finding good deals – that's what put her in the flow state.

Everybody has that thing, it just takes time to find what that thing is. Keep exploring to identify the work you’re uniquely suited to.

4. Build your own unique combination of skills

Scott Adams has this idea that he calls “the talent stack.” There are a lot of people who draw cartoons or work in a corporate office or understand how office politics work – but Scott combined all of these to make something unique, the Dilbert comic strip.

Most people give up on the idea of excellence because it seems impossible. Yes, it's extremely hard to become a tennis pro or the next Tiger Woods or Lance Armstrong. But that isn’t the only option. If you combine a few different, unrelated skills that you are good at, you will build a niche for yourself that is unique – you don’t have to beat a million people in your category, but just create a category where you are the only player.

Some examples:

• Steve Jobs wasn’t a computer genius. But he combined his interests in calligraphy, design, and computers to build a beautiful computer.
• Joe Rogan combined his unique background in standup comedy and MMA with an interest for talking to people authentically to create a podcast that’s made him more than $450 million.
• MrBeast combined an obsessive passion for making YouTube videos with philanthropy to make content that nobody else was even thinking about.
• Morgan Housel combined an intense interest for history and storytelling with his financial background to write the bestseller “The Psychology of Money.”

Find your own niche and set of skills that gives you an unfair advantage in an area that nobody else can compete in. This could leverage your life experience, your unique hobbies, and a network that nobody else has access to. This works for entrepreneurs as well as employees who want to become indispensable.

5. Work a 9 to 5 till you make your first million

Owning and growing a business can be a great way to build wealth – but the problem is, when you’re starting out, you actually don’t know much to add value. To actually build skills, you could consider further education or take up an apprenticeship.

Or, you could get paid to learn while building up your investment to break free. That’s what a 9 to 5 job could allow you to do.

Don’t get me wrong. I still think that working your entire life and living off your income is a bad idea. But there’s no shame in working a job if it lets you learn, acquire skills, and build a network all while accumulating enough capital that will generate the returns you need to retire. Charlie Munger said that the first $100,000 is the hardest. Codie talks about the first million. The number you need to hit is something you’ll have to decide for yourself, but the strategy still holds.

Bonus: Negotiation is an underrated skill.

Finally, one excellent piece of career advice is to realize that every action you do at your job is either making money or losing money for your employer. You’re either a profit center or a cost center. If you understand exactly how much money you are bringing in, then you have leverage to negotiate for a higher pay.

So try to always have a direct connection to the outcome and estimate a price for the money you’re bringing in. Like all skills, negotiation gets better with practice, and it could be the single most important skill to grow your career and income.

For the complete episode with Codie where we dive into many other topics including her background in Private Equity, and whether college is worth it anymore, check out the full video here.

I’ll see you on Wednesday with a new article! If you enjoyed this, forward it to one person whom you think needs to see this.​

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